Synopsis

When Indigenous detective Jay Swan arrives in the remote town of Patterson to investigate a mysterious disappearance from an outback cattle station, he thinks it will be an easy three day job. But it soon becomes clear that this is not a simple case. Not only does the missing local Indigenous teenager Marley know the country, but he would have stayed with his vehicle and not wandered off.  It also appears there may have been force.  But by who?  And why?

Jay – always a loner – now has to work with smart, tough local cop Emma James.  Born to a wealthy pastoral family and proud of her pioneering history, Emma’s life is embedded in the town.  But Emma has her own secrets – bound up in the history of the town.  Jay is also saddled by the arrival of his daughter Crystal, who’s run away from her own trouble at home, and his wife Mary – who comes after her daughter but really wants to save her marriage.

As Jay and Emma investigate the case, they unpeel the layers of the town revealing deep secrets, a previous crime and a major miscarriage of justice perpetrated a hundred years earlier.