While hitchhiking through West Texas, former MP Jack Reacher encounters a young woman seeking protection for herself and her little girl from her monstrous husband, due to be released from jail, and his horrible family, but Reacher soon finds himself over his head among the simmering secrets of Echo, Texas.

Mismatched private detectives Hap and Leonard investigate the murder of a young black man who was conducting his own civilian investigation into the white cop who was stalking his sister.