A fiercely independent woman returns to the frontier of her birth only to find that western society is even less receptive to her notions of women's rights and sexual liberty than strait-laced New England. Trace Bannock hasn't always been a lawman but he's always been alone. Sorrel McCaffrey is smart, reckless and plays like she has nothing to lose. They are drawn to each other from the day Sorrel returns to Garnet, Montana. Ostracized by the more sophisticated world where she was sent for an education, Sorrel just wants her freedom, to dress in pants, to gallop her fine mare as fast and as far as she can, and to take pleasure where she finds it. While she struggles to know her dour father, she draws the attention of other men, including a cattle baron who sees her as a means to acquire her father's ranch, a doctor whose misdiagnoses she challenges, and a hellfire preacher who rants against her from his pulpit. And she is troubled by her growing attachment to the taciturn sheriff whose cold eyes hide his dread that each time he is allowed to touch her might be the last.