Nell's life is going surprising well. She has gained legal custody of her younger sister Mindy who is thriving as a "townie" girl, her sister Esther is settling down with her newborn twins and bonding with the acre of land Nell gifted her, and she's going to marry Occam before the month is out. However, the story begins with her being summoned to visit the vampire Ming of Glass who is now officially Master of the City but something is very wrong with Ming. She was always slightly erratic but now she's completely insane and sends Torquemada and his minions after Nell as a distraction. Once in Knoxville, Torquemada discovers that most of the young men thrown out of the Church carry the devil dog bloodline and he starts kidnapping and torturing them to force them to shift shape. Since there still isn't enough going on, the military has finally caught on that the Church has spawned two unique paranormal bloodlines and is willing to resort to forcing them to "work" for the government. Somehow all of this is connected to Soul's disappearance and Unit 18 pulls together like never before to stay alive and find their boss.

World War III began with Chinese warbots walking out of the ocean near Washington D.C. They were initially held off by the Outlaw Motorcycle Club, who happened to be holding their annual rally outside the city, but the situation just kept escalating both on Earth and in space. For ten years humanity did its worst to destroy both the Earth and themselves until the alien bugs came along and forced peace with their superior technology. The survivors now live in a drastically altered climate with discarded bio-weapons and deadly technology hidden beneath the surface. Thanks to their early heroics, the Outlaws now have a strong relationship with the US government. One of their most well known heroes was a twelve year old girl named Shining Smith who single-handedly brought down one of the Mother Warbots and earned her status as the first female made-man of the Outlaws. Sadly Shining, known as Little Girl to the club, died not long after. Or did she? The club received a distress signal from her old kutte (battle vest) which leads the Enforcer Jagger to a junkyard in the desert formerly known as West Virginia. There he finds a strange woman and her even stranger cats under attack.

Nell has a deep connection to her land, Soulwood. It was simply a green thumb until she was threatened and drew blood on her land for the first time. The forest wanted that blood and with her permission absorbed the life it was offered. Now Soulwood is aware and shares that awareness with Nell. Because of her unique affinity for the land Nell is asked to assist PsyLED, the federal agency tasked with policing supernaturals. She doesn't trust the government but she needs their protection so she agrees to help them find some kidnapped girls. Unfortunately, the investigation leads Nell to the polygamist church she grew up in and forces her to deal with some painful truths.