Drowning in sorrow, regret, and longing-and bottle after bottle of whisky-Jonas Crow can see no future for himself without Rose Prairie, the woman he never even had a chance to love. When word arrives that she may be in Texas, he heads straight there. In the topsy-turvy world of post-Civil War Texas, abortion is legal but firearms are not. When Jonas arrives, he finds a destitute town full of hopelessness and a young crusader on a mission to do God's work and rid the Lone Star State of vice. His reunion with Rose doesn't go as planned, and as is his wont, he finds himself caught up in battle that isn't his, yet one he must nevertheless join if he-and his love-are to have any chance of surviving.

Lin and Rose have gone their separate ways, so Jonas Crow is left alone with his hearse and Jed, his pet vulture. Winter has set in and there's plenty of work to do-plenty of bodies to bury. When a childhood friend, Sid, looks him up and offers him a dangerous job, Jonas eventually agrees to it. Time, however, changes all things, loyalties included. Sid may not be trustworthy, but he was right about one thing-Jonas is the only undertaker in the Old West crazy enough to go after a corpse in Apache territory.