December 1941: Jessica Richards, daughter of corrupt New Orleans councilman Whitman Richards, is the victim of a sensational daylight kidnapping from her Catholic girls' academy. Richards, a man with many enemies, outrages both his wife and police Captain Frank Casey by throwing the police off the case. The desperate mother turns to the one person who might help her—old boyfriend Wesley Farrell.Farrell, a Creole club owner passing for white, freshly returned from a self-imposed exile to Havana, prowls the city's bars and streets, searching for who might have the brains and guts to challenge the powerful councilman. Meanwhile, Negro Squad Sergeant Israel Daggett searches for Skeeter Longbaugh, the sole witness to the kidnapping, unaware that the kidnappers have sent Easter Coupé, the most feared killer in the Negro underworld, after Skeeter....