After an early spring thaw on the Alaskan coast, Anchorage police discover a gruesome new piece of evidence in their search for a serial killer: a dismembered human foot.

In Kincaid Park, a man is arrested for attacking a female jogger. Investigators believe they have finally captured the sadistic serial killer. But one deputy is sure they have the wrong man.

In the remote northern town of Deadhorse, Alaska, Deputy US Marshal Arliss Cutter escorts three handcuffed prisoners onto a small bush plane on route to Anchorage. Its a routine mission and a nonstop flightor so he thinks. When the plane makes an unexpected landing in the middle of nowhere, all hell breaks loose.

Back in Anchorage, deputy Lola Teariki has traced the dismembered foot to a missing girland the serial psychopath who slaughtered her. Its one of the prisoners on Cutters flight . . .