When Chet Ballard visits an old friend, Ben Colter, in New Mexico, he finds Colter's ranch burned to the ground, Ben and his wife Rachel missing, and the Apache who worked for Colter badly wounded. It turns out that whoever hit the ranch did so in order to kidnap Rachel. But why?
While McCall goes in search of Colter, Ballard finds his own trail being dogged by vicious bounty hunters and an Apache on a blood hunt.
Along the way Colter begins to understand why his wife has been taken. It also reveals the desire of a ghost from the past to get his hands on a treasure that has lain hidden for years a cache that only Ben Colter knows how to locate.
As all the different characters make their desperate attempts to gain what they seek, Ballard and McCall can only help Ben locate and save his missing wife in the bullet-riddled finale of Colter's Quest.