During the height of a particularly brutal Vermont winter, one morning a woman's body is found hanging high above the interstate. The woman, found with the word "dyke" carved on her chest is quickly determined to be the victim of a brutal murder. That alone is enough to bring in Joe Gunther and his VBI (Vermont Bureau of Investigation) team. But when the victim is identified not only as a state senator, but as an intimate friend of the governor's, it unleashes a publicity maelstrom that makes the investigation more challenging. While the anti-lesbian message is an obvious feint meant to mislead investigators, it does reveal that the governor is gay, and forces her to publicly acknowledge that fact. In the meantime, while the publicity rages on to even greater heights, the police begin to focus intensely on the dead senator's life. One thing they uncover is that she had a fondness for recreational marijuana. In Vermont, however, neither lesbianism nor marijuana use are the stuff of murder. It's up to Gunther and his team to cut through this particular stack of weed to find out not just who, but why?