Longarm’s got to snag a killer—before he gets stung.
Custis T. Long has plenty he’d rather be doing than investigating an old friend on a brand new murder charge. But just as he’s leaving for a visit to a pretty little Santa Fe senorita, a case comes up that he can’t turn down. It seems his mentor, Jesse Jerome, is under suspicion for the Scorpion Murders—a series of creepy crawly killings over in Agate, Arizona. The killer does the dirty deed by planting some particularly venomous little varmints in the victim’s bed—where they do their lethal work most effectively.
 
Longarm hates the idea of snooping around in his old pal’s business, but he figures he’s lawman enough to either prove Jesse innocent, or put him away if necessary. What the Marshal doesn’t figure on is all the bad blood flowing through Agate’s citizens. There’s poison in that town, all right—and it’s not just from the scorpions….