Chatting with fellow stagecoach passenger Duncan MacGibbon, Sophie Wheelright learns the merchant she promised herself to as a mail-order bride is a violent man, Charles Shanley, who owns a bordello. The Scottish rancher, who is also a doctor, spirits her off the coach before it reaches its destination, and they walk eight miles to his ranch, where his younger sister takes an immediate disliking to Sophie. To save the young woman from Shanley, who is not giving up on turning her into one of his "soiled doves," Duncan marries her, although he'll never love anyone but his late fiancée, Catriona. As Sophie and her husband grow closer, Shanley sends a man to kill Duncan. The MacGibbons devise a plan to trap Shanley, but it goes horribly wrong and Sophie is viciously stabbed several times. Will it be too late for Duncan and his young sister to realize how much Sophie means to them?