Karen Hartley is a charismatic agent in the British Secret Intelligence Service. She and her fellow SIS agent, Fiona Mossop, are assigned to investigate and expose a powerful syndicate operating between England, South Africa and Far Eastern Countries engaging in illegal poaching of rhino horns, elephant tusk and lion bones 'sets'.

Mark Warner, a South African banker, wildlife conservation writer and documentary maker is also a SIS agent in Africa, and becomes involved when his daughter Annabelle suggests recruiting Karen Hartley to investigate and hunt down the heads of the syndicate after his wife, a passionate ecologist and anti-poaching campaigner, is murdered whilst researching the slaughter of black and white rhino in the Kruger National Park.

The syndicates use poor local Mozambican males who risk their lives being lured over the border and with machete in hand, to hack the horn off rhino be it dead or alive, revealing the lengths they will go for sexual gratification, power and greed, pushing the price of rhino horn to an alarmingly high commodity, more expensive than gold, diamonds and heroin.