Matthew Burlock is a brilliant, eccentric judge, faced with the facts of a bizarre ritual murder. In the run-down Delrose Hotel, two men are fond half-eaten by flames: once tied to a cross, the other tied up on the bed with African lioness masks laid next to him. A strange connection between Burlock's exotic pas and the murder is revealed. Somewhere in the family history of international gun trade, his father's mysterious identity and his radical ex-girlfriend lies the answer to the bizarre puzzle.