Overseeing an annual wine auction that attracts high-competition connoisseurs from all over the country, Blaine County Sheriff Walt Fleming provides security for a trio of invaluable bottles that have been targeted by thieves, an assignment that turns deadly when a bomb is detonated at the auction's start.
Rome, AD 34: Vespasian is serving as a military officer on the outskirts of the Empire. But political events in Rome - Tiberius's increasing debauchery, the escalating grain crisis - draw him back to the city. When Caligula becomes Emperor, Vespasian believes that things will improve. Instead, the young emperor deteriorates from Rome's shining star to a blood-crazed, incestuous, all-powerful madman.