With the Spanish Empire brutally driving the buccaneers from their hunting grounds, the half-wild men must look for a new refuge in the West Indies. They find it just a few miles off the northwest coast of Hispaniola: the island of Tortuga.

Rugged, sparsely settled, but poised on the edge of Spain's trade routes, Tortuga is an ideal base for the outcast hunters. Among them is the hulking, enigmatic Jean-Baptiste LeBoeuf, now a reluctant leader of the buccaneers. But LeBoeuf's interest in Tortuga involves more than simply escaping the Spanish Empire. Ownership of a plantation on the island has fallen into his hands, and it is his dream, his vision, to lay claim to that property and put an end to his savage and nomadic life.

But once again Spain stands in his way, as a powerful fleet sent from Seville comes to route the buccaneers from their latest foothold. Among the expedition's leaders is Don Alonso Menéndez, lieutenant governor of the West Indies, who has designs of his own for the island and the land LeBoeuf intends to claim. Now the two men will battle for the beautiful Henriette and the hundred acres of paradise that is the Tortuga plantation.