Life changed for Alejandro Reis – Alex – in just a few brief moments when he discovers that he is not an American citizen. His parents brought him across the Mexican border when he was just months old. Flora Hendricks, on the other hand is born in Missouri. She decides to run away from home. Alex finds himself deported to Mexico On a seeming parallel track, Flora is arrested for shoplifting. And put in the same deportation bus with Alex. Once on Mexican soil Alex and Flora find out quickly that they are way out of their depth. They learn quickly that Tijuana and most of the other border towns are ultra violent places that are overrun by dangerous, warring criminal factions.

A graduate student and martial-arts expert rents a room in a house owned by a single mother who lives there with her son. A local street gang is trying to recruit the son, but the new tenant tries to help the boy’s mother keep him out of the gang. When they learn of this, they target both the mother and her new tenant.