Hauled back early from an exercise with the SAS, Paul Richter is tasked with a short-notice extraction job. It goes unexpectedly well, and as a kind of reward he's given an easy one: he's to investigate the case of James Holden, a middle-aged Englishman living in Dubai, who appears able to predict terrorist attacks.

It should be simple - a break in the sun and a couple of days' work at most - but, almost as soon as he arrives in Dubai, he is diverted to Bahrain. Then it all starts getting complicated. Who is the secretive patient in the Manama hospital? Who has slaughtered a dozen people at a remote stable in Saudi Arabia just to steal one horse? And why has a US State Department jet carrying a specialist CIA team been diverted to Cairo?

Nothing seems to make sense until Richter finally uncovers the outlines of a plot that will come to fruition during the world's richest horse-race. But, behind the scenes, an even more complex scheme is being executed and Richter is in a race against time to prevent a catastrophic terrorist attack on the city of Dubai itself.