Marcus Blake's ramshackle security agency has no clients to speak of until Susan Ellis walks into his office and asks him to help find her brother who has gone missing in Afghanistan. In that moment, Marcus' world is turned upside down and he is plunged into a covert war where arms and drugs are traded by renegades within the CIA. In this world, powerful men who hold high office are tracked by the mysterious Sir Giles Cavendish and sudden, violent death is the certain price of failure. Now, in his quest to find Susan's brother, Marcus faces terror and betrayal in a murky world where one cannot easily tell a friend from a foe.