A battle-hardened warrior. . .
An untested preacher of jihad. . .
And a young man on the run, who could ensure their success. . .or bring them down.

August 2007. Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany. As the surge in Iraq nears its peak, American soldiers flow through the Cold War-era base of Ramstein by the thousands, the American war machine at its most powerful. Its most vulnerable.

Mehmet Ecevit was a CIA asset, dragooned into penetrating Islamist terror networks in Istanbul after an unsuccessful attempt to join the jihad against the Americans in Iraq. An asset who broke under the pressure—broke and ran, fleeing to Germany in an effort to shake off his handlers and escape his past. But one’s past is never far behind.

CIA paramilitary Harry Nichols was supposed to be on his way home, a well-deserved break from the war. Instead, with intelligence pointing toward a homegrown terror cell targeting US forces in Germany, he finds himself tasked with re-acquiring the Agency’s wayward asset. Running Mehmet against his newfound friends in a high-stakes gambit to stop the plot before it can get off the ground. So long as they can trust him, they have an edge.

But loyalty, for a spy, is ever a wild card.