An enigmatic Russian spymaster makes contact with Jake Grafton in the aftermath of the savage attacks on the World Trade Center in New York to give him a warning. A disaffected Russian general has sold four tactical nuclear weapons to the Sword of Islam, a terrorist organisation determined to mount a deadly strike designed to destroy the US as a world power. The goal is nothing less than the final destruction of western civilisation.

This time, Jake learns, the foreign terrorists have domestic friends. Someone within America wants the attack to succeed. Fighting bureaucrats and traitors, Jake Grafton is up to his eyes in agents and double agents with time running out as he hunts for the weapons.