Ray Devlin is retired, living a simple life off the grid in Florida, when a visit from an old colleague stirs some bad memories -- and ends with a gunshot. Soon Devlin is forced to again face a past he'd hoped to leave behind, as a member of a mercenary force that helped put a brutal South American dictator into power.

Tracy Quinn is an investigative reporter at a struggling Philadelphia newspaper decimated by layoffs and cutbacks. Then one day what appears to be a straightforward homicide -- a body left in an abandoned rowhouse -- draws her and Devlin together, and ultimately enmeshes both in a conspiracy that stretches over twenty years and reaches to the highest levels of the U.S. government.

Before long, they're both the targets of a ruthless assassin haunted by his own wartime experiences. For Devlin, it could all mean a last shot at redemption. For Tracy, the biggest story of her career just might cost her life.