A terrorist bomb explodes at a Georgetown restaurant, killing CIA operative Kirk McGarvey's French girlfriend and wounding his daughter. The bomb was meant for him, but the terrorists have made a fatal mistake - attacking McGarvey's family - and he goes after them with a vengeance. At the same time, McGarvey must struggle with an escalating crisis in the Far East, where a mysterious underground nuclear explosion has destroyed a power station off the coast of North Korea. U.S intelligence fears the worst. Because if Kim Jong Il, its controversial stringman, has nuclear weapons, he may just be crazy enough to use them. From the corridors of power in Washington to the Japanese space launch centre at Tanegashima, Kirk McGarvey must track a terrorist operation with its sights on both his family and the White House itself.