Two armed men board a 727 all but forgotten at an airfield in Angola. Hijacking the jet, they then slit the throat of the lone crew and fly to parts unknown. The consternation is immediate, as the CIA, FBI, and other agencies race to find out what happened, in the process elbowing one another in the sides a little too vigorously.

Fed up, the president of the United States turns to an outside investigator to determine the truth, an Army intelligence officer serving as special assistant to the secretary of homeland security. Delta Force Major Carlos Guillermo Castillo, known as Charley, is the son of a German mother and a Tex-Mex father who was killed in the Vietnam War and awarded a Medal of Honor.

A West Point graduate, a pilot, and a veteran of Desert Storm, Castillo has a sharp eye for the facts - and the reality behind them. Traveling undercover, he flies to Africa, and there, helped and hindered by unexpected allies and determined enemies, begins to untangle a story of frightening dimensions - a story that, unless he can do something about it, will end very, very badly indeed, not only for Castillo . . . but for all of America.