"Alex Duarte is my kind of cop. I hope he sticks around for a long, long, time." – Michael Connelly It was supposed to be a low-level bust for ATF agent Alex Duarte, with the hope that he could work it up the ladder to someone important. He just didn't know how important. In New Orleans to check out a mysterious Panamanian named Ortiz who likes to trade guns illegally and import marijuana by the truckload, Duarte suddenly finds himself in the middle of something bigger than he has ever known. Because guns and drugs are bad enough-but there are other things that are much, much worse. A shadowy colonel who is not what he seems… a white supremacist intent on becoming "the man who changed America"… an attractive FBI agent with a lot of pull and a lot of secrets… Alex Duarte knows he's in deep with these characters. He just hopes he's not over his head