This time the chips are truly down for Hollywood Jake Donovan. A government scientist, Dr. William Rush, has been found dead in a North Carolina state park; he'd been doing sensitive research -- possibly a weapons project -- and he'd been brutally murdered. His colleague, Janice Callahan, is also missing...A crime of passion? Or a threat to national security? Jake Donovan -- down on his luck after being mysteriously yanked from the investigation of an assassination attempt on the First Lady -- and his Broken Wings team are assigned to the case by their wealthy benefactor Mrs. De Vries, who also happens to be Janice Callahan's aunt.

But it's not going to be easy for Jake. As he digs deeper into the mystery he is shot at, his car is blown up, and his fingerprints keep turning up where they shouldn't. His personal life is no picnic either: His Broken Wings colleague and girlfriend Katie leaves him for her ex-husband; his former wife has had it with the danger his work brings to her and their two children; and he is plagued by nightmares of the Black Diamond kidnapper, the one criminal whom he has never been able to catch. But the worst blow comes when Donovan's adored son, Eric, is abducted right out of his own bed. Hollywood Jake Donovan finally knows what it's like to be a victim.

In their efforts to save the country, as well as the offspring of one of their own, the Broken Wings team races across America on the trail of a complicated conspiracy. Can they get to the center of the web in time? Once again, John Douglas has delivered a mesmerizing and edge-of-the-seat ride into the world of criminal profiling.