"Pascual Rose, I believe? Or would it be Pascual March today?"

Anyone who knows both Pascual's names means trouble, and Pascual has a feeling that the Yank who has tracked him to a cheap Marseille bistro is going to spoil more than his lunch.

The Agency needs another favor, but there's a carrot with the stick this time-one million dollars. All Pascual has to do is deliver the ransom for some hijacked government data. But when the hackers get hacked and the new deal involves a human life, the job suddenly gets a lot more complicated.

Pascual finds his sympathies lie with the hacker, and with a hundred million dollars in gold-backed cryptocurrency at stake, he suddenly has a whole roster of enemies to go with his new friend, from Syrian thugs to mysterious Russian operatives.

The complications take Pascual to the banking district of Monaco, a secret prison in war-torn Yemen, an anarchist squat in chaotic Athens, and the haunted streets of Istanbul, with no one to trust but himself and the only certainty the need to guess right-or else.