The mutilated body of a senior banker is found on a Kent beach. Could the man's death be linked to the scandal engulfing his employer, a global bank created by the CIA to help track terrorism financing? Kate Pendragon, a financial analyst seconded to MI5, discovers that the bank is close to collapse. Elsewhere, intelligence is gathered on an Islamic terrorist cell intent on triggering a nuclear catastrophe to rig the world's financial markets—rigged, it would appear, by the Americans. Pendragon believes the intelligence community on both sides of the Atlantic could be falling for a sophisticated hoax. Only, no one is listening to her.