When Kilkenny is invited to Rome to consult on the functioning of the
Vatican Library, he is still grieving the death of his wife and son and
welcomes the distraction of the seemingly simple assignment. But Pope
Leo XIV has a startlingly different task in mind for him. In a private
audience, Kilkenny learns of an unreported atrocity committed against
the underground Church in China and its link to Yin Daoming, the
long-imprisoned Bishop of Shanghai who has served thirty years of a life
sentence in a Chinese laogai for refusing to renounce the
Church of Rome. The aging pope then reveals the dangerous truth about
Bishop Yin, a secret that he has kept for over twenty years. Decades of
diplomacy have failed to end China's persecution of the Catholics
loyal to the pope, or to free Bishop Yin. The pope wants Yin free and
asks Kilkenny to devise a plan to accomplish this seemingly impossible
task.
With help from the U.S. president, American Special
Forces, and the C.I.A., he assembles a team of ten men and one woman
that will use some of the most advanced weapons, aircraft, and computer
technology to execute this extraordinary mission.