Battered war correspondent John Bailey is a man living on the edge. He's haunted by nightmares of being kidnapped and tortured in Iraq and he's drinking too much to drown the memories. As he battles to get his life back together, a story breaks that will force him back into the spotlight – and into the crosshairs of a deadly international player. When a beautiful prostitute is found murdered in her luxury Sydney apartment, Bailey is ordered to cover the story by The Journal's editor and his old friend, Gerald Summers, because he can't trust anyone else. One of the victim's clients, a key advisor to the Defence Minister, is chief suspect in her murder and he's on the run. When he contacts Bailey, claiming to have information that will bring down the government, the stakes become deadly. To complicate matters,the investigating police detective is the woman Bailey walked out on a decade ago. When a ruthless CIA fixer turns up, followed by a murderous Chinese agent hot on his trail, Bailey realises he has stumbled onto the story of a lifetime – one that he may not live to tell.