During what was meant to be a low-key smuggling job, Van's friend Hollis winds up with a critically-wounded merchant sailor and too much trouble to handle alone. Van helps Hollis ferry the injured man to a shady private clinic, but the clinic is already serving a client -- a master hacker and extortionist named Bilal Nath, who realizes Van might be the perfect person to obtain something worth more than rubies to the blackmailer. His family threatened, Van is pressured to plan a daring heist from a Seattle immunology firm. But is he about to steal a biological weapon that might kill thousands? With Bilal Nath forcing Van into what might be an act of domestic terrorism, Van needs every bit of help he can find, including lawbreaking friends like Hollis, Big Will Willard, and Willard's sly and seductive niece Elana. Even that formidable crew might not be enough. To outwit a ruthless blackmailer, Van might just need a cold-blooded killer. Even if that same criminal blood might run in his own veins.