Retired British Secret Service member Tomas Nevinson is approached by his sinister former handler, Bertram Tupra, for one last assignment: To go back undercover, in a small Spanish town, to find out which of three women who moved there a decade ago is in fact a Basque separatist ETA terrorist, on loan from the IRA, now on the run and living there incognito. Everything about the assignment is shadowy - from who exactly Nevinson will be working for to the question of what 'justice' he may need to mete out. But, still in his forties and lured by the appeal of once again being on the inside, he accepts the job. As he gets closer to the three women, his task becomes ever harder. How - or who - to choose between these three? Intimately involved with each of them, as lover, colleague or friend, he can find no firm clue to resolve the question. But under increasing pressure from his paymasters, choose - and act - he apparently must . . .