When Judd Ryker is appointed director of the new State Department Crisis Reaction Unit, he figures he has a mandate to help the United States respond more quickly to foreign crises, but he hasńt reckoned with the intense State, Defense, Pentagon, White House, and CIA infighting and turf battles he would face. Then comes a coup in Mali. It is his chance to prove that his theory of the Golden Hour actually works. As Ryker races from Washington across Europe to the Sahara Desert, he finds that everything he thought he knew begins to shift and change beneath his feet, with friends and enemies coming in many forms.