Mark Pacer opens the elevator door to begin his midnight shift at the U.S. State Department operations center and discovers the victim of an attempted murder. Mark, a young U.S. diplomat in Washington in the year 1983 after several tours abroad, saves the man’s life. The man is a crusty ambassador, Hank Lowell, the father of one of Mark’s classmates when Mark began diplomatic training. Hank’s son later resigned and disappeared. Who is attacking diplomats in the supposedly secure halls of the State Department and stealing classified documents? Is one of Mark’s colleagues a mole planted by one of the increasingly active anti-American groups? And what happened to Ambassador Lowell’s son? What secret is the ambassador hiding? Mark’s wife, Reye, also a career diplomat, is on leave at the moment to care for the couple’s small children. Listening to Hank’s suggestions for advancing his own career, Mark struggles to keep a commitment he made to Reye to take the unprecedented step of asking for leave to care for their children until they are of school age, so she can reenter her own career. And what about a new mysterious ailment which may impact the lives of two of his friends, recently given a name: Acquired Immune Deficiency Disorder, or AIDS?