From New York Times bestselling author and Pulitzer Prize winner
Stephen Hunter comes a thriller that pits former Marine sniper Bob Lee
Swagger against the only man who might be able to outshoot him.
A marine sniper team on a mission in tribal territories on the
Afghan-Pakistan border, Whiskey 2-2 is ambushed by professionals using
the latest high-tech shooting gear. Badly wounded, the team's sole
survivor, Gunnery Sergeant Ray Cruz, aka "the Cruise Missile," is
determined to finish his job. He almost succeeds when a mystery blast
terminates his enterprise, leaving a thirty-foot crater where a building
used to be--and where Sergeant Cruz was meant to be hiding.
Months pass. Ray's target, an Afghan warlord named Ibrahim Zarzi,
sometimes called "The Beheader," becomes an American asset in the region
and beyond, beloved by State, the Administration, and the Agency. He
arrives in Washington for consecration as Our Man in Kabul.
And that brings Ray Cruz out of hiding.
Swagger, the legendary hero of seven of Hunter's novels from Point of
Impact to last year's bestselling I, Sniper, is recruited by the FBI
to stop the Cruise Missile from reaching his target. The problem is that
the more Swagger learns about what happened in Zabol, the more he
questions the US government's support of Zarzi and the more he
identifies with Cruz as hunter instead of prey.
