In this race-to-the-finish thriller in the bestselling Tom Clancy's Op-Center series, an attempt to exfiltrate a Chinese scientist threatens to incite war between China and the United States.

When the launch of their powerful new hypersonic missile ends in destruction, the Chinese government needs someone to blame. Was it a failure of engineering, or sabotage? The chief engineer on the project, Dr. Yang Dàyóu, is targeted as the scapegoat and arrested-unable to help his family as they are hunted down by the military.

Op-Center's Lt. Grace Lee is sent to China on a solo reconnaissance mission, but when she sees an opportunity to free the imprisoned scientist, she seizes it. With Lt. Lee on the run and the Chinese military at her heels, Director Chase Williams sends the rest of Op-Center to Mongolia as an extraction team. Meanwhile, Dr. Dàyóu's son has aligned himself with a dangerous group of counterrevolutionaries hellbent on dismantling the Communist regime, putting his father's life-and his own-in jeopardy. The Black Wasp team races to rescue their colleague and her high-risk companion without setting off an international incident that could leave China ready to release their greatest weapon yet.