It is summer 1934, and Hitler is teetering on the edge of supreme power. Any small step forward could vault him toward European domination. When Britain's MI6 gets word that a pair of German scientists have made a breakthrough in germ warfare, they send Elena Standish on a dangerous mission to get one of them out of Germany before he's forced to share his knowledge and its devastating power with Hitler's elite.

But the British soon learn that it's more than just time that Elena is working against. The new head of Germany's germ warfare division is an old enemy of Elena's grandfather Lucas, the former head of MI6. And he's bent on using any means to avenge his defeat at Lucas's hands twenty years before.

What starts as an effort to save Europe from the devastation of disease soon becomes an intensely personal fight. As Elena and the scientist make their way across Germany, from Berlin to Bavaria and beyond, they confront not only the Gestapo but also a ragtag group of unpredictable Nazi supporters. With Elena's every decision challenged, this compelling mystery takes a searing look at what it means to do what's right in a world rife with so much evil.