In Italy the Cardinal Vicar of Rome is assassinated during a celebration for the Pope's birthday. In Los Angeles Harry Addison, a highly successful entertainment lawyer, finds a desperate message on his telephone answering machine from his long-estranged brother, Daniel, a priest in the Vatican. Hours later a tourist bus on which Father Daniel is travelling explodes on the road to Assisi. Arriving in Italy to claim his brother's body, Harry is abruptly plunged into a Kafka-esque nightmare of deception and terror. Learning that Daniel is the prime suspect in the assassination of the Cardinal Vicar, he soon suspects that his brother may have survived the bus explosion and still be alive, but before he can confirm his suspicions he is himself framed for the murder of an Italian policeman. On the run from the authorities and at the same time desperately searching for Father Daniel, Harry discovers someone else is looking for his brother as well - the infamous international terrorist and maniacal killer, Thomas Kind. Pursued and alone, Harry finds himself at the centre of a monstrous conspiracy spun from the very heart of the Vatican, where men of God are using the devil's hand to establish a new Holy Roman Empire in China for the 21st century.