Set during the war with ISIS in Syria, Mercenary Colby Dakota doesn't believe in causes - he survives them. Hardened by years of black-ops and shattered by the death of his daughter, Colby takes one final job in war-torn Syria: extract an archaeologist before ISIS closes in. But when the mission explodes in blood and fire, Colby finds himself alone, hunted, and face-to-face with five runaway brides who fled their ISIS husbands and beg him for protection.

Danielle, a seventeen-year-old Parisian with iron resolve and hidden scars, pleads with Colby in a voice that echoes his daughter’s. Though every instinct tells him to walk away, Colby leads the girls into the scorched Syrian desert where zealots hunt them, food runs dry, and doubt cuts deeper than bullets. As they navigate smugglers, betrayal, and a burned-out land, Colby butts heads with Danielle, whose faith and fire refuse to break, even when everyone else does.
The desert offers no sanctuary. Zaid, a brutal ISIS commander and Danielle’s former husband, defies orders to personally hunt them down, vowing to make an example of their betrayal. When he captures one of the girls during a desperate escape, the group fractures and Colby spirals, blaming himself for everything—his squad’s deaths, his daughter’s murder, and the belief that he can’t save anyone.

Refusing to let the past claim more lives, Colby claws back from despair and prepares the girls for a dangerous final push toward the coast. But the boat that could carry them to safety lies deep within enemy territory, and Zaid guards it like a prize. In a war zone without a flag, Colby chooses to fight not for money, but for the lives tethered to his own redemption.
In a final, explosive assault, Colby stages a one-man raid to kill Zaid and rescue the girls, knowing it might cost him everything. Bloodied, outnumbered, and nearly broken, he discovers that survival isn’t his end - redemption is. And in helping them escape, he finally learns how to forgive himself.