The Night Agent

The novel opens with a flash-forward: Peter Sutherland, an FBI agent detailed to the White House, stalks toward a red brick mansion carrying an ax and a borrowed pistol, battered and sleepless. The narrative then jumps back six days.

Peter works the overnight shift in the White House Situation Room, staffing an emergency phone line accessible only to Diane Farr, the White House chief of staff, and James Hawkins, a senior counterintelligence advisor. Peter's father, Thomas Sutherland, was an FBI counterintelligence section chief suspected of leaking the identities of Russian embassy staffers secretly working for the United States; those sources were recalled to Moscow and executed. Thomas died in a car crash that may have been suicide, and his guilt was never proven. Peter has spent his career trying to escape this shadow, yet colleagues still distrust him.

In nearly 10 months, the emergency line has rung only once, until the night everything changes. At 1:05 A.M., Rose Larkin, the 28-year-old niece of retired FBI counterintelligence officers Henry and Paulette Campbell, calls reciting a night action code. Armed men have attacked her aunt and uncle's house. Peter keeps Rose on one phone while dispatching police on another. Rose hides in a neighboring house as a gunman searches room by room, and police arrive just in time.

The Campbells posed as Department of Commerce contractors but were investigating a Russian intelligence operation. The attack was carried out by Dimitri Sokolov, a deep-cover officer of Russia's foreign intelligence service (SVR), on orders from a source inside the US government codenamed BEECH. Dimitri's team kills both Campbells when they refuse to reveal the location of a "red ledger," a handwritten record documenting meetings between Russian intelligence and their American mole. Before dying, the Campbells instruct Rose to relay a coded message referencing OSPREY, the unknown figure who commissioned their investigation, and warning of a critical event in six days.

Peter visits the crime scene and is warned by Farr to stay away. At the funeral, Rose recognizes his voice and approaches him, but he can offer no answers. Dimitri, watching nearby, identifies both as threats. Days later, Rose calls Peter when her security detail vanishes and she suspects she is being followed. He teaches her surveillance techniques, then returns to her hotel that evening after realizing her follower matches the profile of a trained operative. The electronic locks fail, the lights die, and a man attacks Peter in the dark. He fights back, pulls a fire alarm, and flees with Rose to the White House.

Farr reveals the Campbells were investigating a Russian mole so senior that the investigation was siloed to Farr and Hawkins. The red ledger documents meetings between Russian intelligence and the mole, BEECH, and the six-day deadline is now two days away, coinciding with the Russian president's visit to Washington. Farr assigns Peter to stay close to Rose, who is the only person who trusts him.

At a secure hotel, Rose admits she overheard her aunt and uncle discussing a "chemist" and a "bookbinder" before they died, details they withheld from the emergency message because they did not fully trust their superiors. Peter promises to keep her secret. When Farr interviews Rose the next morning and detects her deception, Farr resolves that if Rose knows too much, she will hand Rose over to the killers.

The narrative then reveals Farr herself is BEECH. When Hawkins reports finding the Campbells' storage unit and the ledger, Farr signals Dimitri, who kills Hawkins with a lethal poison. Farr retrieves the ledger and hides it in a gun vault at her grandfather's vacant house in the Palisades, a wealthy neighborhood in Washington.

The novel reveals the full conspiracy. During the presidential campaign, Farr accepted help from donors with Kremlin ties. The Russians launched a cyberattack on the Washington Metro before the election, intending to embarrass the opposing candidate, but the attack spiraled out of control, killing 21 people. The Russians then owned Farr through the threat of exposure and ensured the election's outcome by seeding financial scandals against President Travers's opponent.

Rose flees her hotel, suspecting her security detail is surveilling rather than protecting her. Peter refuses to reveal her location to Farr. He finds Rose at the Campbells' house, and together they trace the "bookbinder" to Emily Krysanova, a former Russian intelligence officer who works as a bookbinder and antiques dealer. Krysanova confirms the conspiracy and mentions GIDEON, a legendary intelligence contact, providing instructions for signaling a meeting. She reveals she called the emergency line and spoke to Farr, who promised help. When a car arrives and Krysanova opens her door, a sniper kills her. Peter and Rose escape under fire.

Peter realizes Farr has been using the emergency line to locate and eliminate witnesses. He and Rose leave a signal for GIDEON near the National Mall. Peter also learns that Katie Chen, a specialist who investigated the Metro crash for a law firm, has been murdered. Peter approaches President Travers directly, voicing suspicions about Farr. Travers appears receptive but sends Peter to a location where Secret Service agent Daniel Akana, working with Farr, has set a trap. Peter kills one attacker, escapes, and concludes the president is complicit.

Now fugitives, Peter and Rose shelter on the sailboat of Peter's godfather, Greg, at Fort Washington Marina. The next morning, they meet GIDEON in Rock Creek Park, and he turns out to be Greg, a freelance intelligence operative who once worked for the Russians. Peter, enraged at the lifelong deception, punches him, but Rose persuades Peter to accept Greg's help: cars, weapons, cash, and intelligence files on Farr's properties.

Peter identifies the Palisades house as the ledger's hiding place and stages a conspicuous break-in, knowing Farr will see him on the security cameras and race to the house. When Farr opens the safe, Peter confronts her at gunpoint. Rose fires a warning shot, Peter seizes the ledger, and Rose locks Farr in the vault. They escape as police converge.

At a meeting near DC General Hospital, Dimitri ambushes Greg, shoots him, and his men abduct Rose. Peter believes the ledger is also gone. He tracks a blood-smeared SUV to a warehouse and battles Dimitri in a darkened storeroom. Rose, her hands cuffed, throws a bottle to distract Dimitri, and Peter shoves him onto nearby railroad tracks, where a train kills him.

Rose reveals she hid the ledger before her capture. They retrieve it, photograph every page, and send the images to major news outlets, inspectors general, the Department of Justice, and the opposing campaign's senior staff. Peter surrenders to the Secret Service and stalls Farr at a secure facility until the Washington Post calls at 7 P.M. asking about a red ledger. Farr realizes Peter has already distributed the evidence. President Travers arrives with agents, and Rose is safe.

Travers reveals he is OSPREY. An outsider president suspicious that his election broke too conveniently in his favor, he asked the Campbells to investigate, not knowing Farr was the traitor. Farr and Akana are arrested, the meeting with Russian President Vikhrov is canceled, and Russia receives an ultimatum to withdraw troops from Europe's borders.

The ledger is corroborated, confirming the Metro crash as a Russian cyberattack and the election as manipulated. Farr is imprisoned, facing life for treason and complicity in multiple murders. Travers announces he will not seek reelection. The dying Greg implicitly confirms Peter's father's guilt by not denying it. Peter and Rose rent a cottage in the Shenandoah Valley as the investigations proceed. On Peter's last day at the White House, Rose drives them to the Campbells' house, where she sings Stevie Wonder's "You Are the Sunshine of My Life," the song Henry used to hum. She emerges at peace, and they drive away together.