When celebrated Palestinian poet Noor Watani is shot at outside a Cambridge café, Boston PI Brent Malory takes the case expecting a straightforward bodyguard gig: a beautiful client, a nervous brother, and a pool of political enemies a mile wide. Simple enough.
It isn't.
As the threats escalate from a bullet to a ransacked apartment and attempted kidnapping, Brent discovers that someone far more dangerous than a disgruntled activist is circling Noor-a mercenary who believes she's carrying stolen state secrets with the power to ignite a third Intifada. But the woman Brent has come to know, and to love, is not the woman Lawrence Drake is describing. Or is she?
From the leafy streets of Cambridge to a high-stakes reception in Georgetown, Brent races to keep Noor alive while the woman herself plays a game she won't let him see. One that could either prevent a war or start one.
The Rumi Cipher is a propulsive, layered thriller about loyalty, deception, and the impossible arithmetic of doing the right thing in a world where the right thing looks different depending on which side of the wall you were born on.