The Ambassador

The little girl had been shot. Her father held her outside the embassy gates as pursuing soldiers fired. Rounds cracked past us and the Marines beside me shouted and her father begged as she bled in his arms....

All the while, her eyes were on me.

What would you do?

Jackson Ford’s a disgraced former governor who recognizes a second chance when the president’s chief of staff dangles it.

The president needs an ambassador in a third-world nation. Someone to help local tyrants stamp out insurrection while keeping privation and violence out of the election-year news. Ford is a tough idealist, but this administration makes it clear that they don’t want idealism. They expect one thing.

Obedience.

When a rebel leader shows up outside the embassy gates with a wounded child in his arms and soldiers closing in, Ford can watch the girl bleed out or invoke the wrath of dictators and the president.

Ford’s decision to provide sanctuary puts the embassy under siege.

Ford and the US Marines are outmanned, outgunned, and outmaneuvered by an army outside their walls, even as they’re betrayed by enemies within. Ford doesn’t know if they’re defending the Alamo or Bastogne, but he does know they will not betray the ideals that should stir in the heart of anyone who sees the American flag aloft and under fire.