Hap Franklin is an agent with the CIA.
Most people who know him, or of him, would tell you truthfully that he was a major player in the investment world working for a powerful independent financial management firm known as Sterling. He is very much in that line of work and has been for most of his adult life, gaining an impressive reputation and working his way up the corporate ladder.
But he will become an operative with the Agency nonetheless. He is told upon his recruitment that they at Langley had been monitoring his career for the past decade, thinking often of approaching him to go to work for them. With his experience and his placement in the industry, he would be welcome in any corporate meeting and could find reasons for jetsetting to any part of the globe without suspicion. Through in his intimate knowledge of the financial world and any time some mission would require a familiarity with money exchange - and don't they all at some point - he would be a gold mine asset.
Never mind, they tell him, that he is quickly approaching retirement age. They are not looking for youth in someone like him; they want experience and wisdom and understanding and the ability to see behind the glitz and gilding.
And to his surprise - though having read his life story along the way, not to ours - he is intrigued with the chance to do something other than starting at balance sheets. He agrees and his life, and the lives of those closest to him, will never be the same.
Along for this crazy ride will be two women of considerable importance to Franklin. The first is his wife of many years and mother to his two children, Kate. The second and over time even more important is Louise Parker, aka Weezie, who was an infatuation when he was quite young and who became a refuge and a lasting love much later when he needed solace.