Patrick Shannon is an agent with Morituri.
Morituri is a small, highly secret government agency created to handle situations that the FBI and CIA cannot without undue notice. Under the control of a priest referred to as Number One who runs his ministry out of a deteriorating old church, the bureau is often loaned out to other countries when the need arises, but only with the permission of the President. The department is an independent one in that, though the FBI and the CIA provide all the necessary funding to operate it, they do not directly control the actions nor pick the assignments. They can make requests but it up to Number One whether to act on the request and the manner in which the affair was handled.
Shannon has been an agent for Morituri for three years at the start of the series and is now considered its best agent. When he is not fighting the nation's enemies, Shannon is the highly successful author of a series of action novels about a character who is a spy. The books were considered by critics as too fanciful to be realistic even though Shannon based them loosely on his own career.
Shannon is independently wealthy, driving a new model Porsche and living in a two-story penthouse apartment with Joe-Dad, his personal cook, butler, and friend. Shannon is 6'2" tall, in terrific shape, and has a handsome enough face to make the ladies take a second look. He has a quick temper and is easily irritated but he seldom acts rashly and those that annoy him usually find reason to regret it. He has tremendous respect for the old priest who runs Morituri and listens to the man disclose his plans but Shannon knows that out in the field it was his own brains and skills and experience that would keep him alive.