Scotland Yard's new chief inspector Nicholas Drummond is on the first flight to New York when he learns his colleague, Elaine York, the 'minder' of the Crown Jewels for the 'Jewel of the Lion' exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, was found murdered. Then the centerpiece of the exhibit, the infamous Koh-i-Noor Diamond, is stolen from the Queen Mother's crown. Drummond, American-born but raised in the UK, is a dark, dangerous, fast-rising star in the Yard who never backs down.