Edmund Radcliffe's two greedy brothers convinced their father, Malcolm Radcliffe, to exile Edmund to Martinique to save the family from financial ruin and further embarrassment. There, he finds work as an accounting clerk. Still, Edmund wanted to go to sea. After being hired as a second officer on a merchant ship, he discovers the captain is stealing from the ship's owner.

With France consumed by its revolution, the Marquis de Fontaine and his family board Edmund's ship in Bordeaux. On the voyage back to Martinique, Edmund falls in love with Sophie, the Marquis' eldest daughter.

In the U.S., Jaco Jacinto's and Darren Smythe's company - American Shipping & Passenger Lines - is becoming profitable from its packet service up and down the Atlantic Coast and its New York to London passenger and mail service that makes the Atlantic crossing in two weeks.

After generations of cooperation, the Laredos and Jacintos combined their family businesses into one conglomerate called U.S. Industries. But there are clouds on the horizon.

Without a Navy to protect U.S. flagged vessels in the Mediterranean, Barbary Pirates continue to capture ships owned by the Laredos and other American companies despite being paid tribute by the U.S. government. With four other ship owners, the Laredos and Jacintos form Naval Escort Services, Inc. to provide armed vessels to convoy merchant ships from Gibraltar to ports in Italy.

Unhappy that the U.S. was not paying its debt, the French Revolutionary government issued letters of marque to privateer consortiums that allowed them to seize American merchant vessels. The Fleur de Lis consortium sends the brig Rapier captained by Edmund Radcliffe to sea to capture American ships.