"Killing me won't kill the beast," are the last words of rapist-murderer Ronnie Joe Waddell, written four days before his execution. But they can't explain how Dr Kay Scarpetta finds Waddell's fingerprints on another crime scene – after she'd performed his autopsy. If this is some sort of game, Scarpetta seems to be the target. And if the next victim is someone she knows, the punishment will be cruel and unusual. In Richmond, Virginia, young lovers are dying. So far, four couples in the area have disappeared, only to be found months later as mutilated corpses. When the daughter of the president's newest drug czar vanishes along with her boyfriend, Dr Kay Scarpetta knows time is short. Following a macabre trail of evidence that ties the present homicides to a grisly crime in the past, Kay must draw upon her own personal resources to track down a murderer who is as skilled at eliminating clues as Kay is at finding them. Under cover of night in Richmond, Virginia, a human monster strikes, leaving a gruesome trail of stranglings that has paralysed the city. Medical examiner Kay Scarpetta suspects the worst: a deliberate campaign by a brilliant serial killer whose signature offers precious few clues. With an unerring eye, she calls on the latest advances in forensic research to unmask the madman. But this investigation will test Kay like no other, because it’s being sabotaged from within – and someone wants her dead. A reclusive author, Beryl Madison finds no safe haven from months of menacing phone calls – or the tormented feeling that her every move is being watched. When the writer is found slain in her own home, Kay Scarpetta pieces together the intricate forensic evidence – while unwittingly edging closer to a killer waiting in the shadows.