#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A psychopath with an intimate knowledge of death has a personal vendetta against Kay Scarpetta—and many different plans to kill her. . . .
“Cornwell remains the master of incorporating real-life science into pulse-pounding fiction.”—The Philadelphia Inquirer
IN DEVELOPMENT AS THE ORIGINAL SERIES SCARPETTA STARRING NICOLE KIDMAN AND JAMIE LEE CURTIS
Dr. Kay Scarpetta is newly retired from Dublin, where she was called in to examine the remains of a murder victim whose limbs and head were expertly severed—a signature of a cunning killer on the loose again after an eight-year sabbatical—when the same killer apparently strikes again, this time much closer to home. After Scarpetta investigates the murder scene, the killer boldly contacts her through the Internet, inviting her to download photos of the murder victim and signing off with a chilling screen name: deadoc
With the help of her niece, Lucy, an FBI computer expert, she takes an extraordinary virtual tour of the background of the emailed photos. When Scarpetta determines that the victim was exposed to a rare smallpox-like virus before she died and, later, that she herself may have been infected, she realizes that she is up against a killer with access to an incredibly sophisticated arsenal of deadly force—a killer with specific animus directed toward her.
