New chief medical examiner and forensic pathologist Kay Scarpetta is given a highly classified case involving two scientists who were found dead on a private space laboratory.

In the aftermath of a sabotaged NASA rocket launch, Captain Calli Chase comes face-to-face with her missing twin sister, as well as the startling truth of who they really are, and now that a top secret program put in motion years ago has spun out of control, Calli embarks on a frantic search for the missing link between the sabotaged rocket launch and her predetermined destiny.

Kay Scarpetta investigates the murder of a young graduate student who is subsequently linked to bizarre homicides in Washington, D.C., where Scarpetta's FBI agent husband is tracking down a serial killer.