Forensic pathologist Kay Scarpetta has returned to Virginia as the chief medical examiner. Finding herself the new girl in town once again after being away for many years, she₂s inherited an overbearing secretary and a legacy of neglect and possible corruption. She and her husband Benton Wesley, now a forensic psychologist with the U.S. Secret Service, have relocated to Old Town Alexandria where she₂s headquartered five miles from the Pentagon in a post-pandemic world that₂s been torn by civil and political unrest. Just weeks on the job, she₂s called to a scene by railroad tracks where a woman₂s body has been shockingly displayed, her throat cut down to the spine, and as Scarpetta begins to follow the trail, it leads unnervingly close to her own historic neighborhood.
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