The mutilated body on the St. Louis riverfront is just the beginning. PJ Gray, psychologist and expert in forensic virtual reality, has her hands full when the Metro Mangler claims more victims. As the case heats up, so do her feelings for her partner, Detective Leo Schultz. They're like bolts of lightning that sizzle and hiss the closer they get, swept up in a relationship that is more force of nature than emotional state. PJ crawls into the murderer's mind by experiencing the killings in virtual reality. Schultz relies on a cop's instincts. Neither of them can solve the baffling deaths. If they're all connected, then there are two types of murders: one intensely personal and bloody, the other quick and efficient. Two killers, or one killer with different motivations? It's a profiler's nightmare. As a wealthy family's secrets unravel and a thirty-year-old murder comes to light, PJ is suddenly in danger of crossing the line from investigator to victim.