A woman awakes in the morning to find that someone has picked her apartment's supposedly impregnable door lock and rearranged personal items, even sitting beside her while she slept. The intrusion, the police learn, is a message to the entire city of carnage to come. Lincoln Rhyme and Amelia Sachs are brought in to investigate and soon learn that the sociopathic intruder, who calls himself 'the Locksmith,' can break through any lock or security system...

Renowned investigator and forensics expert, Lincoln Rhyme, is drafted to investigate the sniper-killing of a U.S. citizen in the Bahamas. While his partner, Amelia Sachs, traces the victim's steps in Manhattan, Rhyme leaves the city to pursue the sniper himself.

When a killer leaving mysterious tattoo messages on the victims' bodies is thought to be linked to New York's notorious Bone Collector, Lincoln Rhyme and Sachs join the NYPD in seeking a serial killer obsessed with painting the skin with a poisoned tattoo gun. The ghosts of Rhyme's past could prove even deadlier than he suspected.