Caught off-guard when she receives an unexpected phone call from an old friend she hasn't seen in 20 years, Dr Sandy Jones gives Connie Pike a polite brush-off. A few days later, she learns that Connie has been killed in an explosion at her Princeton laboratory.

Consumed by guilt, Jones heads to New Jersey, determined to find out the truth behind Connie's death - and exactly what Connie had been trying to tell her in that last anxious phone call. Having previously participated in Connie's and her lab partner, Paul Ruder's, life's work, the study of the human mind, Jones becomes convinced the pair had made a momentous scientific discovery shortly before the explosion, a discovery that could change the world as we know it.

But who are the shadowy figures who are never far behind Jones as she continues her quest for the truth? As she gradually uncovers evidence of a terrifying global conspiracy, Sandy begins to fear for her life - and the lives of those around her.