A car plows through the crowd at a July 4th parade. The driver climbs out, sick and stumbling, reaching out...and everyone he touches drops dead within seconds. Maeve Sinclair watches in horror as people she loves begin to die, and she knows she must take action. But in the aftermath of this terror, it's Maeve who possesses that killing touch. Fleeing into the mountains, struggling with her own grief and confusion, Maeve faces the dawning realization that she will never be able to touch another human being again.

"Weird s**t expert" Ben Walker is surprised to get a call from Alena Boudreau, director of the newly restructured Global Science Research Coalition. There's an upheaval in the organization, and she needs to send someone she can trust to Jericho Falls. Whoever finds Maeve Sinclair first will unravel the mystery of her death touch, and many are willing to kill her for that secret. Walker's assignment is to get her off the mountain alive.

But as Maeve searches for a hiding place, hunted and growing sicker by the moment, she begins to hear an insidious voice in her head, and the yearning, the need...the hunger to touch another human being continues to grow. When Walker and Maeve meet at last, they will unravel a stunning legacy of death and betrayal, and a malignant secret as old as history.