The curtain rises.
A famous actor is about to perform.
Then the audience discovers that the blood is real.
When veteran performer Leonard White is murdered in a shocking public spectacle, Detective Inspector Stewart Gardener is drawn into a world where illusion is everything and appearances cannot be trusted. White was famous, wealthy and admired—but behind the spotlight was a far more complicated man with secrets, enemies and a past filled with unfinished business.
Then the witnesses make the investigation even stranger.
They describe a suspect who seems to be more than one person.
As Gardener searches through the worlds of theatre, film and performance, he discovers that the killer may possess a frightening talent for disguise and deception. Faces can change. Identities can be invented. And anyone can become someone else.
But behind every performance is a real person.
Gardener just has to find him before another victim takes the stage.
Because the killer is not finished.
And for the next performance, murder may be the main event.