Through a succession of increasingly bizarre murders, a Seattle killer re-creates the nine circles of hell depicted in Dante's Inferno, wreaking eternal suffering across the city. Seattle's only hope rests with an unlikely pair: Detective Robi Darcmel, whose high-functioning autism allows him to see patterns where no one else can, and Janey Doe, a young mute girl Darc rescued from the murderer's grasp. She holds the key to stopping the killer's madness -- that is, if Darc can understand her.As Darc and Janey struggle to communicate despite their individual limitations, the killer readies his master plan. If Darc is unable to decode Janey's role in it, the whole of Seattle and millions of lives stand on the brink of destruction.