Introduction
You face the terrifying vulnerability of protecting the people you love when violent shadows from the past strike without warning. Forensic sculptor Eve Duncan reconstructs facial features from skulls to bring closure to victims and their families. This delicate labor of restoration draws unwanted attention from dangerous men consumed by vengeance.
A grieving father orchestrates an elaborate abduction of forensic sculptor Eve Duncan to force her to reconstruct his dead serial killer son's face, plunging her protectors into a high-stakes rescue mission.
Iris Johansen maps this thriller across four precise stages. You trace the meticulous planning of vengeance, the violent ambush at a secluded lake, the psychological battle of captivity, and the desperate tracking operation.
- How does Jim Doane breach heavily guarded security to take Eve?
- What hidden threats endanger Jane MacGuire and her animals on Summer Island?
- Can Joe Quinn and his allies decode the clues in time to save Eve?
1. Vengeance and Hidden Threats
A grieving father carries out a long-planned vengeance scheme while rogue operatives manipulate events from the shadows.
Doane's Mission
Jim Doane leaves his home in Goldfork, Colorado, carrying his son Kevin's burned skull in a velvet-lined toolbox. He plans to use Eve Duncan to find the person responsible for Kevin's death while communicating with an operative named Blick.
The most durable form of preparation involves years of silent surveillance and precise timing.
At 7:35 A.M. in Goldfork, Colorado, Jim Doane leaves his house after being under surveillance by the CIA for 5 years. Jim Doane talks to his neighbor Ralph Hodder before leaving Colorado under the guise of family trouble, then checks his GPS for Atlanta.
Lee Zander manages his affairs through an assistant named Howard Stang in Vancouver, Canada, and maintains a volatile relationship with a CIA handler named Venable. Zander gives Venable 2 days to find Doane before Zander takes matters into his own hands. Lee Zander orders his assistant Howard Stang to pack up records, destroy computers, and move money to alternate bank accounts after learning Doane has left Colorado.
The Poisoned Dog
Jane MacGuire smuggles her sick dog Toby out of London to seek experimental veterinary treatment on a remote island. Toby, a half-dog half-wolf pet, falls critically ill with an undiagnosed condition, prompting Jane to fly to Summer Island with the assistance of the enigmatic Seth Caleb.
Jane bypasses standard red tape with Seth Caleb's help to transport Toby to an experimental medical facility run by Sarah Logan. The flight time from San Juan to Summer Island is 1 hour and 15 minutes.
A young resident named Margaret Douglas uses an intuitive connection with animals to diagnose a hidden poisoning. Margaret, working alongside facility director Dr. Devon Brady, examines Toby with the help of a golden retriever named Monty and determines the animal was injected with a slow-acting poison. Margaret Douglas is approximately 19 or 20 years old, and the estimated remaining window of time to save Toby is 4 hours.
Margaret tells Jane and Dr. Devon Brady that Toby needs his system flushed and blood replaced because he was poisoned via an injection in his ruff. When Toby is poisoned by a slow-acting agent, Caleb and Jane deduce that the perpetrator must have known Jane's schedule and administered it while Toby was at Nedra Carlisle's Dog Day Care, aiming to cause indirect harm five days ago when Toby became ill. Jane sends an email to Nedra Carlisle's Dog Day Care to review security cameras after Devon Brady discovers a tiny injection mark under Toby's fur.
To save Toby, you must execute these emergency measures:
- Flush out Toby's entire system
- Replace the blood
- Give him a general antidote
- Administer an antibiotic
2. Abduction at the Lake
Eve Duncan is successfully ambushed and kidnapped by James Doane after a series of coordinated distractions isolate her from her protectors.
Caleb analyzes the security footage from the luxury pup day-care center and discovers a man named Herbert Connors poisoning Toby with a syringe. Caleb deduces that the poisoning was not a random act of cruelty but a calculated scheme to force Jane to take an emergency trip to Summer Island, thereby removing her from London and isolating Eve.
At the luxury pup day-care center, cameras catch Herbert Connors holding a syringe over Toby, whom he had visited three times previously to set up the poisoning.
The Sniper Attack
Jane MacGuire is critically wounded by a sniper at the Summer Island airfield while attempting to leave the research facility. As Jane and Margaret prepare to leave for the airfield to check on Eve, Margaret senses an intrusion in the forest. A sniper emerges from a hangar and aims a rifle at them; Jane tackles Margaret to the ground and takes a bullet through her upper shoulder, suffering massive blood loss.
Jane takes a bullet meant for Margaret at the airfield hangar and is rushed to the veterinary research center for emergency treatment and a blood transfusion from Caleb. Joe Quinn charters a private jet to Summer Island after learning of Jane's shooting and demands help from CIA operative Venable to locate Eve. Renting a Learjet from Miami, Joe flies to Summer Island while frantically trying to contact Eve, who failed to call from Atlanta as promised. Suspecting foul play, Joe threatens Venable to leverage CIA resources to find and protect Eve.
The Ambush of Eve
Eve Duncan is ambushed and abducted at her lake property by a man named Doane after discovering Ben Hudson injured on the road. While preparing to travel to Summer Island to rescue Jane, Eve receives a call from Ben Hudson, who claims he is in the woods. When she drives out to find him, she discovers him lying on the ground with a head wound. A kindly-faced man introducing himself as Doane approaches offering help and then incapacitates Eve with a poisoned pinprick.
Eve finds Ben Hudson crumpled on the side of the road with a gash over his eye, where a man named Doane approaches her and injects her with a substance using a pinprick. Eve is abducted and held captive by a man named Doane who communicates via Skype with the shooter Terence Blick. Doane drugs Eve and keeps her on the floor of his truck, reprimanding Blick over a computer screen for shooting Jane instead of just keeping her on the island.
3. Captivity and Survival Tactics
Held in an isolated mountain stronghold, Eve uses desperate survival strategies and raw cunning to endure her captor and protect her surrogate family.
James Doane meticulously set up an exact replica of Eve's lab in an abandoned mountain coin factory. He spent over two years conducting electronic surveillance on Eve to prepare this workspace. Doane threatened to let his violent associate Blick kill Jane if Eve refused to cooperate with his demands.
The Forensic Lab
Doane tenderly places the burned skull of Kevin on the worktable dais in Eve's custom mountain laboratory. Doane keeps this blackened, burned skull named Kevin, believing passionately that forensic reconstruction can bring his son back to how he once looked. Eve works in a secluded house in the Rio Grande Forest in Colorado, dealing with nausea and trying to find clues in Doane's desk. Doane pressures Eve to work faster on the facial reconstruction, using overhead gas jets and controlled ventilation to keep her subdued.
Eve knows Doane uses knockout gas sprayed from ceiling sockets to immobilize her. She decides to build resistance to the kidnapper's knockout gas by intentionally inhaling small controlled doses. You can follow her method to attempt partial immunity:
- Fold up the rollaway bed to gain height
- Prop the nightstand against the bed to steady it
- Climb carefully onto the folded edge to reach the ceiling socket
- Open the socket closure just enough to release a small amount of gas
- Inhale a controlled whiff, then quickly screw the closure shut
- Rest and recover from nausea before repeating the exposure to build immunity
Eve unscrews a ceiling socket closure, inhales the carnation-scented gas, and suffers severe dizziness and sickness before resolving to repeat the process. The ceiling socket sits at an approximate height of ten feet above the cot. After exposure, Eve spends thirty minutes lying on the cot recovering from the sickness. She waits two minutes before cautiously testing the gas valve in her room again.
Building Immunity
Desperate situations can force clever technical workarounds, such as using a computer's peripheral cable to power a dead cell phone. Eve disconnects the mouse from the laptop and strips the insulation from the internal wires to expose the red and black power leads. She connects them to her phone battery terminals using sculpting clay to establish temporary power for a call. You can duplicate this emergency procedure:
- Disconnect the mouse cable from the computer port and strip away the insulation
- Expose the red and black power wires and strip the copper ends
- Attach the wires using sculpting clay to the correct battery compartment terminals
- Plug the other end into the USB port and press the phone power button
Eve successfully powers on her dead mobile phone just long enough to attempt calling Joe before Doane discovers her and smashes the device.
4. The Rescue and Final Revelations
Joe Quinn, Jane MacGuire, and a team of specialists piece together classified files and tracking clues to hunt down Doane and uncover shocking family secrets.
Uncovering the Past
Agent Venable confirms the identity of the abductor as James Doane, also known as James Herbert Relling, who was previously under CIA protective custody. After the murder of CIA agent Tad Dukes, whose throat was cut in the woods, Venable admits that the suspect has a heavily scrubbed file and was protected by the agency for five years following court proceedings involving his son.
Possessing sensitive classified information can be used effectively as a blackmail tool to secure long-term protection from intelligence agencies. Doane describes how Kevin acquired a disk from the Taliban proving that General Tarther had sent assassins to eliminate Pakistan officials moving Bin Laden, which Doane later used to blackmail authorities into putting him under a CIA witness protection program.
Venable hid Relling's crimes initially and placed Doane in a small town in Colorado under five years of surveillance, which ultimately failed due to operative complacency.
The Final Chase
Doane orders his associate Blick to assassinate General John Tarther to initiate his revenge plot. While keeping Eve hostage, Doane calls his operative Blick to execute the first target on his list, General Tarther, demonstrating that he can command violence from afar and terrorize Eve.
Blick breaks into a house next door to Tarther's guarded residence in Virginia and shoots him in his garden while a guard is distracted inside.
Venable confesses to Joe, Jane, and Margaret that Kevin Relling was a Special Forces assassin and megalomaniac who murdered General Tarther's daughter to protect his al-Qaeda allies, and that Doane later sought protection while secretly holding a compromising disk.
Doane drops a bombshell claim that Lee Zander is actually Eve Duncan's biological father. While pursuing Eve up the mountain path, Doane taunts her by revealing that his search for a way to pierce Zander's armor led him to discover that Eve is Zander's daughter, explaining why she was targeted for the final trap.
10 Key Ideas
- Jim Doane leaves his home in Goldfork, Colorado, carrying his son Kevin's burned skull in a velvet-lined toolbox to force forensic sculptor Eve Duncan into facial reconstruction.
- Margaret Douglas uses an intuitive connection with animals to diagnose that Jane MacGuire's half-dog half-wolf pet Toby was injected with a slow-acting poison.
- Caleb analyzes security footage to discover that Herbert Connors poisoned Toby to force Jane's emergency trip to Summer Island, thereby isolating Eve from her protectors.
- Eve is ambushed and abducted at her lake property by James Doane after she discovers an injured Ben Hudson on the road.
- Jane takes a bullet meant for Margaret at the airfield hangar and is rushed to the veterinary research center for emergency treatment and a blood transfusion.
- James Doane confines Eve to an abandoned mountain coin factory and threatens to let his violent associate Blick kill Jane if Eve refuses to cooperate.
- Eve builds resistance to her captor's knockout gas by intentionally inhaling small controlled doses from the ceiling sockets.
- Eve uses a computer mouse's peripheral cable to power a dead cell phone long enough to attempt calling Joe before Doane smashes the device.
- Blick breaks into a house next door to General John Tarther's guarded residence in Virginia and shoots him in his garden.
- James Doane drops a bombshell claim while pursuing Eve up the mountain path by revealing that Lee Zander is actually Eve Duncan's biological father.