"Sizzling...Original...Hypnotic...A page-turner." --ORLANDO SENTINEL "Thoroughly chilling and engrossing...a breathtaking psychological thriller." --LIBRARY JOURNAL Back at college in the '70s, they called themselves "The Madison Seven"--a close circle of friends inseparably linked by trust, loyalty, and love. Then one night, years later, they gathered at Julia Mallet's Manhattan apartment for a "Come-As-You-Were Party" and decided to play a game... Tough, beautiful and independent, Julia Mallet feels her life is nearly perfect. She holds a high-profile executive position in an important advertising firm. She is raising a beautiful little daughter, Emily, without the inconvenience of a husband. And now "The Madison Seven" have come together once again to celebrate her thirty-fifth birthday...and to bring back a past that should have been left dead and forgotten. Less than twenty-four hours later, a woman Julia barely knows is brutally and senselessly slain by a faceless psychopath. NYPD Detective Ray Burgess is a man pursued by shadows, a good cop who has stared too deeply into the face of evil, and his obsessive dedication is drawing him closer to Julia, even as a crazed killer strikes again and again. The maniac has left a calling card behind that only Julia Mallet can read: the result of a post-hypnotic suggestion inadvertently lodged in six subconscious minds--the dark residue of a harmless party game gone terribly wrong. Now Julia knows without question that one of her six dearest friends is a murderer...and is coming after her next.
