When a madman begins using the work of Botticelli as inspiration for his gruesome tableaus, a New York museum curator is the only man who can stop him Mike Manship is an up-and-coming curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. With a Botticelli retrospective fast approaching, Manship is poised to become the Met's director if he can secure three final drawings from Italy. Standing in his way is Ludovico Borghini, a neo-fascist count with a fanatical devotion to his Italian heritage and a deadly obsession with the Renaissance master's work. Between them are the three masterpieces and the alluring Isobel Cattaneo, a direct descendant of Botticelli's greatest muse, Simonetta. Borghini is determined to maintain possession of the drawings, and in the grips of his mania, he kidnaps Cattaneo, whom he suspects of aiding Manship. As the search for Cattaneo reaches a fever pitch, Manship discovers that Borghini is a much more twisted nemesis than he could ever have anticipated--one whose depravity reaches chilling depths.