In the searing heat of Guatemala, Dr. Temperance Brennan excavates the remains of a two-year-old child from a site that is said to contain the bodies of twenty-three women and children. Shaken by the discovery, Tempe tries to harden herself against the horrors that she finds. And then four young girls go missing from Guatemala When a skeleton is found in a septic tank at the back of a rundown hotel, only someone with Tempe`s expertise can deduce who the victim was and how they died. But her path is blocked at every turn. It would seem that some people would prefer that Guatemala`s `disappeared` stay buried. And others want the missing girls kept the same