In 1939, Dr. Lotty Herschel, V. I. Warshawki’s closest friend in Chicago, escaped the Holocaust in Vienna with her childhood playmate, Kitty Saginor Binder. Though the two drifted and animosities grew between them over the years, when Kitty’s daughter finds her life in danger, she turns to Lotty for help. In turn, Lotty summons V.I. to take the case. The threats on the daughter’s life at first seem a simple case of bad drug dealings, but V.I. soon discovers that they are just the tip of an iceberg of lies, secrets and silence whose origins trace back to the deadly race among America, Germany, Japan, and England to develop the atomic bomb. And while the secrets may be old, the people who continue to guard them will do anything to make sure they stay buried.…

1939 年，洛緹‧賀雪是女偵探沃莎斯基在芝加哥最好的朋友，她與兒時玩伴凱蒂‧賽爵娜‧拜德得以從維也納猶太大屠殺倖存下來。漂泊流離的兩人幾年下來心生嫌隙，不過當凱蒂的女兒發現自己有生命危險後，仍然求助於洛緹，而洛緹則轉而請沃莎斯基接手。凱蒂女兒遭受威脅的事因起初看似單純的違法毒品交易，但沃莎斯基很快就發現那不過是冰山一角，隱藏其下的是更大的謊言、秘密和沉默，一切的根源可追溯到美、德、日、英四國間相互較量原子彈開發的致命比賽。雖然這些都已是陳年秘密，但持續守護秘密的人為了確保真相永遠封存，可是什麼事都做得出來……