Working as a buyer for the Reynard Art Fund, an art investment company, Maddy Blume is set to bid on a painting of a headless nude woman by surrealist painter Marcel Duchamp at Sotheby's auction house in New York. But bids on the painting quickly skyrocket and she loses out to an unkempt man representing a Russian oligarch. Maddy's boss is intent on finding out who has the painting and what he plans to do with it, and Maddy is assigned the task.

Meanwhile, Englishman Alan Powell of the Serious Organized Crime Agency, is investigating the identity of a headless corpse found beneath the boardwalk in Brighton Beach. He's sure it has ties to New York's Russian mafia and the Duchamp painting, but first he must identify the dead woman.

Then a third element is added to the mix in the form of a Russian thief and assassin calling himself the Scythian, who's been hired to retrieve the painting from the buyer -- no matter what it takes to do so. His tactics and the outcome are almost beyond comprehension.

As a series of mysterious killings takes place, it becomes apparent there are a number of disparate elements at work here involving a conspiracy that seems almost impossible to unravel.

This edgy and complex arcane thriller is guaranteed to keep you captivated until the volatile ending.