What lies beneath... At first, Jean Suttman thought she had died and gone to heaven when she was granted the opportunity to study in Rome. But the body that's lying in the ancient subterranean Temple of Mithra — the murdered corpse of a repulsive and disliked fellow student — is far from her idea of heavenly. Now she's truly frightened, and not just because small accidents seem to be occurring around her with disturbing regularity. It's the ever-increasing certainty that someone, for some unknown reason, is ruthlessly determined to do her harm. Jean's innocent underground excursion into a sacred pagan place has trapped her in something dark and terrifying, and even the knowledge that practical, perceptive fellow American Jacqueline Kirby is on the case won't ease her fears. Because there's only so far Jean Suttman can run... and no escape for her except death.

Banned forever from the eastern end of the Valley of the Kings, eminent Egyptologist Radcliffe Emerson's desperate attempt to regain digging rights backfires — and his dream of unearthing the tomb of the little-known king Tutankhamon is dashed. Now Emerson, his archaeologist wife, Amelia Peabody, and their family must watch from the sidelines as Lord Carnarvon and Howard Carter discover the greatest Egyptian treasure of all time. But the Emersons' own less impressive excavations are interrupted when father and son Ramses are lured into a trap by a strange group of villains ominously demanding answers to a question neither man comprehends. And it will fall to the ever-intrepid Amelia to protect her endangered family — and perhaps her nemesis as well — from a devastating truth hidden uncomfortably close to home... and from a nefarious plot that threatens the peace of the entire region.

A priceless relic has been delivered to the Emerson home overlooking the Nile. But more than history surrounds this golden likeness of a forgotten king, for it is said early death will befall anyone who possesses it. The woman who implores the renowned family of archaeologists and adventurers to accept the cursed statue insists the ill-gotten treasure has already killed her husband. Further, she warns, unless it is returned to the tomb from which it was stolen, more will surely die. With the world finally at peace — and with Egypt's ancient mysteries opened to them once more — Amelia Peabody and her loved ones are plunged into a storm of secrets, treachery, and murder by a widow's strange story and even stranger request. Each step toward the truth reveals a new peril, suggesting this curse is no mere superstition. And the next victim of the small golden king could be any member of the close-knit clan — perhaps even Amelia herself.