According to Maya legend, December 21, 2012, will mark the end of the world as we know it. Is it myth . . . or will their prediction become reality?

Archaeologist Lina Taylor has devoted her life to studying ancient Maya artifacts, splitting her time between digs in South America and the classroom teaching college students. But the professor's structured, academic life is about to spin out of control. Some extremely valuable and important Maya artifacts have gone missing. Are the culprits fanatics determined to create chaos and usher in annihilation?

Helping out a friend, former immigration and customs enforcement officer Hunter Johnston is determined to recover the missing pieces and he needs Lina's help. A man used to calling the shots and working alone, he isn't comfortable letting anyone get close, especially a beautiful and brainy woman like Lina. His gift for reading people tells him there's a lot going on below that professional exterior, and he's more than a little curious to probe her depths.

Burying herself in her work, Lina's had little experience handling men, especially one as fascinating and exasperating as the secretive, headstrong Hunter. A devoted archaeologist, she has the skill to excavate those protective layers all the way to his core.

But finding the missing artifacts is only the beginning of a mystery that will plunge these unlikely partners into adventure, romance, and danger more thrilling, sensual, and deadly than either of them knows. . . .

Perennial New York Times bestselling author Elizabeth Lowell boldly puts the romance back into romantic suspense with BEAUTIFUL SACRIFICE — a story of passion and intrigue centered around the ancient Mayan prediction of the apocalyptic end of everything. Lowell’s thrillingly imaginative tale unites a dedicated female archaeologist with a former Immigration and Customs Enforcement Officer on a mission to recover priceless South American artifacts that could bring deadly chaos into our world.

BEAUTIFUL SACRIFICE is action, suspense, and love on a bestselling par with Lisa Gardner, Linda Howard, Jayne Ann Krentz, and Nora Roberts…and exactly the sort of romantic adventure that inspired Johanna Lindsey to declare, “Lowell is great!”