The Protocol E-Book

J. Robert Kennedy

• Herausgeber: J. Robert Kennedy
• Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2011

Beschreibung

*** ON SALE FOR A LIMITED TIME TO INTRODUCE YOU TO THIS USA TODAY BESTSELLING SERIES! *** If you enjoy action-packed thrillers, then don’t miss The Protocol, a globe-spanning, heart-pounding adventure two thousand years in the making, from J. Robert Kennedy, “a master storyteller” (Betty Richard) and “one of the best writers today” (Johnny Olsen). THE FINAL SKULL HAS BEEN FOUND. NOW ALL HELL'S BREAKING LOOSE.For two thousand years the Triarii have protected us, influencing history from the crusades to the discovery of America. Descendant from the Roman Empire, they pervade every level of society, and are now in a race with our own government to retrieve an ancient artifact thought to have been lost forever. Caught in the middle is Archaeology Professor James Acton, relentlessly hunted by the elite Delta Force, under orders to stop at nothing to possess what he has found, and the Triarii, equally determined to prevent the discovery from falling into the wrong hands. With his students and friends dying around him, Acton flees to find the one person who might be able to help him, but little does he know he may actually be racing directly into the hands of an organization he knows nothing about. About the James Acton Thrillers: "If you want fast and furious, if you can cope with a high body count, most of all if you like to be hugely entertained, then you can't do much better than J. Robert Kennedy." The James Acton Thrillers series and its spin-offs, the Special Agent Dylan Kane Thrillers and the Delta Force Unleashed Thrillers, have over 3000 Five-Star reviews and over 800,000 copies in circulation. If you love non-stop action and intrigue with a healthy dose of humor, try James Acton today! "James Acton: A little bit of Jack Bauer and Indiana Jones!" Available James Acton Thrillers: The Protocol, Brass Monkey, Broken Dove, The Templar's Relic, Flags of Sin, The Arab Fall, The Circle of Eight, The Venice Code, Pompeii's Ghosts, Amazon Burning, The Riddle, Blood Relics, Sins of the Titanic, Saint Peter's Soldiers, The Thirteenth Legion, Raging Sun, Wages of Sin, Wrath of the Gods, The Templar's Revenge

Leseprobe

The Protocol

A James Acton Thriller

by

J. Robert Kennedy

From the Back Cover

FROM USA TODAY BESTSELLING AUTHOR J. ROBERT KENNEDY COMES THE PROTOCOL, A GLOBE-SPANNING, HEART-POUNDING ACTION ADVENTURE TWO THOUSAND YEARS IN THE MAKING!

For two thousand years the Triarii have protected us, influencing history from the crusades to the discovery of America. Descendant from the Roman Empire, they pervade every level of society, and are now in a race with our own government to retrieve an ancient artifact thought to have been lost forever.

Caught in the middle is Archaeology Professor James Acton, relentlessly hunted by the elite Delta Force, under orders to stop at nothing to possess what he has found, and the Triarii, equally determined to prevent the discovery from falling into the wrong hands.

With his students and friends dying around him, Acton flees to find the one person who might be able to help him, but little does he know he may actually be racing directly into the hands of an organization he knows nothing about?

About J. Robert Kennedy

With over 850,000 books sold and over 3000 five-star reviews, USA Today bestselling author J. Robert Kennedy has been ranked by Amazon as the #1 Bestselling Action Adventure novelist based upon combined sales. He is the author of over thirty international bestsellers including the smash hit James Acton Thrillers. He lives with his wife and daughter and writes full-time.

"A master storyteller." — Betty Richard

"A writer who tells what we are thinking but sometimes afraid to say." — Bruce Ford

"Kennedy kicks ass in this genre." — David Mavity

"One of the best writers today." — Johnny Olsen

"If you want fast and furious, if you can cope with a high body count, most of all if you like to be hugely entertained, then you can't do much better than J Robert Kennedy." — Amazon Vine Voice Reviewer

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Books by J. Robert Kennedy

The James Acton Thrillers

The Protocol Brass Monkey Broken Dove The Templar's Relic Flags of Sin The Arab Fall The Circle of Eight The Venice Code Pompeii's Ghosts Amazon Burning The Riddle Blood Relics Sins of the Titanic Saint Peter's Soldiers The Thirteenth Legion Raging Sun Wages of Sin Wrath of the Gods The Templar's Revenge

The Special Agent Dylan Kane Thrillers

Rogue Operator Containment Failure Cold Warriors Death to America Black Widow The Agenda Retribution

The Delta Force Unleashed Thrillers

Payback Infidels The Lazarus Moment

Table of Contents

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Table of Contents

Beginning

Preface

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Afterword

Don't Miss Out!

Thank You!

About the Author

Also by the Author

Preface

The crystal skulls referred to herein have been confirmed to be of unknown origin and unknown method of manufacture by top scientists at Hewlett-Packard.

“And he bearing his cross went forth into a place called the place of a skull, which is called in the Hebrew Golgotha: Where they crucified him, and two other with him, on either side one, and Jesus in the midst.”

John 19:17-18 King James Version

“All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act out their dream with open eyes, to make it possible.”

1

London, England 1212 AD

“Papa! Help me, please help me!”

Lord Richard Baxter picked himself up from the ground, his knee torn open, the wound demanding attention, its sting ignored. Consuming all his thoughts were his daughter’s desperate cries as they tore at the night like a dagger, slicing through the tortured wailing surrounding him, while fire engulfed home after home. With the smoke choking him, the heat searing his lungs, he held the sleeve of his tunic over his mouth and raced toward the pleas of his precious daughter. Tears streaked the soot on his face, his eyes irritated by the smoke and the overwhelming mental image of his daughter’s plight.

As he pushed through the carnage and destruction, he wondered what could possibly remain of his family home, a home paid for in blood six years earlier while saving King John’s mistress from brigands. His heroics had earned him the King’s thanks, and a Lordship over a small plot of land. As a member of the council, he kept a modest home in London with his beloved wife and daughter, the taxes he now collected from his new territory affording him the luxury of improving their lot.

He stumbled forward, the pain in his knee now too much to ignore. He couldn’t help but conjure images of his wife and daughter, any happy thought of them shoved aside with horrid imaginings of them burning alive, his name on their lips, asking why he hadn’t been there to save them.

It crushed his heart, the thought of not being there with them in their hour of need. His work had run late, very late, and if it weren’t for the unexpected happenings at the council, he would have been home with them, able perhaps to save them from the plight they now suffered.

They’re dying because of you!

He had been in the council chambers, meeting with the elders to discuss the latest discovery, when a terrific explosion had leveled the once mighty walls. He had been one of a handful to survive, and was in the process of attempting to rescue those still trapped in the chamber, when word had reached him of what was happening outside.

Then his only thought was to get home to his family.

What he had found had rendered him speechless. As far as the eye could see, almost every structure had been flattened. Twisted bodies lay strewn about, fires springing up all around him, spreading fast, lighting the thatched roofs of the houses left standing.

He rounded the smoldering embers of what was once a proud stand of trees, to see flames devouring the last remaining section of his home not knocked over by the blast. His servants were desperately dousing the flames with water from the nearby well, but it was of no use. The house was a loss, the hellish flames consuming every surface as if possessed by an unquenchable thirst.

His daughter’s screams reached him from inside.

“Lord Baxter!” cried his valet. “Thank the good Lord you are all right. I had feared the worst.”

“My daughter—”

“She is trapped inside, m’Lord, and we are unable to reach her. I’m afraid your wife was killed in the initial conflagration.”

Richard’s chest ached at the news of his dear wife’s death, his eyes filling with tears as his heart silently broke, but another cry from his daughter had him cautiously approaching the roaring fire as he pushed his grief aside, knowing if he didn’t act quickly, he would lose all that remained of his wife. Shielding himself from the intense heat with his cloak, he retreated, the flames licking the night air as if searching for another taste of the blood it had already claimed.

“Papa!” The pain and desperation in her voice tore at his heart as he imagined his wife, crying from Heaven for him to save their daughter. He ran toward the entrance of the home, determined to salvage what remained of a once happy family, but was grabbed by two of his servants.

“M’Lord, ’tis suicide to enter!” one cried. “You will surely die!”

Wresting free, he rushed for the door when the front wall collapsed inward, silencing the terrified voice. He fell to his knees and sobbed, his fists slamming into the ground as all hope, all dreams of the future, died in that moment, as his will to live left him.

The servants pulled him to safety and to the body of his cherished wife. He stared upon her still form, her lower body charred from the flames, and wept as he imagined the agonizing death she must have endured. He gazed upon her face and noticed her neck, twisted and broken, and prayed it happened before the burning, this small comfort lessening his anguish only slightly as his chest heaved with sobs, his family wiped from existence with one swing of an unforgiving and unknown broadsword of evil. He raised his hands to the heavens and prayed for God to care for their souls, and to reunite them all.

Soon.

A throat cleared behind him, causing a momentary flash of anger to rush through his body as he reached for his sword, rage consuming him as his tortured soul demanded retribution, demanded that all things die so there was no possibility he could experience joy or happiness again, his entire being overwhelmed in grief and self-pity.

Control yourself.

He sucked in a deep breath, holding it as he again stared to the heavens, silently praying for easy entrance into the celestial paradise for his loved ones. Rising to his feet, he wiped the tears from his face before turning to see who had interrupted him.

It was his manservant. “Yes, what is it?”

“I am so sorry to intrude in your hour of grief, m’Lord,” his trusted man murmured, his head bowed, “but the council page has said that your presence is required immediately. I told him that you were unavailable, but he was most insistent.”

Richard raised his hand, cutting him off. “Tell him I will be along in a moment.” He turned back to his wife, knelt down, and placed one last tender kiss upon her forehead, before rising to fulfill his greater duty, a duty handed down for over a thousand years.

2

The British Museum London, England Present Day

Clive Obrock sat at the central security station of the British Museum with his black Nike-shod feet crossed at the ankles, perched on a corner of his desk, with his chair tilted precariously back, his long ponytail suspended in the air. His bony hands were clasped behind his head, revealing the beginnings of yellow sweat stains under the armpits of his threadbare shirt. His mother had told him to replace it, but he hadn’t seen the need—when he had his jacket on, which was all of the time when outside of this room, nobody could see his armpits anyway. He had told her to mind her own business, then wondered why he’d ever agreed to move back into the old family home.

The room hummed with the fans of the computers, almost drowning out the annoying buzz of the overhead fluorescent lighting. Banks of monitors surrounded him, each alternating between different areas of the museum. Various entrances and exhibits flashed by, revealing security guards on patrol, empty corridors, and lonely displays. Clive had worked here so long, the priceless works of art, and artifacts of mostly forgotten ancient civilizations, had lost their allure and fascination.

The only screen that interested him now was the one showing the Man-U football game.

So engrossed was he, that he didn’t notice the car pull up to the Montague Place entrance, or its lone occupant dash to the maintenance door, sheltered from an incessant English rain by the jacket pulled over his head. He rang the buzzer.

Clive nearly fell out of his seat. He killed the game and turned to the monitor demanding his attention. The jacket protected the hunkered over figure from both the rain and the camera. Clive punched the intercom button.

“The museum is closed, sir.”

“Clive, it’s me, Rodney! Let me in, I’m freezing my bollocks off!”

Clive laughed and tapped in the code to open the maintenance entrance. A buzzer sounded, and he watched the door open as Rodney Underwood pushed against it. A moment later his friend appeared on the inner corridor camera, shaking the rain from his jacket and running his hands through his hair, the water puddling around his discount-store Oxfords. Rodney flashed a grin then mouthed something at the camera, prompting Clive to punch up the audio.

“—E-R-P! Double O-L, Liverpool FC!”

Clive pressed the intercom button. “United’s goin’ to kick yer arses!”

Rodney flipped him the bird then continued toward the security station. Clive laughed and turned the game back on, propping his feet on the desk corner again. A few minutes later, there was a knock at the station door. He reached under the desk and pressed the entry buzzer. The door opened behind him.

“Hey, Rodney, United’s up by one.”

He kicked off the desk, spinning his chair to face the door, keeping his eyes on the game as long as he could. As his chair completed its spin, he turned his head around to see the barrel of a gun pointed at him. The gun fired and a stinging pain radiated from the center of this chest as he was hit. He slid from the chair into a heap on the floor, and the last thing he saw before the world blackened around him was his friend of five years standing over him.

On the monitor, Liverpool tied the game.

3

Andes Mountains, Peru One Week Earlier

Garcia swung the pickaxe against the cave wall. The clumped dirt and rock sprayed back at him, mixing with the sweat glistening on his head and soaking through his shirt. “Este trabajo de Puta me lleva al Diablo,” he muttered under his breath.

I feel like a mule. I don’t see the Americanos getting dirty.

He swung again, and another shower of dirt flew back from the wall. It was slow, hard work, but the professor had said there may be a secret room on the other side. Garcia respected the professor.

He gets dirty.

At first, he had agreed to be a guide, his deeply ingrained superstitions too strong to participate in disturbing the ancient home of the ancestors. But the professor had a way of making him feel at ease, so he had agreed to help with the heavy labor. Now he was regretting it. Another swing, and this time the axe almost came out of his hands as he broke through.

Excited, he cleared away more dirt, exposing the other side. After a few minutes of digging with his hands, he stuck his head through the hole. The pungent smell of centuries of rot and decay threatened to overwhelm him, yet he persevered, pushing his head in further. He couldn’t see anything. Then he remembered the flashlight on his belt. He fumbled for it, his fingers numb from swinging the axe, his heart pounding in excitement. Finally grasping it, he shone the light through the hole as he stuck his head back in. At first, he saw only more dirt, then as he played the light around, it struck something shiny. He focused the light and gasped as two disembodied eyes glared at him.

He jerked back, tripping over his axe. As he hit the cave floor, his flashlight flew from his hand, smacking the ground and going dark. “El Diablo!” he muttered as he stared at the hole in horror. He scrambled to his feet. “El Diablo!” he screamed as he ran down the narrow passage back to the surface. “El Diablo!”

Archaeology Professor James Acton was on his knees, carefully brushing dirt away from what appeared to be an intact clay pot. One of his students, working in the same grid, carefully sifted the soil for any small shards. Students in other grids, each cordoned off with twine staked at the corners, were painstakingly removing over five hundred years of earth, burying what Acton was now confident was an ancient Incan city.

This was the part of the job he loved—getting his hands dirty. Teaching in front of a class full of students was a close second, but taking those same students out of the environment they were familiar with, and sticking them in the middle of what was now nowhere, but where once an ancient civilization thrived, was indescribable.

The excitement on the young faces when they discovered something even as simple as a clay pot, brought joy to his heart each time, something he prayed would never grow old. His hunch the city was actually here had been proven several years ago when he and a single grad student had received funding to confirm if an ancient Spanish map was accurate.

And it had been.

Precisely.

He had wanted to stay, to tell the university to forward his mail here, to the middle of nowhere, but of course returned to begin the long fight for funding a real, long-term dig. And now they were here, half a dozen of his best students, funded by the University, various endowments, and some well-off parents of the lucky ones.

It was a shoestring budget, yet he didn’t care. What they were learning was invaluable, much of it routine, though some of it puzzling with no explanation as of yet. And that was what he lived for.

The unexplained.

He sat back on his haunches, his grid forgotten as he gazed at their most puzzling find yet, not twenty feet away.

It makes no sense.

He leaned back and stretched when screams erupted from a nearby cave at the top of the embankment bordering the southern side of the site. He leaped to his feet, rushing toward the hillside. Garcia, one of their local hires, burst from the entrance and tumbled down the hill to the camp below, striking his head on a small rock.

“Señor Professor! El Diablo esta en la cueva! El Diablo is in the cave!”

Acton reached him as the terrified man’s eyes fluttered then shut, a nasty gash on his forehead oozing blood. “Get some water and a med kit over here, now.” Acton knelt beside the unconscious man, examining Garcia’s body for broken bones, and finding none. One of his students, Robbie Andrews, arrived with a canteen of water and the medical kit. Acton opened it as he eyed the now moaning Garcia.

He soaked a cloth in water, then began cleaning the wound. Garcia moaned louder as the cool liquid revived him, and gradually he came to, trying to sit up. Acton held him down.

“Drink,” he ordered, holding a canteen to Garcia’s lips. The still weak man drank gratefully, and when he had his fill, he pulled away. Acton handed the canteen to Robbie, then waved the rest of the gathered students away. “Let’s give Garcia some space, shall we?” The students moved off, disappointed, but his primary concern was for the health of their hired help, a man who had impressed Acton repeatedly over the past few weeks as he had taken on more duties, despite his grave reservations of disturbing “the ancestors.” Acton sat beside him and placed a hand on the man’s shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze. “Now, tell me what you saw. And remember,” he said, looking down at Garcia with a reassuring smile, “you’re safe now.”

Garcia breathed a deep sigh, trying unsuccessfully to control his breathing, his chest still heaving. “Señor Professor, I see the Devil in the cave,” he said in his thick Peruvian accent, the fear still tingeing his voice despite Acton’s assurances of safety. It was clear the man’s superstitions had got the better of him, and it was something Acton had dealt with across the world. Superstitions were pervasive in all cultures, including Western, and especially so outside of the “First World.” It made hiring local help difficult at times, though the almighty dollar would usually win out.

Until one day something was stumbled upon that would send them into a panic, and the camp would suddenly find itself devoid of workers.

He feared if he couldn’t calm Garcia down, they might lose the limited help they managed to attract up to this remote location, which at the moment included only Garcia, two guards, and one driver who brought their supplies.

“Tell me exactly what happened.” Acton continued to smile as he pressed slightly harder on the gash, stemming the flow of blood.

“I was digging at the wall like you ask me to, and I finally get through—”

“You got through?” Acton and Robbie exchanged excited smiles. “What did you see?”

“El Diablo, I see El Diablo! I look through the hole, and I first could see nothing so I get my light and then I can see. I see two red eyes staring at me. It was the Devil, Señor. I swear! I run outta there.”

Acton was skeptical, to say the least, knowing Garcia’s superstitious nature. Whatever he had seen, however, was enough to send this poor man into a panic. And two red, glowing eyes, had to be something, perhaps a reflection off of some jewels. The thought of what Garcia might have found had his own heart racing, but for now he had to calm the man whose breathing had quickened its pace.

“Two eyes?”

“Yes. Come, I show you if you not believe me!” pleaded Garcia.

The best way to calm him was to humor him—expressing any doubt in what he had seen would insult the man’s honor. Besides, regardless of what Garcia thought he had seen, Acton had no doubt he had seen something, and was as eager to find out what that might be as Garcia was to prove he wasn’t lying.

“No, you rest here. I’ll go and look myself.” Acton rose and started up the path leading to the cave entrance. He motioned for a couple of students to watch Garcia and for Robbie to follow him. “Grab some gear.” They soon arrived at the entrance and crawled through the narrow opening of the cave discovered by a couple of amorous students the day before, behind a thick growth of bushes. Once inside, the narrow passageway opened up, allowing them to walk upright, though single file, deeper into the damp, dripping cave. Two hundred feet in, they found the hole Garcia had been laboring at all day. Acton shone his flashlight through, coughing at the overwhelming stench. At first, he too saw nothing.

Then he gasped.

4

National Security Agency Headquarters Fort George G. Meade, Maryland

Echelon chewed through every phone call, e-mail, fax, and telex message sent either by land or satellite from its laboratory in the National Security Agency building. Its Dictionary watchlist was programmed to listen and search for certain hot words such as “bomb” or “anthrax.” Any such messages or calls were flagged for review, and depending on the priority of the words and number of hits in a particular conversation or sequence of communications, meant either immediately reviewed, or put on a file to be reviewed, possibly months later. The call from Peru at 17:52 Eastern Standard Time was immediately reviewed: