Ten Seconds to Dead


L.A. Clayton - 2020
    She molds herself into becoming exactly what the CIA is looking for---and captures their interest, both personally and professionally. But before she can finish the CIA process, Kate is offered a position as an espionage agent in another highly secretive government agency, which she accepts.While completing her agency training, Kate is catapulted into a shadowy world where wealth and power are the ultimate goal, and those in charge will stop at nothing to get it. While on the job, Kate uncovers secrets that, if revealed, would cost her life, but if kept, could bring down a nation. Isolated and unsure of who to trust, she brings in a fellow agent, but pulling him into the web of conspiracy and lies puts a target on both their backs - and it will take every skill they’ve ever learned as agents to stay alive long enough to stop the enemy no one else can see.

Deadly Straits


R.E. McDermott - 2011
    Griffin, R.E. McDermott delivers a thriller to rival the masters.When marine engineer and very part-time spook Tom Dugan becomes collateral damage in the War on Terror, he's not about to take it lying down.Falsely implicated in a hijacking, he's offered a chance to clear himself by helping the CIA snare their real prey, Dugan's best friend, London ship owner Alex Kairouz. Reluctantly, Dugan agrees to go undercover in Alex's company, despite doubts about his friend's guilt. Once undercover, Dugan's steadfast refusal to accept Alex's guilt puts him at odds not only with his CIA superiors, but also with a beautiful British agent with whom he's romantically involved.When a tanker is found adrift near Singapore with a dead crew, and another explodes in Panama as Alex lies near death after a suspicious suicide attempt, Dugan is framed for the attacks. Out of options, and convinced the attacks are prelude to an even more devastating assault, Dugan eludes capture to follow his last lead to Russia, only to be shanghaied as an 'advisor' to a Russian Spetsnaz unit on a suicide mission.Deadly Straits is a non-stop thrill ride, from London streets, to the dry docks of Singapore, to the decks of the tankers that slake the world's thirst for oil, with stops along the way in Panama, Langley, Virginia, and Teheran. Richly spiced with detail from the author's 30 years sailing, building, and repairing ships worldwide, it is, in the words of one reviewer, "fast-paced, multilayered and gripping."

The Protocol


J. Robert Kennedy - 2010
    Descendent 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…

Breach of Peace


Daniel Gibbs - 2019
    Merchant ships operating in neutral space near the Terran Coalition and the League of Sol are disappearing without a trace. The latest report has something the others didn’t. A survivor. When news reaches the planet Lusitania during a cargo offload, Captain Henry and the Shadow Wolf’s crew are hired to extract the surviving operative before she’s silenced and the information she has is lost.But too many opposing forces are at work within the faction-torn republic – and they all want a piece of the prize.With directives from multiple government contacts, Captain Henry concedes to protect his ragtag crew. Years ago, he surrendered to dishonor and dismissal from the Coalition Defense Force in order to protect his fellow officers. This time he knows how to play the game.To save his band of brothers and sisters, Jim must walk a fine line between the operative’s survival and the threats against his crew from the League of Sol. Before the time to negotiate runs out.

The Rescue


Steven Konkoly - 2019
    Hired by an influential US senator to liberate his daughter from a human-trafficking ring, Decker never anticipated sabotage or that the assault could go so disastrously wrong. The hostage is dead. His team is wiped out, and so are their families, including Decker’s own wife and son—eliminated one by one by the Russian mafia. And he’s survived to take the fall.When he’s inexplicably freed soon into a ten-year sentence in federal prison, Decker suspects another setup. And private investigator Harlow Mackenzie knows he’s right. She has evidence that a power greater than the Russian mob was behind the raid that ruined Decker’s life.The next move in a nationwide cat-and-mouse game of high-level sedition is up to them. Fueled by revenge and an obsession to clear his name, Decker has only one mission: to destroy a growing conspiracy before it’s too late.

Burned


Melissa F. Miller - 2021
    Light the fuse. Watch Olivia burn.CIA operative Olivia Santos lives on a razor's edge. As a NOC--an agent with non-official cover--she's well aware of the risks: if her cover's blown, there's no diplomatic immunity, and a life sentence in a foreign prison is the best-case scenario. The worst-case scenario is too gruesome to mention. But she never imagined her cover would be compromised from the inside. She has no choice but to go on the run--as luck has it--with her musclebound driving instructor.Once upon a time, Trent Mann thrived on danger. Now the former Navy SEAL's haunted by a costly mistake in his past. He focuses on his work for Potomac Private Services to hold his nightmares at bay. But when he's saddled with a vapid trophy wife as a defensive driving student, it doesn't take long for the fiery blonde with the enormous eyes to land them both in deep trouble.Soon Trent and Olivia are on the run from the government, foreign agents, her husband, and an endless list of shadowy enemies. As the danger reaches a boiling point, Olivia and Trent will have to ignore the fire crackling between them to focus on staying alive.

The Enigma Strain


Nick Thacker - 2014
    It's a race against time as Ben teams up with a woman from the CDC to figure who's behind the attacks, and how to stop the next one.

Doubt


C.E. Tobisman - 2016
    Right away, her new boss asks her to find out whether a popular GMO causes healthy people to fall ill. Caroline is only supposed to dig in the trenches and report up the ladder, but her tech background and intuition take her further than planned. When she suspects a link between the death of a prominent scientist and the shadowy biotech giant, she cries foul and soon finds herself in the crosshairs. The clock is ticking and thousands of lives are on the line…including her own.Now this rookie lawyer with a troubled past and a penchant for hacking must prove a billion-dollar company is responsible for thousands of deaths…before they come after her.

A Terminal Agenda


Mark McKay - 2015
    When a man dies violently one morning, only yards from the police station, the motive eludes him. The victim had recently been in India, looking for an ancient tomb that could contain something priceless. Was that reason enough to kill him?What seems to be a crime motivated by money, becomes something far more sinister. As the chief suspects continue to elude Nick, another agenda reveals itself, one that will bring death and destruction on a far larger scale. And anyone who compromises that agenda will be eliminated. As events unfold and the stakes get higher, Nick must confront the prospect of losing everything he holds dear, and taking a course of action that will change his life in ways he never imagined.

Mind's Eye


Douglas E. Richards - 2014
    But they're about to get far worse. Because he's being hunted by a team of relentless assassins. Soon Hall discovers that advanced electronics have been implanted in his brain, and he now has two astonishing abilities. He can surf the web using thoughts alone. And he can read minds. But who inserted the implants? And why? And why is someone so desperate to kill him?As Hall races to find answers, he comes to learn that far more is at stake than just his life. Because his actions can either catapult civilization to new heights--or bring about its total collapse.Extrapolated from actual research on thought-controlled web surfing, Mind's Eye is a smart, roller-coaster ride of a thriller. One that raises a number of intriguing, and sometimes chilling, possibilities about a future that is just around the corner.

Origin Story


James Beltz - 2017
    But make no mistake, he's tired of being pushed around. Life ambushed him years ago and left him bitter and broken. Now, when the same type of evil threatens him once more, it finds him more prepared. This time, he is just as lethal as the enemy that pursues him.Prepare yourself for a thriller that will forbid you to put it down. It is an Action / Thriller / Adventure novel that comes complete with heroic deeds, a bit of humor, a dash of romance, a few very unexpected twists, and an ending that may make you hurl something violently across the room.

The Alexandria Project


Andrew Updegrove - 2011
    Only by defeating the Alexandria Project can he clear himself. "THE ALEXANDRIA PROJECT is fiction that cuts close to the bone. But where George Orwell envisioned 1984 from the safety of thirty-five years out, the future that Updegrove describes may already be upon us. That's what makes it dangerous, and that's what makes THE ALEXANDRIA PROJECT an important as well as riveting read." - Dan Geer, CHIEF INFORMATION SECURITY OFFICER, In-Q-Tel

Innocent Injustice


David Archer - 2018
    He had always done his best to do what was right, and worked hard to help his grandparents, who were raising him and his sister after their parents died in a tragic accident. When an opportunity came to go to college, Chance began to think life might be on its way to getting better. But then, his little sister Robin was killed in a senseless murder, and Chance's world started falling apart. His grandfather, shocked at the loss of Robin, suffered a heart attack that took him away, as well. It was just Chance and his grandmother, and little hope that the killers would ever be brought to justice. Justice. Grandma had told Chance all about justice. Now, it was time to put those lessons to work.

Just Add Water


Jinx Schwartz - 2004
    Pushing forty and still single, Hetta is the epitome of the b word: bold, bossy, brassy, breezy and brash. After leaving a lifelong swath of failed multi-national affairs in her jet stream, it is no wonder Hetta prefers living with her dog R.J. But old habits die hard, and trolling for triceps is Hetta s hobby. Plying the waterfront in search of Saturday brunch, Hetta s attention is snagged by a parade of passing yacht--especially their predominantly male skippers--and experiences a champagne-induced epiphany: if she had a boat, she could get a man. In hopes a floating Valhalla will overcome an all-time low-water mark in her life, Hetta buys her dream boat in spite of a spectacular ignorance of all things nautical. But a shadowy stalker, an inconvenient body, and Hetta s own self-destructive foibles imperil not only her new life, but a newly- found romance.

Wood's Relic


Steven Becker - 2014
    An artifact discovered while working on a bridge pier quickly draws the attention of a real estate tycoon, a Jersey mobster and twin Indian Chiefs all trying to open a casino in the pristine Keys. When his psycho ex-girlfriend tracks him down things get even more interesting.