BOX SET of THREE TOP 10 MEDICAL THRILLERS
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March 24th 2013
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Murder, Mystery and Eternal Youth
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A Mystery and Detective Medical Conspiracy Thriller!
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IAN C.P. IRVINE
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Published by Ian C. P. Irvine
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Copyright 2011 IAN.C.P.IRVINE
PLEASE NOTE: THIS BOOK WAS FIRST PUBLISHED UNDER THE TITLE
'THE ORLANDO FILE'
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All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright observed above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the copyright owner.
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
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This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Amazon and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
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To my Mum and Dad.
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Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Review Murder Mystery and Eternal Youth
Chapter 1
PLEASE NOTE: THIS BOOK WAS FIRST PUBLISHED UNDER THE TITLE
'THE ORLANDO FILE'
Park Place Apartments
Washington D.C.
“So what?”
It was an incredible quote, and a brilliant way to begin the article. True, it wasn’t the most conventional opening line for an important piece of investigative journalism, but who said you couldn’t start a story that way?
The CEO of a leading national utility company had been caught with his hand in the till, and when confronted by Kerrin on the phone at his home, he had laughed. Actually laughed.
Perhaps he was drunk, or maybe the CEO was just another of those arrogant bastards that thought he could get away with anything.
Whatever.
Kerrin was going to use the quote, and that was that.
He closed his eyes and imagined the headline of the article in bold print, spread across the top of the page.
"Utility Company Chairman Admits Million Dollar Fraud".
Not bad, but perhaps not good enough. He would fix that later.
First he had to finish the rest of the story.
He focused his concentration back on to the page, his fingers poised lightly on the keyboard and the cursor hanging menacingly above the third line…
There was a shrill, screeching noise in the background, and he bit hard on his lip as he reached for the phone. He hated to be disturbed when he was writing. Since giving up being a cop in Miami and starting from scratch as an investigative journalist at the Washington Post, he spent every day chasing deadlines: and if he didn't get this piece finished in the next five hours, he'd miss Friday's long promised full page spread on Page 3. His best position yet.
“Yes?” he bellowed down the phone.
“Kerrin…is that you?”
“Elizabeth! Sorry, yes, it’s me. You just caught me at a bad moment…”
"I'm sorry to disturb you Kerrin, but I need your help. Something…something terrible has happened!"
His sister's voice trembled as she spoke the words, and then abruptly she burst into tears.
Kerrin straightened up in his chair, his attention now completely on his sister. "What’s the matter? Why are you crying?” In the background Kerrin heard a loudspeaker, announcing the arrival of a flight. “Where are you?”
“I’m at the airport in the Bahamas,… with the kids.”
“The Bahamas? What the hell are you all doing there? You’re meant to be coming here this weekend…What’s going on?”
“I don't know. Martin called me this morning from the office in Orlando, told me not to argue, just to pack as much as I could and catch the first plane to Nassau…He said he'd meet me here this evening. Kerrin, I’m scared…”
“Did he say why?”
“No. There wasn’t time to discuss it. We were cut off…but I know it’s got something to do with the project he was working on…”
“Which project? He’s always working on something that’ll ‘change the world’.”
“Kerrin, don’t joke about it. This is serious!…Henry, Tom and Mike are dead! Sam's dead too, and Alex is missing!”
“Dead? What do you mean they're all dead? ”
“Exactly that. They’re dead!”, she shouted back, then started to cry again.
“Elizabeth, take a deep breath. Try to calm down. I’m sure…”
“Kerrin, I’m scared,” she continued. “Really scared. According to the police, Tom, Mike, Sam and Henry all committed suicide, or tried to. All in the space of four days of each other.”
“That's ridiculous. I was only with Alex and Tom last week when Martin took us out to play golf. They looked a bit stressed, but they definitely weren’t suicidal!”
“But now they’re dead!… and I think Martin is worried that it might be his turn next. That’s why he wants us all out of the country…Kerrin, what do I do? What if he doesn’t turn up?”
“Don't worry sis, he will. When’s he meant to be arriving?”
“In about two hours. He’s flying down in his jet, straight from Orlando.”
“Have you spoken to him since?”
“No, nothing…,” there was a pause, almost as if his sister was trying to pluck up the courage to say something else. “…But before we were cut off, he insisted that I must get you to come down here as well. He said he needed your help and that it was really important. I know that you don't want to leave Dana alone,
but Martin promised that you’d get that big scoop you've always wanted- a front page exclusive. The best story the Washington Post has had for ages! Please come Kerrin…I need you here too…”
Chapter 2
The Caribbean Ocean
Day One
The Lear jet flew silently through the cold, dark night. In bright blue fluorescent numbers the digital thermometer indicated that the outside temperature was -40 degrees. Inside the snug, leather lined cabin, Martin held the joystick tightly in his hands and stared out into the sky ahead.
He was flying high above the thin, scattered clouds, the sea far below him. It was fifty minutes since he had taken off from Miami airport, and with the slight headwind, it would be at least another thirty before he landed.
A voice spoke into his earphones, the control tower in Miami handing him over to the air traffic controllers in the Bahamas. He was out of American airspace now.
Martin felt himself relax, his hands slackening their hold on the joystick, the muscles in his arms and wrists losing some of the tension that had gripped his body for the last two months.
No, it was more than stress. Far more than that.
More like fear. Constant fear.
How long could a person live under such tension before having a heart attack? He thought about the other members of his research team, now dead, and his grip on the joystick tightened again.
His eyes scanned the instrumentation panel, registering that everything was okay. The almost full moon drew his attention, and he glanced upwards admiring its beauty.
After the company takeover, the six most important scientists in his team had refused to make the move from Florida to the new corporate headquarters on the West Coast. Not everyone wanted to live in California anymore. Who needed the congested freeways and overpriced real estate? Not to mention the pollution.
No thanks. Florida was just fine.
Until his friends had begun to die.
Or disappear. Like he was doing just now.
A string of 'unfortunate suicides', as the police had officially described them, caused by severe depression brought on from losing their jobs with their company.
From a team of six, in the space of one week, four had become so unhappy that they had all decided to kill themselves?
Not likely.
Martin had known them all. None of them were quitters, and none of them were so unhappy.
Stressed, yes, but for a different reason.
Martin knew exactly why members of his team were dying. They were being silenced, one by one.
Only Alex Swinton and himself were still around from the team that started the Orlando Project and then refused to move to California.
Then this morning Alex had left a message on his private number at work.
“Martin. You'll be next. Get out while you can…”
Was it a threat or a warning? Either way, for Martin it was enough.
It had taken the rest of the day to finalize and assemble the protection he would need for the future. Thankfully, a few days before, he had successfully managed to download all the information he needed about the Orlando Project… just before his network privileges had been revoked…and now he had enough to enable anyone else to repeat the research and the work they had done.
The trip to the airport had been fine. Although he had been on edge all the way from the office to the plane, half expecting to be mugged, or shot, or stopped by someone en route, it had been surprisingly straightforward to load up his plane, fuel it and take off.
He almost wished that he had not taken the last minute precautions: he had been so scared of something happening to him, that he had bundled up the files on the Orlando Project, and put them in a parcel in the post. That way at least, the information would be protected, and if anything happened to him, he would have something to bargain with.
He looked at his Rolex again.
Twenty-eight minutes to go.
It was beginning to look like he had managed to escape safely. Perhaps it would have been better if he had kept the file with him after all.
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Park Place Apartments
Washington D.C.
After the phone conversation, Kerrin couldn't concentrate. He had never heard his sister so scared before. She never cried. Never. She was the strong one in the family, the one that was always in control and looking after the other siblings, seldom showing emotion, no matter what trouble they’d all got themselves into. Growing up, she was his rock.
Her words reverberated around his mind, “I need you here…”
He hit the 'save' button on the computer screen, and stored the first three paragraphs of the story. The CEO of Small Holdings had just been granted a last minute reprieve. For now.
Opening up his web browser, Kerrin began to search the internet for flights to the Bahamas. The last flight to Nassau that evening had already left, but according to his favorite travel site, there was another one leaving from JFK at nine the next morning. Kerrin selected a window seat and after putting in his credit card details, he printed off the confirmation and his ticket. He picked up what was left of his rum and coke and walked into the TV room.
Dana, his wife, had nodded off again while watching the Letterman show. He kissed her lightly on the cheek, and she stretched and woke up, throwing Kerrin one of her fantastic smiles.
Just then the phone rang again. Dana spun her wheelchair around and rolled over to the phone table.
“Elizabeth? Is that you? …Yes, Kerrin’s right here…”
She held the phone out to Kerrin, covering the mouthpiece as she spoke.
“She’s crying her eyes out! Something’s wrong…”
He took the phone from her outstretched hand.
It took a while before Kerrin could get his sister to talk calmly. She was babbling almost incoherently.
“…He’s dead, Kerrin!…He crashed into the sea!…According to the flight control centre, one minute he was on the radar screen, then the next he wasn’t…He just vanished without a trace! Kerrin, they killed him, just like they killed the others! …”
Chapter 3
Day Six
Sunny Cove
New Providence Island
Bahamas
The sun rose above a picture postcard sea. Gentle waves slowly lapped long sandy beaches, the calm sea, transparent and turquoise near the shore, transforming abruptly to a vivid deep blue as the coral shelf plunged into the depths further off the island.
It was going to be a beautiful day.
Not so for Kerrin. The past few days had been a living hell. He had arrived at Nassau airport and been greeted by an airport official who had escorted him to a private room, where a female police officer had been comforting his sister. She had spent the night in a hotel, and had been asked to return to the airport the next day to help the police and the airport officials with their enquiries.
Although technically Martin's Lear Jet had not yet entered official Bahamian air space when it vanished, they had been tracking the flight on their radar and had been in voice contact with the pilot. Questions were going to be asked, and if there was going to be an air crash investigation, the trail would start at the air traffic control centre in Nassau.
Elizabeth was in a terrible state. Only after quite a bit of persuasion from Kerrin, had she agreed to take a tranquillizer and go back to the hotel for some sleep. A female police officer had looked after the children for the day, neither of whom had yet been told about the death of their father.
After two days it was becoming clear that there was not really going to be any big investigation. The search for the wreckage and Martin's body had been called off after forty-eight hours. Two helicopters and a light aircraft had scanned the area where the plane had disappeared from the radar, and two ships had criss-crossed the surface of the sea where the plane would have come down. After they had found several pieces of floating fuselage, one with a large letter 'K' written on it, part of th
e plane's identity number, the search for survivors was abandoned.
It seemed that why the plane had crashed was a mystery that no one would ever be able to explain. It struck Kerrin that since it had happened in international airspace, there was a lack of motivation and accountability for the Bahamian officials to spend any more time or money investigating the cause of the crash.
Four days after the plane accident, Kerrin had taken his sister and her children to the airport and seen her off on an airplane back to the States. She would be met at the airport in Arizona, where she would spend a few weeks with their other sister Jane on their country ranch. Peace and quiet and rest. That's what they needed now.
He stood on the balcony of his hotel room overlooking the bay, watching the holidaymakers and tourists scurrying onto the beach to claim their portion of sun for the day.
It was only 9 a.m. but already most of the beach beds were occupied.
He had always wanted to come to the Bahamas, but had never been able to find the time nor money, and then after his wife had been crippled, overseas travel had become very difficult. Now he was finally here, it was under the worst possible circumstances, and he wasn't in the mood to do any relaxing.
The memory of Elizabeth crying uncontrollably in the small airless office at the airport kicked him hard, and he winced at the thought of the pain she must be going through.
Apart from Dana, he loved his sister more than any other person alive. She and Martin had made a brilliant couple. Sure, they had had their problems, but so did everybody. Martin was a workaholic, never really spent enough time at home with the kids or Elizabeth. At first she had hated playing the patient mistress to his work, but after a few years she came to accept it, taking comfort from the fact that Martin was driven by the will to save lives and was working on something that one day could change the world. Or so he always claimed. Truth was that neither Elizabeth nor Kerrin really understood exactly what it was that Martin did. It was just too complicated.