13th Apostle Read Online Free PDF

his victim’s cries of pain.
    The old man heard nothing, saw nothing, knew nothing. His body did what it had to do and continued grasping and flailing, even as the second intruder pulled him from the first and beat and kicked him until his body could no longer bring muscle and nerve together to move.
    â€œNow give it to us,” the murderer demanded.
    â€œI don’t know what you want,” Ludlow mouthed. His chest spasmed with unreleased sobs. “I don’t know what you want,” he whispered again.
    â€œThe diary, you old piece of shit! Just give us the diary and we’ll let you die in peace.”
    â€œThe diary?” Ludlow whispered, confused.
    Another kick to his back. “Like you didn’t know,” his torturer snickered.
    Ludlow struggled to clear his thoughts.
    That’s what this was all about? The diary! No, it couldn’t be. It was all too fantastic to imagine.
    He had warned DeVris that powerful people had powerful reasons to get control of the diary. DeVris had laughed at him. Sabbie had indulged him his secrecy and had gone along with his emergency preparations, though she had thought him a bit over the top about it. Sarah, too. But none of them had ever considered him anything but paranoid about the whole matter. Even he doubted his own concerns. And, now, son of a bloody bitch, he had been right all along.
    Ludlow smiled; a tiny raising of the corners of his mouth, an insignificant movement that echoed a greater victory than any round of cannon fire.
    He had what these murderers so desperately wanted, but they had left him with no reason to give it to them. They had taken everything; his Sarah, his desire to live, and his body’s ability to continue to endure their abuse. He was dying and he knew it. Yet this, the only thing they really wanted, they would not get.

Chapter 7
    Day Four, early morning
CyberNet Forensics, Inc., New York City
    CyberNet Forensics was one of the top-rated, though not one of the highest-grossing, Internet Investigative Services in the country. While the identities of clients were usually kept pretty hush-hush, all of the company’s top cybersleuths, including Gil, knew that their clients were some of the most powerful individuals and agencies in the world.
    CyberNet’s website claimed their computer programs had helped spot, prosecute, and put an end to more identity theft, online child pornography, money laundering, fraud, and potential terrorist schemes than all the other Internet forensics companies combined. Oddly, though, according to the company’s annual financial reports, CyberNet continued to remain in the red.
    At least once a month, George, as division supervisor, addressed the company’s team of cybersleuths or, as he preferred to call them, his Internet Forensic Specialists. It was always the same old pep talk about how their programs were helping to keep cyberspace safe for the innocent. Most of them no longer listened to the plethora of words and lack of action. George could never explain why, as the accounts grew, budgets shrank. Morale dropped accordingly.
    When Gil first came to the company, fresh out of graduate school, it had been a different place entirely; full of excitement and hope. These were the crème de la crème; young men and women, not necessarily tops in their classes but independent in their thinking and dogged in their persistence.
    Every one of them was a loner, content to work in some tiny windowless office for days on end, hacking into “unbreakable” data bases and Internet sites, in order to track down a target, find proof of the cyber crime, and present enough solid evidence to back up an arrest and conviction.
    â€œYou get paid to break into top secret files?” Lucy asked incredulously on their first date. “Can’t you be arrested or something?”
    No, he couldn’t be arrested. He was registered with the National Securities Administration, the only