The Seventh Seal — Ian A. O'Connor

In the very first sentence of The Seventh Seal, the reader is introduced to Justin Scott, a retired FBI agent as he receives a call from a very worried chief of staff at the Vatican Embassy. In a voice barely above a whisper, the man informs Justin that the papal ambassador, Francis Cardinal Kettering, has apparently murdered a young woman in the District of Columbia the night before. He further confides that he is calling at the behest of the secretary of state who realizes the Church is in desperate need of advice -- and is asking for Justin by name...As Justin wends his way ever closer to the truth, he, too, becomes a target for murder. Several attempts are made on his life by forces bent on stopping him from learning the terrible secret that had cost Maritha her life. His quest takes him to the very steps of the Throne of Peter, then back to Washington DC to confront Maritha's murderer in a cat-and-mouse stalking that plays to a deadly finish on the meanest streets of the nation's capital.