The Last Ark

SLVIA . . . decades ago, an AI program escaped the NSA Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, and has never been re-captured . . . true story.
Following a brutal massacre, the Ethiopian Ark of the Covenant - a revered religious artifact - sells on the international black market. Soon afterward, the death of an aging Saudi King spurs a flawed Saudi-Israeli peace deal, promoted by a polarizing former US president under criminal indictment and seeking political asylum.

Elsewhere, an assassin from the fanatical Solar Temple murder cult hunts down NSA fugitive Derek Taylor while he searches for an escaped US Defense artificial intelligence called the SLVIA. Breadcrumbs direct Taylor from Portugal to the Vatican, and then Israel to discover a mysterious copper scroll with an incredible ancient secret. As a Temple Mount ceremony transforms into a blasphemous political theater - sparking fears of a modern-day Anti-Christ - Taylor learns the woman he loves, who once betrayed him, has fallen into the hands of the Russian oligarch who may have killed her father.

Now, Taylor faces an impossible choice; one that could change the world order and likely cost him his life...