The Last Monarch — Warren Murphy; Richard Sapir

CURED

Thanks to Chiun's "emptying sin" technique, past U.S. presidents remember nothing about CURE, America's most secret defense organization. Now a former head of state believed to have lost his mind suddenly finds it -- and calls Dr. Harold Smith to say hi. But before Remo and Chiun can redo their amnesia trick, the old guy is kidnapped by bumbling eco-terrorists eager to sell him to a desert despot with a grudge.

As the ex-Mr. President doggedly tries to outwit his captors and single-handedly save the Middle East from extinction, Remo and Chiun pick up the trail, and a worried Dr. Smith fingers his cyanide pill, convinced this is the end. For Remo, it will be...unless Chiun drops the attitude he's adopted over a certain fiasco involving his Hollywood screenplay, and the world's most deadly assassins end up killing each other before they can save anyone else.