James Patterson - Cat & Mouse

Cat and Mouse

Chapter 1

Washington, D.C.THE CROSS house was twenty paces away and the proximity and sight of it made Gary Sonejis skin prickle. It was Victorian-style, white shingled, and extremely well kept. As Soneji stared across Fifth Street, he slowly bared his teeth in a sneer that could have passed for a smile. This was perfect. He had come here to murder Alex Cross and his family.His eyes moved slowly from window to window, taking in everything from the crisp, white lace curtains to Crosss old piano on the sunporch, to a Batman and Robin kite stuck in the rain gutter of the roof. Damons kite, he thought.On two occasions he caught sight of Crosss elderly grandmother as she shuffled past one of the downstairs windows. Nana Mamas long, purposeless life would soon be at an end. That made him feel so much better. Enjoy every momentstop and smell the roses, Soneji reminded himself. Taste the roses, eat Alex Crosss rosesflowers, stems, and thorns.He finally moved across Fifth Street, being careful to stay in the shadows. Then he disappeared into the thick yews and forsythia bushes that ran like sentries alongside the front of the house.He carefully made his way to a whitewashed cellar door, which was to one side of the porch, just off the kitchen. It had a Master padlock, but he had the door open in seconds.He was inside the Cross house!He was in the cellar: The cellar was a clue for those who collected them. The cellar was worth a thousand words. A thousand forensic pictures, too.It was important to everything that would happen in the very near future. The Cross murders!There were no large windows, but Soneji decided not to take any chances by turning on the lights. He used a Maglite flashlight. Just to look around, to learn a few more things about Cross and his family, to fuel his hatred, if that was possible.The cellar was cleanly swept, as he had expected it would be. Crosss tools were haphazardly arranged on a pegged Masonite board. A stained Georgetown ball cap was hung on a hook. Soneji put it on his own head. He couldnt resist.He ran his hands over folded laundry laid out on a long wooden table. He felt close to the doomed family now. He despised them more than ever. He felt around the hammocks of the old womans bra. He touched the boys small Jockey underwear. He felt like a total creep, and he loved it.Soneji picked up a small red reindeer sweater. It would fit Crosss little girl, Jannie. He held it to his face and tried to smell the girl. He anticipated Jannies murder and only wished that Cross would get to see it, too.He saw a pair of Everlast gloves and black Pony shoes tied around a hook next to a weathered old punching bag. They belonged to Crosss son, Damon, who must be nine years old now. Gary Soneji thought he would punch out the boys heart.Finally, he turned off the flashlight and sat all alone in the dark. Once upon a time, he had been a famous kidnapper and murderer. It was going to happen again. He was coming back with a vengeance that would blow everybodys mind.He folded his hands in his lap and sighed. He had spun his web perfectly.Alex Cross would soon be dead, and so would everyone he loved.

Chapter 2

LondonT HE KILLER who was currently terrorizing Europe was named Mr. Smith, no first name. It was given to him by the Boston press, and then the police had obligingly picked it up all over the world. He accepted the name, as children accept the name given by their parents, no matter how gross or disturbing or pedestrian the name might be.Mr. Smithso be it.Actually, he had a thing about names. He was obsessive about them. The names of his victims were burned into his mind and also into his heart.First and foremost, there was Isabella Calais. Then came Stephanie Michaela Apt, Ursula Davies, Robert Michael Neel, and so many others.He could recite the complete names backward and forward, as if they had been memorized for a history quiz or a bizarre round of Trivial Pursuit. That was the ticketthis case was trivial pursuit, wasnt it?So far, no one seemed to understand, no one got it. Not the fabled FBI. Not the storied Interpol, not Scotland Yard or any of the local police forces in the cities where he had committed murders.No one understood the secret patten of the victims, starting with Isabella Calais in Cambridge, Massachusetts, March 22, 1993, and continuing today in London.The victim of the moment was Drew Cabot. He was a chief inspectorof all the hopelessly inane things to do with your life. He was hot in London, having recently apprehended an IRA killer. His murder would electrify the town, drive everyone mad. Civilized and sophisticated London loved a gory murder as well as the next burg.This afternoon Mr. Smith was operating in the tony, fashionable Knightsbridge section. He was there to study the human raceat least that was the way the newspapers described it. The press in London and across Europe also called him by another nameAlien. The prevailing theory was that Mr. Smith was an extraterrestrial. No human could do the things that he did. Or so they said.Mr. Smith had to bend low to talk into Drew Cabots ear, to be more intimate with his prey. He played music while he workedall kinds of music. Todays selection was the overture to Don Giovanni. Opera buffa felt right to him.Opera felt right for this live autopsy.Ten minutes or so after your death, Mr. Smith said, flies will already have picked up the scent of gas accompanying the decomposition of your tissue. Green flies will lay the tiniest eggs within the orifices of your body. Ironically, the language reminds me of Dr. Seussgreen flies and ham. What could that mean? I dont know. Its a curious association, though.Drew Cabot had lost a lot of blood, but he wasnt giving up. He was a tall, rugged man with silver-blond hair. A never-say-never sort of chap. The inspector shook his head back and forth until Smith finally removed his gag.What it is, Drew? he asked. Speak.I have a wife and two children. Why are you doing this to me? Why me? he whispered.Oh, lets say because youre Drew. Keep it simple and unsentimental. You, Drew, are a piece of the puzzle.He tugged the inspectors gag back into place. No more chitchat from Drew.Mr. Smith continued with his observations as he made his next surgical cuts and Don Giovanni played on.Near the time of death, breathing will become strained, intermittent. Its exactly what youre feeling now, as if each breath could be your last. Cessation will occur within two or three minutes, whispered Mr. Smith, whispered the dreaded Alien. Your life will end. May I be the first to congratulate you. I sincerely mean that, Drew. Believe it or not, I envy you. I wish I were Drew.Part OneTrain Station Murders

Chapter 3

I AM the great Cornholio! Are you challenging me? I am Cornholio! the kids chorused and giggled. Beavis and Butt-head strike againin my neighborhood.I bit my lip and decided to let it go. Why fight it? Why fan the fires of preadolescence?Damon, Jannie, and I were crowded into the front seat of my old black Porsche. We needed to buy a new car, but none of us wanted to part with the Porsche. We were schooled in tradition, in the classics. We loved the old car, which we had named The Sardine Can and Old Paintless.Actually, I was preoccupied at twenty to eight in the morning. Not a good way to start the day.The night before, a thirteen-year-old girl from Ballou High School had been found in the Anacostia River. She had been shot, and then drowned. The gunshot had been to her mouth. What the coroners call a hole in one.A bizarre statistic was creating havoc with my stomach and central nervous system. There were now more than a hundred unsolved murders of young, inner-city women committed in just the past three years. No one had called for a major investigation. No one in power seemed to care about dead black and Hispanic girls.As we drove up in front of the Sojourner Truth School, I saw Christine Johnson welcoming kids and their parents as they arrived, reminding everyone that this was a community with good, caring people. She was certainly one of them.I remembered the very first time we met. It was the previous fall and the circumstances couldnt have been any worse for either of us.We had been thrown togethersmashed together someone said to me onceat the homicide scene of a sweet baby girl named Shanelle Green. Christine was the principal of the school that Shanelle attended, and where I was now delivering my own kids. Jannie was new to the Truth School this semester. Damon was a grizzled veteran, a fourth grader.What are you mischief makers gawking at? I turned to the kids, who were looking back and forth from my face to Christines as if they were watching a championship tennis match.Were gawking at you, Daddy, and youre gawking at Christine! Jannie said and laughed like the wicked child-witch of the North that she can be sometimes.Shes Mrs. Johnson to you, I said as I gave Jannie my best squinting evil eye.Jannie shrugged off my baleful look and frowned at me as only she can. I know that, Daddy. Shes the principal of my school. I know exactly who she is.My daughter already understood many of lifes important connections and mysteries. I was hoping that maybe someday she would explain them to me.Damon, do you have a point of view we should hear? I asked. Anything youd like to add? Care to share some good fellowship and wit with us this morning?My son shook his head no, but he was smiling, too. He liked Christine Johnson just fine. Everybody did. Even Nana Mama approved, which is unheard of, and actually worried me some. Nana and I never seemed to agree about anything, and its getting worse with age.The kids were already climbing out of the car, and Jannie gave me a kiss good-bye. Christine waved and walked over.What a fine, upstanding father you are, she said. Her brown eyes twinkled. Youre going to make some lady in the neighborhood very happy one of these days. Very good with children, reasonably handsome, driving a classy sports car. My, my, my.My, my, back at you, I said. To top everything off, it was a beautiful morning in the early June. Shimmering blue skies, temperature in the low seventies, the air crisp and relatively clean. Christine was wearing a soft beige suit with a blue shirt, and beige flat-heeled shoes. Be still my heart.A smile slid across my face. There was no way to stop it, to hold it back, and besides I didnt want to. It fit with the fine day I was starting to have.I hope youre not teaching my kids that kind of cynicism and irony inside that fancy school of yours.Of course I am, and so are all my teachers. We speak Educanto with the best of them. Were trained in cynicism, and were all experts in irony. More important, were excellent skeptics. I have to get inside now, so we dont miss a precious moment of indoctrination time.Its too late for Damon and Jannie. Ive already programmed them. A child is fed with milk and praise. They have the sunniest dispositions in the neighborhood, probably in all of Southeast, maybe in the entire city of Washington.Oh weve noticed that, and we accept the challenge. Got to run. Young minds to shape and change.Ill see you tonight? I said as Christine was about to turn away and head toward the Sojourner Truth School.Handsome as sin, driving a nice Porsche, of course youll see me tonight, she said. Then she turned away and headed toward the school.We were about to have our first official date that night. Her husband, George, had died the previous winter, and now Christine felt she was ready to have dinner with me. I hadnt pushed her in any way, but I couldnt wait. Half a dozen years after the death of my wife, Maria, I felt as if I were coming out of a deep rut, maybe even a clinical depression. Life was looking as good as it had in a long, long time.But as Nana Mama has often cautioned, Dont mistake the edge of a rut for the horizon.Next page