The next morning I was up to take Damon over to the Sojourner Truth School. The place was already bouncing back nicely. Innocence has a short memory. I stopped by Christine Johnson’s office, but she wasn’t back at work yet.
Nobody knew when she would return to the school, but they all missed her like a cure for the flu. So did I, so did I. There was something special about her. I hoped she was going to be all right.
I got home at quarter to nine that morning. The house on Fifth Street was incredibly quiet and peaceful. Kind of nice, actually. I put on Billie Holiday: The Legacy 1933–1958. One of my all-time favorites.
The phone rang about nine. The damn infernal phone.
It was Jay Grayer. I couldn’t imagine why he would be calling me at home. I almost didn’t want to hear the reason for his call.
“Alex, you have to come out to Lorton Prison,” he said in an urgent-sounding voice. “Please come, right now.”
CHAPTER
112
I BROKE every posted speed limit traveling out to the federal prison in Virginia. My head was spinning, threatening to come right off, to smash through the car windshield. As a homicide detective, you need to think that you’re strong and that you can take just about anything that’s dished out, but sooner or later you find out you really can’t. Nobody can.
I had been to Lorton Prison a few times before. The kidnapper and mass killer Gary Soneji had been kept in maximum security there once upon a time.
I arrived about ten in the morning. It was a crisp, blue-skied morning. A few reporters were in the parking lot and on the side lawns when I arrived.
“What do you know, Detective Cross?” one of them asked.
“Beautiful morning,” I said. “You can quote me. Feel free.”
This was where the Sterlings were being held in custody, where the government had decided to keep them until their trial for the murder of Thomas Byrnes.
Alex, you have to come out to Lorton Prison. Please come, right now.
I met Jay Grayer on the fourth floor of the prison building. Warden Marion Campbell was there, too. The two of them looked as pale as the institution’s stucco walls.
“Oh, goddamn, Alex,” Dr. Campbell groaned when he saw me approaching. The two of us went back. I took his hand and shook it firmly. “Let’s go upstairs,” he said.
More police and prison personnel were posted outside an examination room on the fifth floor. Grayer and I filed inside behind the warden and his closest aides. My heart was in my throat.
We had to wear blue surgical masks and clear plastic gloves for the occasion. We were having trouble breathing, even without the masks.
“Oh, goddammit,” I muttered as we entered the room.
Jeanne and Brett Sterling were dead.
The two bodies were laid out on matching stainless steel tables. Both Sterlings were stripped naked. The overhead lighting was bright and harsh. The glare was overpowering.
The whole scene was beyond my powers of comprehension, beyond anyone’s.
Jack and Jill were dead.
Jack and Jill had been murdered inside a federal prison.
“Goddammit. Goddamn them,” I said into my surgical mask.
Brett Sterling was well-built and looked powerful even in death. I could imagine him as Sara Rosen’s lover. I noticed that the bottoms of his feet were dirty. Probably walking barefoot in his cell all night. Pacing? Waiting for someone to come for him?
Who had gotten inside Lorton and done this? Was he murdered? What in the name of God had happened? How could it happen here?
Jeanne Sterling had pasty-white skin, and she wasn’t in good physical shape. She looked much better in tailored gray and blue suits than in the nude.
Above her black pubic hair was a soft roll of paunch. Her legs were crisscrossed with varicose veins. She’d had a nosebleed either before she died or while she was dying.
Neither of the Sterlings seemed to have suffered much. Was that a clue for us? They both had been found dead in their cells at the same 5:00 A.M. guard check.
They had died close to the same time. According to plan? Of course, according to plan. But whose plan was it?
Jack and Jill came to Lorton Prison… and what happened to them here? What the hell happened out here last night?… Who finally killed Jack and Jill?
“They both underwent extensive body searches when they were brought here,” Warden Campbell said to Jay and me. “This may have been a joint suicide, but they had to have help, even for that. Someone got them the poison between six last night and early this morning. Somebody got inside their cells.”
Dr. Marion Campbell looked directly at me. His eyes were bleary and wild and incredibly red-rimmed. “There was a small amount of blood under her right index finger. She fought someone. Jeanne Sterling tried to fight back. She was murdered; at least, I think so. She didn’t want to die, Alex.”
I closed my eyes for a second or two. It didn’t help. Everything was the same when I opened them again. Jeanne and Brett Sterling still lay naked and dead on the two stainless steel tables.
They had been executed. Professionally. Without passion. That was the eeriest part—it was almost as if Jack and Jill had been visited and murdered by Jack and Jill.
Had a “ghost” murdered Jeanne and Brett Sterling? I was afraid we would never know. We weren’t supposed to know. We weren’t important enough to know the truth.
Except maybe one tenet, one principle: there are no rules.
Not for some people, anyway.
CHAPTER
113
I ALWAYS WANT everything tied up nice and neat with a bright ribbon and bow on the package. I want to be the mastermind dragonslayer on every case. It just doesn’t work out that way—probably wouldn’t be any fun if it did.
I spent the next two and a half days at the Sterling house, working side by side with the Secret Service and FBI. Jay Grayer and Kyle Craig both came out to the house in Chevy Chase. I had an idea in the back of my head that maybe Jeanne Sterling had left us a clue to go on—something to get back at her murderers. Just in case. I figured that she was capable of something nasty and vengeful like that—her last dirty trick!
After two and a half days, we didn’t find anything in the house. If there had been a clue, then someone had gotten into the house first. I didn’t discount that possibility.
Kyle Craig and I talked out in the kitchen late in the afternoon of the third day. We were both pretty well worn to the bone. We opened a couple of Brett Sterling’s microbrewery ales and had a chat about life, death, and infinity.
“You ever hear of the notion—too many logical suspects?” I asked Kyle as we sipped our beers in the quiet of the Sterling kitchen.
“Not that specific language, but I can see how it applies here. We have scenarios that could implicate the CIA, the military, maybe big business, maybe even President Mahoney. History rarely moves in straight lines.”
I nodded at Kyle’s answer. As usual, he was a quick study. “Thirty-five years after the Kennedy assassination the only thing that’s certain is that there was some kind of conspiracy,” I said to him.
“No way to reconcile the physical evidence—ballistic and medical—with one shooter in Dallas,” Kyle said.
“So there’s the same goddamn problem—too many logical suspects. To this day, nobody can rule out the possible involvement of Lyndon Johnson, the Army, a CIA ‘black-op,’ the Mafia, your outfit’s old boss. There are such obvious parallels to what’s happened here, Kyle. A possible coup d’état to eliminate a troublemaker in office—with a much friendlier replacement—LBJ, and now Mahoney—waiting in the wings. The CIA and the military were extremely angry at both JFK and Thomas Byrnes. The system fiercely resists change.”
“Keep that in mind, Alex,” Kyle said to me. “The system fiercely resists change, and also troublemakers.”
I frowned, but nodded my head. “I have it in mind. Thanks for all your help.”
Kyle reached out his ha
nd and we shook. “Too many logical suspects,” I said. “Is that part of the nasty, badass plot, too? Is that their idea for cover in daylight?
“It wouldn’t surprise me if it was. Nothing surprises me anymore. I’m going home to see my kids,” I finally said.
“I can’t think of anything better to do,” Kyle said and smiled and waved for me to go on and get out of there.
CHAPTER
114
I CAME HOME and played with the kids—tried to be there for them. I kept flashing on the face of Thomas Byrnes, though. Occasionally, I saw beautiful little Shanelle Green or Vernon Wheatley or even poor George Johnson, Christine’s husband. I saw the corpses of Jeanne and Brett Sterling on those stainless steel gurneys at Lorton Prison.
I worked some hours at the soup kitchen at St. A’s over the next few days. I’m “Mr. Peanut Butter Man” there. I ration out the PB&J, and occasionally a little pro bono advice for those more or less unfortunate than myself. I really enjoy the work. I get back even more than I give.
I couldn’t concentrate on much of anything, though. I was there, but I wasn’t really there. The concept of no rules was stuck like a fish bone in my throat. I was choking on it. There really were too many suspects to chase down and ultimately solve the murder of Thomas Byrnes. And there were limitations to how much a D.C. cop could do on such a case. It’s over now, I tried to tell myself, except the parts you will always carry with you.
One night that week—late—I was out on the sun porch. I was scratching Rosie the cat’s back and she was purring sweetly. I was thinking about playing the piano, but I didn’t do it. No Billie Smith, no Gershwin, no Oscar Peterson. The monsters, the furies, the demons were loose in my mind. They came in all shapes and sizes, all genders, but they were human monsters. This was Dante’s Divine Comedy, all nine circles, and we were all living here together.
Finally, I began to play my piano. I played “Star Dust” and then “Body and Soul,” and I was soon lost in the glorious sounds. I didn’t think about a call I’d had earlier in the week. I had been suspended from the D.C. police force. It was a disciplinary action. I had struck out at my superior, Chief George Pittman.
Yes, I had. I was guilty as charged. So what? And now what?
I heard a knock at the porch door. Then a second rap.
I wasn’t expecting company and didn’t want any. I hoped it wasn’t Sampson. It was too late for any visitors I needed to see that night.
I grabbed my gun. Reflex action. Force of habit. Terrifying habit when you stop and think about it—which I did.
I rose from the piano bench and went to see who was there. After all the bad things that had happened, I almost expected to see the killer Gary Soneji, come to finally get even or, at least, to try his luck.
I opened the back door—and I found myself smiling. No, I actually glowed. A light went on, or went back on, inside my head. What a nice surprise. I felt much, much better in an instant.
It just happened that way. Pack up all my cares and woes.
“I couldn’t sleep,” Christine Johnson said to me. I recognized the line I had used once at her house.
I remembered Damon’s line, She’s even tougher than you are, Daddy.
“Hello, Christine. How are you? God, I’m glad it’s you,” I whispered.
“As opposed to?” she asked.
“Everyone else,” I said.
I took Christine’s hand in mine, and we went inside the house on Fifth Street.
Home.
Where there are still rules, and everybody is safe, and the dragonslayer is alive and well.
CHAPTER
115
IT REALLY DOESN’T END—the cruel, relentless nightmare, the roller-coaster ride from hell.
It was Christmas Eve and the stockings were hung from the chimney with care. Damon, Jannie, and I had almost finished decorating the tree—the final touch being long strings of popcorn and shiny red cranberries.
The damn telephone rang and I picked it up. Nat King Cole sang carols in the background. A fresh layer of snow glistened on the tiny patch of lawn outside.
“Hello,” I said.
“Why hello. If it isn’t Doctor/Detective Cross himself. What a neat treat.”
I didn’t have to ask who the caller was—I recognized the voice. The sound of it had been in my nightmares for a while—years.
“Long time, no talk,” Gary Soneji said. “I’ve missed you, Dr. Cross. Have you missed me?”
Gary Soneji had kidnapped two young children in Washington a few years back, then he’d led us on an incredible search that lasted for months. Of all the murderers I’d known, Soneji was the brightest. He had even fooled some of us into believing that he was a split personality. He’d escaped from prison twice.
“I’ve thought of you,” I finally told him the truth, “often.”
“Well, I just called to wish you and yours a happy and holy holiday season. I’ve been born again, you see.”
I didn’t say anything to Soneji. I waited. The kids had picked up that something was wrong about the phone call. They watched me, until I waved for them to finish up with the Christmas tree.
“Oh, there’s one other thing, Dr. Cross,” Soneji whispered after a long pause.
I knew there was something. “What is it, Gary? What’s the one other thing?”
“Are you enjoying her? I just had to ask. I have to know. Do you like her?”
I held my breath. He knew about Christine, goddamn him!
“You see, I was the one who left little Rosie the cat for your family. Nice touch, don’t you think? So whenever you see the little cutie, you just think—Gary’s in the house! Gary’s real close! I am, you know. Have a joyous and safe New Year. I’ll be seeing you soon.”
Gary Soneji hung up the phone with a gentle click.
And then so did I. I went back to the beautiful tree and Jannie and Damon and Nat King Cole.
Until next time.
Detective Alex Cross is in love—but his happiness is threatened by a series of chilling murders.
For an excerpt from the next Alex Cross novel,
turn the page.
I CAME FULLY awake, and I wondered what I was afraid of, what the hell was happening here. My first conscious fear was that I was having a heart attack in my own bed.
I was spacey and woozy, still flying high from the party. My heart was beating loudly, thundering in my chest.
I thought that I had heard a deep, low, pounding noise from somewhere inside the house. The noise was close. It sounded as if a heavy weight, maybe a club, had been striking something down the hallway. My eyes weren’t adjusted to the darkness yet. I listened for another noise. I was frightened. I couldn’t remember where I left my Glock last night. What could possibly make that heavy pounding sound inside the house? I listened with all the concentration I could command.
The refrigerator purred down in the kitchen.
A distant truck changed gears on the mean streets.
Still, something about that sound, the pounding noise, bothered me a lot.
Had there even been a sound? I wondered. Was it just the first warnings of a powerful headache coming on?
Before I realized what was happening, a shadowy figure rose from the other side of the bed.
Soneji! He’s kept his promise. He’s here in the house!
“Aaagghhgghh!” the attacker screamed and swung at me with a large club of some sort.
I tried to roll, but my body and mind weren’t cooperating. I’d had too much to drink, too much party, too much fun.
I felt a powerful blow to my shoulder! My whole body went numb. I tried to scream, but suddenly I had no voice. I couldn’t scream. I could barely move. The club descended swiftly again—this time it struck my lower back.
Someone was trying to beat me to death. Jesus, God. I thought of the loud pounding sounds. Had he gone to Nana’s room first? Damon and Jannie’s? What was happening in our house?
I reached for him an
d managed to grab his arm. I yanked hard and he shrieked again, a high-pitched sound, but definitely a man’s voice.
Soneji? How could it be? I’d seen him die in the tunnels of Grand Central Station.
What was happening to me? Who was in my bedroom? Who was upstairs in our house?
“Jannie? Damon?—” I finally mumbled, tried to call to them. “Nana? Nana?”
I began scratching at his chest, his arms, felt something sticky, probably drawing blood. I was fighting with only one arm, and barely able to do that.
“Who are you? What are you doing? Damon! Damon!” I called out again. Much louder this time.
He broke loose and I fell out of the bed, face first. The floor came at me hard, struck, and my face went numb.
My whole body was on fire. I began to throw up on the carpet.
The bat, the sledgehammer, the crowbar, whatever in hell it was—came down again and seemed to split me in two. I was burning up with pain. Ax! Has to be ax!
I could feel and smell blood everywhere around me on the floor. My blood?
“I told you there was no way to stop me!” he screamed. “I told you.”
I looked up and thought I recognized the face looming above me. Gary Soneji? Could it possibly be Soneji? How could that possibly be? It couldn’t!
I understood that I was dying, and I didn’t want to die. I wanted to run, to see my kids one more time. Just one more look at them.
I knew I couldn’t stop the attack. Knew there was nothing I could do to stop this horror from happening.
I thought of Nana and Jannie, Damon, Christine. My heart ached for them.
Then I let God do His will.
Read an extended excerpt and learn more about Cat & Mouse.
Alex Cross gets a presidential request:
“Please find my kids!”