The Big Bad Wolf

Epilogue

WOLVES



PASHA SOROKIN WAS DUE at the courthouse in Miami at nine o’clock on Monday

morning. The van he rode in was escorted from the federal prison by half a dozen cars; the

route wasn’t known by any of the drivers until the last possible moment before departure.

The attack took place at a stoplight just before the cars would have gotten on the Florida

Turnpike. They hit with automatic weapons and also rocket launchers, which took out most

of the escort cars in under a minute. There were bodies and smoking metal everywhere.

The black van that Pasha Sorokin was riding in was quickly surrounded by six men in dark

clothes, no masks. The car doors were yanked open and the police guards were beaten and

then shot dead.

A tall, powerful-looking man strode up to the open door and peered inside. He smiled

playfully, as if a small child were in the prison van.

“Pasha,” the Wolf said, “I understand that you were going to turn me in. That’s what my

sources say, my very good sources, my incredibly well-paid sources. Talk to me about this.”



“It’s not true,” said Pasha, who meanwhile was cowering in the middle seat of the van. He

wore an orange jumpsuit, and his wrists and ankles were bound by chains. He no longer had

his Florida tan.

“Maybe, maybe not,” said the Wolf.

Then he fired one of the rocket launchers point-blank at Pasha. He didn’t miss.

“Zamochit,” he said, and laughed. “One can’t be too careful these days.”



About the Author



James Patterson’s most recent major international bestseller is The Lake House. He is the

author of twenty-three books and lives in Florida.

The Alex Cross Dossier and Along Came a Spider Excerpt



The Alex Cross Dossier



PERSONAL:

Alex Cross, born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, is six-three, weighs 200 pounds, athletic,

and good-looking. He is a widower, with three children: Damon; Janelle (Jannie); and Alex Jr.

(Alex’s son with Christine). His wife, Maria, a social worker, killed in a drive-by shooting when

the children were toddlers. Murder never solved. Cross calls himself the Dragon slayer. He and

his children live with Regina Hope Cross (Nana Mama), 81. Nana Mama was an English

Teacher and assistant principal of Garfield North Junior High School. Cross’s mother died of

lung cancer when he was nine, his father, a heavy drinker, the year before. He was sent to

D.C. and raised by his grandmother. Three brothers: 2 deceased, not raised by grandmother.

Cross’s best friend, since they were both 10, is John Sampson, senior detective, six-nine, 250

pounds, called Two-John and Man Mountain.

Cross’s favorite food: white bean soup. Likes beer, fine wine.

Cross’s hobby: the piano. Loves Gershwin, classical music. An avid reader of fiction and

nonfiction.

Favorite vacation spot: Caribbean.

Cross is a volunteer in St. Anthony’s soup kitchen, where he is called Peanut Butter Man and

Black Samaritan and offers free therapy. Cross is a family man, gives the children bi-weekly

boxing lessons. He drives a ‘74 Porsche.

Cross, his three children, and Rosie, their cat, live with Nana Mama on Fifth Street,

Washington, D.C., Southeast.

PROFESSIONAL:

Education: Ph.D. in psychology from Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD. Special

concentration in the field of abnormal psychology and forensic psychology.

Upon graduation Cross worked as a migrant farm worker for a year. He then had a private

practice in D.C. for three years. Cross joined the Washington, D.C., police department as a

psychologist and homicide detective. He’s been on the force eight years. He works in an

unofficial capacity with VICAP (Violent Criminal Apprehension Program) as a liason

between the FBI and



D.C. police. Cross is a profiler.

A Washington Post article in its Sunday magazine section published a piece about Cross

called “The Last Southern Gentleman.” The article praised the psychologist-detective for his

work in Homicide and Major Crimes.

Cross’s articles about the criminal mind were published in Psychiatric Archives and American

Journal Psychiatry. He wrote a diagnostic profile of the pyschopathic serial killer Gary Soneji.