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.
The Big Bad Wolf
James Patterson's books
- Bender (The Core Four Series)
- Embrace the Night
- The Mighty Storm
- Wethering the Storm
- One Day In The Life
- Ravenous (Book 1 The Ravening Series)
- Along came the spider
- The Eye of Minds
- The Kill Order (The Maze Runner 0.5)
- The Invention of Wings
- Under the Wide and Starry Sky
- Awakening the Fire (Guardian Witch #1)
- Captured (The Captive #1)
- The Love Game (The Game, #1)
- The Hurricane
- The Program (The Program #1)
- James Potter and the Vault of Destinies
- Charmfall (The Dark Elite #3)