Cross

This is the book where Patterson finally answers the question that has haunted the series since the opening pages of the first novel: who killed Maria Cross? The answer costs Alex almost everything — his faith in his best friend, his girlfriend, and his belief that justice works. If you like crime fiction where the detective's own life is the crime scene, this is your book. It also stands alone well enough for newcomers, though series fans will feel the payoff most.

1. 1

   Act 1

   The Night Maria Died

   The book opens with a flashback to the night Alex Cross's wife Maria was shot and killed. Maria is shot in a drive-by shooting outside their home in Washington, D.C. She is pregnant with their third child. As she dies, she tells Alex, 'I love you.' That's the wound the whole novel grows around — a wife and an unborn child gone in seconds. Years later, Alex has left the FBI and works as a private psychologist in Washington. He lives with his three children and his 81-year-old grandmother, Nana Mama — Regina Hope Cross — who helped raise him and the kids after Maria's death. He is a lonely man, but a devoted father, spending as much time with his family as his work allows. His girlfriend is Kayla Coles, a resident physician at a hospital in Southeast Washington, D.C., who was introduced in the earlier novel Four Blind Mice. Then John Sampson, his former partner, shows up with a case he can't shake: a serial rapist is attacking women in Georgetown, and the methods look like an old unsolved case the two of them worked together years earlier. Alex agrees to help. He doesn't yet know that this favor will drag him back to the night Maria died.

2. 2

   Act 2

   The Butcher of Sligo

   The Georgetown investigation leads to Michael Sullivan, 'the Butcher of Sligo' — and Patterson gives you his whole terrible biography. Sullivan grew up in Brooklyn under a bullying, abusive father. At eighteen, he killed him, dismembered the body with a scalpel, and fed the remains to the fish in the bay. From there he went pro, becoming a hitman for the Mafia's Maggione crime family. His cruelty earned the nickname 'the Butcher': he cut up his victims' faces with a scalpel and photographed the results, using the pictures to terrorize future victims into silence. The Butcher began raping young, attractive women, often leaving them alive and showing them the gruesome photographs to keep them quiet. Sullivan has a wife, three sons, and a home in Maryland, and he hides his brutal criminal life from all of them. His partner in crime is Jimmy 'Hats' Galati, known as 'Jimmy the Protector' because he always had the Butcher's back. The investigation into the Georgetown rapes uncovers a connection to Maria Cross's murder — suggesting the same killer might be responsible for both.

3. 3

   Act 3

   What Sampson Buried

   A mid-story flashback brings Maria back to life for a few pages: kind, gentle, loving, a devoted mother to Janelle and Damon, deeply in love with Alex, pregnant with their third child when she died. Kayla is stabbed by a junkie while at work and lands in the hospital, where Alex comforts her during her recovery. Later, visiting her parents in her hometown in North Carolina, Kayla decides to move back there — she believes she can do more good. Alex is saddened but supports her. She tries to convince him to come with her, but he refuses, believing he can never leave Washington behind. The relationship ends, saddening them both, and they go their separate ways. Sullivan believes one of his mob bosses ordered the killing of Jimmy Hats. Sampson, together with fellow detective Rakeem Powell, killed Galati in New York City years earlier — and Galati, not Sullivan, was Maria's real murderer.

4. 4

   Act 4

   The Truth, and Keeping It

   The climax: Alex confronts Michael Sullivan and kills him, ending the Butcher's reign of terror. With Sullivan dead, John Sampson finally comes clean to Alex about how Maria really died. Jimmy 'Hats' Galati was the killer, and Sampson and Rakeem Powell killed him years ago in New York City — then covered it up so no one would ever find out. Sampson's confession doesn't break their friendship; it strengthens it. Alex and Sampson decide to keep the truth about Galati's death and Maria's real killer buried. The novel closes with Alex remaining in Washington, D.C., with his family — having lost Kayla, but finally knowing the truth about Maria's murder.

Readers who like their thrillers fast, dark, and personal, especially anyone following the Alex Cross series who wants the story behind Maria's death. It also suits fans of crime fiction where the detective's worst enemy turns out to be a secret kept by someone he loves.

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