A masked crew executes bank tellers while a killer taunts Alex Cross at home.
Who drives the story
D.C. homicide detective and forensic psychiatrist raising three kids and a recovering Nana Mama while a killer phones him at crime scenes and at home. He loses the chase, keeps the family, and gets a promise of more.
The unseen planner behind the masked bank crew, who taunts Cross by phone and mail and treats murder as a game. He escapes through tunnels beneath the bank and remains at large.
FBI lead on the robbery-murders who starts by fighting Cross over jurisdiction and ends as his lover. A farmhouse bomb puts her in the hospital with a concussion and broken arm.
Cross's grandmother, recovering from a stroke and the family's spine. She refuses to let the Mastermind chase them from their home.
The female robber in the Reagan mask, a former Army military police officer court-martialed for brutality. Cross disarms her in the vault and shoots her in the leg.
Also in the story
Mother of Cross's son Alex Jr., still shattered by her kidnapping in a previous case. She asks for space, and the relationship fractures.
How they are connected
homicide detective and forensic psychiatrist raising three kids and a recovering Nana Mama while a killer phones him at crime scenes and at home.
The unseen planner behind the masked bank crew, who taunts Cross by phone and mail and treats murder as a game.
FBI lead on the robbery-murders who starts by fighting Cross over jurisdiction and ends as his lover.
She refuses to let the Mastermind chase them from their home.
Mother of Cross's son Alex Jr.
Cross disarms her in the vault and shoots her in the leg.
Go deeper
Surveillance as terror · Murder as performance · The cost of the badge · Control and its collapse
Themes explainedThe full story act by act, the ending explained and a quick quiz.
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