Cross Country (27 page)

I
HAD TOLD my interrogators about the possible CIA and Tiger connection, but that wasn't important to them. They'd let me go, hadn't they? They could deny all that — and besides, the Tiger was dead. I had cleaned up that particular mess for them.

It was what she had contacted Ellie Cox about; she had talked to Ellie about her research. That was what got her family murdered in Georgetown.

Adanne had told me horror stories during our time together, especially about life and death in Sudan. Rape was the weapon of war there, and girls of age five and up were abused, sometimes by "peacekeepers." Hundreds and hundreds of mass graves had been discovered but were rarely reported on. Police corruption and brutality, some of which I'd witnessed myself, were rampant — an epidemic, really, and kidnappers were working in the Delta area, especially around Port Harcourt.

On the couch that had been in Nana's living room since I was a boy, I slept, finally. But not like a baby. That kind of sleep would never come to me again. The truth was, I had accepted that my family was gone, just like so many other families that had been murdered before them. Nothing would ever be the same for me again.

I
WAS WOKEN up early in the morning. Somebody was coming into the house!

I jumped up from the couch, trying to collect my thoughts in a hurry, to focus on how to get to my gun in the den, when two men burst into the living room!

I was surprised — no, I was shocked — to see Steven Millard and Merrill Snyder from the CIA. Millard spoke first.

"Detective Cross, we didn't know you were here. We—"

Someone else walked into the living room behind Millard and Snyder. My God, it was Ali.

And he looked all right to me — unharmed.

He looked just incredible — safe, alive, home.

"Ali!" I called and went forward to him. "Ali!"

"Daddy! Daddy!" he shrieked as he ran and threw himself into my outstretched arms. My little boy was crying and shaking uncontrollably.

No, no — I was the one crying and shaking. Ali was just holding on to me incredibly tightly. He kept repeating, "Daddy, Daddy, Daddy!" I couldn't hear the words enough times.

What was happening here? I wondered, looking to the CIA men for answers. Now I saw that Eric Dana and my friend Al Tunney had come to the house as well.

Then I heard, "Alex? Is that you in there? Alex, is that you?"

The voice was Nana's, but the next person entering the living room was Jannie.

She had her arms stretched out, and she was sobbing as she ran and crashed into my chest. "Oh, my sweet girl, my darling girl," I whispered as she pressed into me. "Oh, Jannie, sweetheart. Oh, my baby, my baby."

"I'm okay, we're okay," Jannie said. "They kept us in a room. They asked us so many questions. We didn't know why, Daddy, we didn't know anything."

"No, of course you didn't."

Then Nana slouched into the living room, and she looked terrible and wonderful all at the same time. She came to us, and then we were all group hugging. The CIA agents just looked on, warmly, it seemed to me, but they said nothing.

"They didn't harm us," said Nana. "Thank God, we're all here together. We're all safe."

That was enough for this unbelievable moment, the most emotional one of my life — we were all together, and we were safe.

T
HE GOOD MOOD was broken by Steven Millard from the CIA. "Detective Cross, can we have a moment? Whenever you're ready," he said.

"Where were they? Where did you find them?" I asked Millard. "Who took them?"

He walked ramrod straight and I decided he had probably been military before he came to the CIA. He seemed very sure of himself, confident about who he was and his role here. So what was it? Who the hell was Steven Millard? What was his role?

"I told you before, Detective, we're the good guys — we're still the good guys. Most of us are busting our asses to do a good job and help keep this country safe. Ian Flaherty wasn't. He sold us out, maybe a couple of times. The last time, it was to the Chinese. Maybe to a bad apple from their basket."

"My family," I said, reminding Millard of my question.

"We had Flaherty under surveillance from the moment he reached Washington. Trust me on that one. He led us to your family. I don't know if they would've been released. A couple of mercenaries were with them — they were working with Flaherty. Flaherty was working for the Chinese. Your family was questioned, but mostly they were just insurance, in case it was needed. Flaherty was afraid you might have found out about him in Lagos."

I shook my head. "Bribery has become a way of life there. Adanne Tansi knew the Chinese were involved with oil trading in the Delta. Thousands of Nigerians have been murdered down there, as you know."

"Yes, we know," said Millard.

"And you knew the civil war was coming, but you did nothing to stop it."

"There was nothing we could do. We don't need another Iraq, do we?"

I stared into his eyes. "Where's Flaherty now?"

Millard didn't flinch as he answered. "We have him. We're talking to him now. Eventually he'll talk to us. We know that Mr. Sowande, your Tiger, worked for him."

"That's all you can tell me?"

Millard shook his head. "No. I can tell you this. Go home to your family, Detective Cross. They're special. You've been away from them too much."

I nodded at Millard. He wasn't going to level with me, so there was nothing else to say. I turned around and began to walk back to my house.

He was right about one thing: My family was special.

They were waiting for me on the porch, and as I got close, another dark sedan pulled up in front. Damon stepped out, and he looked my way. He half waved, half saluted.

But then Damon came running, and so did I.

The Cross family was back together again. Maybe that was all that mattered.

I
COULDN'T LET it end like that — it just wasn't in me. One night a couple of weeks later, I arrived at the house in Great Falls, Virginia, at a little past three in the morning. Interesting to me, and more than a little creepy, I had received a call from the psychopath Kyle Craig earlier in the week. Cool as ever, Kyle said he was glad I had gotten my family back, and then he hung up before I could say a word to him.

The CIA's Steven Millard stood there wearing a dark blue terrycloth robe, his legs and feet bare. He didn't look so impressive without a suit and tie. I heard a woman's voice call from upstairs, "Steve, is everything all right down there?"

"Go back to sleep, Emma. It's just work," he called back.

Then Millard's eyes came back to mine. "What do you want at my house at three in the morning, Detective Cross? This better be worth it."

"Why don't you invite me in and I'll tell you all about it. I could use some coffee. So could you."

W
E WENT INSIDE and sat in the kitchen, which looked as though it had been refurbished recently. Millard didn't offer coffee or anything else to drink, so I started to tell him why I'd come out to Virginia in the middle of the night.

Millard listened patiently, nodded, waiting for the punch line.

I stared at him for a while, and I was thinking about the idea of "good guys." Were there any left? I thought so. I sure hoped so.

"So that's why you're here? To let me know that everything is fine?" Millard spoke again.

"Looked fine. Just like it was supposed to. But last week I went back to the Cox house. At that point I had enough time to be a real detective again. I talked to Elbe's editor at Georgetown University Press. He hadn't gotten the last section of Elbe's manuscript, which surprised him. That was the part that detailed her trip to Nigeria."

"Maybe she never got to write it," Millard suggested. "That would make sense, wouldn't it, Detective? It could be why she was targeted and murdered."

"I guess so. But if that was true, why would I be here at three in the morning, when I could be home sleeping?"

Millard's brow furrowed. He was starting to show some irritation and I couldn't blame him. "Maybe because you never properly thanked me for finding and bringing home your family? You're welcome. Now you can go. Go."

I hit Steven Millard then. It was a strong right hand that lifted him right out of the kitchen chair, and knocked him onto the pinewood floor. His nose was bleeding, but he didn't go out. I could tell he wasn't sure where he was; his hands were feeling around the floor for some purchase.

"That's for taking my family in the first place," I said to him.

"Ellie had a typist for her manuscripts," I went on. "A woman in DC named Barbara Groszewski. I found that out through some checks Ellie paid every month. The good news, the reason I'm here, is that Barbara Groszewski had the last part of Ellie's manuscript, the section where she traveled to Lagos and met Adanne Tansi among others. Ian Flaherty is mentioned several times in the pages. So are you, Millard. Adanne was aware of what you and Flaherty were up to. In fact, you were the one who set up the oil meetings with the Chinese. You took their bribes. And you were the one who hired Sowande, the Tiger. You're under arrest, Millard, and the Central Intelligence Agency isn't going to protect you. They've already given you over to us. So maybe there still are some good guys left."

Millard actually smiled. "A manuscript? Part of one? A writer's notes? You have nothing to hold me on."

"I think we do," I told him. "I'm sure of it."

I opened the kitchen door and let in several agents from the FBI, including my buddy Ned Mahoney. These were definitely the good guys.

I turned back to Millard. "Oh, I left out the best part, the most important. We found Ian Flaherty. You lied about holding him. In fact, we have Flaherty now. He's talking. That's why I'm arresting you. You're going down, Millard. You made a big mistake in judgment."

"What was that?" Millard finally asked.

Now it was my turn to smile. "You should've killed me when you had the chance. I'm very persistent. I don't ever give up."

Thus spake the Dragon Slayer.

On my way home, at around five that morning, my cell phone started to ring. I grabbed it off the seat and answered with my name.

I heard a voice that I didn't want to hear, not ever again, but especially not now.

"You are so damn impressive, Alex. I'm awfully proud of you," said Kyle Craig. "Believe it or not, I was right there in Millard's house with you. Guess I'm kind of special myself. And I don't give up either."

Then Kyle clicked off.

And as always, he was scarier than anyone else.

J
AMES PATTERSON published his first thriller in 1976 and since then has become one of the best-known and bestselling writers of all time, with more than 140 million copies of his books sold worldwide. He is the author of the two most popular detective series of the past decade, featuring Alex Cross and the Women's Murder Club, and he has written numerous other #1 bestsellers. He has won an Edgar Award — the mystery world's highest honor — and his novels
Kiss the Girls
and
Along Came a Spider
were made into feature films starring Morgan Freeman. His charity, the James Patterson PageTurner Awards, has given hundreds of thousands of dollars to individuals and groups that promote the excitement of books and reading. He lives in Florida.