Pop Goes the Weasel (Alex Cross 5)

“Yes. But do you?” he asked.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a switchblade knife. He had it at her throat in an instant.

“Don’t hurt me,” she whispered. “Just be cool.”

“Get out of the car. Slo

wly. Don’t you dare scream. You be cool.”

Shafer got out with her, staying close, the knife still pressed to the hollow of her throat.

“It’s all just a game, darling,” he explained. “My name is Death. You’re a very lucky girl. I’m the best player of all.”

As if to prove it, he stabbed her for the first time.

Book One

THE JANE DOE MURDERS

Chapter 1

THINGS WERE GOING PRETTY WELL that day. I was driving a bright-orange school bus through Southeast on a blistering-hot morning in late July, and I was whistling a little Al Green as I drove. I was in the process of picking up sixteen boys from their houses and also two foster homes. Door-to-door bus service. Hard to beat.

Just one week earlier I had returned from Boston and the Mr. Smith murder case. Mr. Smith and a deranged killer named Gary Soneji had both been involved in that one. I needed a rest, and I’d taken the morning off to do something I’d been looking forward to for a change.

My partner, John Sampson, and a twelve-year-old named Errol Mignault sat behind me on the bus. John was wearing Wayfarer shades, black jeans, and a black T-shirt that read ALLIANCE OF CONCERNED MEN. SEND DONATIONS TODAY. He is six-nine, a very solid two hundred fifty pounds. We’ve been friends since we were ten, when I first moved to D.C.

He, Errol, and I were talking about the boxer Sugar Ray Robinson, almost shouting over the bus’s blustery, occasionally misfiring engine. Sampson had his huge arm lightly draped over Errol’s shoulders. Proper physical contact is encouraged when dealing with these boys.

Finally, we picked up the last little guy on our list, an eight-year-old who lived in Benning Terrace, a tough project known to some of us as Simple City.

As we left the project, an ugly smear of graffiti told visitors everything they needed to know about the neighborhood. It read YOU ARE NOW LEAVING THE WAR ZONE, AND YOU LIVED TO TELL ABOUT IT.

We were taking the boys out to Lorton Prison in Virginia. They would be visiting their fathers for the afternoon. They were all young, between eight and thirteen. The Alliance transports forty to fifty kids each week to see their fathers and mothers in different prisons. The goal is a lofty one: to bring the crime rate in Washington down by a third.

I’d been out to the prison more times than I cared to remember. I knew the warden at Lorton pretty well. A few years back I’d spent a lifetime there, interviewing Gary Soneji.

Warden Marion Campbell had set up a large room on Level One where the boys met with their fathers. It was a powerful scene, even more emotional than I’d expected. The Alliance spends time training the fathers who want to participate in the program. There are four steps: how to show love; accept fault and responsibility; attain parent-and-child harmony; discover new beginnings.

Ironically, the boys were all trying to look and act tougher than they actually were. I heard one boy say, “You weren’t in my life before, why should I listen to you now?” But the fathers were trying to show a softer side.

Sampson and I hadn’t made the run to Lorton before. It was our first time, but I was already sure I’d do it again. There was so much raw emotion and hope in the room, so much potential for something good and decent. Even if some of it would never be realized, it showed that an effort was being made, and something positive could come from it.

What struck me most was the bond that still existed between some of the fathers and their young sons. I thought about my own boy, Damon, and how lucky we were. The thing about most of the prisoners in Lorton was that they knew what they had done was wrong; they just didn’t know how to stop doing it.

For most of the hour and a half, I just walked around and listened. I was occasionally needed as a psychologist, and I did the best I could on short notice. At one little group, I heard a father say, “Please tell your mother I love her and I miss her like crazy.” Then both the prisoner and his son broke into tears and hugged each other fiercely.

Sampson came up to me after we’d been in the prison for an hour or so. He was grinning broadly. His smile, when it comes, is a killer. “Man, I love this. Do-gooder shit is the best.”

“Yeah, I’m hooked myself. I’ll drive the big orange bus again.”

“Think it’ll help? Fathers and sons meeting like this?” he asked me.

I looked around the room. “I think today, right now, this is a success for these men and their sons. That’s good enough.”

Sampson nodded. “The old one-day-at-a-time approach. Works for me, too. I am flying, Alex.”

So was I, so was I. I’m a sucker for this kind of stuff.