The Big Bad Wolf (novel)

"The Big Bad Wolf" is the ninth book by James Patterson featuring the former Washington, D.C. homicide detective and forensic psychiatrist and current FBI agent Alex Cross.

Plot summary

The book begins with a Russian mobster known as The Wolf buying his way into ADX Florence. He is there to see Italian mobster, 66 year old Augustino Palumbo. Once inside The Wolf is courteous and friendly. The meeting is to unite the 2 families, thus becoming one of the biggest crime syndicates in the world. He leans toward the old man and whispers something in his ear, which terrifies Palumbo. He then grabs the old man by the neck and breaks it.

A beautiful woman, Elizabeth Connolly, mother of 3, is leaving the upscale Phipps Plaza mall in Atlanta, Georgia. The Wolf has paid 2 persons $150,000 to abduct her.

They approach her and grab her, carrying her to her SUV and putting her in the trunk. They put her to sleep using chloroform. They drive to another nearby mall and transfer her to a van.

In Washington, D.C., Dr. Alex Cross, who has left the police department to join the FBI, is walking his two eldest children, Damon and Jannie, to their school. His smallest kid, little Alex, is walking next to his dad. Alex was contemplating how quickly his children were growing and how well things were going in his life now. He wondered how long that would last.

By 9 am that morning, Cross is in Quantico at the FBI training academy. Burns has granted Alex a few allowances, like the age limit, condensing the training period to 8 weeks and not having to live in the training facility. Alex is attending a class when a secretary tells him Senior Agent Gordon Nooney needed to see him.

Nooney tells Cross he's dismissed for the day and Director Burns wants him involved on a case. He wonders why Cross even needs training since he's caught so many psychopaths.

On the helicopter the other two agents — Jim Heckin and his partner—inform him that a Baltimore police officer has his own family hostage and has asked for Cross.

When Alex arrives, the scene is a bit chaotic. The SWAT team is already on scene. The police are a bit resentful of Cross, but he pays them no mind. The police officer’s name is Detective Dennis Coulter. Cross knows of him and has worked with him but was surprised that Coulter had asked for him. Cross is able to talk to Coulter, who tells Alex he’s being set up by his partner and internal affairs and that the police are trying to kill him. According to Coulter he had proof that other police officers were involved in a drug trafficking scheme.

Cross talks with Capt. Stockton Sheehan, who tells him they’re going in at sundown. Looking at his watch, Alex sees that they have maybe a half hour left of light. He calls Coulter himself and tells him he has a plan. Cross thinks that the police are trying to kill Coulter and he might be Coulter’s only shot. Cross has the police move away and has Coulter come out. Once outside the FBI surround him to protect him from possible snipers. They load Coulter into a van and leave. His family comes out all carrying boxes with the proof Coulter had talked about.

That night Alex returns home. It was late and little Alex had woken up. Cross goes to his room and the two fall asleep.

The Wolf performs zamochit on the dead old man. Zamochit means "the breaking of bones". It is part of a murder ritual practiced by members of the Red Mafiya.

The kidnappers, Slava and Zoya, were hiding out for a few days at the Chelsea Hotel in New York City. The get a call from Sterling, one of the Wolf’s men, that another client wants a woman. They agree to take the job. As soon as they hang up they resume doing Zamochit to a gagged and cuffed man.

Alex stops at the J. Edgar Hoover Building to talk to Burns, who is impressed with Alex’s performance in Baltimore. Burns is going to send Cross on another assignment. Cross got the feeling he was no longer going to continue training at Quantico. Director Burns also gave Alex a message that sometimes in the FBI it’s hard to tell the good guys from the bad and to not trust anyone, using Kyle Craig as an example.

Alex is going to Atlanta. Once inside the small airplane, Cross is joined by Wyatt Walsh and is told that the kidnapping of Elizabeth Connolly isn’t the first and that she’s a judge’s wife so now the FBI has authority on the case.

When they get on the scene they already have two witnesses, a young high school couple that had been in the back of a van making out. Alex then talks with the local police and informs them as much as he can. There had been other abductions similar to this in other states and it was a judge’s wife a ransom was only asked for once and none of the women have ever been found. A female detective asks if this is related to the Sandra Friedlander case from two years back. Cross says no, but he’d lied to them.

Over 220 women were currently listed as missing and 7 were linked to the FBI’s white slave rings. White women in their 20’s and 30 have commanded high prices in Asia and the Middle East. Cross is meeting with Judge Brendan Connolly. He asks him if he’s noticed anyone watching his wife or showing interest. The judge said he never noticed.

The Wolf was throwing a party at his mansion in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The Wolf was 47 years old and a former KGB agent, who became the head of the Russian Mafia. He was ruthless and methodical. He took the name of the Siberian Wolf which was a ruthless hunter. He was hands on in all the operations. The party was to celebrate the launch of a new magazine called Instinct. He went by the name of Ari Manning, a wealthy business man from Tel Aviv, in South Florida and used other names in other areas. He was pleased that no one at the party, neither his associates nor friends, knew about the illegal diamonds, the heroin, the stolen weapons, the stolen airplanes, stolen cars or the kidnapped women. He went downstairs to see Elizabeth Connolly, who reminded him of Claudia Schiffer. Elizabeth had been bound and gagged.

Cross is ordered to attend a key person meeting of what has been dubbed the “White Girl” case. The team consists of Ned Mahoney, Monnie Donnelly, and Walter Zelras. The FBI is working with Interpol, and they discuss the slave industry in general.

After lunch, Alex returns to orientation and takes some more classes. At the end of the day Gordon Nooney approaches Alex. Gordon is upset about all the special accommodations and the preferential treatment that Alex is getting.

Alex reviews some files and sees that all the women abducted were blond, good looking and likable.

When Alex gets home late, his best friend and former partner with the police, John Sampson, is waiting for him. He tells Alex things are good and loves being married. He informs Alex that Billie, John’s wife, is pregnant.

In a mall in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania, Slava and Zoya abduct and kidnap Audrey Meek, but her small children are left as witnesses, on purpose. She had been bought for $250,000.

The Wolf is in northern Miami, Florida. He is going to see Yeggy Titov about some security matters. The Wolf prided himself in all the small details. Yeggy had worked for the Wolf for a little over a year. The Wolf was disgusted about how Yeggy lived. Yeggy tells The Wolf that his website is secure and the catalogue is finished. The Wolf looks through it and tells Yeggy that girls 7 and 17 were dead, to which Yeggy scoffs by saying “details, details, details”. Then Yeggy demands payment. The Wolf pulls a gun and shoots him in between the eyes. The Wolf fixes the catalogue and makes a copy to a disk. Details, thought the Wolf.

Monnie Donnelly brought some more files of other abductions. She warns Alex not to get Nooney mad. Alex finds out about Meek’s abduction, but Nooney denies his request to join the team sent to investigate.

The next morning Alex is having breakfast. He goes outside to get the newspaper and sees the headline about the kidnappings being connected. There were specifics never released to the press, so Cross knows there is a mole inside the FBI.

That morning, Alex plays the piano before going to Quantico. In the middle of an exercise, Nooney requests to see him. Nooney tells Cross he had spoken with Pittman, who told Nooney that Cross used the Washington Post before to get things done. He asks Cross if he leaked the information to the Washington Post. Cross says no. Cross tells him his friend at the post was murdered and doesn’t know anyone there anymore. He also tells Nooney he had no reason to leak the story. Nooney again tells him he doesn’t like Cross special treatment.

At a gay bar in Newport, Rhode Island the couple abducts a young man, a Benjamin Coffey. The buyer went by the name of Mr. Potter, which was a codename he used. Mr. Potter was happy with his purchase and marveled at the boy. The boy is naked and bound and blindfolded. Mr. Potter is in love. He works as a university professor and he’s angered that he can’t touch any of his students.

Audrey Meek meets her captor, who calls himself the Art Director. She’s in a remote cabin. He tells her she’s not to try to escape and makes her breakfast.

Alex comes home a bit late. His family is a bit upset because he’s working late and they’d all made plans to go to a movie.

The next day at Quantico, Burns arrives and Alex is asked to go to a debriefing. He tells the agents there that the mistakes seem to be done on purpose. They had a suspect named Rafe Farley, who was a sex offender. He’d gone to an internet chat room and given details of the Audrey Meek kidnapping. Alex is asked to go with Mahoney to North Vineland, New Jersey to take Farley down. After a few hours the agents go in but the front door was booby trapped and 2 agents go down. Other agents rush through the back and subdue Farley and his girlfriend, both overweight and in their 40’s.

Cross and Mahoney interview Farley. He says he was making up the story to impress his internet friends and had a police scanner to listen to the details about the kidnapping not released to the press.

In a secure chatroom the Wolf, Sterling, Mr. Potter, The Sphinx, The Art Director, and Marvel were communicating with each other about eliminating the couple. The Wolf noticed someone had gotten on the chat room, uninvited, and logged off when they were discovered. The Wolf vowed to find them and kill them.

The hacker was a 14 year old girl named Lily Olsen. She’d heard the entire conversation and wondered what to do.

The Wolf is in Long Island at Slava and Zoya’s home. When he arrives they are already bound and tied on the floor. He wants to know why they betrayed him and breaks Slava’s neck. Zoya then tells him everything. We also learn that back in Russia, a rival leader had broken his knee as a warning. When he had recuperated he performed zamochit on him and his lieutenants.

The Wolf goes to a club in Brooklyn and meets his ex wife, Yulya, and her lover, a mobster named Mikhail Biryukov. The Wolf confronts them both about the betrayal and quickly stabs Mikhail with an ice pick in the eye and snaps Yulya’s neck.

Benjamin Coffey is imprisoned in a basement underneath a barn. He is still tied and gagged and had been crying. Suddenly he hears someone calling for him and saying it’s the FBI. The person was actually Mr. Potter who tells Benjamin that he was a bad boy and bashes him in the head with a sledgehammer.

Mr. Potter’s real name was Homer O. Taylor. He was an assistant at Dartmouth College. He missed Benjamin dearly and called Sterling to make another purchase. Taylor had inherited $2 million from his parents 5 years ago, but he was draining through it too fast. He didn’t care. He needed someone to love him.

The bodies of Slava and Zoya were found. Their pictures were shown to the witnesses and they were confirmed to be the kidnappers. Alex and Monnie discuss the Russian Mafia and are convinced they are behind the kidnappings of the white, blond women.

The Art Director is taking Audrey Meek for a drive. It’s a beautiful day. Audrey believes he’s going to kill her, but the Art Director surprises her by letting her go. Before she leaves, he tells her he loves her.

Alex is rushed to Norristown, Pennsylvania where Audrey Meek is being held by the FBI. As soon as he arrives, Alex questions her. She told Alex that other than forcing her to have sex with him, the Art Director was pleasant and liked to wait on her. Using the information Meek provided, they find the house she was held in. Inside the Art Director was dead. He’s committed suicide and poisoned himself. He had left a suicide note and asked Audrey Meek for forgiveness and explains that he just had to have her, even if only for a few days.

Alex returns late to Washington DC. His family is angry because he’s promised to take Janelle to the pool. He talks, and makes peace with her.

The Wolf is in Washington on business. First he meets with an Italian capo, and then with an FBI agent he has working as a mole in the department. The agent informs The Wolf that the FBI is good at connecting the dots and although they don’t know the Wolf is involved, they soon will.

The next night Alex arrives home early and has dinner with his family when he receives a call from his ex-girlfriend, Christine Johnson, who is in town and wants to see her son, little Alex. Alex tells her she can come right away, but she decides to be there the next morning.

At 8:30 am Christine shows up. She plays with little Alex. Inside Alex knows she’s going to take little Alex away.

The Wolf is now meeting two professional hockey players in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The players are Russians and are two of the best in the NHL. The Wolf wants them to throw a game. The players demand more money and the Wolf beats them both. He warns them to throw the game or die.

A huge task force was set up and led by Stacy Pollack. She informs all the agents that there is a leak in the department. Pollack believes the leak is Monnie Donnelly. Cross thinks that’s impossible. Pollack also believes the kidnappers are sexually obsessed. Cross disagrees and thinks that it’s simply about the money.

After the meeting Alex calls Monnie and tells her everything. Monnie is angry. They go for a drink at a pub. She thanks Alex for being a friend.

Vince Petrillo and Francis Deegan were a gay couple at Holy Cross. They were stargazing when Francis was abducted and Vince was killed by the new 3 ruthless kidnappers.

Francis is taken to Mr. Potter, who calls him Roland. Mr. Potter hugs and kisses him, tells him he’s missed him and asks him to never leave him again. Francis is confused but decides not to anger Mr. Potter any more and agrees with him, to which Mr. Potter slaps him and tells him there was no Roland and was simply messing with him.

Alex meets Monnie who tells her she has a lead and tells him about the 14 year old that hacked into the website “The Wolf’s Den”. The 2 decide to go visit Lily Olsen, who only lives 12 miles away in Dale City, Virginia. She explains to them how she had created an encryption device that allowed her access. They have her try to hack in again, but now the system is changed and needs an Eye scan to get in. Lily tells them the owner of the site goes by the name of the Wolf and appears to be Russian.

At another meeting led by Pollack, everyone is informed about Dugan’s kidnapping. Cross and Donnelly share the information from Lily Olsen. Donnelly Shares that the Wolf is a Russian gangster named Pasha Sorokin.

Cross suggests that the FBI keep 24/7 surveillance on certain pornography sites.

The next day Alex is going to a custody hearing. Her lawyer alleges that Cross’ profession was dangerous and that Nana was too old. That got Alex upset so Cross he leaves, telling Christine that what she's doing is wrong.

Alex leaves the office and returns to work, but can’t focus so returns home where Nana is waiting for him. She insists on going for a drive, and the two talk. Nana tells Alex to fight for his son.

Jam calls Alex and the two talk for a while, and she also tells him to fight.

About 10 seconds after hanging up, Alex’s phone rings again. It was Director Burns. Burns tells Cross to go to New Hampshire in the morning. They have a suspect using Alex’s idea for tracking porn websites. Alex is upset no one told him. Burns asks that Alex trust him a little longer.

The suspect was an assistant English professor at Dartmouth University using the code name of “Mr. Potter”. Potter had bragged about the Wolf’s Den site where if you have enough money you can buy anything. The FBI is now surveying Dr. Homer Taylor. Upon following him to a secluded farm at night, they wait until he goes inside and ambush the place. Once inside they catch Taylor by surprise and find the bound bloody body of Francis Deegan naked, but alive.

Cross begins to interview Taylor at his small home library. Taylor demands his lawyer, Alex tells him they’re just chatting but did call his lawyer since they arrested him at 8am and called the lawyer at 8:30am and Taylor looks at his hand and its only 12:30am so Cross tells him that they have plenty of time then. Taylor tells Alex that the time when Francis was taken to the hospital was recorded to which Alex replies that Francis was taken to the hospital a little after 9am and Alex wrote the time himself.

The two men are left alone in the small library. Taylor is handcuffed and sitting on a chair. Taylor demands his lawyer again. Cross demands to know where Ben Coffey is buried, that they will find the body eventually and it will save them time if Taylor just tells him. Taylor becomes sarcastic with Alex, so Alex kicks him in the chest and Taylor falls down and begins screaming for his lawyer. He yells at Cross for over an hour. After he was done, he asks Cross if he can make a deal. Alex says yes, but Taylor needs to deliver everyone including the Wolf. Taylor tells him he doesn’t know what the Wolf looks like but can get Cross inside the Wolf’s Den.

Pollack gives a briefing about the Wolf. He was the leader of the Russian Red Mafia, and is involved in everything from drugs, weapons, prostitution, theft, laundering, gambling, slave trading and more. His name is Pasha Sorokin, and he’d been brought to the United States by the CIA, for whom he was supposed to deliver all sorts of information, but disappeared once he got in the US and never delivered. Sorokin once sold his two cousins into slavery and was selling babies when he first arrived. He recently swindled a Miami bank out of $200 million.

In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania The Wolf and his young son Dimitri watch the two Russian players throw the game and sees the Philadelphia Flyers lose the game.

Cross and Taylor are going into the Wolf’s Den. Taylor warns Cross that the Wolf will kill them both and both will regret the deal and there is nowhere to hide. Once Taylor uses the retinal scan he is escorted out and Cross assumes the role of Mr. Potter. He demands another boy. The Sphinx says to wait his turn and demands his woman. Sterling asks Potter what happened to the last man he’d gotten and said he killed him and his body was disposed off. The Wolf then tells everyone to wait and warns them that they’re being watched. After signing off the other agents clap their hands and are impressed with Cross.

After a few days, the Wolf sends Potter an email that a decision had been made and to contact the Wolf. Cross waits 1 ½ hours before contacting the Wolf again. The FBI had agents posing as Taylor at his house and told the school Taylor had the flu and he wouldn’t be in for a few days.

After Taylor arrives and does the eye scan, Cross begins typing “This is Potter” to which there is no reply. After waiting several minutes Alex types again “This is Potter” to which the Wolf replies I know, and Cross goes into a “tirade” about making him wait. The Wolf questions Cross before agreeing to get another boy for him.

The boy that the Wolf was supposed to deliver was actually a young, handsome and boyishly looking FBI agent who had 24/7 protection and was armed. He “attended” Harvard University in Boston, Massachusetts. On the second night the bait walks into a dark park on his way to a pub. The agents notice three men ambushing the young agent. The FBI rushes them, and one of the Russian men shoots the young agent in the head. The 3 men start running. Cross and Agent Peggy Katz go after the shooter. The shooter turns around to kill Alex, but is shot dead by agent Katz. The other 2 kidnappers got away, but the young agent shot in the face was still alive.

Cross feels that joining the FBI was a mistake and they were too “by the book” sometimes. Cross is ordered to return to DC, just like that. He arrives at the DC FBI office at 6am and was tired and hadn’t slept. Pollack tells Alex that Boston was not his fault and had good news. The wire transfer had been monitored from every transaction and bank it went through. The money finally arrived at a Dallas, Texas bank.

The account belonged to Lawrence Lipton, a well-to-do businessman in Dallas. The FBI put him under surveillance. Cross wondered if he was the Wolf. Lipton was a deacon at his church and belonged on several boards of directors. The kicker to Cross was that he owned a software company.

The next day all the agents that were surveying the house were ordered to pull back and given no explanation. The order had come from Burns.

The next morning, via a conference call, Director Burns explains himself. The Liptons were an influential family, and the Dallas Police and the Texas Governor wanted to make sure the FBI had the right person and had requested the FBI back off. After Burns spoke with them, the FBI is renewing its surveillance on Lawrence Lipton.

A few seconds later Burns calls Alex and tells him he’s to be heavily involved in bringing the entire Wolf’s Den down.

Cross is chosen to confront Lipton and goes to Lipton’s office. He’s made to wait about 15 minutes when Cross decides to get tough and has Lipton pulled out of his meeting.

Lipton yells at Cross after Cross tells him why he is visiting. Lipton quits yelling when he calls him “Sterling”. Cross follows the quiet Lipton into his office. Tells him he can protect his family. Lipton becomes uncooperative and Alex has the FBI move in and arrest Lipton.

The Wolf had been watching the scene from his car. He orders his driver to get close and pulls out a semi-automatic pistol. He’d seen Cross next to Sterling, but Cross almost psychically pulls Sterling down before being hit.

After interrogating Sterling for over 7 hours and using his family as leverage, the FBI finally get Sterling to admit who he is, but before delivering the Wolf, Sterling wants lots of assurances in writing.

After hashing out the details with Lipton’s lawyers, Cross interrogates Lipton. Lipton explains that he desired teenagers and preteens. He would order videos and pictures online. One day a man came to his office and came with proof of everything he’d bought and asked if he wanted the real things. After several months the Wolf approached him and wanted to partner with him. Using his computer knowledge, Sterling told Cross that The Wolf uses the alias of Ari Manning.

Cross, Mahoney and several other agents were on a boat outside Manning’s mansion in south Florida. A large party was going on. They decide to crash it. A large man asks for their invitations. Cross and Mahoney pull out their guns and badges.

Inside the agents identify themselves. Cross, who knew what the Wolf looked like walked up to him. The Wolf’s lawyer is on hand and asks the agents to leave. Cross tells him they’re not leaving and unless they want him arrested in public then they can go to a private room. As they go inside the Wolf simply says “your little boy's name is also Alex?” Once in the room Alex tells The Wolf, in front of his lawyer, that Manning is the Russian mobster Pasha Sorokin also known as the Wolf.

Elizabeth Connelly starts a fire in her little room to alert the FBI to her presence. Using the distraction, Sorkin’s bodyguards start shooting and take Sorokin upstairs. Cross and Mahoney follow them upstairs and using a small window, they follow them into the ocean waters.

They follow the Wolf into a shopping center. After a brief standoff, Sorokin comes out smiling saying he is Sorkin, but is not the Wolf and begins to laugh.

Over a 2 day period, Pasha said he was simply given a part to play and had never met the Wolf. Using all available resources, the FBI brings in the CIA agents that brought the Wolf into the US, and take them to the cell Sorkin is held at, where they confirm that he is not the man they helped get out of Russia. Sorkin does give Cross the name of the person code named the Sphinx, Elizabeth Connelly’s own husband Judge Brendan Connelly. Sorkin had met them at a party. Sorokin wanted Elizabeth because she looked like Claudia Schiffer. Connelly, who’d been having affairs for years, did not, and sold her to Sorokin.

They follow Connelly as he drives to work in his Porsche Boxster. Upon seeing he was followed, the judge ran.

The chase ends with Connelly losing control of the car and crashing into an oak tree. Cross and Mahoney then approach the judge. He comes out with a gun and shoots at the 2 agents. Cross tells Mahoney not to shoot and rushes at the Sphinx and hits him, causing him to roll about 20 feet down a small hill. When he got up Cross hits him again. Soon Cross beats the judge until he can’t get up. Mahoney asks if that’s how the DCPD does it, to which Alex responds Yes, and laughs.

For the next few weeks, everything was quiet. Alex was promoted to Deputy Director of Investigations and was given a week off, which he used to be with his family. During one day on his week off, Burns calls him and wants a short meeting with him. He tells Cross Nooney is resigning the FBI and he was the leak at the Post. Burns offers Cross Nooney’s job, which Alex declines. Alex likes field work.

Alex returns to work a few days later. As soon as he settles in his office, he and Pollack are ordered to go to Brooklyn to follow a lead on the Wolf. As they go toward the airplane in the airbase, a sniper shot missed Alex as he had laughed at a joke and it hit Pollack. She was down, but alive. After some investigating, Burns concludes that they were set up and there is a mole inside the FBI. Burns wants the Wolf and sets up a BAM team to capture him. BAM is an acronym for By Any Means.

A few nights later Cross is woken up and informed Lipton was murdered inside his cell, including 2 agents assigned to protect him. Lipton’s family had also been murdered. Burns family had been hit but everyone was alive. As Alex’s family is evacuated he notices a photographer. Alex knew then and there he would lose custody of little Alex and the photographer worked for Christine’s lawyer.

The next day, Alex is in Texas. Lipton’s body had every bone broken. No video records. Alex goes to visit Kyle Craig in Colorado. Kyle used to be a friend of Alex and an FBI agent. Kyle was a psychopathic killer known as the Mastermind and had killed dozens of people. Cross asked Kyle if he knew who the Wolf was. Kyle said he played chess with him the night he murdered Palumbo and he knows who he is.

It took another day but Cross negotiated a name out of Kyle. The FBI was hesitant because the information came from Kyle. They proceeded with caution and checked and rechecked the facts. If the information was incorrect, it would embarrass the bureau for years. The FBI waited a week and followed all due diligence procedures. The CIA confirmed they’d had suspicions and those suspicions proved true when electronic surveillance confirmed the Wolf was going after Burns again. Burns sends agents to New York City to arrest him.

The operation was big. The NYPD FBI, CIA, and Secret Service were all involved in apprehending the Wolf. The Russian was the head of the trade delegation to New York and was a well-to-do business man. When they try to apprehend him, the bodyguard open fire and there’s a fight between Cross and Mahoney vs. the Russian who is big and powerful. Cross tells him that Kyle Craig gave him up.

The man believed to be the Wolf was Andrei Prokopev. The Russians were cooperating and told them they had also been investigating and although Prokopev was red mafia, they were sure he was not the Wolf. The Russians know who the Wolf is and believe Prokopev was set up because he was the Wolf’s chief rival.

That night Alex plays the piano to help him unwind. The next day little Alex is being taken by protective services. Christine was awarded custody due to the dangers of Alex’s job.

Epilogue

Pasha Sorokin was riding a van escorting him to the courthouse. There was an escort of about 6 cars. The Wolf attacks the caravan. He and his men used automatic weapons and rocket launchers and it took less than a minute. The Wolf goes inside the van carrying Pasha and fired a rocket launcher at him.

The End