Alert Page 25

  I decide to walk, heading south from the cemetery toward the Atlantic. I always underestimate the distance to the ocean, but it’s a nice day for a walk, even if a little steamy. And I enjoy the houses just south of Main Street along this road, the white-trimmed Cape Cods with cedar shingles whose colors have grown richer with age from all the precipitation that comes with proximity to the ocean. Some are bigger, some are newer, but these houses generally look the same, which I find both comforting and a little creepy.

  As I get closer to the ocean, the plots of land get wider, the houses get bigger, and the privacy shrubs flanking them get taller. I stop when I reach shrubbery that’s a good ten feet high. I know I’ve found the place because the majestic wrought-iron gates at the end of the driveway, which are slightly parted, are adorned with black-and-yellow tape that says CRIME SCENE DO NOT CROSS.

  I slide between the gates without breaking the seal. I start up the driveway, but it curves off to some kind of carriage house up a hill, which once upon a time probably served as a stable for the horses and possibly the servants’ quarters. So I take the stone path that will eventually lead me to the front door.

  In the center of the wide expanse of grass, just before it slopes dramatically upward, there is a small stone fountain, with a monument jutting up that bears a crest and an inscription. I lean over the fountain to take a closer look. The small tablet of stone features a bird in the center, with a hooked beak and a long tail feather, encircled by little symbols, each of which appears to be the letter X, but which upon closer inspection is a series of crisscrossing daggers.

  And then, ka-boom.

  It hits me, the rush, the pressure in my chest, the stranglehold to my throat, I can’t breathe, I can’t see, I’m weightless. Help me, somebody please help me—

  I stagger backward, almost losing my balance, and suck in a deep, delicious breath of air.

  “Wow,” I say into the warm breeze. Easy, girl. Take it easy. I wipe greasy sweat from my forehead and inhale and exhale a few more times to slow my pulse.

  Beneath the monument’s crest, carved into the stone in a thick Gothic font, are these words:

  Cecilia, O Cecilia

  Life was death disguised

  Okay, that’s pretty creepy. I take a photo of the monument with my smartphone. Now front and center before the house, I take my first good look.

  The mansion peering down at me from atop the hill is a Gothic structure of faded multicolored limestone. It has a Victorian look to it, with multiple rooflines, all of them steeply pitched, fancy turrets, chimneys grouped at each end. There are elaborate medieval-style accents on the facade. Every peak is topped with an ornament that ends in a sharp point, like spears aimed at the gods. The windows are long and narrow, clover-shaped, with stained glass. The house is like one gigantic, imperious frown.

  I’ve heard some things about this house, read some things, even passed by it many times, but seeing it up close like this sends a chill through me.

  It is part cathedral and part castle. It is a scowling, menacing, imposing structure, both regal and haunting, almost romantic in its gloom.

  All it’s missing is a drawbridge and a moat filled with crocodiles.

  This is 7 Ocean Drive. This is what they call the Murder House.

  This isn’t your case, I remind myself. This isn’t your problem.

  This could cost you your badge, girl.

  I start up the hill toward the front door.

  I’m transported back hundreds of years, to a time when you rode by horseback or carriage, when you lived by candlelight and torches, when you burned witches and treated infections with leeches.

  When I close the front door of the house at 7 Ocean Drive, the sound echoes up to the impossibly high, rounded ceiling, decorated with an ornate fresco of winged angels and naked women and bearded men in flowing robes, all of them appearing to reach toward something, or maybe toward one another.

  The second anteroom is as chilling and dated as the first, with patterned tile floors and more of the arched, Old Testament ceilings, antique furniture, gold-framed portraits on the walls of men dressed in ruffled shirts and long coats, wigs of wavy white hair and sharply angled hats—formalwear, circa 1700.

  The guy who built this place, the patriarch of the family, a guy named Winston Dahlquist, apparently didn’t have a sense of humor.

  My heels echo on the hardwood floor as I enter the open-air foyer, rising up three stories to the roof. Every step I take elicits a reaction from this house, fleeting coughs and groans.

  “Hello,” I say, like a child might, the sound returning to me faintly.

  The stairs up to the second floor are winding and predictably creaky. The house continues to call out from parts unseen, aches and hiccups and wheezes, a centuries-old creature drawing long, labored breaths.

  When I reach the landing, it seizes me again, stealing the air from my lungs, pressing against my chest, blinding me. No, please! Please, please, stop—

  —high-pitched childlike squeals, uncontrollable laughter—

  Please don’t, please don’t do this to me.

  I grasp the banister so I don’t fall back down the stairs. I open my eyes and raise my face, panting for air, until my heartbeat finally decelerates.

  “Get a grip, Murphy.” I pass through ornate double doors to the second-floor hallway, where the smell greets me immediately, the coppery odor of spilled blood, the overpowering, putrid scent of decay. I walk along a thick red carpet, the walls papered with red and gold, as I approach the bedroom where Zach Stern and Melanie Phillips took their last breaths.

  I step onto the dark hardwood floor and look around the room. Gold wallpaper is everywhere. Against one wall is a king-size canopy bed with thick purple curtains and sturdy bedposts. The bed is dressed in a purple comforter and ruffle with velvet pillows, some of which are still on the bed, some of which lie on the floor. The dark wood dresser holds two pewter statuettes that were probably bookends for the thick volumes of short stories that also now lie on the floor. The statuettes, as well as an antique brass alarm clock, are knocked to the side on the dresser.

  Opposite the bed, made of wood that matches the dresser, is a giant armoire. And in the far corner of the room, south of the armoire and west of the dresser, is the bathroom.

  I remove copies of the crime scene photos I xeroxed from the file. Zachary Stern was found lying facedown on the floor, his head turned to the right toward the door, his feet pointed toward the bed. Beneath him was a pool of blood and other bodily excrement from the horrific stab wound to his midsection. Several of his fingers were crushed as well. Melanie Phillips was found by the armoire opposite the bed, the back of her right hand touching the armoire’s leg; she was lying on her stomach like Zach, her head to the left, her eyes open and her mouth frozen in a tiny o. She was stabbed more than a dozen times, in the breast and torso and then in the face, neck, back, arms, and legs.

  Now back to the scene. The comforter on the bed has been pulled back on the left side, showing a large blood pool where Zach was first stabbed while lying in bed. There is blood spatter on the wall behind the bed, and a thick sea of blood embedded in the floor where he died. There is blood spatter on the armoire and all over the nearby floor where Melanie lay as she died.

  Two more facts: Judging from the fresh semen found inside Melanie and on Zach’s genitalia, it seems clear that the two of them had had sexual intercourse not long before they were killed. And as of now, barring DNA testing that is still pending, there is no physical evidence putting Noah Walker in this house—no fingerprints, no carpet fibers, no shoe or boot prints.

  And now the theory the STPD and the district attorney are running with: Noah was obsessed with Melanie. He somehow learned of her affair with Zach and followed her here. We don’t know how he got in. The front door should have been locked, and no damage was done to it. In any event, he lay in wait until they had completed their sexual intercourse, when they were relaxed, when their guards
were down, to spring into the room.

  Noah surprised Zach in bed, plunging his knife into Zach’s chest and dragging the blade downward, causing a vertical cut of roughly five inches, tearing open the esophagus and stomach. At this point, Melanie, who was in the bathroom cleaning up, came out. Noah subdued her by the dresser, knocking over the books and alarm clock and stabbing her multiple times in the breasts and torso before throwing her to the floor by the armoire, where he continued to stab her from behind, slicing her cheek and ear and neck and then her back, arms, and legs. He then returned to Zach and threw him out of the bed and onto the floor, stomping on and crushing some of Zach’s fingers in a blind rage.

  I move to the corner beyond where Zach’s body was found and squat down, trying to get the angle right and using the photos to make sure I’m accurate. Where Zach would have been lying on the floor, with his head to the right, his sight line travels beyond the edge of the bed to the armoire. I repeat the same exercise from Melanie’s vantage point and get the same line of vision, from the opposite end.

  I remove my compact from my purse and squat down by the leg of the armoire that Melanie’s right hand touched. I curl the compact under the armoire and around the leg so I can see the back of it. As I thought, the wood is abraded—scraped and cut.

  Ten minutes later, I’m walking on Ocean Drive toward Main Street, on my cell phone with Uncle Langdon. “Melanie Phillips was handcuffed to the armoire’s leg,” I say. “He made her watch the whole thing. This wasn’t an act of blind rage, Chief. This was a calculated, well-executed act of sadism.”

  About the Authors

  James Patterson’s books have sold more than 300 million copies, and he has had more #1 bestsellers than any other author. In addition to his novels for adults, he has also written numerous books for young readers, and with initiatives that include ReadKiddoRead.com, he has dedicated himself to improving access to books that will keep kids reading for life. He lives in Florida with his family.

  Michael Ledwidge is the author of The Narrowback and Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead. He is also the coauthor of the Michael Bennett series with James Patterson.

  jamespatterson.com

  Follow James Patterson on Facebook.

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  Books by James Patterson

  Featuring Alex Cross

  Hope to Die • Cross My Heart • Alex Cross, Run • Merry Christmas, Alex Cross • Kill Alex Cross • Cross Fire • I, Alex Cross • Alex Cross’s Trial (with Richard DiLallo) • Cross Country • Double Cross • Cross (also published as Alex Cross) • Mary, Mary • London Bridges • The Big Bad Wolf • Four Blind Mice • Violets Are Blue • Roses Are Red • Pop Goes the Weasel • Cat & Mouse • Jack & Jill • Kiss the Girls • Along Came a Spider

  The Women’s Murder Club

  14th Deadly Sin (with Maxine Paetro) • Unlucky 13 (with Maxine Paetro) • 12th of Never (with Maxine Paetro) • 11th Hour (with Maxine Paetro) • 10th Anniversary (with Maxine Paetro) • The 9th Judgment (with Maxine Paetro) • The 8th Confession (with Maxine Paetro) • 7th Heaven (with Maxine Paetro) • The 6th Target (with Maxine Paetro) • The 5th Horseman (with Maxine Paetro) • 4th of July (with Maxine Paetro) • 3rd Degree (with Andrew Gross) • 2nd Chance (with Andrew Gross) • 1st to Die

  Featuring Michael Bennett

  Alert (with Michael Ledwidge) • Burn (with Michael Ledwidge) • Gone (with Michael Ledwidge) • I, Michael Bennett (with Michael Ledwidge) • Tick Tock (with Michael Ledwidge) • Worst Case (with Michael Ledwidge) • Run for Your Life (with Michael Ledwidge) • Step on a Crack (with Michael Ledwidge)

  The Private Novels

  Private Vegas (with Maxine Paetro) • Private India: City on Fire (with Ashwin Sanghi) • Private Down Under (with Michael White) • Private L.A. (with Mark Sullivan) • Private Berlin (with Mark Sullivan) • Private London (with Mark Pearson) • Private Games (with Mark Sullivan) • Private: #1 Suspect (with Maxine Paetro) • Private (with Maxine Paetro)

  NYPD Red Novels

  NYPD Red 3 (with Marshall Karp) • NYPD Red 2 (with Marshall Karp) • NYPD Red (with Marshall Karp)

  Summer Novels

  Second Honeymoon (with Howard Roughan) • Now You See Her (with Michael Ledwidge) • Swimsuit (with Maxine Paetro) • Sail (with Howard Roughan) • Beach Road (with Peter de Jonge) • Lifeguard (with Andrew Gross) • Honeymoon (with Howard Roughan) • The Beach House (with Peter de Jonge)

  Stand-alone Books

  Truth or Die (with Peter de Jonge) • Miracle at Augusta (with Peter de Jonge) • Invisible (with David Ellis) • First Love (with Emily Raymond) • Mistress (with David Ellis) • Zoo (with Michael Ledwidge) • Guilty Wives (with David Ellis) • The Christmas Wedding (with Richard DiLallo) • Kill Me If You Can (with Marshall Karp) • Toys (with Neil McMahon) • Don’t Blink (with Howard Roughan) • The Postcard Killers (with Liza Marklund) • The Murder of King Tut (with Martin Dugard) • Against Medical Advice (with Hal Friedman) • Sundays at Tiffany’s (with Gabrielle Charbonnet) • You’ve Been Warned (with Howard Roughan) • The Quickie (with Michael Ledwidge) • Judge & Jury (with Andrew Gross) • Sam’s Letters to Jennifer • The Lake House • The Jester (with Andrew Gross) • Suzanne’s Diary for Nicholas • Cradle and All • When the Wind Blows • Miracle on the 17th Green (with Peter de Jonge) • Hide & Seek • The Midnight Club • Black Friday (originally published as Black Market) • See How They Run • Season of the Machete • The Thomas Berryman Number

  For Readers of All Ages

  Maximum Ride

  Maximum Ride Forever • Nevermore: The Final Maximum Ride Adventure • Angel: A Maximum Ride Novel • Fang: A Maximum Ride Novel • Max: A Maximum Ride Novel • The Final Warning: A Maximum Ride Novel • Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports: A Maximum Ride Novel • School’s Out—Forever: A Maximum Ride Novel • The Angel Experiment: A Maximum Ride Novel

  Daniel X

  Daniel X: Lights Out (with Chris Grabenstein) • Daniel X: Armageddon (with Chris Grabenstein) • Daniel X: Game Over (with Ned Rust) • Daniel X: Demons and Druids (with Adam Sadler) • Daniel X: Watch the Skies (with Ned Rust) • The Dangerous Days of Daniel X (with Michael Ledwidge)

  Witch & Wizard

  Witch & Wizard: The Lost (with Emily Raymond) • Witch & Wizard: The Kiss (with Jill Dembowski) • Witch & Wizard: The Fire (with Jill Dembowski) • Witch & Wizard: The Gift (with Ned Rust) • Witch & Wizard (with Gabrielle Charbonnet)

  Middle School

  Middle School: Just My Rotten Luck (with Chris Tebbetts, illustrated by Laura Park) • Middle School: Save Rafe! (with Chris Tebbetts, illustrated by Laura Park) • Middle School: Ultimate Showdown (with Julia Bergen, illustrated by Alec Longstreth) • Middle School: How I Survived Bullies, Broccoli, and Snake Hill (with Chris Tebbetts, illustrated by Laura Park) • Middle School: My Brother Is a Big, Fat Liar (with Lisa Papademetriou, illustrated by Neil Swaab) • Middle School: Get Me Out of Here! (with Chris Tebbetts, illustrated by Laura Park) • Middle School, The Worst Years of My Life (with Chris Tebbetts, illustrated by Laura Park)

  Confessions

  Confessions: The Paris Mysteries (with Maxine Paetro) • Confessions: The Private School Murders (with Maxine Paetro) • Confessions of a Murder Suspect (with Maxine Paetro)

  I Funny

  I Totally Funniest: A Middle School Story (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Laura Park) • I Even Funnier: A Middle School Story (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Laura Park) • I Funny: A Middle School Story (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Laura Park)

  Treasure Hunters

  Treasure Hunters: Danger Down the Nile (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Juliana Neufeld) • Treasure Hunters (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Juliana Neufeld)

  Other Books for Readers of All Ages

  Public School Superhero (with Chris Tebbetts, illustrated by Cory Thomas) • House of Robots (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Juliana Neufel
d) • Homeroom Diaries (with Lisa Papademetriou, illustrated by Keino) • Med Head (with Hal Friedman) • santaKid (illustrated by Michael Garland)

  For previews and information about the author, visit JamesPatterson.com or find him on Facebook or at your app store.

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  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Welcome

  Dedication

  Prologue: The Old SodOne

  Two

  Three

  Part One: Off the RailsChapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5