Along Came a Spider - James Patterson [1]
The Midnight Club
Along Came a Spider
Kiss the Girls
Hide &Seek
Jack &Jill
Cat &Mouse
Copyright
The characters and events in this book are fictional. Any similarity to real persons, either living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.
WARNER BOOKS EDITION
Copyright © 1992 by James Patterson
All rights reserved.
Cover illustration by Joe Ivies
This Warner Books Edition is published by arrangement with Little, Brown and Company.
Warner Books, Inc.
Hachette Book Group
237 Park Avenue
New York, NY 10017
Visit our website at www.HachetteBookGroup.com.
First eBook Edition: February 2001
ISBN: 978-0-7595-2030-1
Contents
Along comes the most talked about, the most gripping thriller in years…
Copyright
Acknowledgments
Prologue
Part One: Maggie Rose and Shrimpie Goldberg (1992)
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
Part Two: The Son of Lindbergh
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
CHAPTER 36
CHAPTER 37
CHAPTER 38
CHAPTER 39
CHAPTER 40
CHAPTER 41
CHAPTER 42
CHAPTER 43
Part Three: The Last Southern Gentleman
CHAPTER 44
CHAPTER 45
CHAPTER 46
CHAPTER 47
CHAPTER 48
CHAPTER 49
CHAPTER 50
CHAPTER 51
CHAPTER 52
CHAPTER 53
CHAPTER 54
CHAPTER 55
CHAPTER 56
CHAPTER 57
CHAPTER 58
CHAPTER 59
Part Four: Remember Maggie Rose
CHAPTER 60
CHAPTER 61
CHAPTER 62
CHAPTER 63
CHAPTER 64
CHAPTER 65
CHAPTER 66
CHAPTER 67
Part Five: The Second Investigation
CHAPTER 68
CHAPTER 69
CHAPTER 70
CHAPTER 71
CHAPTER 72
CHAPTER 73
CHAPTER 74
CHAPTER 75
CHAPTER 76
CHAPTER 77
CHAPTER 78
CHAPTER 79
CHAPTER 80
CHAPTER 81
CHAPTER 82
CHAPTER 83
CHAPTER 84
CHAPTER 85
CHAPTER 86
Part Six: The Cross House
CHAPTER 87
CHAPTER 88
CHAPTER 89
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank Peter Kim, who helped me learn about the private lives, the secrets, and the taboos that still exist all across America. Anne Pough-Campbell, Michael Ouweleen, Holly Tippett, and Irene Markocki gave me more of a feeling for Alex and his life in the Southeast section of D.C. Liz Delle and Barbara Groszewski kept me honest. Maria Pugatch (my Lowenstein) and Mark and MaryEllen Patterson put me back in touch with my half-dozen years working psych at McLean Hospital. Carole and Brigid Dwyer and Midgie Ford helped tremendously with Maggie Rose. Richard and Artie Pine ran with this like the banshees they can be. Finally, Fredrica Friedman was my partner in crime from beginning to end.
Prologue
Let’s Play
Make-Believe
(1932)
New Jersey, near Princeton;
March 1932
The Charles Lindbergh farmhouse glowed with bright, orangish lights. It looked like a fiery castle, especially in that gloomy, fir-wooded region of Jersey. Shreds of misty fog touched the boy as he moved closer and closer to his first moment of real glory, his first kill.
It was pitch-dark and the grounds were soggy and muddy and thick with puddles. He had anticipated as much. He’d planned for everything, including the weather.
He wore a size nine man’s work boot. The toe and heel of the boots were stuffed with torn cloth and strips of the Philadelphia Inquirer.
He wanted to leave footprints, plenty of footprints. A man’s footprints. Not the prints of a twelve-year-old boy. They would lead from the county highway called the Stoutsburg-Wertsville Road, up to, then back from, the farmhouse.
He began to shiver as he reached a stand of pines, not thirty yards from the sprawling house. The mansion was just as grand as he’d imagined: seven bedrooms and four baths on the second floor alone. Lucky Lindy and Anne Morrow’s place in the country.
Cool beans, he thought.
The boy inched closer and closer toward the dining-room window.