James Patterson - Cross

Then he saw the couple – him, in a Burberry trench; her, in a cashmere wrap and carrying John Berendt's City of Falling Angels.

He followed them, hidden in the midst of the festive, noisy crowd. Sullivan had thought it best to dress like an average Joe – khaki Dockers, sweatshirt, floppy rain hat. The pants, shirt, and hat could be discarded in a matter of seconds. Underneath, he wore a brown tweed suit, shirt and tie, and he had a beret. Thus, he would become the Professor. One of his favored disguises when he traveled in Europe to do a job.

The Harrises didn't walk far from St. Mark's, eventually turning onto Calle 13 Martiri. Sullivan already knew they were staying at the Bauer Hotel, so they were heading home now. "You're almost making this too easy," he muttered to himself.

Then he thought, Mistake.

HE FOLLOWED MARTIN and Marcia Harris as they walked arm in arm through a dark, narrow, and very typical Venetian alleyway They entered a gateway into the Bauer Hotel. He wondered why John Maggione wanted them dead, but it didn't really matter to him.

Moments later, he was sitting across the bar from them on the hotel terrace. A nice little spot, cozy as a love seat, it overlooked the canal and the Chiesa della Salute. The Butcher ordered a Bushmills but didn't drink more than a sip or two, just enough to take the edge off of things. He had a scalpel in his pants pocket, and he fingered it while he watched the Harrises.

Quite the lovebirds, he couldn't help thinking as they shared a long kiss at the bar. Get a room, why don't you?

As if he were reading the Butcher's mind, Martin Harris paid the check, and then the couple left the crowded, subdued terrace lounge. Sullivan followed. The Bauer was a typical Venetian palazzo, more like a private home than a hotel, lavish and opulent at every turn. His own wife, Caitlin, would have loved it, but he could never take her here, or ever come back himself.

Not after tonight and the unspeakable tragedy that was going to happen here in a matter of minutes. Because that's what the Butcher specialized in – tragedies, the unspeakable kind.

He knew that there were ninety-seven guest rooms and eighteen suites in the Bauer, and that the Harrises were staying in one of the suites on the third floor. He followed them up the carpeted stairs and immediately thought, Mistake.

But whose – mine or theirs? Important question to consider and be ready to answer.

He turned out of the stairwell – and it all went wrong in a hurry!

The Harrises were waiting for him, both with guns drawn, and Martin had a nasty smirk on his face. Most likely, they were going to take him to their room and kill him there. It was an obvious setup… by two professionals.

Not too shabby a job, either. An eight out of ten.

But who had done this to him? Who had set him up to die in Venice? Even more curious – why had he been targeted? Why him? And why now?

Not that he was thinking about any of that now, in the dimly lit corridor of the Bauer, with two guns pointed toward him.

Fortunately, the Harrises had committed several mistakes along the way: They'd made following them too easy; they'd been careless and unconcerned; and too romantic, at least in his jaded opinion, for a couple married twenty years, even one on holiday in Venice.

So the Butcher had come up the stairs with his own pistol drawn – and the instant he saw them with guns out, he fired.

No hesitation, not even a half second.

Chauvinist pig that he was, he took out the man first, the more dangerous opponent in his estimation. He got Martin Harris in the face, shattered the nose and upper lip. A definite kill shot. The man's head snapped back, and his blond hairpiece flew off.

Then Sullivan dove, rolled to the left, and Marcia Harris's shot missed him by a foot or more.

He fired again – and got Marcia in the side of her throat; then he put a second shot into her heaving chest. And a third in her heart.

The Butcher knew the Harrises were dead in the hallway, just lying there like sides of meat, but he didn't run out of the Bauer.

Instead, he whipped out his scalpel and went to work on their faces and throats. If he'd had the time, he would have stitched up the eyes and mouths too – to send a message. Then he took a half dozen photographs of the victims, the would-be assassins, for his prized picture collection.

One day soon, the Butcher would show these photos to the person who had paid to have him killed and failed, and who was now as good as dead.

That man was John Maggione, the don himself.

IN HIS MICHAEL SULLIVAN PERSONA, he had the habit of thinking things through several times, and not just his hit jobs. The lifelong habit included things about his family, small details like how and where they lived, and who knew about it. Also, images from his father's butcher shop in the Flatlands were always with him: an awning of wide stripes with the orange, white, and green of the Irish flag; the bright whiteness of the shop on the inside; the loud electric meat grinder that seemed to shake the whole building whenever it was turned on.

For this new life of his, far away from Brooklyn, he had chosen affluent, and mostly white-bread, Montgomery County in Maryland.

Specifically he had picked out the town of Potomac.

Around three on the afternoon that he arrived back from Europe, he drove at exactly twenty-five miles an hour through Potomac Village, stopping like any other good citizen at the irritatingly long light at the corner of River and Falls Roads.

More time to think, or obsess, which he usually enjoyed.

So, who had put a hit out on him? Was it Maggione? And what did it mean to him and his family? Was he safe coming home now?

One of the general "appearances," or "disguises," that he had carefully selected for his family was that of the bourgeois bohemian. The ironies of the lifestyle choice gave him constant amusement: nonfat butter, for example, and NPR always on the radio of his wife's trendy SUV; and bizarre foods – like olive-wheatgrass muffins. It was patently absurd and hilarious to the Butcher: the joys of Yuppie life that just didn't stop.

His three boys went to the private Landor School, where they hobnobbed with the mostly well-mannered, but often quite devious, children of the middle rich. There were lots of rich doctors in Montgomery County, working for NIH, the FDA, and Bethesda Naval Medical Command. So now he headed out toward Hunt County, the ritzy subdivision where he lived, and what a private hoot that was – "Hunt County, home of the Hunter."

And finally, there was his home, sweet home, purchased in 2002 for one point five million. Six large bedrooms, four and a half baths, heated pool, sauna, finished basement with media room. Sirius satellite radio was the latest rage with Caitlin and the boys. Sweet Caitlin, love of his straight life, who had a life coach and an intuitive healer these days – all paid for by his dubious labors on the Hunt.

Sullivan had called ahead on his cell, and there they were on the front lawn to meet and greet – waving like the big happy family that they thought they were. They had no idea, no clue that they were part of his disguise, that they were his cover story. That's all it was, right?

He hopped out of the Caddy, grinning like he was in a fast-food commercial, and sang his theme song, the old Shep and the Limelites classic "Daddy's Home."

"Daddy's home, your daddy's home to stay." And Caitlin and the kids chorused, "He's not a thousand miles a-waaay."

His life was the best, wasn't it? Except that somebody was trying to kill him now. And of course there was always his past, the way he grew up in Brooklyn, his insane father, the Bone Man, the dreaded back room at the shop. But the Butcher tried not to think about any of that right now.