6th Target, The

Book 6: A Women's Murder Club Thriller

by James Patterson, Maxine Paetro

Genres: Female Sleuths; Legal Thrillers; Suspense

Synopsis

When a horrifying attack leaves one of the Women's Murder Club struggling for her life, the others fight to keep a madman behind bars before anyone else is hurt. Lindsay Boxer and her new partner in the San Francisco police department are racing to stop a series of kidnappings that has electrified the city: children are being plucked off the streets together with their nannies, but the kidnappers aren't demanding ransom. Amid uncertainty and rising panic, Lindsay juggles the possibility of a new love with an unsolvable investigation, and the knowledge that one member of the club could be on the brink of death. And just when everything appears momentarily under control, the case takes a terrifying turn, putting an entire city in lethal danger. Lindsay must make a choice she never dreamed she'd face-with no certainty that either outcome has more than a prayer of success.

Release date: May 8, 2007

Publisher: Little, Brown and Company

Print pages: 401

Sample

16th Seduction (with Maxine Paetro)



15th Affair (with Maxine Paetro)



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)



First to Die

Cross the Line

Cross Justice

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

Bullseye (with Michael Ledwidge)

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)

Missing: A Private Novel (with Kathryn Fox)

The Games (with Mark Sullivan)

Private Paris (with Mark Sullivan)

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 4 (with Marshall Karp)

NYPD Red 3 (with Marshall Karp)

NYPD Red 2 (with Marshall Karp)

NYPD Red (with Marshall Karp)

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)

Two from the Heart (with Frank Constantini, Emily Raymond, and Brian Sitts)

The Black Book (with David Ellis)

Humans, Bow Down (with Emily Raymond)

Never Never (with Candice Fox)

Woman of God (with Maxine Paetro)

Filthy Rich (with John Connolly and Timothy Malloy)

The Murder House (with David Ellis)

Truth or Die (with Howard Roughan)

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 (originally published as The Jericho Commandment)

Season of the Machete

The Thomas Berryman Number

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: Lights Out (with Chris Grabenstein)

Daniel X: Armageddon (with Chris Grabenstein)

Daniel X: Game Over (with Ned Rust)

Daniel X: Demons & Druids (with Adam Sadler)

Daniel X: Watch the Skies (with Ned Rust)

The Dangerous Days of Daniel X (with Michael Ledwidge)

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: Dog’s Best Friend (with Chris Tebbetts, illustrated by Jomike Tejido)

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: 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: The Murder of an Angel (with Maxine Paetro)

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 TV (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Laura Park)

I Totally Funniest (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Laura Park)

I Even Funnier (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Laura Park)

I Funny: A Middle School Story (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Laura Park)

Treasure Hunters: Peril at the Top of the World (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Juliana Neufeld)

Treasure Hunters: Secret of the Forbidden City (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Juliana Neufeld)

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

Treasure Hunters (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Juliana Neufeld)

House of Robots: Robots Revolution (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Juliana Neufeld)

House of Robots: Robots Go Wild! (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Juliana Neufeld)

House of Robots (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Juliana Neufeld)

Word of Mouse (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Joe Sutphin)

Give Please a Chance (with Bill O’Reilly)

Cradle and All (teen edition)

Jacky Ha-Ha (with Chris Grabenstein, illustrated by Kerascoët)

Public School Superhero (with Chris Tebbetts, illustrated by Cory Thomas)

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.

Chapter 1

A KILLER IN WAITING, Fred Brinkley slumps in the blue-upholstered banquette on the top deck of the ferry. The November sun glares down like a big white eye as the catamaran plows the San Francisco Bay, and Fred Brinkley glares right back at the sun.

A shadow falls across him, a kid’s voice asking, “Mister, could you take our picture?”

Fred shakes his head—no, no, no—anger winding him up like a watch spring, like a wire tightening around his head.

He wants to smash the kid like a bug.

Fred averts his eyes, sings inside his head, Ay, ay, ay, ay, Sau-sa-lito-lindo, trying to shut down the voices. He puts his hand on Bucky to comfort himself, feeling him through his blue nylon Windbreaker, but still the voices pound in his brain like a jackhammer.

Loser. Dog shit.

Gulls call out, screaming like children. Overhead, the sun burns through the overcast sky and turns him as transparent as glass. They know what he’s done.

Passengers in shorts and visors line the rails, taking pictures of Angel Island, of Alcatraz, of the Golden Gate Bridge.

A sailboat flies by, mainsail double-reefed, foam flecking the rails, and Fred doubles over as the bad thing whips into his mind. He sees the boom swing. Hears the loud crack. Oh, God! The sailboat!

Someone has to pay for this!

Startling him, the ferry’s engines grind into reverse and the deck vibrates as the ferry comes into dock.

Fred stands, works his way through the crowd, passing eight white tables, lines of scuffed blue chairs, his fellow ferry riders giving him the eye.

He enters the open compartment at the bow, sees a mother berating her son, a boy of nine or ten with light-brown hair. “You’re driving me crazy!” the woman shouts.

Fred feels the wire snap. Someone has to pay.

His right hand slips into his jacket pocket—finds Bucky.

He slips his finger into the trigger loop.

The ferry lurches as it bumps the mooring. People grab on to one another, laughing. Lines snake out from the boat, bow and aft.

Fred’s eyes shoot to the woman who is still belittling her son. She’s small, wearing tan clam diggers, her breasts outlined in the soft skin of her white blouse, nipples pointing straight out.

“What’s wrong with you, anyway?” she yells over the engines’ roar. “You really piss me off, buster.”

Bucky is in Fred’s hand, the Smith & Wesson Model 10, pulsing with a life of its own.

The voice booms, Kill her. Kill her. She’s out of control!

Bucky points between the woman’s breasts.

BLAM.

Fred feels the jolt of the gun’s recoil, sees the woman jump back with a little hurt yelp, a red stain blooming on her white blouse.

Good!

The little boy follows his mother’s fall to the deck with his big round eyes, strawberry ice cream plopping out of his cone, pee spreading across the front of his pants.

The boy did a bad thing, too.

BLAM.

Chapter 2

BLINDING WHITE SAILS fill Fred’s mind as blood spills onto the deck. Trusty Bucky is hot in his hand. Fred’s eyes pan across the deck.

The voice in his head roars, Run. Get away. You didn’t mean to do it.

Out of the corner of his eye, Fred sees a big man charge him, rage on his face, hell in his eyes. Fred straightens his arm.

BLAM.

Another man, Asian, hard black eyes, a white line for a mouth, makes a grab for Bucky.

BLAM.

A black woman stands nearby, locked in place by the crowd. She turns toward him, round cheeked, wide-eyed. Stares into his face and… reads his mind.

“Okay, son,” she says, reaching out a trembling hand, “that’s enough, now. Give me the gun.”

She knows what he did. How does she know?

BLAM.

Fred feels relief flood through him as the mind-reading woman goes down. People in the small forward compartment move in waves, cowering, shifting left, then right as Fred swings his head.

They are afraid of him. Afraid of him.

At his feet, the black woman holds a cell phone in her bloody hands. Breath rasping, she presses numbers with her thumb. No, you don’t! Fred steps on the woman’s wrist. Then he bends low to look into her eyes.

“You should have stopped me,” he says through clenched teeth. “That was your job.” Bucky screws his muzzle into her temple.

“Don’t!” she begs. “Please.”

Someone yells, “Mom!”

A skinny black kid, maybe seventeen, eighteen, comes toward him with a length of pipe over his shoulder. He’s holding it like a bat.

Fred pulls the trigger as the ship lurches—BLAM.

The shot goes wide. The metal pipe falls, skitters across the deck, and the kid runs to the woman, throws himself down. Protecting her?

People dive under the benches, and their screams rise up around him like licks of fire.

The noise of the engines is joined by the metallic clanking of the gangway locking into place. Bucky stays trained on the crowd as Fred looks over the railing.

He judges the distance.

It’s a drop of four feet to the gangway substructure, then a pretty long leap to the dock.

Fred pockets Bucky and puts both hands on the rail. He vaults over and lands on the flats of his Nikes. A cloud crosses the sun, cloaking him, making him invisible.

Move quickly, sailor. Go.

And he does it—makes the leap to the dock and runs toward the farmer’s market, where he dissolves into the throng filling the parking lot.

He walks, almost casually, a half block to Embarcadero.

He’s humming when he jogs down the steps to the BART station, still humming as he catches the train home.

You did it, sailor.

Chapter 3

I WAS OFF DUTY that Saturday morning in early November, called to the scene of a homicide because my business card had been found in the victim’s pocket.

I stood inside the darkened living room of a two-family house on Seventeenth Street, looking down at a wretched little scuzzball named Jose Alonzo. He was shirtless, paunchy, slumped on a sagging couch of indeterminate color, his wrists cuffed behind him. His head hung to his chest, and tears ran down his chin.

I had no pity for him.

“Was he Mirandized?” I asked Inspector Warren Jacobi, my former partner who now reported to me. Jacobi had just turned fifty-one and had seen more homicide victims in his twenty-five years on the job than any ten cops should see in a lifetime.

“Yeah, I did it, Lieutenant. Before he confessed.” Jacobi’s fists twitched at his sides. Disgust crossed his timeworn face.

“Do you understand your rights?” I asked Alonzo.

He nodded and began sobbing again. “I shouldn’ta done it, but she made me so mad.”

A toddler with a dirty white bow in her hair, wet diapers sagging to her dimpled knees, clung to her father’s leg. Her wailing just about broke my heart.

“What did Rosa do to make you mad?” I asked Alonzo. “I really want to know.”

Rosa Alonzo was on the floor, her pretty face turned toward the flaking caramel-colored wall, her head split open by the iron her husband had used to knock her down, then take her life.

The ironing board had collapsed around her like a dead horse, and the smell of burned spray starch was in the air.

The last time I’d seen Rosa, she’d told me how she couldn’t leave her husband because he’d said he’d hunt her down and kill her.

I wished with all my heart she’d taken the baby and run.

Inspector Richard Conklin, Jacobi’s partner, the newest and youngest member of my squad, walked into the kitchen. Rich poured cat food into a bowl for an old orange tabby cat that was mewing on the red Formica table. Interesting.

“He could be alone here for a long time,” Conklin said over his shoulder.

“Call animal control.”

“Said they were busy, Lieutenant.” Conklin turned on the taps, filled a water bowl.

Alonzo spoke up.

“You know what she said, Officer? She said, ‘Get a job.’ I just snapped, you understand?”

I stared at him until he turned away from me, cried out to his dead wife, “I didn’t mean to do it, Rosa. Please. Give me another chance.”

Jacobi reached for the man’s arm, brought him to his feet, saying, “Yeah, she forgives you, pal. Let’s take a ride.”

The baby launched a new round of howls as Patty Whelk from Child Welfare came through the open door.

“Hey, Lindsay,” she said, stepping around the victim, “who’s Little Miss Precious?”

I picked up the child, took the dirty ribbon out of her curls, and handed her over to Patty.

“Anita Alonzo,” I said sadly, “meet the system.”

Patty and I exchanged helpless looks as she jostled the little girl into a comfortable position on her hip.

I left Patty rummaging in the bedroom for a clean diaper. While Conklin stayed behind to wait for the ME, I followed Jacobi and Alonzo out to the street.

I said, “See ya,” to Jacobi and climbed into my three-year-old Explorer parked next to six yards of garbage out by the street. I’d just turned the key when my Nextel bleeped on my belt. It’s Saturday. Leave me the hell alone.

I caught the call on the second ring.

It was my boss, Chief Anthony Tracchio. An unusual tightness strained his voice as he raised it over the keening sound of sirens.

“Boxer,” he said, “there’s been a shooting on one of the ferries. The Del Norte. Three people are dead. A couple more wounded. I need you here. Pronto.”

Chapter 4

I HAD A REALLY BAD FEELING, thinking ahead to whatever hell had brought the chief out of his comfy home in Oakland on a Saturday. The bad feeling mushroomed when I saw half a dozen black-and-whites parked at the entrance to the pier, and two more patrol cars up on the sidewalk at either end of the Ferry Building.

A patrolman called out, “This way, Lieu,” and waved me down the south driveway leading to the dock.

I drove past the police prowlers, ambulances, and fire rigs, and parked outside the terminal. I opened my door and stepped out into the sixty-degree haze. About a twenty-knot breeze had whipped up a stiff chop on the bay, making the Del Norte rock at her mooring.

The police activity had excited the crowd, and a thousand people shifted between the Ferry Building and the farmer’s market, taking pictures, asking cops what had happened. It was as if they could smell gunpowder and blood in the air.

I ducked under the barrier tape cordoning off the dock, nodded to cops I knew, looked up when I heard Tracchio call my name.

The chief was standing at the mouth of the Del Norte.

He was wearing a leather blazer and Dockers, and sporting his signature Vitalis comb-over. He signaled to me to come aboard. Said the spider to the fly.

I headed toward him, but before I got five feet up the gangway, I had to back up and let two paramedics pass with a rolling stretcher bouncing between them.

I dropped my eyes to the victim, a large African American woman, her face mostly covered with an oxygen mask, an IV line running into her arm. Blood soaked the sheet tucked tightly over her body.

I felt a pain in my chest, my heart catching on a full second before my brain put it together.

The victim was Claire Washburn!

My best friend had been shot on the ferry!

I grabbed the gurney, stopping its forward motion and causing the brassy blond paramedic bringing up the rear to bark at me, “Lady, out of the way!”

“I’m a cop,” I said to the paramedic, pulling open my jacket to show her my badge.

“I don’t care if you’re God,” said the blonde. “We’re getting her to the ER.” . . .