Only the Strong Read online

  Praise for Ethan Cross:

  “A fast paced, all too real thriller with a villain right out of James Patterson and Criminal Minds.”

  — Andrew Gross, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Reckless and Don’t Look Twice on The Shepherd

  “Cross pushes the boundaries in this sinisterly clever showdown between one shadowy vigilante justice group and three twisted serial killers. The surprises are fast and furious, and will leave you breathless to read more.”

  — Lisa Gardner, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Catch Me and Love You More on The Prophet

  “The best book of its kind since Thomas Harris retired Hannibal Lecter, a cat-and-mouse-game extraordinaire that will leave your knuckles white and your stomach churning.”

  — Jon Land, bestselling author of Strong Vengeance on The Prophet

  “I’m a huge Ethan Cross fan and love this series, so I had high expectations for this book. It reached them…. I highly recommend this whole series.”

  — Writers and Authors on The Judas Game

  Also by Ethan Cross:

  The Shepherd

  The Cage

  The Prophet

  Blind Justice

  Father of Fear

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher.

  Studio Digital CT, LLC

  PO Box 4331

  Stamford, CT 06907

  Copyright © 2018 by Aaron Brown

  Jacket design by Aaron Brown

  Story Plant paperback ISBN-13: 978-1-61188-261-2

  E-book ISBN-13: 978-1-945839-18-4

  Visit our website at www.TheStoryPlant.com

  Visit the author’s website at www.EthanCross.com

  All rights reserved, which includes the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever except as provided by US Copyright Law. For information, address The Story Plant.

  First Story Plant printing: October 2019

  Printed in the United States of America

  ONLY THE STRONG

  ETHAN CROSS

  Chapter One

  Francis Ackerman Jr. had lost track of the number of lives he had taken and the level of destruction he had wrought. He barely remembered much of those dark years. They were merely a blur of blood and pain. If a man truly reaped what he sowed, Ackerman knew the kind of harvest he deserved. Still, he couldn’t make himself worry about consequences or fear judgment. He had stared into the darkness on numerous occasions and imagined the smell of brimstone and the sound of weeping and gnashing of teeth. But he couldn’t harness the proper emotional and physical response. Fear remained as elusive to him as sight to a man whose eyes had been carved from his head.

  Ackerman hadn’t been born blind to fear and addicted to pain. His own father had subjected him to every form of torture imaginable and forced him to experience traumatic events from the lives of the most notorious killers in the world. When that wasn’t enough, his father surgically ravaged the portions of his brain which controlled the response to fear and the fight or flight instincts.

  Despite those inherent setbacks, Ackerman was proud of what he’d accomplished so far. He had found his way back to his younger brother and, through Marcus, had gained a family. Since then, he had saved several lives and, by his count, aided in the capture of eight serial murderers. And the biggest catch yet—a man they knew only as Demon who ran a network of sadistic killers for hire—was scheduled for transfer from Foxbury Prison to ADX Florence, one of the most secure correctional facilities in the world.

  Ackerman should have been in a better mood. But he couldn’t allow himself joy or pride over the capture, since he hadn’t directly beaten the Demon. Part of him knew that while they both still breathed, their struggle would never be over.

  He watched his brother from the rear of a briefing room with speckled floors and white block walls that stank of cigarettes and gun oil. Special Agent Marcus Williams—Ackerman’s younger brother—wore a black suit and a dark-gray dress shirt, no tie, his brother having vowed to never wear one again. Marcus outlined the details of the transfer to the team of law enforcement and correctional officers arranged in a grid of folding chairs crowded into the room’s center. Ackerman wasn’t allowed to directly participate in the transfer, since his status was merely that of a “consultant.” But his skills would be put to use soon enough. What coach left the star player on the bench for long? And if killing were a sport, then Ackerman was certainly the Michael Jordan of murder.

  His brother’s plan was simple, but had merit. Three teams would leave the staging area at staggered intervals. Each convoy would consist of a forward scout in an unmarked sedan, two patrol cruisers, the armored prisoner transport, two trail cars, and a helicopter on overwatch. In addition, they would have state police diverting traffic to insure that their route was clear of innocent bystanders and potential threats. Each armored transport would be loaded with a hooded man. Not even the guards would know which convoy held the real prisoner.

  Marcus would ride shotgun with a state trooper behind the real prisoner, while the others from their team occupied the trail cars of the decoys. Ackerman and Special Agent Maggie Carlisle would be in the overwatch chopper for Marcus’s group—him as a special consultant and her as his keeper. Ackerman had grown quite fond of Maggie and considered her family, though his brother had yet to pop the question to his longtime girlfriend and officially make her Ackerman’s little sister.

  Marcus finished the briefing and motioned for Ackerman and Maggie to join him at the side of the room opposite the exiting officers. Marcus said, “I want you two to be scouting ahead for possible ambush points. We’ll send the forward car up to check out any spots that could pose a threat.”

  Ackerman said, “I still don’t think we should be sending him in any of those transports.”

  “Drop it, Frank. It was hard enough getting all of this approved once. We’re not going to do multiple waves. But don’t worry. That transport isn’t stopping for anything.”

  Ackerman shrugged. “You’re the boss, little brother.”

  “Don’t call me that. At least not in public.”

  “That hurts my feelings.”

  “Considering you enjoy pain, you’re welcome.”

  Ackerman smiled. “When do I get to say goodbye?”

  “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

  “The only ideas I have are good ones.”

  Maggie rolled her eyes. “Let’s just get on with it. I wouldn’t mind spitting in that prick’s face before he’s hauled off.”

  Ackerman said, “Majority rules.”

  Marcus shook his head. “This is not a democracy. That being said, I think the three of us could possibly get him to give something away. Some clue to his identity or where we can find his friends. Keep that in mind when we talk to him.”

  Ackerman’s heart rate increased and his anticipation grew at the thought of once again coming face to face with the Demon. The feeling reminded him of the girl who took his virginity, or at least what he felt was his true virginity—all his other encounters being of a forced and violent nature. She had been a Mayan girl he had picked up along the road to Cancun, and she had served as Bonnie to his Clyde. For a time anyway. He now trembled with the same kind of adrenaline he had felt when she had dropped her flower dress from her shoulders.

  Marcus led them down a concrete-and-block co
rridor into a room that smelled exactly as it should: like six men with shotguns in full tactical gear baking in the Arizona heat. Demon was strapped to an industrial dolly in the center of the six men. As they approached, Marcus ordered one of the guards to remove the hood, straps, and bite-stopping mask covering the prisoner’s face.

  Demon rolled his head from side to side and opened his mouth to stretch out the muscles of his jaw. He had long black and gray hair that hung down over his face. The tissue over his left eye had been melted, and he had no eyebrows. Knife wounds and slashes intersected most of the rest of his face, but the most prominent of the disfigurements was his Glasgow smile—a wound achieved by cutting the corners of the mouth and then torturing the victim. When the victim screamed or moved, the flesh of his face would tear.

  Demon’s Glasgow smile stretched nearly from jawbone to jawbone. But it wasn’t straight across or turned up like a smile. It looked more as though a giant axe had cleaved the bottom of his head off at a slight angle.

  When Demon spoke, his voice flowed out in a mellifluous Scottish brogue. “This is not even close to the level of comfort I’m accustomed to when traveling. I’m definitely going to leave you a bad Yelp review.”

  Marcus’s lips curled back in disgust. “I’ll call up the captain and have him send in your wine, jackass.”

  “You’ve seen me take life before, Agent Williams, but that was for business. You’ve never experienced the beauty of what I do for pleasure. I like to lead my subjects through a representation of each level of hell.”

  Marcus stepped close and whispered, “It’s good you’re into that kind of thing. Because that’s where we’re sending you. Hell.”

  “Are you referring to the prison or a plan to send me to the grave?”

  “Pick one.”

  Demon shook his head, black strands of hair whipping back and forth over his face like inky tentacles. “You’ve probably heard ‘Seek and ye shall find’ in regard to the Kingdom of Heaven and God, but that applies in the opposite direction as well. For every thesis, there is an antithesis. If you pursue the devil, he’ll find you . . . and everyone you love.”

  Marcus was about to respond, but Ackerman had sat back long enough. It was time to establish dominance. He punched Demon in the center of his face, snapping the dark-haired man’s head back against the metal of the dolly. Demon laughed and spit blood on the floor.

  Ackerman said, “Whoever my brother calls family is my family as well. And I dare any man to try and take what’s mine.”

  “I offered you a way out before, but I’ll give you one more chance. Your team can let me go and forget all about me. Or, if you choose to oppose me, I will burn your family alive and shake their dust from my feet as a testimony against them.”

  Ackerman grinned. “If I was capable of fear, I would be worried.”

  Demon’s gaze traveled from Maggie to Marcus. “This is one of life’s binary choices, boys and girls. There’s only one path or the other, no in between. It’s like choosing whether to believe or not believe or have children or not. Your only options here are to let me go now or face the consequences.”

  Maggie said, “I’ve heard enough.”

  “Then a cloud appeared and covered them,” Demon said, “and a voice came from the cloud: ‘This is my vessel of wrath, whom I hate. Fear him.’”

  Ackerman tilted his head at their prisoner. “I’ve heard that the Almighty doesn’t look kindly upon those who pervert the Gospel.”

  Demon whispered, “I’m not even sure I believe in all that. But I do know this, my boy. I’m going to give you a tour of hell, and when you ask me for the bread of mercy, I’ll give you razor blades instead.”

  Ackerman chuckled. “Sounds like a party.”

  ~~*~~

  Chapter Two

  Special Agent Marcus Williams—a team leader in the Department of Justice’s black ops program known as The Shepherd Organization—strapped on his Level-4 tactical gear. The armor had been designed to withstand rounds even from a high-powered rifle. He cycled his M4A1 assault rifle to make sure it was locked and loaded, clean and lubricated. He had a terrible feeling that he would be needing the weapon and the body armor in the next few hours. He had hunted several serial murderers—including, at one time, his own infamous brother, Francis Ackerman Jr.—but Marcus had never encountered anyone quite like the man they knew only as Demon.

  Marcus had apprehended Demon just beyond the borders of Foxbury Prison as the madman aided in the escape of the leader of one of the world’s most dangerous gangs. He had learned from Demon’s former apprentice, the now-deceased Judas Killer, that the Scottish-born man with the scarred face had actually recruited and organized a network of the most depraved members of society and given them direction and purpose. He had banded this interconnected web of psychopaths and malcontents into a money-making machine, which allowed Demon’s influence to grow in both power and reach.

  It was the kind of case the SO had been created to handle, the sort of work Marcus had been born for.

  Ackerman had told him that a man with Demon’s resources wouldn’t remain in custody for long, but that only led Marcus to take a more personal role in Demon’s transport and incarceration. He had succeeded in the apprehension of a killer whose criminal influence spread out like a fibrous cancer across the dark underbelly of society, and Marcus had no intention of letting such a prize slip from his grasp.

  He waited in the long dark tunnel leading from Demon’s holding area to an armored transport that would carry the criminal mastermind to the supermax prison known as ADX Florence—a modern dungeon surrounded by a barren wasteland which housed everyone from the world’s most dangerous terrorists, including Al-Qaeda operatives and Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski, to several organized crime figures. One of those inmates had a very personal connection to Marcus and Ackerman—their own father, the mass murderer known as Thomas White.

  His real name was Francis Ackerman Sr., but the SO had kept that information under wraps, allowing the name of Thomas White, the killer’s last-used alias, to become his permanent name. Even Marcus had grown accustomed to thinking of his biological father as Thomas White. It made it easier to distance himself from the madman who had used Marcus and his son, Dylan, as test subjects, just as he had done with his brother many years prior.

  Marcus had no plans to visit his biological father upon dropping off his current prisoner. He hadn’t spoken to Thomas White since his apprehension, after the madman tried to blow up a group of school children in Kansas City, which only came after his torturing Marcus in a dark hole for months on end. If God answered his many prayers, Marcus would never have to look in the eyes of his biological father again. His brother felt differently, even though Ackerman had endured even more torture at the hands of their sperm donor. Ackerman had gone so far as to request visitations with their father, and the Director had reluctantly indulged his brother’s forays into the dark mind of Thomas White.

  He wondered if his brother’s control and willpower had now surpassed his own. He couldn’t stand to be in the presence of the man who had brought him into this world. He had even fantasized many times about his father’s violent death and didn’t know how Ackerman could look the bastard in the eyes. But he supposed that his brother’s total lack of fear helped when facing their own personal monster.

  As the guards marched Demon down the long dark corridor of concrete and rebar, Marcus white-knuckled his weapon and resisted the urge to end the mastermind’s life. Part of him wished he had killed Demon when he had the chance in the tunnels beneath Foxbury.

  “Take off the headgear. I want to say goodbye,” Marcus said to the guards.

  With the hood and protective mask removed, Demon smiled and puckered his lips as if for a kiss. Grabbing the killer by the throat, Marcus said, “If you try anything, I’m going to put a bullet in you. The biggest part of me hopes that you’ll attempt to e
scape, because nothing would bring me more peace than to have you lying on a slab in some morgue.”

  Demon, quoting Nietzsche through rancid breath, said, “Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.”

  Marcus looked to the lead guard and said, “Get him out of my sight.”

  The officers loaded Demon into an armored prison transport, and Marcus took his position inside the rear patrol car. He had tried to plan for the worst and consider all possibilities, but some dark intuition told him it wouldn’t be enough.

  The caravan rolled out from the holding facility in Arizona early that morning, expecting to arrive at the secure facility at ADX Florence around 11:30 that night. Marcus had actually informed the prison of a much later arrival, but the early departure was another attempt at sabotaging any potential rescue attempts. Demon had the resources necessary to stage a dramatic escape, and unfortunately, any countermeasures he could dream up could be outthought by the opposition. He just hoped he had planned one move ahead of the unseen adversary.

  The first eleven and a half hours of their journey proceeded without incident.

  Marcus could barely keep his eyes open most of the drive. The Colorado scenery whipping past the window was probably beautiful during the day, but now the view was nothing but vague silhouettes and the occasional flash of an animal’s eyes illuminated by the periphery of the convoy’s headlights. He nodded off for a moment, always surprised at how much easier it was to fall asleep when he was trying to stay awake. But he sprang to attention as the cruiser bumped its way over a dead animal, some small carcass that flashed out of sight before he could really look. His hand rested on his pistol. He tried to relax while keeping his eyelids from dropping like castle gates.

  The state trooper behind the wheel of the cruiser—possessing about as much personality as an earthworm—was little help. The short but muscular man had barely spoken a sentence since they left. Marcus disliked people who were comfortable in their own silence. The quiet moments left more time to think. More time for questions with answers he didn’t really want to know.