The Blue Zone

He chuckled again and put the magazine aside. “I’m always proud of you, Kate.”

Kate looked around the room. Their den was filled with pictures from all the trips they’d taken. There was a Northwest Indian mask on the wall they had picked up skiing in Vancouver. An African basket they’d brought back from Botswana, where they’d been on safari. This room had always been a friendly place for Kate, filled with the warmest memories. All those memories seemed threatened now.

Kate met his eyes. “You’d tell me, Daddy, wouldn’t you?”

“Tell you what, sweetheart?”

She hesitated. “I don’t know. If you really did something wrong?”

“I did tell you, Kate. Mel thinks we have a good shot at fighting this thing. He claims that the RICO statutes-”

“I don’t mean legally, Daddy. I mean if you really did something wrong. Something we should know about.”

He shifted toward her. “What are you asking, Kate?”

“I’m not sure.” The words stuck in her throat. “If you knew…”

He nodded, keeping his eyes on her, and clasped his hands together. He didn’t answer.

“Because it’s important to me, Daddy-who you are. All this stuff, these trips, how we’ve always talked about family-it’s not just words or pictures and mementos to me. All of us need to believe in something right now-to get through this-and the thing I choose to believe in is you. Because it’s what I’ve always believed in.” Kate shook her head. “I don’t really want to start looking for someone else right now.”

Ben smiled. “You don’t have to, pumpkin.”

“Because I can give Mom pep talks,” Kate said, eyes glistening, “and remind Emily and Justin how you never let us down-because you haven’t! But I’ve got to know, above everything, Dad, that the person who walked through that door tonight, who’s going in there tomorrow to fight this as I know you will, is the same one I’ve known all my life. The person I always thought I knew.”

Her father looked at her, then took her hand and massaged it, like she remembered from when she was sick.

“I am that man, pumpkin.”

Kate’s eyes welled up. She nodded.

“C’mere…” He pulled her close, and Kate rested her head against him. It made her feel the way she always did in his arms. Safe. Special. A thousand miles away from harm. She wiped the tears off her cheek and tilted her face up to him.

“Money laundering, conspiracy…” She shook her head. “It just doesn’t fit you, Dad.”

He nodded wistfully. “I’m sorry. I know.”

“Now, tax felon.” Kate shrugged. “Or jewel thief. That would be a different story.”

Her father smiled. “I’ll try to do better next time.”

Suddenly she couldn’t hold back. Kate squeezed his hand and felt a rush of tears streaming down her cheeks-stupid and like a little girl, but impossible to hold back. It hurt her, how her father had always been so in control-how everything had always been so in control-and now, she knew, she couldn’t fight it, their life was about to change. No matter how he tried to pretend it would go away. This wouldn’t go away. This was going to hang over them. This was bad.

“You know, they’re talking fifteen to twenty years,” her father said in a low voice as he held her. “That’s federal prison, Kate. No plasma TV there. You’ll be married then. With kids-maybe the same age Em is now…”

“You’ll do what you have to do, Daddy,” Kate said, squeezing him tighter. “We’re behind you, whatever that is.”

There was a shuffling of feet. Sharon looked in at the door. She was in her bathrobe, holding a cup of tea. She stared at Ben a little blankly. “I’m going to bed.”

That was when they heard the click of a car door being opened out front. Footsteps coming up the drive.

“Who’s that?” Kate’s mother turned.

Her father exhaled. “Probably the fucking New York Times.”

Suddenly the windows exploded in gunfire.

CHAPTER TEN

There was an ear-shattering barrage-glass splintering everywhere, bullets shrieking over their heads, flashing in the night.

Raab hurled himself on top of Kate. For a second, Sharon just stood there, paralyzed, until he reached over and grabbed her by the robe, dragging her onto the floor, and pressed his body tightly over both of them.

“Stay down! Stay down!” he screamed.

“Jesus Christ, Ben, what’s going on?”

The noise was terrifying-deafening. Bullets ricocheted everywhere, thudding into the cabinets and walls. The large Palladian window was gone. The house alarm was blaring. Everyone was screaming, faces pressed into the floor. The noise was so frightening and seemed so close, directly over them, Kate had the terrifying sense whoever was shooting had climbed into the room.

She was certain she was about to die.

Then suddenly she heard voices. Yelling. The same paralyzing thought occurred to everyone at once:

The kids. Upstairs.

Kate’s father arched up and shouted above the frenzy, “Em, Justin, don’t come down! Get on the floor!”

The barrage continued. Maybe twenty, thirty seconds, but it seemed like an eternity to Kate, huddled with her hands over her ears, her heart pounding out of control.

“Hold on, hold on,” Kate’s father kept repeating, blanketing them. She heard screaming, crying. She didn’t even know if it was hers. The window was wide open. Bullets were still flying in every direction. Kate just prayed: Whoever you are, whatever you want, please, God, please, just don’t come inside.

And then there was silence. As quickly as it had begun.

Kate heard footsteps retreating, an engine starting up, and a vehicle lurching away.

For a long time, they just clung to the floor. Too afraid to even look up. The silence was just as terrifying as the attack. Sharon was whimpering. Kate was too frozen to speak. There was a steady pounding very close by, loud, above the shrieking of the alarm.

Gradually, almost joyously, Kate realized that it was the sound of her own heart.

“They’re gone. They’re gone.” Her father finally exhaled, rolling off of them. “Sharon, Kate, are you all right?”

“I think so,” Kate’s mother muttered. Kate just nodded. She couldn’t believe it. There were bullet holes everywhere. Shattered glass all over the floor. The place looked like a war zone.

“Oh, my God, Ben, what the hell is going on?”

Then they heard voices coming down the stairs. “Mom…Dad…?”

Justin and Emily. They ran into the study. “Oh, thank God…” Sharon literally leaped up, throwing her arms around them, smothering them with kisses. Then Kate, too. Everyone was crying, sobbing, hugging each other in tearful relief. “Thank God you’re all all right.”

Slowly the panic began to recede, and in its place was the horrifying sight of what had happened. Sharon looked around at the devastation of their once-beautiful home. Everything was shattered. They were lucky to be alive.

Her eyes came back to her husband. There was no longer terror in them. There was something else-accusation.

“What the hell have you done to us, Ben?”