The Blue Zone

CHAPTER NINE

Kate decided to stay on at the house that night. Her mother was a mess and closed the door to her room. Emily and Justin just seemed shell-shocked. Kate tried her best to calm them. Dad had never let them down, not ever, had he? This time, she wasn’t sure if they believed it. Around nine, Em put on her iPod and Justin went back to a video game. Kate went downstairs.

There was a light on in the den. Her father was there, a magazine on his lap, watching CNN on the oversize plasma TV.

Kate knocked, quietly. Her father looked up.

“This a good time to talk about my rent allowance?” She hung in the doorway with a crooked grin.

That brought a smile to her dad’s face. “If it’s you, it’s always a good time, pumpkin.” He turned down the volume on the TV. “Did you do your shot?”

“Yes.” Kate nodded with a roll of her eyes. “I took care of my shot. I’ve been to college, Dad. I basically live with a doctor. I’m twenty-three.”

“Okay, okay…” Her father sighed. “I hear ya-it’s just reflex.”

Kate curled up next to him on the couch. For a moment they just avoided the obvious. He asked about Greg. How things were going at the office. “With the leuskophy…”

“Leukoscopophy, Dad. And it’s called a lab. Not an office. And one day you’ll be proud of me for what we’re doing. You just won’t ever be able to pronounce it.”

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.