The Blue Zone

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Everyone was gathered at the house. Kate and Sharon were trimming some hydrangeas in the kitchen, trying to keep their nerves at bay, when a dark blue sedan accompanied by a black Jeep turned into the drive.

Ben had called an hour earlier. He told them he had something very important to discuss. He wouldn’t say how the meeting with the FBI had gone. No one had left the house all day. The kids hadn’t gone to school. Cops and FBI agents had been all around their house constantly.

A man and a woman dressed in suits stepped out of the sedan, then Raab. The Jeep pulled around in the circle and blocked the head of the drive.

“I don’t have a good feeling about this.” Sharon put down her shears.

Kate nodded back, holding her breath. This time neither did she.

Her father stepped into the house and took off his coat, ashen. He gave Kate a halfhearted wink, then Sharon a stiff hug.

“Who are those people, Ben?”

He merely shrugged. “We’ve got some things to talk over as a family, Sharon.”

They sat around the dining room table, which didn’t exactly make anyone feel relaxed, because they never sat in the dining room. Ben asked for a glass of water. He could barely look any of them in the eyes. A day before, they’d been thinking about Em’s SATs and planning their winter trip. Kate had never felt such tension in the house.

Sharon looked at him, uneasily. “Ben, I think you’re scaring everyone a bit.”

He nodded. “There was something I didn’t quite go into last night,” he said. “There was someone else who came to me at the office, who I introduced to Harold as well. Someone who was looking for the same arrangement as the guy I told you about, from Paz. Convert some cash into gold. Get it out of the country…”

Sharon shook her head. “Who?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. It doesn’t matter anyway. Maybe he proposed a few things I shouldn’t have agreed to.” He took a sip of water. “Maybe they got some things I said on tape.”

“On tape…?” Sharon ’s eyes widened. “What kinds of things are you talking about, Ben?”

“I don’t know…” He stared ahead blankly, still avoiding everybody’s gaze. “Nothing very specific. But just enough that, combined with the payments I received, it really complicates things. It makes it all look pretty bad.”

“Bad…?” Sharon was growing alarmed. Kate, too. They’d been shot at the night before! Just the fact that the conversations had been recorded was insane.

“What are you saying, Ben?”

He cleared his throat. “This other guy…” He finally looked up, pallid. “He was FBI, Sharon.”

It was like a deadweight had crashed into the center of the room. At first no one spoke, only looked in horror.

“Oh my God, Ben, what have you done?”

He started to unravel it in front of them, in a low, cracking monotone. How all the money in the past few years-the money that paid for the house, their trips, the cars-was all dirty. Drug money. How he knew it but just kept doing it. Getting deeper. He couldn’t pull out. Now they had him. They had his voice on tape offering the same arrangements to an undercover agent. They had the monies he’d received, the fact that he’d set up the connection.

Kate couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Her father was going to jail.

“We can fight this, can’t we?” her mother said. “I mean, Mel’s a good lawyer. My friend Maryanne, at the club, she knows someone who’s defended people for securities fraud. Those Logotech people. He got them a deal.”

“No, we can’t fight this, Sharon.” Ben shook his head. “This isn’t securities fraud. They have me dead to rights. I had to cut a deal. I may have to go to jail for a while.”

“Jail!”

He nodded. “Then I’ll have to testify. But that’s not even it. It’s deeper than that. A lot deeper.”

“Deeper?” Sharon stood up. She still had her apron on. “What could be deeper than that, Ben? We were almost killed! My husband just told me he’s going to jail! Deeper…? You plead. You pay a fine. You give back whatever you took unfairly. What the hell do these people want from you, Ben-your life…?”

Raab jumped up. “You’re not seeing it, Sharon.” He went over to the window. “This isn’t a bad stock trade. These are Colombians, Sharon! I can hurt them. You saw what they did last night. These are bad people. Killers! They’re never going to let me go to trial.”

He threw back the curtains. Two agents were leaning on the Jeep at the head of the driveway. A police car blocked the entrance up by the pillars. “These people, Sharon…they’re not here to drive me home. They’re federal agents. They’re here to protect us. That’s exactly what these bastards want from me.” His eyes filled with tears and his voice rose to a harried pitch.

“They want my life!”