Harlan Coben - Home

“You know,” I say, “because you already researched it.”

Silence.

Then Carlo says, “We researched you too.”

“I’m sure you did,” I say.

“You’re rich.”

“I am.”

“They also say you’ve gone crazy. They say you’re a weird recluse now.”

I spread my arms. “Do I look like a recluse?”

“So why do they say that?”

“I made it up.”

“Why would you do that?”

“Because,” I say, “some bad people have been trying to kill me.”

“So you’ve been, what, hiding?”

“Something like that.”

“So why are you here now?”

“We’ve rescued one boy,” I say. “I need your help to rescue the other.”

That seemed to satisfy them.

“It shouldn’t be hard,” Carlo says. “To join the game you have to log in to our server.”

“This will give us his IP address.”

“Damn,” Carlo says, “he’s using a VPN.”

“Of course he would,” Renato replies, “but we can get around it with…”

They slip back into Italian, which is fine with me. I don’t speak tech-ese anyway. Their voices are loud and angry. They start cursing at each other. I hear the names of players on Roma and Lazio and I’m certain now that they are starting with the team-rival insults. That, Giuseppe warned me, was how they worked.

“The angrier they get,” he assures me, “the closer they are to getting you an answer.”

So I wait. They are trying, it seems, to keep up with both the game on their screens and finding the location of SHARK CRYPT I.

“You’re right,” Carlo says to me, still typing furiously. “It’s Fat Gandhi.”

“He’s trying to cover up,” Renato adds.

“Hide his identity now that we know his moves,” Carlo says.

They start screaming again in Italian. Ten minutes later, I hear a cheer. Giuseppe nods at me as a printer starts whirring. He heads over and picks up a sheet of paper. “The address,” Giuseppe says, handing it to me.

I look at it. The location is in the Netherlands.

“How much time do I have?”

Carlo takes that one. “If we try our best, we will be done in about two hours.”

I start for the door. “Then don’t try your best,” I tell him.

Myron pulled up to the aging split-level home.

He had been raised in this dwelling. Well, more than raised. He had lived here with his parents up until, well, recently. In fact, when his parents, Ellen and Al (“People call us El Al,” Mom would explain, “you know, like the Israeli airline?”), finally decided to sell the house and retire to Florida, Myron had purchased it from them.

In the old days, whenever Myron would be dropped off or pull into the driveway, his mother would run out the door and throw her arms around him as though he were a just-released hostage she hadn’t seen in five years. That was her way.

It had, of course, embarrassed him. And then-equally, of course-it pleased him to no end. When you’re young you don’t get how great it is to be loved unconditionally.

Now, as the front door opened, Mom’s steps were a slow shuffle. Dad helped her, holding her by the elbow. Mom, the still-fiery feminist, shook from the cruelty of Parkinson’s. Myron waited a moment in his seat, letting her get closer to the car. She finally shrugged away Dad’s hand, not wanting, he knew, for her son to see that she was older and frailer.

Myron slid out of the car as Mom reached him. She still threw her arms around him as though he were a just-released hostage. He hugged her back. Dad came up behind her. Myron kissed his cheek. That was how he greeted his father. With a kiss. Always.

“You look tired,” Mom said.

“I’m fine.”

“Doesn’t he look tired, Al?”

“Leave him alone, El. He looks fine. He looks healthy.”

“Healthy.” She turned to her husband. “What, you’re a doctor now?”

“I’m just saying.”

“He needs to eat more. Come inside. I’ll order more food.”

Ellen Bolitar didn’t cook. Not ever. There had been an attempt at a meat loaf involving Ragú sauce sometime during Myron’s high school years. They’d had to repaint the kitchen to get rid of the smell.

Myron offered her his hand. His mom gave him the stink eye.

“You too? I’m fine.”

She started back toward the house with a discernible limp. Myron looked over to his father, who just gave him a small shake of the head. They followed behind her.

“I’ll tell Nero’s to throw in another veal Parmesan. He needs to eat. And your nephew, he eats like he’s a building with a tapeworm.” She made a shooing gesture with her hand. “You two boys go in the den and do whatever manly bonding stuff you guys do.”

She grabbed the handrail and made her way into the kitchen. Dad nodded for Myron to follow him. Myron just stood there for one moment and let the feeling rush over him.

He loved his parents.

Yes, we all do, but rarely is it so uncomplicated. There was no confusion, no remorse, no resentment, no hidden rage, no blame. He loved them. He loved with no buts or stipulations. They could do no wrong in his eyes. There were some who claimed that he just looked at them through rose-tinted glasses, that Myron was prone to both fits of nostalgia and familial historical revisionism.

Those people were wrong.

Myron and Dad sat in the same spots in the den or TV room, whatever you want to call it, that they had sat in for more years than Myron cared to remember. When Myron was young, experts warned about the dangers of too much television watching, which might or might not be true, but this particular father and son had bonded in this room sharing mutually loved programs. Prime time was eight to eleven P.M., and back then, before everyone watched on demand or via streaming, a father and son would sit and laugh at a stupid sitcom or discuss the clichés in a detective series. You’d watch and you’d be together, in the same room, and that meant, whatever else you want to say about it, some concept of bonding. Now parents went to their rooms and kids went to theirs. They all stared at smaller screens-laptops, smartphones, tablets-and watched exactly what they wanted to watch. The experience now was entirely solitary, and Myron couldn’t help but think that was a terrible thing.

Dad grabbed the remote, but he didn’t turn on the TV.

“Is Mickey here yet?” Myron asked.

His parents had come up to stay with Mickey while Mickey’s parents went on their retreat.

“He should be here any minute,” Dad said. “He’s bringing Ema to dinner. You know her?”

“Ema? Yeah.”

“She always wears black,” Dad said.

Mom from the other room: “Lots of women do, Al.”

“Not like that.”

Mom: “Black is slimming.”

“I’m not judging.”

Mom: “Yes, you are.”

“I am not!”

“You think she’s a big girl.”

“You’re the one talking about wearing black because it’s slimming, not me.” Dad turned to Myron. “Ema wears black nail polish. Black lipstick. Black mascara. Black hair. Not naturally black. I mean, like ink black. I don’t get it.”

Mom: “And who are you to get it?”

“I’m just saying.”

“Look at Mr. Haute Couture over there. What, you’re suddenly Yves Saint Laurent with the fashion tips?”

“I thought you were on the phone changing the order!”

“The number was busy.”

“So call back.”

“Yes, master. Right away.”

Dad sighed and shrugged. This was their way. Myron just sat back and enjoyed the show.

Dad leaned toward Myron and spoke in a low voice. “So where is Terese?”

“In Jackson Hole. On a job interview.”

“As an anchorwoman?”