James Patterson: Kill Me If You Can

The grenade fuses burst with a terrifying bang, and the sound waves bounced off the terminal’s marble surfaces like so many acoustic billiard balls. Within seconds, the entire area for a hundred feet was covered with a thick red cloud that had billowed up from the grenade casings.

The chaos that had erupted with the first gunshot kicked into high gear as people who had dived for cover from the bullets now lurched blindly through the bloodred smoke in search of a way out.

Half a dozen cops stumbled through the haze to where they had last seen the bomb thrower.

But the Ghost was gone.

Disappeared into thin air.

I SWEAR THIS is true. My name is Matthew Bannon, and I’m a Fine Arts major at Parsons in New York City.

The first thing you resign yourself to when you decide you want to dedicate your life to being a painter is that you’re never going to get rich.

It goes with the territory. Vincent van Gogh died without a nickel, and that guy could paint rings around me. So I figured I’d spend the rest of my life as a starving artist in a paint-spattered loft in SoHo — poor but happy.

But that fantasy took a total nosedive when I found millions of dollars’ worth of diamonds inside a locker in Grand Central Terminal one night.

That’s right. Found.

I know, I know. It’s hard to believe. I didn’t believe it, either. I felt like a guy must feel when he wins the Mega Millions lottery. Only I didn’t buy a lottery ticket.

I just reached inside locker #925, and there it was.

A leather bag filled with millions and millions of dollars’ worth of diamonds.

One minute I was planning a life of poverty; the next minute I was holding a small fortune in my hand.

Growing up in Hotchkiss, Colorado, I saw my share of rich people. None of them lived there. They would just be driving the scenic route on their way to Vail or Telluride and they’d stop for gas or something to eat at the North Fork Valley Restaurant.

Hotchkiss is about half the size of Central Park, with fewer people than you’d find in some New York City apartment buildings. But it’s in the middle of God’s country. It’s everything John Denver sings about in “Rocky Mountain High.”

It’s where I learned to hunt, fish, ski, fly a plane, and do a whole lot of other macho stuff that my father taught me. He was a Marine. So were his father and his father before him.

My artistic side comes from my mom. She taught me to paint.

My father wanted me to carry on the family’s military tradition. My mother said one uncultured jarhead in the family was enough.

So we compromised. I spent four years in the corps, with three active deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan. Then I saved up enough money to move to New York. Now at the age of thirty, I was in one of the best art programs in the country.

And suddenly my days of worrying about money were over.

I was rich. Or at least I could be rich if I decided to keep the diamonds. And why not? The guy who owned them wouldn’t come looking for them.

As far as I figured, that guy was dead.

YOU MIGHT THINK that finding a bag full of diamonds would be the best thing that happened in my life.

But you’d be wrong.

The best thing was finding Katherine Sanborne.

We met at the Whitney Museum.

The Whitney is one of my favorite places in New York, and I was staring at one of my favorite paintings, Armistice Night, by George Luks.

And then I saw her. Midtwenties, a heart-stoppingly beautiful face framed with auburn hair that fell to her shoulders in soft curls. She was escorting a group of high-school kids. As they came up beside me, she said, “George Luks was an American Realist.”

“And I’m a Puerto Rican romantic,” one kid said.

Big laugh from his teen cohorts.

Another kid jumped right in. “And I’m a Jewish pessimist,” he said.

Within seconds, half a dozen kids were vying to see who could get the biggest laugh. Katherine just grinned and didn’t try to stop them.

But I did. “None of you is as funny as George Luks,” I said, pointing at the painting on the wall.

“You think this picture is funny?” the Puerto Rican romantic said.

“No, I don’t,” I said. “But the guy who painted it, George Luks, was a stand-up comedian and a comic strip illustrator. Then he teamed up with seven other artists and they became known as the Ashcan School.”

“Cool,” the kid said.

“He was pretty cool,” I said. “Until one night he got the crap kicked out of him in a barroom brawl and was found dead a few hours later. Now, if you paid attention to your teacher, you could learn a lot of cool stuff like that.”

I walked away.

A half hour later Katherine found me gawking at Edward Hopper’s Early Sunday Morning.

“Where’s your class?” I said.

“I’m not their teacher,” she said. “I just do volunteer work at the museum every Wednesday. The kids liked you. They were sorry you left.”

“I’m sure you handled them just fine,” I said.

“I did. But I was sorry you left, too. How do you know so much about art?”

I shrugged. “I just do. It’s not a very exciting story.”

“I love to hear what other people think about art,” she said. “If I bought you a cup of tea and a pumpkin muffin at Sarabeth’s Kitchen, would you tell me some of the least boring parts?” She smiled and her soft gray eyes were full of mischief and joy and promise.

“I couldn’t do that,” I said.

Her smile faded and her eyes looked at me, more than a little surprised.

“But I could buy you a cup of tea and a pumpkin muffin at Sarabeth’s Kitchen,” I said. “Would that work?”

The smile flashed back on. “Deal,” she said, extending her hand. “I’m Katherine Sanborne.”

“Matthew Bannon,” I said. Her hand was warm and soft and about half the size of mine. I held it for only a second, but it was long enough for me to get that jolt that goes through your body when you touch someone who has touched your heart.

We had tea.

I told her about my dream to be a painter.

“Maybe I can help,” she said. “I teach art. I’d love to see your work. Maybe you can bring some samples to my office tomorrow after my class.”

“I thought you said those kids in the museum weren’t your class.”

“They’re not. I don’t teach high school.”

“Oh, okay. That makes sense,” I said. “You’re pretty young. You probably wouldn’t want to put up with a bunch of hormonal teenage boys all day. What grade do you teach?”

She smiled. “It’s not a grade,” she said. “It’s a master’s program. I’m a professor of Fine Arts at Parsons.”

It was now official: Katherine Sanborne was beautiful and brilliant.

I was totally out of my league.

I SPENT HALF that night trying to figure out which of my paintings I should show her. Was this one too predictable? Was that one too boring? Or worse, completely pedestrian? I was seeing my work in a whole new light. Not just was it any good, but was it good enough for Katherine?

The next day I was in Professor Sanborne’s office with fourteen photos of what I hoped was the best work I had done thus far. I doubt I’d ever felt more vulnerable and exposed in my life.

“No wonder you knew so much about the Realists,” she said after she looked at them. “Your work reminds me of Edward Hopper. In his early days.”

“I suppose you mean back when he was finger-painting in kindergarten?”

She laughed, and I decided it was gentle humor, kind humor, rather than the savage variety some professors strive to perfect.