Andrew Gross - The Blue Zone

“ And don’t forget Fergus’s heart pill before you go to bed!!! ”

It was tough, hiding things from him. Kate felt disloyal. He was her husband, her closest friend. They were supposed to share everything. She trusted him more than anyone in her life. She knew she should at least call. Last night at the hotel, she’d picked up the phone to call him to let him know she was safe and had gotten as far as punching in his number. Then she put the phone down. Something held her back. Kate didn’t know what.

Maybe he wouldn’t understand. And she didn’t want to hear it. Maybe she just had to keep this part of her life separate.

Kate opened the door to the squash club. Immediately she heard the sharp, thwacking sound of the ball slamming against the hardwood walls. There were several white-walled courts with clear glass fronts. A couple were in play. Two sweating men, who had obviously just finished up and had towels draped over their necks, were downing fluids, going over their game. Kate walked up to an athletic-looking, red-haired man in a squash shirt, standing behind the front desk.

“Excuse me, I’m trying to locate someone. You mind taking a look?”

“Not at all.”

She handed him Emily’s photo, one taken last year at the junior Maccabean Games. “She’s my sister. I think she plays out here.”

The redheaded pro took a long look. He shook his head. “Sorry, I’m afraid I’ve never seen her before.” He had an English accent and smiled at her, somewhat apologetically.

“You’re sure?” Kate pressed. “Her name’s Emily. She’s seventeen. She’s a ranked player back east. She’s just moved out here with my dad. I know she plays somewhere in town. I just want to surprise her.”

The squash pro shrugged again, handing Kate back the photo. “I run the junior program here. If she played here, I’d definitely know her. Have you checked Berkeley yet?”

Kate exhaled in disappointment. “Yeah, I have.” She folded the photo back into her bag and said, “Thanks, anyway.”

On her way out, she took sort of a desperate, final look around, as if she’d missed Em the first time and she might just suddenly materialize out of nowhere. She knew that this was a long shot. Even if her hunch had been right, there were dozens of places they could be and dozens of squash programs, too. Kate felt a little foolish playing cop. She was a scientist, not an investigator.

She went back outside.

“Back to the motel?” the cabbie asked as she climbed in again. He’d driven her around all day.

“No.” Kate shook her head. “ Airport .”

Phil Cavetti took the 7:00 A.M. shuttle back to New York, heading straight from La Guardia to FBI headquarters in lower Manhattan.

The proverbial shit was hitting the fan.

As if the fact that one of his closest colleagues had been found dead weren’t enough-on top of that, one of that agent’s own case subjects was implicated in the murder. Now, in another of her cases, one of the government’s most valuable assets in the entire WITSEC Program, a man whose information had put dozens of criminals away, was MIA as well.

Cavetti was unable to connect the dots, other than to the point where his own career intersected with disaster. And he didn’t like what he saw. Forget northern Michigan -the ice fields of North Dakota seemed a more likely prospect now. It was imperative they find Raab. Even more imperative they locate Bachelor Number One.

Now, unbelievably, Kate Raab was missing, too.

Nardozzi and Special Agent Alton Booth were waiting in the small conference room on the fourth floor of the Javits Federal Building when he arrived.

“This better be important.” The prosecutor put down his cell phone, looking plenty annoyed. “I’ve got a junior attorney stepping in to do a cross on a Pakistani cabdriver who’s accused of plotting to blow up the TKTS counter in Times Square.”

Cavetti removed three folders from his briefcase. “Trust me, it is.”

He tossed the reports he had prepared for the deputy director, marked “Restricted Access,” onto the table. They contained the FBI report on Margaret Seymour, the subsequent disappearance of Benjamin Raab, and the incident on the Harlem River involving his daughter Kate. One or two need-to-know details had been omitted.

“So how the hell is Kate Raab?” Alton Booth asked, taking a chug of his coffee.

“Gone.”

“ Gone? Like in Puerto Vallarta, gone. I thought after what happened on the river you had her under guard 24/7.”

“ Gone , like in left him holding the pooch.” Cavetti closed his eyes, chagrined. “She boarded a United flight two days ago for San Francisco. After that, your guess is as good as mine. She was smart enough not to rent a car at the airport. We have our guys checking cabs.”

“Cabs.” Booth stared implacably at him. “You know, this Blue Zone of yours is starting to get a little fucking crowded for me, Phil.”

Cavetti smiled. The FBI man didn’t know what was about to hit him next.

“So what’s your best guess?” Nardozzi asked. “Why would she run? And why San Francisco? Because someone targeted her?”

“We can only surmise her father’s been in touch with her. She hasn’t called in. She only left behind this vague note. There’s also the chance she’s trying to get in contact with her family.” He glanced at the FBI man. “You might want to get someone out there. Now. ”

Booth scribbled something on a pad and sighed. “Gee, Phil, all this concern for the girl is downright touching. If this witness-protection thing doesn’t work out, maybe you oughta consider the Department of Children and Families next time.”

“I am concerned for her, Al. I am.”

Nardozzi’s gaze bore through him. “There’s something you’re not telling us, Phil. Why the hell are we here? Why was I pulled out of court?”

“Margaret Seymour.” Cavetti cleared his throat. Time to fill in the blanks. “She was the same case agent-”

“The same agent for whom ?” Alton Booth put down his coffee and stood up.

Cavetti opened his briefcase again. This time he took out an addendum to his report, containing the need-to-know details that had been omitted. On whom Maggie Seymour was protecting. On Bachelor Number One.

He tossed it onto the table and swallowed. “I’m afraid that Blue Zone, Al, is even more crowded than you think.”

Yesterday Kate was in Portland. Today Seattle. Bellevue, actually, a stylish suburb just across Lake Washington.

She knew she was running out of options.

This morning she had driven downtown to the Seattle Athletic Club. To no avail. The same for two other squash clubs in Redmond and Kirkland. And one at the University of Washington, too.

Kate knew this one was pretty much it. A banner over the doorway read PRO SQUASH IN BELLEVUE. She had followed the band’s tour. She had put together the details she’d been able to glean from her family’s e-mails. But this was basically the end of the line. She had run out of cities, squash centers. If this was a dead end, too, Kate didn’t know where she was going to go next.

Except home.

The club was a gray, aluminum-sided building tucked into the rear of a small business park off a commercial highway. Someone had told her the Pakistani pro there was pretty much world-renowned. The main strip had all the icons of an upscale place to live: Starbucks, Anthropologie, Linens-N-Things, Barnes & Noble. The cabbie let her off in front of the entrance, as he had four times earlier today, and waited.

Kate stepped through the doors. By now every squash club in America seemed to have the same look to her. This one had four clean, white courts, glass-enclosed, with a spectator balcony overhead. It was crowded. The balls echoed off the walls. It was the end of the day, and the courts were filled with kids. Some kind of after-school youth program going on.