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.

Okay. She drew an anxious breath, facing a pretty young woman behind the desk, in a white piqué shirt with the club’s logo embroidered on it.

One last time…

Kate unfolded Emily’s picture. “I don’t mean to bother you,” she said. The young woman didn’t seem bothered at all. “Do you happen to know this girl?”

As Kate handed over the photo, she was already going through her options for what she would do next. Call Cavetti. Say she was sorry for ditching his agent. For probably involving the FBI in a manhunt to find her. Then beg him to break the rules and reveal where her family was. Face Greg. That option wasn’t sitting well either. Kate realized she had her share of explaining to do there, too.

The girl behind the counter nodded. “That’s Emily Geller.”

“What?”

“Emily Geller,” the girl said. “She’s one of our best players. She moved here from back east.”

Kate’s blood surged in shock and exultation.

Geller. The name went through Kate’s mind, as she told the taxi to come to a stop a way down the block from the white clapboard house that backed onto the lake, off Juanita Drive in Kirkland.

Nice house, Kate thought. Even in the dark, there was something about it she liked immediately. It could be anybody’s house. The family next door. Just knowing that her mom and Em and Justin were inside made her smile. Geller.

“This where we’re going, miss?”

She thought back to the day they all saw their house in Larchmont for the first time. Mom just stood in the giant vestibule, eyes wide. “It’s so big.” Dad took her to the windows overlooking the sound, beaming proudly. “We’ll fill it, Sharon.” Em came back in and grabbed Kate’s hand. “You’re not going to believe this”-her eyes excited-“it even comes with a turret.”

“We’ll fill it, Sharon.” Then we’ll leave it all behind.

“You want me to pull in?” the turbaned taxi driver turned around and asked.

“No,” Kate said, unsure what to do, “just pull over here.”

The taxi drew up to the curb in front of a modern cedar-and-glass house under tall evergreens, two houses down. Kate was nervous. She spotted some cars on the street. She knew there were probably WITSEC marshals all around, that they were probably alerted to her, too, and that if they found her, she’d be in cuffs in thirty seconds flat.

But the fact that her family was this close, just beyond her reach, made her know she couldn’t pull back now. She hadn’t seen them in over a year. Suddenly Kate wasn’t sure what to do. She didn’t know if there were agents inside. If their phones were bugged. Maybe she should wait for them at the squash club? Maybe she should turn around and do this another day?

“What do you want to do, miss?” the driver asked, pointing toward the meter now.

“I’m sorry. I’m not sure.”

Finally she took out her cell phone. Her fingers were trembling a little, sweaty, and she felt like she was back in her shell, grabbing hold of the oars at the start of an important race. Nervously, she punched in the number the girl had given her at the squash club. It started ringing. Her stomach was knotted. Any second she expected voices to start shouting and lights to go on.

It was Emily who picked up. “Hullo.”

Kate could barely contain herself. “I was just wondering what you might say to an all-expense-paid dream date with Stephan Jenkins of Third Eye Blind?”

There was a pause. “Kate?”

“Yeah, Em…” Kate felt her eyes well up. “It is. It’s me, baby…”

Suddenly she heard Emily break out screaming, “It’s Kate! It’s Kate!” It was like she was tearing up the stairs through the house. “Mom, Just, Kate’s on the phone! How did you find this number? I can’t believe you’re calling here! What are you, totally crazy?”

Kate laughed, giddy. “I don’t know… Maybe I am.”

She heard voices in the background. Her mother and Justin surrounding the phone. Em didn’t want to give it up. “God, it’s been so long… There’s so much I have to tell you, Kate. Where are you?” Emily asked.

Kate stared at the house. For a second she had to dig deeply to find her voice.

“I’m right outside.”