Captive-in-Chief (3 page)

The clock read 13.47 when he walked into the bar. He had twenty dollars to his name and a day and a half of travelling ahead of him. He slapped the twenty on the bar. “Bourbon.”

The barman quickly fulfilled his sole client’s needs. His reward was a gruff “Another!”, as the glass was lifted, emptied, and replaced in one motion.

Joe swallowed his second mouthful and the cloud began to lift. The drink blended with his already elevated blood levels, redirecting Joe from his sober state towards his far happier drunken one.

His glass was filled for a third time. A sip rather than a mouthful gave the barman leave to place the bourbon bottle back on the shelf and return to his other duties. Another sip and Joe was reminiscing over a childhood long forgotten in the rugged wilds of West Virginia and the treacherous mining towns where death was all too prevalent. As a child, death had never been a concern. The hills and caves were the perfect playground. Joe and his friends would leave home when the sun rose and if they weren’t too busy exploring, be home for dusk.

Joe had known Clay Caldwell as long as he had known himself. They had been neighbors, born merely months apart, and in every memory of his childhood, Clay was there. Even in bed, separated by a paper thin wall, the two boys were, in reality still together, chatting incessantly through the wall until finally sleep tore them apart. Inseparable, the two spent every waking minute together. Even at school, they were kept together. The school had tried once to put them in different classes, an experiment that was never repeated. The chaos caused by each of the boys in their separate classes far outweighed the annoyance of their incessant chatting when together.

Joe finished his third drink in a final swig. A dark day in his history had been reached. Clay’s father’s death in a mining accident was the day that ended his childhood friendship with Clay. Clay’s mother had taken him and gotten as far away from the mines and West Virginia as she could. Barely had the funeral ended when she had packed and was hauling out of town. Joe’s memory of Clay crying, his hand raised towards his friend in the back window as the car disappeared around the corner never left him. Promises had been made, they’d keep in touch and see each other regularly. Promises children made, not realizing the distance between West Virginia and Florida. They were fifteen then, and it had been close to forty years since they had been ripped apart. The Internet, instant messaging, WhatsApp, Facebook—none of them had even been thought of. Long distance phone calls were expensive and neither family had the money.

Joe continued to underachieve, doing the bare minimum of work required to graduate high school. His parents took little or no interest in his education. Mining wasn’t for rocket scientists, and as far as they were concerned, Joe would follow his father like his father before him, into the mines. Joe and Clay had other ideas. Clay had talked of joining the Marines and seeing the world and it was a plan that Joe was going to follow, fully expecting to see his friend again.

At seventeen, after much persuasion, his parents let Joe sign up. His days playing in the wilds of West Virginia had created a powerful, fit young man. Running up and down hills, scaling mountains, and exploring caves had been the perfect training ground for the recruiter’s recommendation that Joe aim for the elite Force Recon division. Joe sailed through training and selection, moving quickly into the Marine’s special ops team. Throughout his time, he looked out for Clay, assuming he too would have gone for the elite option. It would be years before the two would cross paths again. Clay had joined the Marines, as Joe had thought he would, although not Force Recon, and only after gaining a college degree and joining as an officer.

“Move!” came a shout from behind the door, bringing Joe back to the present. A thud followed by a yelp had him moving in an instant.

The door opened as Joe approached it and in came a laughing group of men. Joe pushed past them to a number of “Hey!” and “What the…”

Sandy was cowering a few feet from the door, her tail tucked under herself, looking at her left rear leg. Joe rushed over and patted her, checking her leg for any damage. Her tail soon moved back to its more familiar wagging position as Joe fussed over her. Joe stood up and turned back to the bar.

Joe was a big guy, six three and powerfully built. His stomach could have been a little more toned but in general he was not a guy who had to prove himself. His daily swims were punishing routines that, despite his lifestyle, kept him in shape. Although in his early fifties, he could easily pass for a man in his forties.

The six laughing men were like himself, well-built, although younger and fitter, ranging in age from mid-twenties to mid-thirties. If he had to guess, football buddies or a work crew.

“Who kicked the dog?” asked Joe.

The laughing started again.

“I’ve only got a problem with whoever kicked my dog,” said Joe, his voice rising to counter the laughs. “The rest of you can walk out of here, just tell me who kicked my dog.”

“Look, buddy,” said the barman. “I don’t want any trouble in here, the cops are all over us as it is.”

“Perhaps we should all go out and give her a kick?” laughed one of the men to his friends.

“You’d have to get through me first,” Joe snarled.

The laughing stopped when the challenge was thrown at them. Some old guy was disrespecting them in their own bar.

“Guys!” shouted the barman. “Let him go, there doesn’t need to be any fighting.”

Joe waited but nobody was moving. He didn’t believe in waiting for the first punch to be thrown, not when you knew it was going to be coming in any event. You may as well get it in first. Hit hard and fast. Joe stepped towards the guy who suggested they all kick the dog. He laughed as though it was hysterical that Joe was coming towards them.

Joe didn’t hesitate and swung his right foot up and into the guy’s balls, crushing them with his bare foot. Had he been wearing shoes rather then flip flops it would have been a deadly blow such was the force he used. Before the others had time to react to their fallen comrade, Joe had swung his fist and broken another’s nose. A backhanded follow-up had taken another in the neck. From there, things got a little harder. Three enraged men threw themselves at him. Unfortunately, none had cowered out. It was always a hope when there were many opponents that some would step back and fail to engage. Not on this occasion. All six were up for the fight. Six against one, no matter how good you were, the odds were not good.

Joe caught one of the three square on the jaw. He joined the other three on the floor, though only at the expense of a punch to Joe’s own head. He let his head roll with the force of the blow, taking as much of the strength out of it as he could. Still, it was a mighty hit. Joe staggered and took a boot to the thigh from the other attacker. He threw himself into the puncher and used all of the momentum from the kick and his own weight to take the puncher down with him, raising his elbow and powering it into the guy as he fell on top of him. A massive
oomph
suggested he had taken every ounce of air out of the puncher’s lungs as a result. The kicker had him on the floor but Joe was ready, rolling off the puncher and avoiding a second massive kick which landed squarely on the puncher’s hip. Joe was back up and ready, five men down and only the kicker still in the game. At least for the moment. Some of the friends were coming to terms with their injuries and pulling themselves back into the fight. Joe needed to end it quickly. He surged forward, catching the kicker by surprise and landing a massive uppercut, lifting the kicker off his feet and sending him a few feet back towards the bar.

While three were trying to get to their feet, Joe moved, delivering three more blows in rapid succession that sent them back to the floor.

“I’ll ask again, who kicked my dog?” he wheezed. He hadn’t exerted himself that much in years. He looked around. Six powerful younger men lay in various states of discomfort while he remained standing. He still had it,
just
. They had caught him twice and if they had known what they were doing, he would have been down and out. If they had been better, perhaps he would have been more careful. Whatever the case, it wasn’t a bad result after many years of inaction. His mind had remained calm and his moves calculated. He had continually re-evaluated the situation and altered his actions throughout to benefit from any potential advantage.

Two hands indicated to the guy whose nuts Joe had crushed. His face was a whitish gray and he was tucked in a fetal position with his hands hovering over the injured area, too painful to actually touch. Joe looked at him with some pity. There was every chance he had done some permanent damage.

“I think he learned his lesson,” said Joe.

One of the men raised his hands as he stood, accepting the fight was over.

“Not bad for an old man,” he said, rubbing his chin. Two more stood up, one nursing a bloodied and broken nose, all accepting the fight was over.

“Drink?” asked one of the men.

None of the six looked up for more of a fight, and the guy who kicked Sandy was in no state for anything. Joe shrugged. What the hell? If they were going to be magnanimous in defeat who was he not to have a drink with them?

Raising his glass to his new ‘friends’, the TV behind the bar caught his eye. A photo of a woman who had reportedly been kidnapped was displayed on the screen. Though he had never seen the woman, that didn’t stop him from recognizing her. He had known her as a child. She was the spitting image of her mother, with her father’s eyes. Only four people alive knew who her father really was: Joe, the mother, the father, and the woman. The full reason for the president’s call for help suddenly made sense. Joe placed his glass on the bar, the bourbon remained.

He had a bus to catch and a friend in need.

“Mr. President.”

President Caldwell swept past his secretary, ignoring her polite requests as she tried in vain to catch his attention on the walk form his car to the Oval Office.

“Mr. President!” she snapped loudly, stopping everyone in their tracks when he neared his office door.

President Caldwell turned slowly and faced his secretary. She had his attention.

“I’m sorry, Mr. President,” she apologized, although Clay knew it was more for the audience than a genuine apology. Ramona was not a woman who liked to be ignored, nor was she easy to. At 220lbs, she was as large as she was loud. She had a million dollar smile that shone all the more brightly against her dark skin and had lured many an unsuspecting prey into thinking she was a cuddly old grandma. Her intellect was quick, her tongue sharper than most, and her temper hotter than Hell. She was a fearsome gatekeeper who protected and worshipped President Clay Caldwell as if he were her son and berated him in private as she would her own. There wasn’t a cabinet member in office who had not felt her wrath. She had achieved legendary status. The dilemma they all joked about was if two calls came to them at once, one from the President and one from Ramona, which would they take first? The fact they even had to think about that told you all you needed to know about Ramona.

“All hell has broken loose in there,” she fumed. “Storming by me like I’m not here!”

Clay looked to the Oval Office’s closed door questioningly.

“Yep, went past me like I wasn’t here. Well I can tell you they ain’t getting any refreshments and don’t you go offering them, cause they won’t be coming!”

“Who?” asked Clay, more concerned about who was in his office.

“The only one I recognized was that uppity bit—” Ramona caught herself, “…woman from the FBI.” She waved her hand in the air, leaning against her desk to catch her breath. “Rolled past me like she owned the place with her little entourage scurrying in behind her!”

“I’ll let her know not to do it again,” said Clay, appeasing and reassuring Ramona, although he knew no such assurance was necessary, Ramona would make it crystal clear herself soon enough.

Clay turned and opened the door. The uppity woman he knew was going to be Sarah Myers, a headstrong and rather too full of her own importance Executive Assistant Director. However, given her responsibility for the National Security Branch, valuing her own importance was not an entirely bad thing. Unfortunately, she hadn’t learned to temper herself, although Clay felt sure that Ramona would help her out with that in the near future.

“Sarah!” barked the president, entering his office.

Six people jumped to attention as his voice boomed across the most powerful office in the world. The two couches that faced each other were crowded with Sarah’s subordinates, while she sat in one of the armchairs by the fireplace.

“Mr. President,” Sarah said, rising slowly, the only person in the room unfazed by his presence.

“To what do I owe this unexpected intrusion?” he asked, striding towards his desk, ignoring the people on his sofas.

“We have a group claiming responsibility for the director’s death.”

The president stopped in his tracks. He knew who had killed the director, or at least he knew what they wanted, not who they were. They were the same people who had killed his Chief of Staff, his lead agent, and who had kidnapped his daughter - all to ensure he did exactly what they told him.

“Who?”

“We still have to confirm the validity,” came a voice from the sofa.

The president’s head spun round to face the speaker. “Who?!”

“Well it…” said the voice, faltering under the president’s intense gaze.

“Who?!”
he almost screamed.

“You see—”

“If the next words are not the name of the group, so help me!” threatened the president.

“The New Black Panthers. Or a splinter cell of theirs calling itself the Black Action Group,” said Sarah, taking over from her somewhat starstruck team.

“Bullshit!”

“We believe so,” agreed Sarah. “However, a short video of the killing of the director has been uploaded onto the group’s website, a video shot by the killer, using either a head or body cam that recorded the event.”

“Any images of the killer?”

“Yes, a reflection in the window of the police cruiser next to where the director was killed shows the image of a black man wearing a mask.”

“Wait, so you’re telling me the killer was a black man?”

“We don’t know. The reflection is a fake. Our guys have analyzed the footage, and it’s definitely a fake, and a very good one. To the casual viewer, it looks completely real, however, analysis shows the pixels are wrong and the image is merely obscuring the real image of the killer.”

“And the reason the group killed Director Schwartz?”

“Retaliation for the murder of innocent black citizens at the hands of law enforcement officers, according to the note posted on the website.”

“Dear God!” said the president, taking the vacant armchair next to Sarah.

“We’ve already seen a significant spike in chatter among the white supremacist groups. It’s going to get real nasty, real quick.”

“Even though he was Jewish?”

“He was killed because he was white. At any rate that’s what the supremacists are saying. His religion is irrelevant in this instance.”

“So what are we doing about this Black Action Group?”

“We have the leaders of the group in custody.”

“Good work,” said the president, impressed.

“They came to us and alerted us to the video on their site.”

President Clay Caldwell looked around the room, heads nodded back at him, it was true.

“They told you they posted the video, and then turned themselves in?”

“They claim their website was hacked, their access denied, and the video was posted by someone else. They hoped we could take the website down before anyone could see it.”

“And we obviously haven’t if the white supremacists have seen it.”

“It’s down now, although unfortunately not before an email link was widely distributed.”

Clay pressed the intercom button. “Ramona, could we get some refreshments in here, please?”

“Mr. President, I should introduce you to the team,” Sarah said while they waited for Ramona to take their orders. She went along individually, introducing the agents in charge of a number of the domestic terrorism and intelligence sections within the FBI’s National Security Branch, which housed the counterterrorism and counterintelligence units of the FBI.

A knock on the door preceded Ramona’s entry with a single cup of coffee. Her million dollar smile was nowhere to be seen as she delivered the steaming cup to the president and exited without a word.

“I may owe her an apology,” Sarah said, reading between the lines. “We were keen to speak to you.”

Clay took a sip of his coffee. “Hmmm,” was all he could offer as the door burst open.

“Oh my God!” exclaimed the First Lady, Val Caldwell, rushing across the room and hitting the power button to switch on the TV, oblivious to the faces following her.

A breaking news banner filled the bottom of the screen. The top of the screen showed an image more reminiscent of those from the darkest days of the 60’s. The back of two figures in white cloaks and hoods filled the majority of picture, and between their pointed hoods was a pixilated section. However, it could not hide the horror of what the pixelated area depicted. A man was hanging by the neck from a tree. The banner filled in the detail:
“Lynch mob hang Mayor of Atlanta, Georgia…”

“Have you seen it?” asked Bill Miller, the president’s Homeland Security Advisor, rushing into the room.

“Convene an emergency Homeland Security Council meeting in the Situation Room!” Clay shouted to Ramona. “Sarah, keep me updated.”

“Of course, Mr. President,” she said, as she and her team exited.

When the Oval Office was emptied of everyone except for Clay, his wife, and his HSA, he asked, “Do you know about the Black Action Group’s video?”

Bill nodded. “Sarah called me earlier. I had just landed at Andrews and told her to get here and bring you up to speed asap.”

“You know Director Schwartz was from Atlanta, right?”

“Yeah,” he said. “A black hate group killed a prominent white Atlanta man, so the white hate group reciprocates against the most prominent black man in Atlanta.”

“Ramona!” shouted the president. “I need—”

“The Atlanta Chief of Police is holding on line one and the Governor is on line two.”

“Thanks,” said Clay picking up the handset. As much as she could be a pain in the ass, Ramona was outstanding at her job and read situations as well as any member of his cabinet.

He hit both lines, creating a conference call. “Is it real?” he asked.

“Mr. President, we’re trying to verify it now,” replied the Atlanta police chief. “The photo was sent to the TV station before we knew anything about it. We can confirm that the mayor is missing and would seem to have been taken by force. The back door of his house has been bust open and from the look of his office, he put up a mighty struggle.”

“Wait a minute, when was he taken?”

“We think it was this morning. He sent a text to his assistant to say he wasn’t feeling well and wouldn’t be in, that was at 8.57 a.m. Thing is, he
never
sends texts.”

Clay took the handset away from his face. “Bill, when was the video put up on the website?”

“About two to three hours ago. We’ll know an exact time once we crack the code.”

“The timings don’t gibe. The mayor was likely kidnapped this morning, three hours before the video surfaced and before we had even broken the story about Director Schwartz’s death.”

Clay returned to the call. “Governor, whatever you need, anything, you call me.”

“Thank you, Mr. President. We’ve recalled all officers and will maintain high levels of visibility over the next few days. We’ll keep it under control.”

“I hope you do, although this has got set-up written all over it. Anything you need, you’ve got it,” he emphasized, ending the call.

“Bill, could you give us a minute?” asked Clay. “I’ll meet you down in the Situation Room.”

“Of course, Mr. President.”

Clay’s wife was his rock. She had been by his side for over twenty years, through good and bad times, and had borne him two wonderful children. He loved her as much as the first day he had fallen for her. She was as smart, if not smarter, than him. She was his sounding board, his most trusted advisor, and yet there he was, in a position he promised he would never again be in, lying to the most precious person in the world to him. He couldn’t tell her about his first child, that time had been and gone. No matter how he tried to tell her, it would be nothing more than a betrayal for all the years he hadn’t. The messages he kept receiving, the threats to his family, the murders of his close confidants, his knowledge that this was nothing more than a sham—only he could know. He hugged her as the door closed behind Bill. He desperately wanted to talk to her, to tell her everything. However, he couldn’t and wouldn’t place her in danger.

“Are you okay?” he asked. “You’ve met the mayor a few times.”

“I can’t believe there are people in this day and age...” She buried her head in his shoulder, lost for words.

He held her tightly. Whatever happened over the coming days, weeks, and months, he would keep her and his family safe. He promised that, above all else. As for his secret daughter, her safety was beyond his control and in the hands of one man. A drunk called Joe.

He hugged his wife tighter, his eye catching sight of his cellphone on his desk, a new message from an unknown number. His heart started to race, it was a new message from them.