She steps in the middle of the huddle as the cameras whir and click, and she nods and ignores the questions the White House press pool is throwing at her like water balloons.
“Madam President, the Speaker says the budget talks are on hold until you…”
“Madam President, how do you respond to the Chinese threats about closing the Straits of Taiwan…”
“Madam President, despite their personal promises to you, it appears the average NATO defense budget is going to decrease again this year…”
She keeps that smile frozen on her face, and one of her young male staffers, checking his watch, says, “That’s enough now, thank you, thank you very much,” and he holds his hands wide to push out the press pool and the fresh-faced and eager members of the Junior Chamber of Commerce delegation.
One of the adult hosts, a stout Asian woman in a dark blue skirt suit, trails behind and offers a hand that Pamela gives a quick shake.
“Thanks for coming,” Pamela says. “I hope you enjoy the rest of the day.”
The woman’s eyes are brimming with tears. “Thank you, thank you, Madam President…believe me, we’re all pulling for you. We all love you. God bless you, Madam President.”
Pamela’s smile is for real as she reaches out and touches the woman’s shoulder. “Thank you, that’s quite kind of you,” she says, and while she is touched by the visitor’s sudden outburst of emotion, she quickly starts thinking, Well, not everyone’s pulling for me, especially the House leadership, China, Russia, Iran, a good part of the news media and the Internet, and a very large part of the country who still can’t get over calling the leader of the free world “Madam.”
Finally, the group departs the Oval Office, and Pamela’s husband, Richard, strolls in, leather-bound folder in his strong and still-weathered hands, and she once again feels that pleasing rush of love and appreciation for her husband as he comes near. He has on his daily uniform of a dark gray suit from Savile Row and a dark red necktie, and before she got where she belongs—here, in the White House—there were nasty remarks about the expense of his suits.
And at the time, Richard said, “Look, I grew up in Osceola County with cow shit all over my clothes, and now you’re begrudging me a chance to clean up?”
To the only man she can 100 percent trust in this city, Pamela says, “What’s next on the schedule?”
Without hesitation, Richard says, “I’ve canceled it all.”
That knocks her back. After her narrow win two Novembers ago, Richard headed her transition team, and there were howls of outrage when she pulled a JFK (who appointed his brother Bobby attorney general) and named him chief of staff. But her history-making victory tempered those howls, and now there were days like this one, when she wishes she was on day two of her term, riding on so much goodwill.
“What’s happened?” she asks, going back to the historic Resolute desk, used by so many past presidents.
The door to the Oval Office closes and Richard sits next to her at the desk. “Mel Keating’s been kidnapped.”
“What?” She’s astounded, horrified. “Matt Keating’s daughter?”
She had been preparing herself for a terrorist attack, a military action, the death of someone prominent…but this?
Richard opens the leather-bound binder and says, “Nearly two hours ago. I got a briefing from Secretary Charles at Homeland Security. Mel Keating and her boyfriend were on a hike up in the White Mountains, about a half hour’s drive from Matt’s home on Lake Marie. The boyfriend’s body was found on a dirt parking lot, at a trailhead. He’d been murdered, one shot to the head. Mel’s knapsack was on the ground near him.”
“What the…where in hell was her Secret Service coverage?”
“Her father’s no longer president, and the law says her protection ends when she turns sixteen. Mel Keating is nineteen.”
Pamela takes a breath. “Any ransom demands?”
“Not yet.”
“Any idea who might be involved?”
Richard says, “Matt’s service in the SEALs and his political record means a long list of enemies, Madam President. I’m sure the FBI is running that down at the moment.”
“What’s being done right now?”
“Local law enforcement is responding, we’ve got the FBI Hostage Rescue Team on the ground at Matt’s home, and the Bureau is sending in every available agent from Boston to Buffalo.”
“News media?”
“Just Internet rumors so far that something unusual is going on up there in New Hampshire, but you can bet it’s going to break wide open very shortly,” Richard says. “We should have you make a statement as soon as possible, get in front of it right away.”
Pamela rubs at her eyes. “Shouldn’t Lisa Blair take the lead? Won’t people want to hear from the head of the FBI?”
“No, ma’am,” Richard says with confidence. “If this was any other high-profile kidnapping, I would agree with you. But not the daughter of the former president. You need to take the lead, take control, show the country that you’re on top of things.”
Pamela nods. Her husband and chief of staff is making sense. “All right,” she says. “I want Director Blair over here soonest for a briefing. Get Secretary Charles and the head of the Secret Service here as well, and General Perkins, and Fred Munroe. Full-court press. Oh…and where’s the vice president?”
“On an aircraft, heading to South America,” he says. “But the Joint Chiefs chairman, and your national security advisor…Are you certain, Madam President?”
“Dead certain, Richard,” she says. “What are the chances that Mel was kidnapped for cash by some local yokels? There’s going to be a national security and military aspect to this kidnapping, and I want to make sure we plan through all possible contingencies.”
“On it, Madam President,” he says.
Pamela shakes her head. Years back, she and Richard tried to have children to no avail, and neither of them wanted to go the grueling and possibly fruitless IVF route. So they lavished attention on their nieces, nephews, and cousins (and amazing how many more cousins came out of the woodwork once she was sworn in!), and she can’t imagine the horror of having a child kidnapped.
She says, “I want to talk to Matt Keating.”
“Ah, not possible at the moment, ma’am.”
“Why the hell not?”
“He’s in an FBI Black Hawk, heading to the Manchester airport. I believe from there, he’ll be coming down to the DC area to be in close contact for information and developments.”
“And Samantha Keating?”
“En route as well.”
She says, “Okay, at first opportunity, I want a face-to-face with them both. No press.”
“I’ll make it happen.”
Pamela is thinking: Who else to get in here? She has full faith and confidence in FBI director Lisa Blair even though she was appointed by Pamela’s predecessor, and there are none better in the world when it comes to resolving kidnappings. Her secretary of Homeland Security, though, is a Florida cop with little imagination, and she’ll make sure he shuts up and does what the FBI wants Homeland Security to do. And how about the NSA? The best in intercepting communications, and she’ll have to make sure that—
Her husband and chief of staff is still sitting there.
From experience, she knows that’s a huge signal.
“What else, Richard?”
He locks her in with his steady gaze and says, “This is a crisis, Madam President. But it is also an opportunity. The past several months haven’t been good for us, have they?”
“Richard, it’s just—”
He interrupts her. “Pamela, we’re sinking. Floundering. Your history-making achievement is in everyone’s rearview mirror. Now here’s a chance to take control, show real leadership, and make the tough decisions that will impress our people and other countries.”
Pamela looks right back at the man who helped put her here, in the most famed office in the world.
&
nbsp; “What kind of tough decisions, Richard?”
His gaze is steady and calm. “Pamela, when you find out what they want for a ransom, you’re going to say no.”
Chapter
36
Saunders Hotel
Arlington, Virginia
It’s chaos on the fifth floor of the Saunders Hotel a few minutes after my arrival with Agent David Stahl, and I’m doing my best to make it a controlled chaos. We were met at Dulles Airport with two Suburbans and three other Secret Service agents from the field office on 1100 L Street NW, in the District of Columbia. The agent sitting next to me in the rear of the second Suburban was a Hispanic male, and I surprised him by saying, “Agent Morales, how are you? How’re the twin boys?”
Amazed, he managed to stammer out, “Very—very good, sir. They’re both in first grade, making their nuns miserable.”
“Good for them,” I said, grateful I had just spent a minute or two thinking of something else besides Mel. Agent Morales spent six months in the Presidential Protective Division when I was POTUS, and when you spend nearly every waking moment with agents like him, you get to know their lives, families, and experiences.
On the fifth floor, Agent Morales is standing watch at the open door linking the suite belonging to my failed reelection campaign to another empty room, allowing us more office space. Both spaces are filled with hotel security staff, managers, workers bringing in more desks and chairs and computer terminals, and I’m paying for all of this with the Visa card issued in the name of the still existing Committee to Reelect Matthew Keating, and I imagine I’m running up one hell of a bill and I don’t really give a shit.
Lights are burning brightly, phones are ringing, and a large flat-screen television is muted and tuned to CNN, the worldwide news network that is the United States’ unofficial eighteenth intelligence agency for broadcasting breaking news before it reaches the White House or the State Department.
Every few seconds there’s a “Mr. President, Mr. President”—questions come my way about getting more secretarial staff, additional rooms for sleeping, what kind of coffee and meals should be ordered—and I’m in the center of this damn storm, longing for the simplicity and organization of the White House Situation Room.
I want at least a minute to myself to find out where Samantha is and ask Agent Stahl if he’s gotten any additional news from either the New Hampshire State Police or the FBI, but each time I turn, there’s someone else in front of me holding a cell phone or a laptop, asking me a question.
“Everyone! Shut the hell up, now!” says a bellowing voice belonging to a woman. “I don’t want to hear another goddamn peep from anybody!”
I turn and nearly sag in relief in the sudden silence as Madeline Perry, my chief of staff, strolls right in, eyes flashing, head turning, as if issuing an open challenge to stand in her way.
She comes to me, gives me a quick hug. “Oh, Mr. President…”
I pull away, blinking at the sudden tears. “Thanks for getting here so quickly, Maddie.”
She takes both of my hands in hers, gives them a quick squeeze. “I practically had to bribe my way onto the best flight available from LaGuardia to Dulles. Anything new?”
“Not that I know of.”
She drops my hands, spots Agent Stahl on the phone, and says, “David! Huddle up time with me and Harbor. Now.”
We both follow her into the nearest empty room, which happens to be the suite’s large bathroom. Madeline ushers us in and, before closing the door, says, “Anybody knocking on this door will get their fingers broken, I goddamn guarantee it!”
In the bathroom, Madeline says, “Agent Stahl, what’s the latest? Any ransom demand?”
He shakes his head. “Not that I know of. The latest is that the FBI’s HRT is still on-site at Lake Marie, every FBI agent that can walk in the Northeast is arriving up there, there’s a New England–wide BOLO going out for the Cadillac Escalade we suspect was used in Mel’s kidnapping, and right now, all border stations in New England and New York State are being closed.”
Madeline says, “Mr. President, have you heard from the White House? FBI? Homeland Security?”
“Not yet,” I say. “I’ve been pretty mobile for the past couple of hours. If I stop answering questions about what kind of phone systems to install, I plan on reaching out, not waiting.”
“Good,” Madeline says. “Trust me, when we leave this room, you’re not going to be bothered.” She takes a quick breath. “I haven’t seen anything in the news media about Mel’s…situation, but that’s going to change pretty damn quick. I’ll start working up a statement for you to issue.” She struggles to contain her emotions. “Oh, that poor girl.”
I say, “Agent Stahl, any word on my wife?”
He says, “I was just getting an update when Maddie arrived, Mr. President. Maine State Police and agents from the Portland field office got her on a United flight to Dulles, which landed about thirty minutes ago. We have a detail bringing her in.”
Another bit of relief flows through me.
I need Samantha here.
My wife, Mel’s mom, and, most importantly, my partner.
I won’t get through this and get Mel back without her at my side.
“Good to know,” I say. “Maddie, how long before the story is out?”
“Minutes, if that,” she says.
I run a hand across my face. “Then this goes global, and every nut with a grudge or psychic with a vision is going to start clogging the phone lines and email accounts of the FBI and Homeland Security and everyone else in between.”
Madeline nods. “True, sir. But let’s get you out of here, allow you to get to work. Make some phone calls on your own before everything gets clogged with nonsense.”
I reach for the doorknob and Madeline says, “No, sir, I’m going out first.”
She opens the door and again raises her voice. “Listen up, people, and listen up well! I’m Madeline Perry, President Keating’s chief of staff, and any question, request, or announcement comes to me, and me only. Got it? In other words, leave him the hell alone. We’re taking the room next door and if you need him, you come through me.” Then, to me: “This way, sir.”
I follow Madeline to the door leading to the other suite, and her plan immediately falls apart, as the other door opens and Samantha strolls in, sees me, and says, “Matt!”
A few seconds pass and I get in a hard hug with her, feeling her hair against my face, smelling Maine salt air and dirt, and thinking of times past—confirming her pregnancy, me coming home from my first overseas deployment, that horrid day two summers ago when now president Barnes beat me in the California primary—and at each of those times, I didn’t want to let Samantha go.
Like now.
But I pull away and kiss her and she’s crying and says, “Anything? Anything at all?”
I hold her face in my hands and I’m about to think of what I can possibly say when Madeline Perry calls out, “Turn it up! Turn it up!”
We all face the flat-screen television, where a familiar-looking woman is sitting at the CNN anchor’s desk, and there’s a bright red-lettered crawl—BREAKING NEWS—and someone finally finds the remote and the woman’s voice booms right out into the crowded hotel suite.
“…CNN has learned from two high-level federal law enforcement sources that Melanie Keating, the daughter of former president Matthew Keating, has been kidnapped while on a hike in the White Mountains of northwestern New Hampshire and that her male hiking companion was brutally murdered…”
Chapter
37
Monmouth, New Hampshire
Officer Corinne Bradford of the Monmouth Police Department pulls her ten-year-old town police cruiser into one of the reserved spots near the police station and switches off the engine. A few minutes ago, Chief Randy Grambler called her on her cell phone, asking her to come back to the station.
She wonders what’s going on that the chief would want her to report in without putting
anything out over the regular radio dispatch, and she’s hoping it’s something to do with the kidnapping of the president’s daughter, Mel Keating.
Corinne steps out of the cruiser, metal clipboard under her arm, just as a state police cruiser roars by on Route 3, followed by a Grafton County sheriff’s cruiser and two black Chevy Suburbans with flashing lights in the radiator grilles and windshield visors. Two Black Hawk helicopters are flying by to the south, up where Mount Rollins is, only about a twenty-minute drive from her new hometown.
She’s still getting used to calling this place home. A year ago, she was living in Brockton, Massachusetts, had a great job with the Massachusetts State Police, until a series of scandals involving her troop—and not her directly, thank God—led to whole-scale reshuffling of the staties, leaving her dismissed and looking for a new job.
Which is now being one cop in a three-person department in the middle of the damn woods and mountains, headed by a local who’s apparently been chief since the last ice age.
She walks to the side of the one-story white clapboard building with tall black window shutters; this marks the entire town government and police force of Monmouth, said force being in the rear basement. Corinne opens the sticky door and Chief Grambler is sitting behind a dull gray metal desk, his long legs outstretched. His six-foot-six frame is so gaunt he looks one meal away from fainting. He wears the same kind of dark blue uniform Corinne has, but on his, the knees and elbows are shiny from age.
He scribbles on a slip of paper and passes it to Corinne. Overhead pipes from the town hall’s plumbing system rattle as someone on the first floor flushes a toilet. The department’s cramped office contains two desks, chairs, filing cabinets, and cardboard boxes filled with old records from last century. There is no jail or holding cell. The few folks Corinne has picked up during her two months here have all been taken to the Grafton County jail over in Haverhill for processing.
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