A/N - I omitted to thank my wonderful Beta, DianeM37 for all her hard work. Thanks Diane! And thanks to all who have read and reviewed.
Chapter 2
Frank Reagan was slowly beginning to regain consciousness in the back of the van as it sped through the back streets of the New York suburbs. The vibrations coming up from the floor rattled his teeth and hammered through his skull as they continued at speed. His eyes opened slowly and he tried to focus and take stock of where he was. He was having trouble remembering exactly what had happened. He raised his head slightly, regretting it almost immediately as the jackhammers started with a vengeance. He caught sight of a black, laced, military-style boot close to his head. Then an unfamiliar voice broke the silence.
"Hey, Wade, look who's awake."
"Ah, Commissioner Reagan, nice of you to join us," Wade said, leaning down to Frank, who was lying uncomfortably on his side on the floor of the van.
Frank tried to change his position and was halted by an agonising pain that shot up through his thigh and into his side. He couldn't contain his cry and instinctively brought his hands down and grasped the injured area. He immediately felt the slick blood that was soaking his trouser leg.
"Oh, yeah. Sorry about that, Commissioner. One of my friends got a bit trigger happy," Wade said sarcastically, loudly banging the division between the driver and the back of the van to get the point across to his accomplice, Jack, who was driving.
"Trigger happy?" Frank said angrily, through gritted teeth. Suddenly the events of the last thirty minutes came rushing back. "You murdered my people."
"Yeah, well we had just one objective and you were it. Unfortunately, they got in our way. I like to think of them as… casualties of war," Wade replied, apparently unperturbed by his murderous acts.
"Bastard," Frank growled defiantly and promptly received a kick in the ribs from the second of the men for his troubles.
He curled into a foetal position and tried to protect his body from any further blows.
"Jeez, Leshawn, try not to kill him before we get back to the warehouse," Wade snarled. "He's already bleeding all over the floor. Do something about that, will you? Take his tie off."
"What? Why?" Leshawn asked, looking blankly at Wade.
"Tie it around his leg above the wound, Dumbass.. I don't want him bleeding to death before we get our money," Wade replied patronisingly.
Leshawn did as he was ordered and loosened the tie around Frank's neck before yanking it roughly over his head. He knelt close to Frank's injured limb and tied it tightly above the wound. Frank winced and gritted his teeth, and it took all of his self-control not to cry out again.
"Why are you doing this?" Frank asked once he got his breath back.
"Because some dude is paying us a wad of cash to take you to him," Leshawn replied with a smarmy grin.
Wade cast Leshawn a cutting look. He wasn't happy that his partner in crime was getting chatty with their victim. Leshawn got the message pretty quickly.
"No more questions," Wade decided. "Keep your mouth shut and you might just get out of this alive."
Every bone in Frank's body wanted to fight back, to slap the little punk in the mouth, but he wasn't feeling at all well. His head was spinning. He wasn't sure if it was from the blood loss or the bump on his head. He closed his eyes in an effort to quell the rising nausea. He rested his head back on the floor of the van and offered no resistance. Soon he felt the van take a sharp right and the vibrations of the road underneath changed slightly. They were on a smoother surface, Frank noted. The van slowed and eventually stopped.
Frank's captors clambered to their feet and slid the van door open. Frank peered out in an attempt to see where he was.
"Come on," Wade said, pulling him by the arm. "Get out!"
Frank tried to comply but he found it difficult to move with his injury. He dragged himself to the door, his efforts causing him great discomfort. There was an endless throbbing in his leg. He wasn't able to tell if the bone had been broken by the bullet or not. Leshawn watched his slow progress out of the van and quickly lost patience and yanked him out the rest of the way. As soon as Frank put his weight on his injured leg, he collapsed in a heap at his captor's feet. The blood rushed to his head and roared in his ears. He was close to passing out again. A voice from further away called to the two men standing above him.
"What the hell's the matter with him?"
Wade and Leshawn exchanged worried glances. Their employer didn't look too happy.
"He got shot," Wade replied, trying to sound cool.
"Shot? Who the hell shot him? I knew you idiots would screw this up," the unidentified voice growled. "How bad is it?"
"He took one in the leg. He'll live," Wade assured him.
"You idiots!" the voice said crossly. "This wasn't what we agreed."
"It couldn't be helped. Things got out of control pretty quickly," Wade told him.
"Nothing we can do about it now. Proceed as planned. Secure him in the store room," the voice instructed the men. "I've an important call to make."
Back at Frank's home, his family were beside themselves with worry. Danny was on the telephone, talking to his sister, Erin, informing her of the morning's drama. She was at work in the DA's office and was deeply upset at what she was hearing. Naturally, she wanted to do something to help. Danny assured her that everything that could be done was being done. His words offered little comfort to Erin, though, who decided that it was best if she was with the rest of her family at such a stressful and emotional time. She left work without any explanation to anyone. They would hear about it soon enough, as it would no doubt make the news, she thought. She caught a cab outside her building and it took her to her father's address.
By the time she got there, she had to plow her way through a barrage of news reporters and police officers in order to get to the house. Crime Scene Investigators were busily working the fresh crime scene outside her childhood home. Erin was shocked to see the condition of the SUV. It resembled Swiss cheese, riddled with bullet holes and it was difficult to ignore the dark pool of blood on the sidewalk. She had to identify herself to a uniformed officer before she was let up the steps to the front door, which displayed significant bullet damage also. Inside the house, there was a somber air. She could hear voices coming from a few different areas downstairs. In the living room she found her brothers and her grandfather, Danny still with his cell phone to his ear, Jamie pacing aimlessly and Henry, looking shaken, clutching the glass of brandy in his hand.
He looked up when he saw his grand-daughter and gestured her to come over to him. She quickly covered the ground between them, he got to his feet and they embraced. Erin was so far managing to maintain her outer calm, but inside there was turmoil. She prayed for some good news.
"Anything?" she asked expectantly.
Henry shook his head. She could see the worry in his eyes.
"Danny's sending someone to view traffic camera footage. They have a description of the van and they'll try and follow it that way," Henry explained.
"And that's it?" Erin asked.
"For now. The best witnesses are both in the hospital. Detective Fisher will need surgery. Baker isn't as badly injured and should be able to give us something in a few hours," Henry told her. "Cooper didn't make it."
"Oh my God," she sighed. "I just can't believe this is happening. What do they want? Do you think there'll be a ransom demand?"
"In my experience, kidnapping a high profile target like Francis is very high risk, so the demands will be very high. It is likely that he will be used to force the city, maybe the police force, to give the perpetrators something money can't buy. We will just have to wait and hope that whatever they want can be given to them," Henry said hopefully.
"And if it can't?" Erin asked.
Henry couldn't look at her. He broke eye contact, shook his head and walked to the window. The answer was not something anyone wanted to hear.
Leshawn and Wade half-carried, half-dragged Frank's considerable bulk to the store room at the back of the building. The slightest movement was sending bolts of fire shooting up from Frank's wounded leg and causing him immense pain. He was teetering on the edge of consciousness. Before his captors brought him into the room, Wade ordered Leshawn to empty Frank's pockets. They removed his overcoat, took his wallet, cell phone and reading glasses from his person.
They then opened the door and dragged Frank to a mattress that had been purposefully left on the floor. Wade started to show some consideration for the first time, and actually eased Frank down gently so that he could sit on the mattress. Frank rested his head back against the wall, trying to stifle the urge to throw up. Wade knelt on one knee and had a look at Frank's injured leg. It was still bleeding.
"Hang in there, Commissioner," he said, standing up and making towards the door. "Hopefully you won't be here too long."
He threw Frank's now emptied overcoat onto the floor in the room, and with that the door slammed shut and Frank heard the key turn in the lock. He looked around and examined his prison. It was a tiny room, no more than a closet, he suspected. On one wall stood the remains of a shelving unit bearing a few cardboard boxes. There was no window but there was a skylight in the roof to provide illumination. The mattress on which he sat took up almost half of the floor space. There was a trash can and an old computer hard drive in one corner and that was pretty much it.
Gradually, Frank's heart rate slowed as the adrenaline that had been pumping though him for the last 45 minutes abated. His breathing regularised and he finally started to think straight. The pain from the bullet in his leg eased a little now that the jarring and movement had ceased. He decided that it would be prudent to check his leg and assess the damage. He located the bullet hole in his trouser leg and used it to tear a larger hole to better access the wound.
He loosened the makeshift tourniquet that Leshawn had applied in the van. Blood bubbled steadily from the wound. Gritting his teeth, Frank palpated the area around the entry wound to try and feel the bullet. He couldn't feel it under the skin, which led him to determine that it was embedded deep in the muscle or possibly in the bone. He felt in the breast pocket of his suit jacket and pulled out a handkerchief. He folded it into a wad and placed it over the wound. Then using his neck tie once more, he secured it tightly over the wound. The whole process caused him tremendous pain, and it took all his resolve not to pass out. He breathed heavily for a couple of seconds after and lay his head back against the wall and fought to stay conscious, but he was fighting a losing battle. When the darkness came, he felt relief and allowed it to claim him.
Outside, Frank's captors gathered together in an office the other side of the warehouse.
"So, how's our guest?" the boss asked as Wade and Leshawn returned.
"He's still bleeding, Ricky. We should at least get some gauze or something. If he bleeds out in there, you've lost your leverage," Wade explained sensibly.
Ricky turned and looked across to the door of the storeroom and cursed under his breath. This was not meant to have happened. Their job was to pick up the PC unharmed and keep him that way. They screwed it up and he wasn't happy, but his plan could still work. As long as Reagan was alive, he had something to bargain with.
"Fine, go to the drugstore and pick up whatever you need. But don't take the van! The cops will be looking for it," Ricky warned.
"Have you made the call yet?" Wade wondered.
"Nah, I'll do it soon," he replied. "Have to give them time for it all to sink in."
Back at the Reagan house, Danny was fidgeting and feeling totally helpless. All the sitting around was driving him insane. The Crime Scene Unit were just finishing up outside. The SUV had been loaded onto the back of a truck and covered, ready for transport to the forensics garage. One of the detectives, Monroe, who had been assigned the investigation, approached Danny. They knew each other by name but had never met before today.
"Detective Reagan, can I have a word?" he asked.
"Sure," Danny replied and followed Monroe to the relative privacy of the hallway. "What is it?" he asked, sensing that the detective had something on his mind.
"CSU have discovered blood spatter close to the area where a witness said that your father was forced into the van," Monroe explained candidly. "They've taken samples to confirm, but it is suspected that the Commissioner was wounded in the struggle."
Danny reached for the wall with one hand and looked to the ground. He took a cleansing breath and tried to compose himself. It was bad enough knowing that his father had been taken, but now he had to deal with the fact that he was more than likely wounded and he had no idea how badly. This was just going from bad to worse. For all he knew, his father could be dead. It just didn't bear thinking about.
Detective Monroe slapped Danny on the back in a macho gesture of support. Danny nodded his head in acknowledgement.
"Thanks, Monroe," he said gratefully. "Keep me posted, okay?"
"Of course," Monroe replied. "Don't worry, we'll find him."
Danny knew only too well the mountain that stood before them. He had worked abductions before and a lot of leads came down to dumb luck. Sometimes a member of the public would give them a tip off, sometimes the perp would get sloppy and leave something behind, sometimes the victim escaped; they were the good results. Most of the time the victim's body was found dumped in some alley or under a bridge. He knew the odds were stacked against them. But this time they had to beat the odds. They had to get their father back. He decided that it was best not to tell the rest of the family that Frank could be injured. Not for the time being, at least.
Danny was snapped back from his morbid thoughts by a polite knock on the open front door. He looked up as Garrett Moore, his father's Deputy Mayor and public relations advisor, entered. Garrett extended his hand and Danny shook it.
"How's the family?" Garrett asked thoughtfully.
"Shocked," Danny replied. "Lost. We don't know what to do. What have you heard?" Danny asked, hoping that Garrett might have heard something from the Office of the Commissioner.
"Not very much. I heard Cooper was killed and Fisher and Baker were shot and your father's missing. The press have very little else, only hearsay. They're tossing around the terrorist angle again, trying to create headlines, but there's nothing to make us think that this is a terrorist attack."
"But we don't think this was random," Danny told him.
"Definitely not. It was vicious and professional. According to witness statements, the whole attack took two minutes from start to finish. They got what they came for and had an escape plan," Garrett told him.
"Have you spoken to the Mayor?" Danny enquired.
"Yeah, he's waiting to see if there's a ransom demand before making a statement to the press," Garrett said seriously.
There was a contemplative silence for a moment, then Danny asked;
"Are we going to lose him, Garrett?"
Garrett shook his head and sighed.
"I hope not, Danny. I hope not."
To be continued...