A typically mundane day of delegating responsibility for Kristi Johnson gets turned upside down when the emergency flash message reaches her that there had been a suspected terrorist bombing in St. Louis, Mo. while hovering above the scene, through the news copter traffic below, her worst fears are realized, she makes the call to the Department of Homeland Security recommending raising the national terror threat level to RED for the first time in history. What follows is a hair raising rollercoaster ride through the heretofore unimagined world of a nationwide National Emergency. The characters in L.C. Beys debut novel come from all walks of life, but they must navigate this locked down society of curfews, check points tracked movements and fear . Kristi and her FBI tactical team have very little time to decipher the cryptic clues left behind at the crime scene taunting them into recognizing that the terror spree was far from over, the hubris of the terrorist indicating that he was much smarter than their best and brightest... Volume one sets up the landscape of this pre Marshall law America, showcasing the strain inflicted on relationships of all kinds, the high tech investigations and the way human nature makes for strange bed fellows when said humans are stretched to the limit. Join us for the ride as we trailblaze the country in the midst of Threat Level RED !!!
Mr Corbin-Bey is the author of From The Inside, a book of poetry previously published, he is an Ohio Native that currently resides in Atlanta, Ga, USA. his use of strong female protagonists is most likely the product of his growing up the youngest of six with five older sisters and a very industrious mother and father
The centerpiece of Threat Level RED, she is the dream / nightmare anyone would want to have on their side of a shootout. Not your everyday administrative functionary, Kristi loves her job and as a black woman she knows that in order to keep her job she has to be the Best at it.
She is the first black female in a SAC Special Agent in Charge - in this building and as such she is nothing to play with...
I introduce you to ... SAC, Kristi Johnson
Book Excerpt
Threat Level Red
“Damn, why the hell is it that I can order forty cases of Fed Shock explosive tipped .40 caliber rounds and get them by first thing in the morning, but an order of pastel blue and pink post-it notes is not here two weeks later?”
The little things were starting to pile up on Special Agent Kristi Johnson. Her new command in Center vale Maryland was barely six months old, and in those six months she had been turning in good work. Whatever it was, luck or her ability to hand pick talent, they had run down numbers six and eight on the top ten list in less than 180 days. That was simply not heard of, it was an agency record and it was done by a girl! In the parlance of the intelligence world, she was a Single Black Female, eight year vet of the FBI and the youngest SAC. Special Agent in Charge of her own subspecialty division; her charge was tie-ins, interstate crimes, jokingly they called her shop the disorderlies. Because she had jurisdiction over non organized crimes, leads and links to major crimes not indictable under the RICO Act - basically freelance high profile criminals. Little was known of her work until results poured in. Hostage rescue, mob task forces and Homeland Security interagency co-ops always got the headlines.
She was good with that, it made her feel like a non-military Delta Force unknown results producer. Besides, the less known she was the less publicity, and the less publicity the less pressure, the less pressure – the fewer mistakes. That all worked its way down the funnel of more money in the budget which bought more and better technology and technicians to do the work; and things were working well. She had perused a new overnight; a jewel theft of major proportions and a strange kinky bank robbery. Hmmm, “Kinky bank robbery” she thought, she wondered what that was about, robberies of all types crossed her desk but this was the first with the official description “kinky.”
She was no prude by any stretch of the word; she was a healthy, horny, sexually active Jet centerfold quality black woman. She could have been an Olympic medal winner for all the running around campus she did outpacing madly waving dicks on the yard of Howard University where she did her undergrad. But, she knew, the only time to get stopped was when she stopped, not when she was stopped. Football, basketball, baseball players, senators, want-to-be senators, they all chased her. She was a cross between Flo Jo, Halle Berry and Janet Jacme – or so they told her…FloJo for her runner’s legs; Halle Berry for her curves and beautiful face and Janet Jacme for the pornographic wet dreams she inspired. Because no one on campus was known to have gotten the punnanni – this was subterfuge, she had a contract with the lovers she did see: if one word came out regarding anything about her sex life they would be cut off from the most flexible, fantasy fulfilling, willing come-back pussy they were ever bound to get this side of heaven. To ensure nothing got out she would shave icons out of her pubic hair interesting enough to be irresistible not to talk about, if you were a contract breaker. Once she shaved the McDonalds golden arches with the middle bar forming an arrow down to the best meal in town; if that didn’t get around campus, nothing would. The cut off threat was solid, her security was intact.
She pulled the bank robbery file, the perpetrator was a woman or an incredible impersonator, she was tall muscularly built and disguised. She was solo, which was different, usually banks get hit by crews not a singular person. She appeared out of nowhere and disappeared the same way. Witnesses reported a vintage car they couldn’t identify, an older gentleman thought the description sounded like a Jaguar XKE 12 cylinder from the late 60’s, but none had been sighted in the area.
They continued to look for the car locally, probably a dead end. Says she was totally prepared, down to pre-cut lengths of duct tape with extra just in case, thoughtful, she used that on the manager. But that didn’t spell “kinky” to her; the next page explained it all. The clothes that the victims had been wearing had been tossed into the safe and time locked. They were duct taped in a sexual daisy chain.
“Oh my God!”
They were left behind genital to mouth, Kristi had no choice but to cross her legs and put her hand to her mouth as she read. Apparently, from the officers that reviewed tapes, it started with the men; erections poking onto the lips and faces of the women caused a chain reaction causing the women to get turned on. In the beginning they were all moaning and upset because they got robbed, then the relief over not being hurt dissolved into the sights before their eyes…incredibly the women and men started one by one until they were all engaging the sexual organ within their reach in oral sex!
It was unbelievable. Leave it to a woman to stage a robbery that turns into an oral orgy. Kristi had to refrain from rubbing her thighs together like a cricket making music, but, she was incredibly turned on reading a criminal action report. This was a first, but it was also a harbinger of a very imaginative criminal mind at work, this one would be hard to crack at best. She would have to delve into criminal practices and behaviors from across multiple platforms to try to profile her – she hoped it was a she because if not, trying to track down a homosexual with this level of psychological know-how would be a nightmare.
Though the lack of male-to-male pairings pointed to a heterosexual woman, the female-female pairings seemed numerical coincidence. Kristi reluctantly put down the robbery report and referred back to her incoming crime log sheet: gang related kidnapping, fifteen cars stolen from a parking garage, which sounded like an inside job, she giggled absolutely no pun intended. Triple murder suicide, which sounded like a completely closed circle, but murder suicide was the new fad now.
This was started by cowards too afraid to pay for their crimes, so they kill themselves instead…two cops murdered in Georgia, Cobb County – she had heard of that place. Supposedly they dealt out harsh punishment for some of the pettiest things, oh yeah that was where they imprisoned that poor young boy for consensual oral sex; ten years with no parole for getting some head. If she could remember correctly it was a young black boy getting a blowjob from a classmate, a white girl. Both of them were underage, but he got ten years in prison…she got a reputation; sad.
The report was about two hard core deputies that worked at the detention center. Apparently, they pissed off the wrong person - jeeze, they were shot, gutted and left in their personal cars in the jail parking lot. The crime scene photos made her stomach clench, Deputies Reed and Paul. Both had long careers with that county, but between them it says they had an entire book full of grievances against them, meaning it could have been anybody. Considering how many people get locked up and warehoused in this facility, that number was huge.
Kristi put that report away sighing. She was glad she was a Federal cop, especially SAC; she made the decision about what she participated in and delegated everything else. With this position and the uniqueness of her shop, she had the juice to pull resources from virtually anywhere to assist in her investigations. This cut down on local Agent depletion during a big case; she could fly into an out-of-state locale with three agents and be met by a task force at her disposal. It did cause some friction when some SAC’s, male SAC’s realized how much bigger her balls were than theirs.
In those situations she did have a gift, her looks and confidence gave her the ability to take command while still letting her male counterparts feel as if they hadn’t lost control. It was sort of like faking an orgasm: it accomplished the goal of getting an ineffective man up off of you, and then at the same time…making him feel like he’d done something. She just had to make sure not to play that card unless it was absolutely necessary. She scrolled through the rest of the listings to see if there were any more standouts. Diamond theft oh hell, this is one they’re gonna try to keep below the radar – twenty two million dollars’ worth of naturally colored diamonds stolen under the noses of the owners during a high profile party at their house with a full complement of security. Whew! The local office had requested still shots of all the guests and the invitation register and guest list. This was going to be a bear as well, damn! How come the week had to start like this? The actual listing had about three hundred incidents that had occurred over the last forty eight hours; and they had been sent to her and of all…these few stood out as the most intriguing.
She would put out a support proposal to Georgia, doubtful these rednecks would accept help from a black girl, and they would probably keep it in-house with their good-ol-boy GBI. The bank probe would get a pair of agents dedicated and two agents flown to the jewel heist location on the coast. Secure comm emails had already been shot to local offices letting them know to expect the pairs. She would stay behind in the nerve center to monitor the teams; she’d know when to step in if necessary.
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