A Dark Place Read online

  A DARK PLACE

  Copyright© 2018 Keith Yocum All rights reserved.

  ISBN: 978-0-9978708-2-4

  ISBN: 978-0-9978708-0-0

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Writers need support; they work in isolation, have few resources except their imagination, and are often plagued with doubt and frustration. This project would not have been completed without Denise’s constant intercession. She has been an emotional and editorial support system throughout. A special thank you also goes to a group of influential readers who provided critical guidance and feedback, including Michael, Jeannine, John, Louise, Lisa and Lyn.

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  CHAPTER 28

  CHAPTER 29

  CHAPTER 30

  CHAPTER 31

  CHAPTER 32

  CHAPTER 1

  The older, heavyset man knelt down for the third time and held his thick fingers against her neck.

  “Well?” the young man said.

  “Yes. Finally,” the older man said, standing up. He looked around the dense forest of beech, oak and ash. The damp soil was full of roots that made the digging difficult, but he let the young man do most of it.

  “She is very pretty,” the young man said, kneeling down. “I like her tan.” He brushed a piece of dirt off the woman’s face. “How much of that stuff did you give her?”

  “A lot,” the older man said.

  “Are you sure she’s dead?”

  “There’s enough in her to kill ten people.”

  “Do you think anyone is looking for her?”

  “Someone is always looking for a lost person.”

  “She is very pretty,” the younger man said.

  “She was pretty,” the older man said. “She’s dead now.”

  “I think she’s still pretty,” the younger man said.

  “You’re getting on my nerves. Let’s get going.”

  “Is the next part necessary?” the young man said. “Who will know?”

  “You’ve done this before, so stop complaining. Help me remove her clothes. Look for tattoos. Then the hands, the feet, the head. It’s the same. We take the hands, the feet and the head; we leave the rest here in the grave.”

  “I know how to do it, I just don’t like it.”

  “If they find out we didn’t do it right, there will be much pain and suffering, I promise you. You have no idea how cruel these people are. The body here, if it’s ever found, will be nameless. We bag the hands, feet and head and bury them far away from here. Help me remove her shirt. And don’t drop anything, like an earring or something.”

  They struggled to remove her clothing and underwear.

  “See, a tattoo,” the older man said. “Go get the razor. And don’t forget the saw. You do the feet, I’ll do the hands.”

  “I’m not going to help you with the head,” the young man said. “Not this time. She’s too pretty.”

  “I will do the head myself; you just shut up and go to work. It will be dark soon. And you’re getting on my nerves.”

  ✦

  Dennis was uncomfortable and did little to hide it. This was his first meeting with Louise Nordland, his new boss.

  “I know we have not worked together before, but I can assure you we’ll get along fine,” she said. “While I’ve been accused of looking young, I’ve been in the agency for thirteen years. I’ve had many overseas assignments in operations and moved to the Office of the Inspector General thirteen months ago. I was in the OIG’s inspections group for one year and am now working in investigations. As you can imagine, I’ve heard a lot about you.”

  “You’ll have to forgive me,” Dennis said, “but you seem really, really young to be managing investigators here in OIG.”

  “What’s ‘young’ got to do with anything?” she said.

  “I’m just saying that, you know, my job is difficult,” Dennis said, stirring in his seat. “This work can be kind of crappy. People inside the agency hate you when you come calling, and people outside the agency hate you because they think you’re covering stuff up. It helps when you know your ass is being protected back here at OIG.”

  “You don’t think I can cover your ass back here?” she said. “I told you I’ve worked at the agency for more than a decade. Just because I look young doesn’t mean I’m not competent.”

  “So how old are you then?” Dennis asked.

  Her brow wrinkled in two, long horizontal lines. “Cunningham, you know that’s not an appropriate question. I was warned that you are irritatingly blunt, but asking my age?”

  “Well, you brought it up. I didn’t.” He shrugged.

  At five feet two inches, Louise had classic Nordic straight natural blond hair, parted down the middle and falling like lead weights to her shoulders. She wore the informal uniform of many agency female managers: an open-necked, starched white cotton blouse and a two-piece dark business suit. A simple gold chain circled her thin neck.

  “You really are something,” she said. “I’m thirty-nine. How old are you?”

  “You can’t ask questions like that,” Dennis said. “I’ll have to report you to HR.”

  “Ah, HR,” she said, twisting her small mouth into a smirk. “Don’t they run Langley? When I started here, I thought the director ran the agency, but it’s actually run by HR. Who knew?”

  Dennis laughed. “They said you were a straight shooter with a sense of humor.”

  “Who’s ‘they?’” she parried.

  “You know, the faceless minions here, the great ‘they,’” Dennis said. “There are twenty thousand of us going to work at the agency every day to make this country safe.”

  “Mmm,” she said. “Safe from whom?”

  “Ourselves?” He shrugged.

  “Ain’t that the truth.”

  Louise opened a dark brown folder and scanned a document. Dennis watched her pursed lips as she concentrated and wondered if that was why she ended up in OIG. She seemed incapable of disguising her emotions. As she read the document, her forehead wrinkled in concentration.

  “Okay,” she said, looking up. “We have a meeting with the IG in fifteen minutes. He’d like to speak with you.”

  “Come again?”

  “We have a meeting with the inspector general in fifteen minutes,” Louise said.

  “We do?”

  “Yes, what’s wrong?”

  “Well
, I’ve never met the IG, for one,” he said. “I mean, he doesn’t want to talk about what happened in Australia and all that stuff, does he? I’m tired of talking about that. I’m back to work. I’m healed. Why the hell does he want to talk to me?”

  “Which reminds me,” she said. “How are you feeling? Physically?”

  “I’m fine. It wasn’t that big a deal. The bullet just grazed me here,” Dennis said, pointing to his right temple. “You can’t even see the scar.”

  “There was a skull fracture, correct?”

  “Yes, but there were no clots or bleeding in the brain. I’m just left with a tendency to drool in public and wet my bed. Otherwise, I’m fine.”

  “God,” she said, shaking her head. “You really are too much. Well, for the record, and I have to get this out of the way — you’ll never hear me refer to it again — but I’m embarrassed and ashamed by what happened to you at the hands of your old boss Marty and his pals.”

  Dennis flicked his wrist upward as if he were brushing smoke from his face.

  “Fine. I got that out of the way,” she said.

  “But the IG wants to see me? In his office?” Dennis said.

  She exploded in a guttural laugh. “What is it with you and the IG?”

  “Well, for one, I don’t even know his name, because they change them every couple of years. And secondly, I don’t like hanging with the brass. I like hanging with people like you, who keep me away from hanging with people like the IG.”

  “Relax, Cunningham,” she said. “Chill. His name is Bill Richardson. Call him Bill.”

  ✦

  “Ah, the famous Dennis Cunningham,” Richardson said, coming around the huge mahogany desk. “It’s a pleasure to finally shake your hand. I hope you got the letter I sent you.”

  “Yes, I did,” Dennis said. “Very nice of you to send it.”

  “Well, you went through a lot, and I’m not going to dig up the whole episode again, but I’m deeply sorry for what happened to you.”

  “Thank you,” Dennis said.

  “Please, sit,” Richardson said waving to a round table with several, black Windsor-style chairs.

  After they settled in, Louise said, “Bill, I see there has been an external request for Cunningham to be assigned to a specific project. That’s a little unusual, isn’t it?”

  Dennis shot her a glance, but she kept her eyes on Richardson.

  “Yes Louise, it is a little unusual. Awkward is probably the better word.”

  “Can you fill us in a bit more, since Cunningham has just returned to work? And he and I have not had a chance to discuss this issue. I want to make sure he is not disadvantaged in any way.”

  Dennis felt strange watching two people talk about him as if he were not in the room. And he was getting angry, which he knew from experience often led to trouble — mostly for him.

  “Yes, well, this is what’s going on,” Richardson said. “Representative Daniel Barkley, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, has requested that we investigate the disappearance of the deputy chief of station in London.”

  “That was already investigated several times by operations,” Louise said.

  “Yes, and Barkley and his staff are not satisfied, for some reason,” Richardson said.

  “But he has no purview over the agency’s investigations,” Louise said.

  “Of course he doesn’t have direct authority, Louise. But you know how this works. He is extremely influential in our budgeting process, and it’s good to have him on our side. When he makes an informal request through the director, and the director turns to me, well, we’d like to reduce any friction by just acceding to his request. Assuming, of course, that it’s not harmful or illegal.”

  “Excuse me,” Dennis said. “Did Representative Barkley request me specifically to work on a project? Is that what I’m hearing?”

  “Actually, yes,” Richardson said.

  “By name?” Dennis said.

  “Of course,” Richardson said. “Otherwise we wouldn’t be sitting here right now.”

  “Cunningham,” Louise said, “we know you are familiar with Barkley because he was involved in the Australia incident. You apparently made an impression.”

  “I wasn’t particularly fond of the congressman,” Dennis said. “Thought he was a pompous son of a bitch.”

  As soon as the words tumbled out, he was sorry. When he was angry, his worst affronts came at the end of several sentences; the longer he talked, the more likely he was to offend. It was a problem of mathematics, he believed. When he was angry, uttering one less sentence was much better; it was always the last sentence that caused him grief.

  Richardson winced, and Louise gave Dennis a surprisingly fierce stare.

  “I’m sorry if that was too blunt,” Dennis said.

  “We’re all entitled to our opinions,” Richardson said. “We just need to remember who we’re with when we express them. I think your opinion of the congressman might be shared by several people here. But there is the politics, as I pointed out. And we’re in Washington, where politics reigns.”

  “Of course,” Dennis said.

  “So, do you mind if I just ask a few more questions, Bill?” Louise said. “I know this is delicate, but Cunningham is only just back in the office, and given his most recent episode, I was hoping we wouldn’t expose him to any wasteful and unproductive case work. He’s a valuable member of a very small investigative team.”

  “I understand fully,” Richardson said. “But as I stated, Dennis here has been requested to do a final wrap-up of a controversial disappearance in London. I think we all know that Dennis not only has a reputation for being prickly at times—” he smiled wanly “—but has an extraordinary knack for finding people.”

  ✦

  The sadness had evolved slowly, picking up momentum as the days dragged by. She would find herself staring idly out the window of her car at a stoplight until someone hit their horn. Or at home she would lose interest in a book or TV show and find herself staring at the floor.

  Her best friend Cilla finally confronted her. “You’re depressed, Judy. And lonely. Let’s just call it what it is,” Cilla said as they ate dinner at a small Italian restaurant in Fremantle, Western Australia.

  “No, I’m not,” Judy said.

  “Stop it,” Cilla said. “You’re depressed. And it’s that Yank’s fault. He lured you into a relationship; you flew to the US, saved his bloody life in that sordid CIA disaster. And now you’re alone and depressed.”

  “I’m just lonely,” Judy said, weakly swirling her wine glass. “I’m not depressed.”

  Cilla said nothing and stabbed at her pasta.

  “All right, maybe I am depressed. A little. Perhaps.”

  “As your friend,” Cilla said, “I’m not sure what to suggest. I feel as depressed as you about it. I know you want him. I thought he needed and wanted you enough to move here. With your son still in school, it’s really up to him to move.”

  “Dennis says that he wants to move here,” Judy said. “But he’s just started back to work, and I’m afraid he’ll get caught up in another one of those investigations.”

  Cilla held up her wine glass. “Here’s to bloody men who promise one thing and do another.”

  ✦

  “I know, I know,” Dennis said, dropping his right arm onto the soft fabric of the armrest. “I have to make a decision. I’ve tried, but I just freeze when I think about it.”

  “Well, it’s not fair to her,” Dr. Jane Forrester said. “And not fair to you either.”

  “Oh, please don’t start the ‘self-destructive behavior’ thing,” Dennis said. “Can’t a guy just be stuck?”

  “I thought you were madly in love with her?” Forrester said. “She risked a lot emotionally visiting you in the US, and without rehashing everything, she als
o risked her life in coming to your aid in that shooting.”

  Dennis slumped in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest.

  “So?” he said.

  “So what are you going to do about her?” she said. “If the relationship is over, then it’s over and you should tell her. If it’s not over, perhaps you should take some steps to improve the relationship.”

  “Like move to Australia?” he said. “I don’t have a job there. I just started back to work here. I like what I do. What am I going to do there, play golf every day? I don’t play golf. Take photos of kangaroos?”

  “Dennis, as you well know, you are not the first adult on this planet that has to deal with a difficult choice about a relationship. But right now you’re not dealing with anything. You’re letting the situation deal with you. And it’s sapping your energy and making you feel guilty. You shouldn’t hide from your responsibility. This woman needs to be treated fairly, and you need to get on with your life. And I hate to say this, Dennis, but our time is up today.”

  ✦

  He surrendered his mobile phone, his wristwatch, wallet and a ballpoint pen and then walked through a large scanning device that resembled an MRI, was wanded with a hand-held scanner by a taciturn security official, and went through the retinal scanner outside the room. After being buzzed in, Dennis entered a large room that encased a smaller, glass-enclosed room in the center. Inside he could see Louise and two men talking at a table. The soundproofing of the glass room gave the scene a surreal quality, as if Dennis was watching a TV show with the sound turned down.

  Louise waved at him and pointed to a door on the side.

  “Great to see you, Cunningham,” she said formally. “I’d like you to meet David Simpson, senior operations manager at the National Security Agency, and Tim Felton, chief of European signals intelligence at NSA.”

  Both men stood and shook Dennis’s hand, and then they sat.

  Dennis had been to Fort Meade in Maryland once before, a short visit to one of the outlying buildings. He had never been this far into the labyrinth office complex at the NSA’s headquarters northeast of Washington, D.C.

  “Well,” Louise said. “Let’s just dig in, shall we?”