by Keith Yocum
“Yes, that’s a little more complicated,” he said, taking a small sip of scotch. “The director appears not to trust the recommendation about who nabbed Forrester. I guess he’s looking for a second opinion.”
“He comes all the way here to ask you to help out? Something doesn’t sound right, Dennis. I’m sorry but you’re being very naïve about this.”
“He said I was recommended as an independent evaluator, someone who could find out what happened to Forrester and who the bad people are.”
“I know who the bad people are,” Judy said, walking out of the kitchen. “They’re the Central Intelligence Agency.”
“He said I can turn this request down and just walk away. He made that very clear.”
“Then we have no worries. Just decline. End of story.”
Chapter 4
Calvin Miller’s office was spacious, with an enormous window facing Murray Street. As director of the AFP’s office in Perth, he was appropriately officious and self-important. Like many bureaucratic officials, he was respected by the rank and file, but not particularly liked.
Miller had scheduled a meeting with both Judy and Daniel for 9:30 a.m. That alone was unusual, since the director was notoriously slow moving in the mornings. Judy and Daniel had speculated on what was behind the meeting, but neither could come up with a plausible answer. Except for the unnerving incident with the meth addict in Golden Bay, there was nothing to talk about.
“As you know we have a new internal affairs director back east,” Miller said, cradling his cup of tea in both hands like a chalice. “His name’s Calhoun. A real stickler for details. He’s questioning the protocol you used with that young man in Golden Bay.”
“Protocol?” Daniel said. “Are you serious?”
“Yes, I am. Calhoun does not believe you two handled the situation properly.”
“Calvin, I can’t believe this is happening,” Judy said. “We handled it exactly as we should have. No one was injured, and the young man was taken into custody later without incident. What do you mean about ‘protocol’?”
“Judy, there were two shots fired, am I correct?”
“Yes, but—”
“Let me finish, please. You and Daniel had your backs to the front door when the young man returned and started firing, correct?”
“Calvin, the bastard had already gone inside the house,” Daniel said. “As far as we were concerned, the conversation was over. There was no suspicion of him having a firearm.”
“Yes, but he did return with a weapon, didn’t he? And one of you could have been injured. Or worse.”
“Is this fellow Calhoun the cause of all this?” Judy said.
“Well, he did request more information,” Miller said, taking a quick sip of tea. “And an investigation.”
“A what?” Judy shouted.
“Please, there is no need to overreact. I’m sure nothing will come of it.”
“Calvin,” Daniel said, “please tell me that you’re not going to authorize an internal affairs investigation of what happened this week in Golden Bay. You can’t be serious.”
“He is the director of internal affairs, Daniel.”
“He’s an idiot,” Judy said standing. “And I can’t believe you didn’t put your foot down and stand up for us.”
“Judy!” Miller yelled as his two agents stalked out of the office.
“So, are you going to stay in Australia?”
“Heck, I don’t know, Beth,” Dennis said. “I feel like I just got here, but it’s already been ten months. I like it here.”
The phone calls with his adult daughter were always a little stilted, since the two were never very close when she was growing up. Dennis’s work had taken him around the globe in search of those agency miscreants who sprouted like dandelions on freshly mowed lawns. Being on the road for so long had deprived Dennis and Beth of the typical father-daughter relationship during her school years. And now, with his wife deceased and Beth living in San Francisco with her lawyer husband, the two of them were still trying to solve the riddle of how to make the relationship work.
“Are you and Judy still, like, an item?”
He laughed. “Yes, we’re still an item.”
“Do you think you’re going to get married?”
“I guess so.”
“You guess so? Doesn’t sound very definitive to me, Dad. You’re not still thinking about Mom all the time, are you?”
“Mmm. I do sometimes. But that’s not an issue. I’m just trying to get used to living here. And I’m not working any longer, and there’s a lot of adjustment. But I have no intention of leaving Judy. Remember she has a son here in university, and her family is here too. I suppose at some point one of us is going to have to decide to move permanently.”
“My guess is that you’re going to have to decide, Dad. She’s got a job and a family that is going to be hard to leave.”
“That’s a good call on your part,” Dennis said. “You seem to have your mother’s wisdom. I suppose I should try to make it easier on Judy and just settle down here.”
“I’m sure she’d appreciate it, Dad. I’ve only met her once, and she seemed very cool. And she’s quite pretty, you know. You shouldn’t wait around forever.”
“Yipes, you haven’t been talking to her, have you?”
“No. But some things are just obvious.”
He had never seen her like this. Judy called him in a rage, stopping halfway through sentences to curse, and then continuing. Dennis rushed over from his apartment to find her half undressed from work, gesturing wildly, and stalking around her house throwing couch pillows and small kitchen utensils.
“An investigation! Who in the bloody hell does this idiot back east think he is?”
“I’m sure it’s going to be fine,” Dennis said, following her from room to room. She had taken off her blouse, kicked off her shoes, but walked around wearing only her skirt and bra.
“It won’t be fine!” she said. “Do you know what these internal affairs reports look like in your file? Forget a promotion. I’d be lucky to be able to carry a firearm! And Daniel, well, he’s fit to be tied. God, the nerve of these people.”
“Can we just sit down for a minute?” he said. “Come here. Sit down.” He sat down on the bed and patted the area next to him. “Sit. Please.”
Judy ignored him, ripping off her skirt and tossing it onto the bed. She pulled open a drawer in her dresser, grabbed a pair of denim jeans, and tugged them on. Then she pulled out a sweatshirt and tugged that over her head.
Judy continued to murmur to herself in the mirror as she removed her earrings and tossed them into her jewelry box. Then, as if a plug had been pulled from the socket, she stared into the large dresser mirror at herself, twisting her mouth in concentration.
Her eyes caught his in the mirror’s reflection, and she turned. “Did you say something?”
“No, not much,” he said. “Why don’t you sit down here.”
She sighed, walked over, and sat down. He patted her knee. Just be there for her, he thought. And shut up. She’s not listening anyway.
“I’m thinking of taking a leave of absence,” she said.
“Really?”
“Yes, absolutely. Bloody idiots.”
“Whatever is best for you,” he said. “Just give the situation a little time to settle, then do what you think is best.”
Dennis looked down at the business card and nudged it with the tip of his right forefinger as if it were alive. He sat in the coffee shop and fussed with his frothy, flat white coffee.
How strange it was to be surrounded by chaos again, after dodging it for a while. In what seemed like a millisecond, he transitioned from suffering the trauma of bad golf shots to the angst of returning to the dark, thankless work that nearly killed him.
Earlier in his car
eer, he had convinced himself of the righteousness of his cause: there were a handful of bad people in the agency who slipped through screening and caused profound problems. He was the policeman, they were the criminals. Good versus evil.
But that was before he retired to an oasis of sublime ennui, where languid days chasing a dimpled white ball around the landscape were the highlights. A modest amount of self-reflection had drawn the curtain back on the dark, dirty truth about Dennis. It was not the mission to rid the agency of bad people that drove him all those years; it was the chase itself. The truth was that the agency was the repository of every form of duplicitous individual known to mankind, and they were only good or bad employees depending on happenstance and whim. Every analyst or agent was ten seconds away from making an incompetent—or worse—a criminal decision. There really was no tiny cadre of sinners hiding among the saints. They were all sinners to some extent, just some were worse than others.
Now that he had reconciled himself to that truth, he also recognized what excited him about his work. It was simply the hunt. It gave him structure and momentum. He could forget the rest of the world and simply focus on the hunt. It enthralled and consumed him.
It also separated him.
Isn’t that what Dr. Forrester had tried to show him? The psychologist had dutifully reminded him over and over that by taking refuge in the hunt, he cut himself off from the normal emotions extended to family and friends. It was “hunt and hide,” not “hunt to rid the agency of bad people,” she said.
How odd, Dennis wondered, that of all the people to go missing it was an obscure psychologist with a small contract to provide therapy to agency employees. He had stopped seeing her about a year and a half ago, yet here she was again making her presence known.
Siren call or call to noble action? Would the hunt take him away from Judy, or could he balance the two powerful forces—passion for a woman, and passion for hunting—so that he survived?
He nudged the business card again. In the airplane, Simpson had given him a cheesy business card for Fred’s Painting Services. It sported an image of a paintbrush and the motto: “Interior/Exterior Painting at an affordable price.” At the bottom was an 800 number.
“Within twenty-four hours you need to call this number and leave a message saying you’d like to have your house painted,” Simpson said. “If you don’t call, that means you’re not interested in this project. Very simple. In or out. Your call.”
Dennis looked at his watch, took a sip of coffee, and nudged the card one more time to see if it was alive.
“I’m thinking of asking for a leave of absence,” Judy said.
“You can’t do that, Jude,” Daniel said. “It will look bad. Let this investigation play out. There was nothing else we could have done differently. You’ll see.”
“I’m tired of this work,” she said, sitting on the corner of his desk. “I thought it was exciting and different for a woman, at least in the beginning. It’s bad enough to get shot at, but then getting reprimanded afterward is bloody awful.”
“It will pass, I promise you,” he said. “Everyone says it’s bullshit. This new internal affairs wanker is causing all the trouble.”
“During the shooting, I looked at you while we were behind the car,” she said.
“You did?”
“I saw a person who was petrified. Your face was twisted and distorted. I don’t think this kind of stuff is good for human beings.”
“But I was petrified! Thought the bastard was going to kill me. Or you. Or turn around and shoot his father.”
“But is that a job worth having? Not knowing whether something ordinary will turn deadly in a split second? I don’t think so. Not to me. Or at least not any longer.”
Daniel spun around in his office chair and stared up at Judy.
“How are you getting along with your Yank?”
“Why do you ask?”
“Don’t know. You seem preoccupied lately. Wondered if you two were still together.”
“Yes, we’re still together.”
“Is he going to move here?”
“Yes. Or that’s what I think.”
“Last week you said you thought he was bored.”
“Well, he is a bit bored.”
“Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”
She sighed. “I’m not sure, actually. We’ll see.”
“I think I owe it to her,” Dennis said.
She arched her eyebrows. “You ‘owe it to her’? Are you serious?”
Dennis sat inside their favorite small restaurant in Subiaco. The temperature had dropped during the day and a stiff easterly breeze off the Indian Ocean brought a cold rain with it.
“Dr. Forrester did help me a lot, or at least it seemed that way.”
“What you’re saying is that you want to go back to work.”
“No, not permanently. I can’t do that. But this one job seems like it’s the right thing to do.”
“Do you realize what it might do to us? As a couple? You get consumed by investigations and strange things happen. Dangerous things. You’ve trained me not to trust anything they do. Now you want to go back to find a missing psychologist? Really?”
“As I said, that woman helped straighten out my life. I think it’s worth trying to find out what happened to her. I’d be doing it for her and her family, not for the agency.”
“It feels like you want to avoid dealing with us.”
“What does that mean?”
“That you don’t want to settle down with me. This way you can run off again and avoid making a decision.” She had already put down her knife and fork and had pushed her plate away. She took a sip of wine and closed her eyes.
“Well, then it’s settled,” he said reaching across the table and covering her hand with his. “I’ll pass on this thing. They can get someone else.”
She pulled her hand away. “Don’t be daft. If it’s not this one, it will be another case. Go chase your Dr. Forrester, wherever she is. I’m tired and would like to go home now.”
Judy insisted that Dennis drop her off at her house and that they sleep apart.
“Really?” Dennis said. “You’re angry.”
“No, just tired,” she said. “Don’t read too much into it, Dennis. We both need a little alone time every now and then.”
Dennis continued to plead that she was overreacting, but she refused to engage him.
Why is it that I never see men’s intentions clearly? she thought.
By the time Dennis entered his apartment, he was drained. He limited himself to a modest pour of single malt, hoping to avoid a long night of drinking, as he struggled to make sense of the apparent rupture of his relationship with Judy.
He sat down at his small kitchen table and pulled out his phone. Looking at his watch he texted Judy:
time expired; turned down job…r we ok?
After ten excruciating minutes came a return text:
u need to take this job. don’t worry about me
am worried about us; job not important
take the job. u r bored
too late
His phone rang.
“Dennis, you need to take that job,” Judy said. “Maybe I’m feeling a little fragile lately. Don’t worry about me. I’m being selfish. Please take this job.”
“I told you the time limit passed. It’s over. Let’s just forget I brought it up.”
“Dennis, you’re not hearing me: it’s fine for you to get back to work. We’ll be fine.”
“And you’re not hearing me, Judy, I’m not taking it. Now get some sleep.”
“Damnit, Dennis, now I feel guilty!”
“Judy, you’re wasting energy feeling guilty. Go to bed. I’m hanging up now. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
He pushed the disconnect button, sat b
ack in the creaky metal chair and took a long sip.
It was Dr. Forrester, he remembered, who kept reminding him that life is only ten percent what happens to you, but ninety percent how you react to what happens to you. Two goons had shown up at a golf course and dragged him into an airplane and a job offer—that was the ten percent. And now he was struggling with his own self-esteem, boredom, and guilt for disrupting a perfectly solid relationship—this was the ninety percent. Dr. Forrester said he needed to work on the ninety percent; he had no control over the ten percent.
He slowly finished his drink, changed into his old gym shorts and faded gray George Mason University t-shirt, brushed his teeth, and turned off the light. He had just settled in and could smell Judy’s shampoo from the pillow next to him.
The sound of a key unlocking the front door jolted him upright in bed.
The goons!? he thought.
The kitchen hallway light turned on, and he heard footsteps approach.
“Judy, you scared the shit out of me.”
She walked over and sat next to him on the bed.
“You wouldn’t listen to me, so I thought I’d come over and finish the conversation.”
“What conversation?” he said, rubbing his eyes and clearing his throat.
“Stop it. Now you’re being dense. The job. Take the job. It’s all right with me. In fact, if you don’t take the job, I’ll be really angry. This is my issue, not yours.”
Dennis flopped back into bed. “Why don’t you come to bed? We’ll talk about it in the morning. I can’t do this anymore today.”
She stood up. “Get up and make the call. Come on.”
Judy walked into the kitchen.
“I have the business card in my hand right now,” she yelled.
Dennis flew out of bed and raced into the kitchen.
She had poured herself a small juice glass of white wine from the refrigerator and was sitting at the table holding the card.