“There’s a guy sitting outside the door who is here for you. His name’s Cisco. He’s been where you are.”
“Please, I can’t.”
“Yes, you can. But you’ve got to want it. Deep down. You have to know that you are in the abyss and that you want to climb out.”
“No,” she moaned.
Bosch now knew the tears were real. Between her fingers he could see true fear in her eyes.
“Has any doctor ever put you on Suboxone? It helps. You still carry the weight of withdrawal, but it helps.”
She shook her head and was back to holding her arms tightly across her chest.
“It will help you. But you have to gut it out and you’ve got to want to.”
“I’m telling you, nothing works. I can’t be saved.”
“Look, I know you lost somebody. You’ve got it written on your skin. I know it can drive you down into a hole. But think of Daisy. Is this the end she would want for you?”
Elizabeth didn’t answer. She brought a hand up to cover her eyes again while she cried.
“Of course it’s not,” Bosch said. “It’s not what she would want.”
“Please,” Elizabeth said. “I want to go now.”
“Elizabeth, just tell me you want this to end. Give me the nod and we’ll get through it.”
“I don’t even know you!” she screamed.
“You’re right,” Bosch said, his voice remaining calm. “But I know there is something better than this for you. Tell me you want it. For Daisy.”
“I want to go.”
“There’s nowhere to go. This is it.”
“Fuck.”
“Stay here, Elizabeth. Say you want to try.”
She stopped hiding behind her hand and dropped it lifelessly into her lap. She looked away from him to her right.
“Come on,” Bosch said. “For Daisy. It’s time.”
Clayton closed her eyes and held them closed as she spoke.
“Okay,” she said. “I’ll try.”
34
Bosch got to his breakfast meeting fifteen minutes late. Haller was in a booth near the back of the restaurant. Bosch slid in across from him, wondering if he could stomach any food. He decided not.
“You’re late and you look like shit,” Haller said.
“Thanks,” Bosch said. “Let’s just say the past seventy-two hours haven’t been the best of my life.”
“Then, good news, my brother. We’re here to plot your rise from the ashes.”
“Sounds good to me.”
“You know, a lot has happened in the past seventy-two hours. I wish I had Cisco here to talk about his end of it, but he seems to be off the grid.”
“You can’t fill me in?”
“Of course I can. The main thing is, we have a strong lineup of testimony for Wednesday, as long as we can get our foot in the door. That’ll be the key. The D.A. and Cronyn are going to argue like hell to exclude us from the hearing, but I think we have a strong argument for standing. So I need you to practice your outrage.”
“I don’t need to practice it. And Borders will be there?”
“The judge issued a transfer order. He’s probably coming down in a van as we sit here.”
“Yeah, well, if he’s there and that close to freedom, then I’ll have all the outrage you need.”
Haller nodded. That’s what he wanted to hear.
“Now, as upsetting as that article in the Times was, it’s going to work in our favor,” the lawyer said. “Because that kicks this thing out into the open, and the state’s not going to be able to argue that your professional reputation hasn’t taken a big hit. It’s clear as day, right there in black and white.”
“Good,” Bosch said. “I’m glad that’s backfiring on that asshole Kennedy.”
“Right. Now, we have to be ready for all eventualities. After I make my argument, the judge might want to question you back in chambers. The story yesterday guarantees full media coverage of this, so the judge may want to take you back and hear your side of it before he puts it out in front of the media. You have a problem with that?”
“No, none.”
The waitress came to the table and Bosch ordered coffee. Haller ordered a short stack of pancakes and the waitress left them alone.
“You don’t want to eat?” Haller asked.
“No, not now,” Bosch said. “So what about Spencer, the counter guy? Where’s that gone since I’ve been out of the loop?”
“We put a solid buzz in his ear last night.”
“What’s that mean?”
“I had him hit with a subpoena. It freaked him the fuck out because he didn’t know we were onto where they were hiding his ass.”
“Okay, back up. I’ve been out of the loop since Thursday, you remember? Last I heard, Cisco was on him and saw him meet with Cronyn’s wife in the bookstore parking lot. What happened after that?”
“The next morning, I put Cisco back on him. Cronyn and Cronyn obviously suspected you were up to something and not going to take this lying down. So they tried to stash Spencer until after the hearing so we wouldn’t have him. But fuck that, Cisco and his guys already had him and followed him to the stash house they set up down in Laguna. It was their own weekend house. You should’ve seen the look on Spencer’s face when he got the subpoena.”
“You were there?”
“No, that would have been against the rules, me delivering a subpoena. But I’ve got the next best thing to being there.”
Haller pulled out his phone and continued as he set up the playback of a video.
“I issued a subpoena and faxed it to a P.I. I know down in OC. Lauren Sachs, ex–Orange County sheriff and a real looker. People call her Sexy Sachsy. She does a lot of matrimonial work now—you know, going into bars to see if the husband’s got the wandering eye, that sort of thing. She’s got these glasses with the hidden camera she wears on those jobs, and I told her I wanted a video record of service on this thing. This is what she got.”
Haller turned his phone so Bosch could see it. Harry leaned across the table so he could pick up the audio. On the screen was a door. It was shot through the point of view of Sachs’s video glasses. Bosch saw her arm reach out as she knocked on the door. There was silence but then a shadow could be seen through an ornamental stained-glass square set in the center of the door. Someone was standing silently on the other side.
“Mr. Spencer,” Sachs said. “I need you to open the door, please.”
Her stern tone was met with a long silence.
“Mr. Spencer, I can see you,” Sachs said. “Please open the door.”
“Who are you?” said a voice. “What do you want?”
“I have legal documents for you to sign. From Los Angeles.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Your law firm is Cronyn and Cronyn, right? Then these are for you.”
No response. Then a lock could be heard turning, and the door opened three inches. A man looked out with one eye. But enough of his face appeared in the opening for Bosch and anyone else to confirm it was Spencer. Sachs quickly shoved a folded white document through the door. Spencer tried to close it but, unseen in the video, Sachs had put her foot over the threshold. The document got through and Spencer let it fall to the floor in the hallway behind him.
“That is a subpoena demanding your appearance in court this coming Wednesday morning,” Sachs said. “It is all clear in the document you have been served with. If you do not appear, you will be subject to warrant and arrest by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. I’d be there if I were you.”
Spencer’s eyes widened as he realized that his worst nightmare was about to unfold. When he spoke, he stuttered.
“I – I – I’m not Terry Spencer.”
“Well, sir, I never used the name Terry here and the subpoena says ‘Terrence.’ If I were you, I would not try that tack to avoid appearance in court. You have been duly and legally served, sir. I have
documented service. To not show up or to claim you have not been served will only anger a Superior Court judge and probably your employer, the Los Angeles Police Department.”
Sachs removed her foot and Spencer closed the door. His shadow remained behind the stained-glass panel. Sachs held at the door for a moment, then reached out and knocked again, this time employing a gentle, almost sympathetic tap.
“A piece of advice, Mr. Spencer? Come with a lawyer. And you should know that using Kathy Cronyn would be a conflict of interest. Her firm represents the interests of Preston Borders, not yours. Have a good day, sir.”
The POV of the video swung 180 degrees as Sachs turned and walked down a stone pathway to a waiting car. The location was clearly the hills of Laguna. and Bosch could see the cobalt blue ocean over the roofline of the house across the street.
The video ended and Haller took his phone back. He looked at Bosch with a smile.
“Pretty neat, huh?” he said. “I think we teed up Mr. Spencer pretty good.”
“What do you think he’ll do?”
“I’m hoping he shows up. I told her to say that part about angering the judge and his employer. Maybe that will make him show.”
“Did you tell her to suggest he bring a lawyer? A lawyer might tell him to take the fifth.”
“Maybe. But I thought it was worth the risk. We need him to cut the Cronyns loose. The hope is he won’t let them know what’s going on.”
“I get that, but if he takes the fifth, we’ll never know how he played the evidence and got into that box.”
“Some secrets you live with if you win your case. Know what I mean?”
“I guess. What else have we got?”
“Well, that’s where I need you, broheim. Cisco is at large—I hope he hasn’t slipped up—and I need an investigator. I want to locate—”
“Just so you know, Cisco’s been working for me. Since yesterday afternoon. Not on this. On a personal matter.”
Haller laughed, thinking it was a joke.
“I’m serious,” Bosch said.
“A personal matter,” Haller said. “What personal matter?”
“He’s helping a friend of mine and it’s confidential. It’s got nothing to do with this.”
“It has everything to do with this if I don’t have my investigator. What the fuck is going on?”
“Look, it was an emergency and I needed him. He’ll be clear later on and I’ll be able to tell you all about it then. But you’ve got me. You said you want to locate something or somebody. What? Who?”
Haller stared at him for a long moment before answering.
“It’s a who,” he finally said. “I pulled the court file on the original trial and have been reading the transcription. I want to locate Dina Skyler.”
Bosch didn’t need long to place the name. Dina was Danielle Skyler’s younger sister. She was the one who had been scheduled to visit Danielle through the holidays.
The visit never happened but Dina did come out from Hollywood, Florida, during the trial to testify about the plans the sisters had for living together and taking Hollywood, California, by storm. Dina was eighteen months younger and Danielle had been protective of her. While testifying, she spoke of their loving the movie White Christmas because it was a show business story about two sisters. She told the jury that every holiday season, they would put on a rendition of the song “Sisters” for their parents.
Dina was a powerful witness during the penalty stage of the trial. Bosch had always felt that her hour of tearful testimony was what swayed both the jury and then the judge toward the death penalty.
“I’m thinking we might need her for the emotional pull,” Haller said. “I want the judge to know the family still cares, that the victim’s sister is right there in the courtroom, and he had better get this thing right.”
“She was a strong presence at the trial.”
“Did she ever move out here, like she and her sister planned?”
“Yeah, she did. I stayed in touch with her at the beginning and then it kind of tapered off. I think I was a reminder of what had happened to Dani. I got the message and stopped checking on her.”
“Dani?”
“Danielle. People who knew her called her Dani.”
“If you are allowed to testify Wednesday—and I will go apeshit crazy if you’re not—make sure you call her that.”
Bosch didn’t respond. These kind of subtle manipulations were part of Haller’s daily life but they always bothered Bosch, even if they were done in his favor. He felt that if he didn’t condone them from attorneys working against him, he shouldn’t accept them from one working for him.
Haller moved on.
“So, did she make it?” he asked. “I looked her up on IMDB and there was nothing. Did she change her name or something?”
“Uh, I didn’t really track that. I don’t know whether she stayed in the business.”
“Do you think you can find her?”
“If she’s alive, I’ll find her. But if she’s not in L.A., I don’t know about getting her here by Wednesday morning.”
“Right. Just see what you can do. Maybe we get lucky.”
“Maybe. What else?”
“For you, that’s it. I’m going to work here this morning and figure out a case path.”
“What’s that?”
“The one thing we can count on is that our request to intervene on the motion to vacate will draw heavy fire from both the D.A. and Borders. I’ll make an argument and I’ll offer a proffer to the judge—sort of an unofficial look at what we’ll present if granted standing. I’ll run down our witness list and say what each of them is willing to testify to. If we convince the judge, then we’re in and then we kick their asses.”
“Got it. Do you mind if I split? I gotta go in for some follow-up stuff this morning and I want to go to work on finding Dina.”
“No problem, Harry. Go get ’em. But between now and Wednesday get some sleep. I don’t want you coming into that courtroom looking like you’re guilty.”
Taking a last gulp of coffee, Bosch pointed a finger at Haller like a gun and then slid out of the booth. Haller spoke again before he could walk away.
“Hey, Harry, one last thing? You are a damn fine detective, brother, but I want my man Cisco back.”
“Right. I’ll tell him.”
35
Bosch saw a TV truck from one of the Spanish-language stations parked in front of the SFPD headquarters when he drove in. He assumed it was there because of the farmacia murders, but he didn’t think that what had happened over the weekend could be contained for very long, and the Spanish-language media was often ahead of the game when it came to the news in San Fernando.
Before going to his office in the jail across the street, Bosch went in the side door of the station to get more coffee and check on things in the detective bureau. It was a full house this time, with all three detectives in their work pods and even Captain Trevino visible behind his desk through the open door of his office.
Only Bella Lourdes looked up at Bosch’s entrance, and she immediately signaled him over to her cubicle.
He held up a finger, telling her to hold a moment. He turned to the nearby coffee station and quickly poured his second jolt of the day into a cup. He then worked his way around the three-desk module to get to Bella’s spot in the back.
“Morning, Harry.”
“Morning, Bella. What’s up?”
She pointed to her computer screen, where a video was playing. It was obviously taken from a helicopter and shot downward at a water recovery of a body. Two divers were wrestling with the body of a man floating facedown. He was clothed but the T-shirt he wore was torn off and held to his body by the collar only. The rest of it waved in the water like a white flag of surrender. The divers were struggling as they tried to roll the body onto a rescue stretcher attached to a cable extending down from the chopper.
“Salton Sea,” Lourdes said. “This was two hours ago. They
spotted the body on a flyover at dawn.”
Bosch leaned down, careful not to spill his coffee, to look more closely at the screen and the body.
“That the second Russian?” Lourdes asked.
Before Bosch could answer, he noticed that they had been joined by Sisto, who was looking over Bella’s other shoulder.
“Clothes look the same,” Bosch said. “From what I can remember. Gotta be him.”
“I asked them to send us a close-up of the face once they have the body at the coroner’s,” Lourdes said.
“That would wrap things up nice,” Sisto said. “On our case at least.”
“Sure would,” Lourdes added. “Why don’t we all go into the war room for updates and to figure out who’s doing what on this today?”
“Sounds like a plan,” Sisto said.
Lourdes got up and called to Trevino and Luzon.
Bosch could still smell the breakfast he had missed lingering in the air of the war room. The four detectives took seats around the table and Trevino joined as well. Bosch spoke first.
“Uh, before we start divvying up paperwork and stuff, I’m here to do what I need to do and be available for any follow-ups with other agencies. But as you all know, I have a thing in court Wednesday morning with my reputation and possible future with this department on the line. So I need some prep time for that today. There are some things I have to do, and they can’t wait.”
“Understood, Harry,” Trevino said. “And if there’s anything we can do here to help with that, you let me know. I’ve talked to the chief and, speaking for him and everybody in this room, we are behind you one hundred percent. We know what kind of detective and person you are.”
Bosch could feel his face turning red with embarrassment. In all his years in law enforcement, he had never heard such accolades from a supervisor.
“Thanks, Cap,” he managed to say.
They settled down and got to the business at hand, starting with Lourdes summarizing a report she had gotten that morning from Agent Hovan on the DEA’s activities since the previous afternoon. She reported that the encampment down near Slab City had been raided and shut down. The addicted inhabitants were evacuated to the naval base in San Diego, where they were being medically evaluated before being offered placement in pro bono rehab programs.