The Harry Bosch Novels Vol Ii Part 22

"Whatever's biting. What are you going for?"

He looked directly at Bosch when he asked this and Harry saw that his eyes were brown like beer-bottle gla.s.s.

"Well, you heard about the earthquake, didn't you?"

"Sure, who didn't? You know, I've been through quakes and 'canes and you can keep the quakes. At least with a hurricane, you see it coming. You take Andrew, he left a lot of devastation, but think how much it woulda been if n.o.body knew he was about to hit. That's what you get with your earthquakes."

It took Bosch a few moments to place Andrew, the hurricane that had slammed the South Florida coast a couple of years earlier. It was hard to keep track of all the disasters in the world. There were enough just in L.A. He looked out across the inlet. He saw a fish jump and its reentry create a stampede of jumping among the others in the school. He looked at McKittrick and was about to tell him when he realized it was probably something McKittrick saw every day of his life.

"When'd you leave L.A.?"

"Twenty-one years ago. I got my twenty in and pffft, pffft, I was gone. You can have L.A., Bosch. s.h.i.+t, I was out there for the Sylmar quake in 'seventy-one. Knocked down a hospital and a couple freeways. At the time we were living in Tujunga, a few miles from the epicenter. I'll always remember that one. It was like G.o.d and the devil meetin' in the room and you were there with 'em playin' referee. G.o.dd.a.m.n ... So what's the quake got to do with you being here?" I was gone. You can have L.A., Bosch. s.h.i.+t, I was out there for the Sylmar quake in 'seventy-one. Knocked down a hospital and a couple freeways. At the time we were living in Tujunga, a few miles from the epicenter. I'll always remember that one. It was like G.o.d and the devil meetin' in the room and you were there with 'em playin' referee. G.o.dd.a.m.n ... So what's the quake got to do with you being here?"

"Well, it's kind of a strange phenomenon but the murder rate's fallen off. People are being more civil, I guess. We-"

"Maybe there's nothing left there worth killing for."

"Maybe. Anyway, we're usually running seventy, eighty murders a year in the division, I don't know what it was like when you-"

"We'd do less than half that. Easy."

"Well, we're running way below the average this year. It's given us time to go back through some of the old ones. Everybody on the table's taken a share. One of the ones I've got has your name on it. I guess you know your partner from back then pa.s.sed away and-"

"Eno's dead? G.o.dd.a.m.n, I didn't know that. I thought I would've heard about that. Not that it would've mattered a whole h.e.l.l of a lot."

"Yeah, he's dead. His wife gets the pension checks. Sorry you hadn't heard."

"That's okay. Eno and me ... well, we were partners. That's about it."

"Anyway, I'm here because you're alive and he isn't."

"What's the case?"

"Marjorie Lowe." He waited a moment for a reaction from McKittrick's face and got none. "You remember it? She was found in the trash in an alley off-"

"Vista. Behind Hollywood Boulevard between Vista and Gower. I remember them all, Bosch. Cleared or not, I remember every G.o.dd.a.m.n one of them."

But you don't remember me, Bosch thought but didn't say.

"Yeah, that's the one. Between Vista and Gower."

"What about it?"

"It was never cleared."

"I know that," McKittrick said, his voice rising. "I worked sixty-three cases during seven years on the homicide table. I worked Hollywood, Wils.h.i.+re, then RHD. Cleared fifty-six. I'll put that up against anybody. Today they're lucky if they clear half of 'em. I'll put it up against you blind."

"And you'd win. That's a good record. This isn't about you, Jake. It's about the case."

"Don't call me Jake. I don't know you. Never seen you before in my life. I- wait a minute."

Bosch stared at him, astonished that he might actually remember the pool. But then he realized that McKittrick had stopped because of his wife's approach along the dock. She was carrying a plastic cooler. McKittrick waited silently for her to put it down on the dock near the boat and he hoisted it aboard.

"Oh, Detective Bosch, you'll be way too hot in that," Mrs. McKittrick said. "Do you want to come back up and borrow a pair of Jake's shorts and a white T-s.h.i.+rt?"

Bosch looked at McKittrick, then up at her.

"No, thanks, ma'am, I'm fine."

"You are going fis.h.i.+ng, aren't you?"

"Well, I haven't exactly been invited and I-"

"Oh, Jake, invite him fis.h.i.+ng. You're always looking for somebody to go out with you. Besides, you can catch up on all that blood-and-guts stuff you used to love in Hollywood."

McKittrick looked up at her and Bosch could see the horses fighting against the restraints. He was able to get it under control.

"Mary, thanks for the sandwiches," he said calmly. "Now, could you go back up to the house and leave us be?"

She threw him a frown and shook her head as if he were a spoiled boy. She went back the way she had come without another word. The two of them left on the boat let some time go by before Bosch finally spoke and tried to recover the situation.

"Look, I'm not here for any reason other than to ask you a few questions about this case. I'm not trying to suggest there was anything wrong with the way it was handled. I'm just taking another look at it. That's all."

"You left something out."

"What's that?"

"That you're full of s.h.i.+t."

Bosch could feel the horses rearing up in himself. He was angry at this man's questioning his motives, even though he was right to do so. He was on the verge of shedding the nice-guy skin and going at him. But he knew better. He knew that for McKittrick to act this way, there must be a reason. Something about the old case was like a pebble in his shoe. He had worked it over to the side where it didn't hurt when he walked. But it was still in there. Bosch had to make him want to take it out. He swallowed his own anger and tried to stay level.

"Why am I full of s.h.i.+t?" he said.

McKittrick's back was to him. The former cop was reaching down under the steering console. Bosch couldn't see what he was trying to do, except he guessed he was maybe looking for a hidden set of boat keys.

"Why are you full of s.h.i.+t?" McKittrick answered as he turned around. "I'll tell you why. Because you come here flas.h.i.+ng that bulls.h.i.+t badge around when we both know you don't have a badge."

McKittrick was pointing a Beretta twenty-two at Bosch. It was small but it would do the job at this distance, and Bosch had to believe that McKittrick knew how to use it.

"Jesus, man, what's the problem with you?"

"I had no problem until you showed up."

Bosch held his hands chest-high in a nonthreatening pose.

"Just take it easy."

"You take it easy. Put your f.u.c.king hands down. I want to see that badge again. Take it out and toss it over here. Slowly."

Bosch complied, all the while trying to look around the docks without turning his head more than a few inches. He didn't see anyone. He was alone. And unarmed. He threw the badge wallet down on the deck near McKittrick's feet.

"Now I want you to walk around the bridge to the bow up there. Stand against the bow rail where I can see you. I knew somebody would try to f.u.c.k with me someday. Well, you picked the wrong guy and the wrong day."

Bosch did as instructed and went up to the bow. He grabbed the railing for support and turned around to face his captor. Without taking his eyes off Bosch, McKittrick bent and picked up the wallet. Then he moved into the c.o.c.kpit and put the gun down on top of the console. Bosch knew if he tried for it McKittrick would get there first. McKittrick reached down and turned something and the engine kicked over.

"What are you doing, McKittrick?"

"Oh, now it's 'McKittrick.' What happened to the friendly 'Jake'? Well, what's doing is, we're going fis.h.i.+ng. You wanted to fish, that's what we'll do. You try to jump and I'll shoot you in the water. I don't care."

"I'm not going anywhere. Just take it easy."

"Now, reach down to that cleat and unhook that line. Throw it up on the dock."

When Bosch had finished completing the order, McKittrick picked up the gun and stepped back three paces into the stern. He untied the other line and pushed off from a pylon. He returned to the helm and gently put the boat in reverse. It glided out of the slip. McKittrick then put it in forward and they started moving through the inlet toward the mouth of the ca.n.a.l. Bosch could feel the warm salt breezes drying the sweat on his skin. He decided he would jump as soon as they got to some open water, or where there were other boats with people on them.

"Kind of surprised you're not carrying. What kind of guy says he's a cop, then doesn't carry a piece?"

"I am a cop, McKittrick. Let me explain."

"You don't have to, boy, I already know. Know all about you."

McKittrick flipped open the badge wallet and Bosch watched him study the ID card and the gold lieutenant's badge. He threw it on the console.

"What do you know about me, McKittrick?"

"Don't worry, I still have a few teeth left, Bosch, and I still have a few friends in the department. After the wife called, I made a call. One of my friends. He knew all about you. You're on leave, Bosch. Involuntary. So I don't know about this bulls.h.i.+t story about earthquakes you were spinning. Makes me think maybe you picked up a little freelance work while you're off the job."

"You got it wrong."

"Yeah, well, we'll see. Once we get out into some open water, you're gonna tell me who sent you or you're gonna be fish food. Makes no difference to me."

"n.o.body sent me. I sent myself."

McKittrick slapped his palm against the red ball on the throttle lever and the boat surged forward. Its bow rose and Bosch grabbed the railing to hold on.

"Bulls.h.i.+t!" McKittrick yelled above the engine noise. "You're a liar. You lied before, you're lying now."

"Listen to me," Bosch yelled. "You said you remember every case."

"I do, G.o.dd.a.m.nit! I can't forget them."

"Cut it back!"

McKittrick pulled the throttle back and the boat evened off and the noise reduced.

"On the Marjorie Lowe case you pulled the dirty work. You remember that? Remember what we call the dirty work? You had to tell the next of kin. You had to tell her kid. Out at McClaren."

"That was in the reports, Bosch. So-"

He stopped and stared at Bosch for a long moment. Then he flipped open the badge case and read the name. He looked back at Bosch.

"I remember that name. The swimming pool. You're the kid."

"I'm the kid."

Chapter 25

McKittrick let the boat drift in the shallows of Little Sarasota Bay while Bosch told the story. He asked no questions. He simply listened. At a moment where Bosch paused, he opened the cooler his wife had packed and took out two beers, handing one to Bosch. The can felt ice-cold in Bosch's hand.

Bosch didn't pull the tab on his beer until he finished the story. He had told everything he knew to McKittrick, even the nonessential part about his run-in with Pounds. He had a hunch, based on McKittrick's anger and bizarre behavior, that he had been wrong about the old cop. He had flown out to Florida believing he was coming to see either a corrupt or a stupid cop and he wasn't sure which he would dislike more. But now he believed that McKittrick was a man who was haunted by memories and the demons of choices made badly many years ago. Bosch thought that the pebble still had to come out of the shoe and that his own honesty was the best way to get to it.

"So that's my story," he said at the end. "I hope she packed more than two of these."

He popped the beer and drank nearly a third of it. It tasted delicious going down his throat in the afternoon sun.

"Oh, there's plenty more where that came from," McKittrick replied. "You want a sandwich?"

"Not yet."

"No, what you want is my story now."

"That's what I came for."

"Well, let's get out there to the fish."

He restarted the engine and they followed a trail of channel markers south through the bay. Bosch finally remembered he had sungla.s.ses in the pocket of his sport coat and put them on.

It seemed like the wind was cutting in on him from all directions and on occasion its warmth would be traded for a cool breeze that would come up off the surface of the water. It was a long time since Bosch had been on a boat or had even been fis.h.i.+ng. For a man who had had a gun pointed at him twenty minutes earlier, he realized he felt pretty good.

As the bay tapered off into a ca.n.a.l, McKittrick pulled back on the throttle and cut their wake. He waved to a man on the bridge of a giant yacht tied up outside a waterside restaurant. Bosch couldn't tell if he knew the man or was just being neighborly.

"Take it on a line even with the lantern on the bridge," McKittrick said.

"What?"

"Take it."

McKittrick stepped away from the wheel and into the stern of the boat. Bosch quickly stepped behind the wheel, sighted the red lantern hanging at center point beneath the span of a drawbridge a half mile ahead and adjusted the wheel to bring the boat into line. He looked back and saw McKittrick pull a plastic bag of small dead fish out of a compartment in the deck.

"Let's see who we've got here today," he said.