Angels Flight

by Michael Connelly

  ‘I’m saying there probably wasn’t an abduction at all. Stacey Kincaid was an abused child. My guess is that her stepfather defiled her and then probably killed her. And that doesn’t happen without tacit knowledge, if not approval, by the mother.’

  Bosch was silent. Rider had spoken with such fervor and even pain that he couldn’t help but wonder if she was talking from some kind of personal experience.

  ‘Look,’ Rider said, apparently sensing the skepticism of her partners. ‘There was a time that I thought I wanted to move into child sex crimes. This was before I put in for homicide. There was an opening on the endangered-child team in Pacific and the job was mine if I wanted it. They first sent me to Quantico for a two-week training program the bureau puts on once a year on child sex crimes. I lasted eight days. I realized I couldn’t hack it. I came back and put in for homicide.’

  She stopped there but neither Bosch or Edgar said anything. They knew there was more.

  ‘But before I left,’ Rider continued, ‘I learned enough to know that most often sexual abuse of children comes from inside the family, relatives or close friends. The boogie monsters who climb through the window and abduct are few and far between.’

  ‘It’s still not evidence in this specific case, Kiz,’ Bosch said gently. ‘This could still be the rare exception. It wasn’t Harris who came through the window but this guy.’

  He pointed to her computer, though the images of the headless man’s assault on Stacey Kincaid were thankfully not on the screen.

  ‘Nobody came through the window,’ Rider insisted.

  She pulled a file over and opened it. Bosch saw it contained a copy of the protocol from the autopsy of Stacey Kincaid. She leafed through it until she came to the photos. She picked the one she wanted and handed it to Bosch. While he looked at it she started paging through the protocol.

  The photo Bosch held was a shot of Stacey Kincaid’s body in situ — the position and place where it was found. Her arms were spread wide. Sheehan had been right. Her body was darkening with interior decomposition and the face was gaunt, but there was an angelic quality to her in repose. His heart ached from looking at the photos of her tortured and now dead.

  ‘Look at the left knee,’ Rider commanded.

  He did so. He saw a round dark spot that appeared to be a scab.

  ‘A scab?’

  ‘Right. The protocol calls it premortem by five to six days. It happened before she was abducted. So she had that scab on her knee the entire time she was with her abductor—if there really was one. In the photos on the web site, she has no scab. I can go back in and show you if you like.’

  ‘I’ll take your word for it,’ Bosch said.

  ‘Yeah,’ Edgar added. ‘Me, too.’

  ‘So these photos on the web were taken well before she was supposedly kidnapped, well before she was murdered.’

  Bosch nodded, then shook his head.

  ‘What?’ Rider asked.

  ‘It’s just ... I don’t know. Twenty-four hours ago we were working the Elias thing and thinking maybe we were looking for a cop. Now all of this ...’

  ‘It changes things all right,’ Edgar said.

  ‘Wait a minute, if that’s Sam Kincaid in those pictures with her, why the hell are they still on that web site? It doesn’t make sense that he would risk that.’

  ‘I thought about that,’ Rider said. ‘There are two possible explanations. One being that he doesn’t have editing access to the web site. In other words, he can’t take those photos off without going to the site administrator, raising suspicions and exposing himself. The second possibility, and it might be a combination of both, is that he felt he was safe. Harris was fingered as the killer and whether he was convicted or not that was the end of the story.’

  ‘It’s still a risk leaving those photos out there to be seen,’ Edgar said.

  ‘Who’s going to see them?’ Rider asked. ‘Who’s going to tell?’

  Her voice was too defensive. She realized this and continued in a calmer tone.

  ‘Don’t you see? The people with access to this site are pedophiles. Even if someone recognized Stacey, which is unlikely, what were they going to do? Call the police and say, “Uh, yes, I like fucking children but I don’t stand for murdering them. Could you get these photos off our web site?” Not in a million years. Hell, maybe keeping the photos on there was a form of bragging. We don’t even know what we have here. Maybe every girl on that site is dead.’

  Her voice was growing sharper as she tried to convince them.

  ‘Okay, okay,’ Bosch said. ‘You make good points, Kiz. Let’s stay on our case for now. What is your theory. You think Elias got this far along and it got him killed?’

  ‘Absolutely. We know it did. The fourth note. “He knows you know.” Elias went onto the secret web site and was found out.’

  ‘How’d they know he was in there if he had the passwords from the third note?’ Edgar asked.

  ‘Good question,’ Rider replied. ‘I asked the O’Connors the same thing. They did some snooping around after getting into the server. They found a cookie jar on the web site. What that means is that there is a program that captures data about each user who enters the site. It then analyzes the data to determine if someone has entered the site who should not have had access. Even if they have the passwords, their entry is still recorded and a data trail called an Internet protocol address is left behind. It’s like fingerprints. The IP, or the cookie, is left on the site you enter. The cookie jar program will then analyze the IP address and match it to a list of known users. If there is no match a flag is raised. The site’s manager sees the flag and can trace the intruder. Or he can set up a tripwire program that waits for a return visit from the intruder. When he comes back, the program will attach a tracer which will provide the site manager with the intruder’s E-mail address. And once you have that you have the intruder cold. You can identify him then. If it looks like a cop you close the elevator — the page you hijacked and were using as a secret gateway — and you go find a new web page to hijack. But in this case it wasn’t a cop. It was a lawyer.’

  ‘And they didn’t shut down,’ Bosch said. ‘They sent someone out to kill him.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘So you think this is what Elias did,’ Bosch said. ‘He got these notes in the mail and followed the clues. He stumbled into this web site and set off an alarm. A flag. The response was to kill him.’

  ‘Yes, that would be my interpretation of what we know at this point, particularly in light of the fourth note. “He knows you know.”’

  Bosch shook his head, confused by his own extrapolations of the story.

  ‘I’m still not getting this. Who is the “they” we’re talking about here? That I just accused of murder.’

  ‘The group. The users of the site. The site administrator — which might possibly be Kincaid — picked up on the intruder, realized it was Elias, and dispatched someone to take care of the problem in order to fend off exposure. Whether or not he polled all members of the group first doesn’t matter. They are all guilty because the web site is a criminal enterprise.’

  Bosch held his hand up to slow her down.

  ‘Slow down. We can leave the group and the bigger picture for the DA to worry about. Stay focused on the killer and Kincaid. We are assuming he was involved in all of this and somehow someone knew about it, then decided to inform Elias instead of the cops. Does that make sense?’

  ‘Sure it does. We just don’t know all the details yet. But the notes speak for themselves. They clearly indicate someone tipped Elias to the site, then later warned him that he had been found out.’

  Bosch nodded and thought about this for a moment.

  ‘Wait a minute. If he set off a flag, then didn’t you just do the same?’

  ‘No. Thanks to the O’Connors. When they were inside the server they added my IP as well as their own to the site’s good guy list. No alarms. The operators and users of the site won’t know we�
�ve been there unless they actually look at their good guy list and notice it has been altered. I think we’ve got the time to do what we need to do.’

  Bosch nodded. He wanted to ask whether what the O’Connors had done had been legal but thought it best not to know.

  ‘So who sent Elias the notes?’ he asked instead.

  ‘The wife,’ Edgar said. ‘I think she got an attack of the guilts and wanted to help Elias rip Sam the car czar a new asshole. She sent the notes.’

  ‘It fits,’ Rider said. ‘Whoever sent the notes had knowledge of two separate things: Charlotte’s Web Site and the car-wash receipts. Actually, a third thing as well: that Elias had tripped an alarm. So my vote goes with the wife, too. What was she like today?’

  Bosch spent the next ten minutes updating her on their activities during the day.

  ‘And that’s just our work on the case,’ Edgar added. ‘Harry didn’t even tell you how we got the back window of my car shot out.’

  ‘What?’

  Edgar told the story and Rider seemed mesmerized by it.

  ‘They catch the shooter?’

  ‘Not that we heard. We didn’t wait around.’

  ‘You know, I’ve never been shot at,’ she said. ‘Must be a rush.’

  ‘Not the kind you want,’ Bosch said. ‘I still have questions about all of this Internet stuff.’

  ‘What are they?’ Rider said. ‘If I can’t answer, one of the O’Connors can.’

  ‘No, not technical questions. Logic questions. I still don’t understand how and why this stuff is still available for us to look at. I understand what you said about the users all being pedophiles and their seeming feeling of safety, but now we have Elias dead. If they killed him, why the hell didn’t they at least move to a new gateway?’

  ‘Maybe they are in the process of trying to do just that. Elias hasn’t been dead forty-eight hours.’

  ‘And what about Kincaid? We just told him we are reopening the case. Whether he was in danger of exposure or not, it seems he would have gotten on the computer the minute we left and either contacted the site administrator or tried to crash the site and those pictures himself.’

  ‘Again, maybe it’s in process. And even if it is, it’s too late. The O’Connors backed everything onto a Zip drive. They can crash the site but we still have it. We’ll be able to trace every IP address and take every one of those people — if you consider them people.’

  Again the fervor and anger in her voice made Bosch wonder if something about what she had seen on the web site had touched something personal, something deep inside.

  ‘So where do we go from here?’ he asked. ‘Search warrants?’

  ‘Yep,’ Rider said. ‘And we bring in the Kincaids. Fuck their big mansion on the hill. We have enough already to bring them in for questioning on the child abuse. We separate them and sweat them in the rooms. We go for the wife and get a confession. Get her to waive spousal privilege and give us her husband, that rat bastard.’

  ‘You’re talking about a very powerful and politically connected family.’

  ‘Don’t tell me you’re afraid of the car czar.’

  Bosch checked her look to make sure she was kidding.

  ‘I’m afraid of moving too fast and blowing it. We’ve got nothing that directly links anybody to Stacey Kincaid or Howard Elias. If we bring mom down here and don’t turn her, then we watch the car czar drive away. That’s what I’m afraid of, okay?’

  Rider nodded.

  ‘She’s dying to be turned,’ Edgar said. ‘Why else send those notes to Elias?’

  Bosch put his elbows on the desk and washed his face with his hands as he thought about things. He had to make a decision.

  ‘What about Charlotte’s Web Site?’ he asked, his face still covered by his hands. ‘What do we do with that?’

  ‘We give that to Inglert and the O’Connors,‘ Rider said. ‘They’ll jump all over it. Like I said, they’ll be able to trace the good guy list to the users. They’ll identify them and take them down. We’re talking multiple arrests of an Internet pedophile ring. That’s just for starters. The DA might want to try to link them all to the homicides.’

  ‘They’re probably all over the country,’ Edgar said. ‘Not just L.A.’

  ‘They might be all over the world but it won’t matter. Our people will work with the bureau on it.’

  More silence passed by and Bosch finally dropped his hands to the desk. He’d made his decision.

  ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘You two stay here and work on the search warrants. I want them ready to go tonight, in case we decide to move. We want all weapons, computer equipment — you know what to do. I want warrants for the old house, which they still own, as well as the new house, all cars and Kincaid’s office. Also, Jerry, see what you can find out about the security guy.’

  ’D.C. Richter, will do. What — ’

  ‘In fact, on the warrants, write up one for his car.’

  ‘What’s the PC?’ Rider asked.

  Bosch thought a moment. He knew what he wanted but he needed a legal means of getting there.

  ‘Just say that as Kincaid’s director of security it is believed that his vehicle may have been used in the commission of crimes relating to Stacey Kincaid.’

  ‘That’s not probable cause, Harry.’

  ‘We stick the warrant in with the other ones,’ he said.

  ‘Maybe the judge won’t care after he’s read what is in them. In fact, check the judge list. Let’s take these to a woman.’

  Rider smiled and said, ‘Aren’t we sly?’

  ‘What are you going to be doing, Harry?’ Edgar asked.

  ‘I’m going downtown to talk to Irving and Lindell, tell them what we got and see how they want to play it.’

  Bosch looked at Rider and now saw disappointment.

  ‘Harry, this isn’t like you,’ she said. ‘You know that if you go to Irving he’ll take the conservative route. He won’t let us move until we’ve nailed down every possibility.’

  Bosch nodded and said, ‘Normally, that would be true. But these aren’t normal times. He wants to prevent the city from burning. Going with this, and going fast, might be the way. Irving’s smart enough to see that.’

  ‘You have too much faith in human nature,’ she said.

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘The best way of cooling this city off is to arrest a cop. Irving’s already down there with Sheehan in the box. He isn’t going to want to hear this, Harry.’

  ‘You think that if you arrest the car czar and say he did Elias that everybody will believe you and be cool,’ Edgar added. ‘You don’t understand. There are people out there who need this to be a cop and they won’t listen to anything else. Irving’s smart enough to see that, too.’

  Bosch thought of Sheehan downtown at Parker Center in a room. He was being measured as the department’s sacrificial lamb.

  ‘Just work on the warrants,’ he said. ‘I’ll worry about the rest.’

  27

  Bosch looked out the window and down at the protestors lining the sidewalks in front of Parker Center and across Los Angeles Street. They moved in orderly lines, carrying signs that said ‘JUSTICE NOW’ on one side and ‘JUSTICE FOR HOWARD ELIAS’ on the other. The duplication of the signs attested to the careful orchestration of the protest for the benefit of the media. Bosch saw Reverend Preston Tuggins was one of the marchers. As he walked, reporters walked along with him, sticking microphones in front of him and focusing cameras at his face. Bosch didn’t see any signs that said anything about Catalina Perez.

  ‘Detective Bosch,’ Deputy Chief Irving said from behind him. ‘Run it down for us. You’ve told us what information you’ve accumulated. Now put it into perspective. Tell us what you think it means.’

  Bosch turned around. He looked at Irving, then at Lindell. They were in Irving’s office. Irving was ensconced behind his desk, sitting ramrod straight in his full uniform — an indication he would be appearing at a press
conference later. Lindell sat in one of the chairs across the desk. Bosch had just recounted for them what Rider had come up with and the steps his team had taken to that point. Irving now wanted his interpretation of it all.

  Bosch composed his thoughts as he stepped back to the desk and took the seat next to Lindell.

  ‘I think Sam Kincaid killed his stepdaughter or had something to do with it. There never was an abduction. That was the story he cooked up. Then he got lucky. He caught a big break when those fingerprints happened to point to Harris. After that was discovered he was practically home free.’

  ‘Start at the start.’

  ‘Okay. You start with Kincaid being a pedophile. He married Kate six years ago, probably as a cover. And to get at her daughter. The girl’s body was too decomposed for the coroner to determine if there was indication of long-term sexual abuse. But I’m saying there was. And at — ’

  ‘The mother knew?’

  ‘I don’t know. She found out at some point but when that was is the question.’

  ‘Go on. Sorry to interrupt.’

  ‘Something happened last summer. Maybe the girl threatened to tell someone — her mother, if she didn’t know yet, or maybe go to authorities. Or maybe Kincaid simply grew tired of her. Pedophiles target a specific age group. They’re not interested in children older than their target group. Stacey Kincaid was about to turn twelve. She may have been too old for her stepfather’s ... tastes. If she was no longer of use to him in that way, she was only a danger to him.’

  ‘This conversation is turning my stomach, Detective. We are talking about an eleven-year-old girl.’

  ‘What do you want me to do about it, Chief? It’s turning mine, too. I’ve seen the pictures.’

  ‘Then move on please.’

  ‘So something happened and he killed her. He hid the body and jimmied the window. He then let events take place. In the morning the mother finds her gone and calls the cops. The abduction story starts to unfold.’

  ‘He then gets lucky,’ Lindell said.

  ‘Right. He catches a nice piece of luck. Of all the prints collected in the girl’s room and the rest of the house, the computer spits out a match with Michael Harris, ex-convict and all-around dirtbag. RHD was off to the races then. Like they were wearing blinders. They dropped everything and Harris became the only focus. They picked him up and did their thing with him. Only a funny thing happened on the way to a conviction. Harris didn’t confess and there was no other evidence to go with those fingerprints. Meantime, Harris’s name was leaked to the media. It became known that the cops had a suspect. Kincaid found out where Harris lived — maybe he got it from a friendly cop who was just keeping the parents of the victim informed. However it happened, he knew where Harris lived. He went to the spot where he’d hidden the body and moved it. My guess is that it was in the trunk of a car all along. Probably on one of his car lots. Anyway, he took the body to Harris’s neighborhood and dumped it in a trash lot a couple blocks from the suspect’s apartment. When it was found the next morning, the cops finally had another piece of evidence — circumstantial as it was — to go with the fingerprints. But all Harris was was a patsy.’