The Lincoln Lawyer Collection

by Connelly, Michael

  Sarah started flying on autopilot. She was there but not there. Her eyes were fixed on a distance that was far beyond the room they were in.

  “We have a theory, Sarah. The autopsy that was conducted on your sister determined that she had not been sexually abused by her killer or anyone else prior to that day. We also know the dress she wore happened to be yours and Melissa was borrowing it that morning because she liked it.”

  McPherson paused but Sarah said nothing.

  “When we get to trial we’re going to have to explain the semen found on the dress. If we can’t explain it, the assumption will be that it came from the killer and that killer was your stepfather. We will lose the case and Jessup, the real killer, will walk away free. I’m sure you don’t want that, do you, Sarah? There are some people out there who think twenty-four years in prison is enough time served for the murder of a twelve-year-old girl. They don’t know why we’re doing this. But I want you to know that I don’t think that, Sarah. Not by a long shot.”

  Sarah Gleason didn’t answer at first. Bosch expected tears but none came and he began to wonder if her emotions had been cauterized by the traumas and depravities of her life. Or maybe she simply had an internal toughness that her diminutive stature camouflaged. Either way, when she finally responded, it was in a flat, emotionless voice that belied the heartfelt words she spoke.

  “You know what I always thought?” she said.

  McPherson leaned forward.

  “What, Sarah?”

  “That that man killed three people that day. My sister, then my mother… and then me. None of us got away.”

  There was a long moment of silence. McPherson slowly reached out and put her hand on Gleason’s arm, a gesture of comfort where no comfort could exist.

  “I’m sorry, Sarah,” McPherson whispered.

  “Okay,” Gleason said. “I’ll tell you everything.”

  Thirteen

  Thursday, February 18, 8:15 P.M.

  My daughter was already missing her mother’s cooking—and she’d only been gone one day. I was dropping her half-eaten sandwich into the garbage and wondering how the hell I could’ve messed up a grilled cheese when my cell phone’s ring interrupted. It was Maggie checking in from the road.

  “Tell me something good,” I said by way of greeting.

  “You get to spend the evening with our beautiful daughter.”

  “Yes, that’s something good. Except she doesn’t like my cooking. Now tell me something else that’s good.”

  “Our primary witness is good to go. She’ll testify.”

  “She made the ID?”

  “She did.”

  “She told you about the DNA and it fits with our theory?”

  “She did and it does.”

  “And she’ll come down here and testify to all of it at the trial?”

  “She will.”

  I felt a twelve-volt charge go through my body.

  “That’s actually a lot of good things, Maggie. Is there any downside?”

  “Well…”

  I felt the wind go out of the sails. I was about to learn that Sarah was still a drug addict or there was some other issue that would prevent me from using her at trial.

  “Well, what?”

  “Well, there are going to be challenges to her testimony, of course, but she’s pretty solid. She’s a survivor and it shows. There’s really only one thing missing: emotions. She’s been through a lot in her life and she basically seems to be a bit burned out—emotionally. No tears, no laughter, just straight down the middle.”

  “We can work on that. We can coach her.”

  “Yeah, well, we just have to be careful with that. I am not saying she isn’t fine the way she is. I’m just saying that she’s sort of a flat line. Everything else is good. I think you’re going to like her and I think she’ll help us put Jessup back in prison.”

  “That’s fantastic, Maggie. Really. And you’re still all right handling her at trial, right?”

  “I’ve got her.”

  “Royce will attack her on the meth—memory loss and all of that. Her lifestyle… you’ll have to be ready for anything and everything.”

  “I will be. That leaves you with Bosch and Jessup. You still think he’ll testify?”

  “Jessup? Yes, he’s got to. Clive knows he can’t do that to a jury, not after twenty-four years. So, yes, I’ve got him and I’ve got Bosch.”

  “At least with Harry you don’t have to worry about any baggage.”

  “That Clive knows about yet.”

  “And what’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It means don’t underestimate Clever Clive Royce. See, that’s what you prosecutors always do. You get overconfident and it makes you vulnerable.”

  “Thank you, F. Lee Bailey. I’ll keep that in mind.”

  “How was Bosch today?”

  “He was Bosch. What happened on your end?”

  I checked through the door of the kitchen. Hayley was sitting on the couch with her homework spread out on the coffee table.

  “Well, for one thing, we’ve got a judge. Breitman, Department one-twelve.”

  Maggie considered the case assignment for a moment before responding.

  “I would call that a no-win for either side. She’s straight down the middle. Never a prosecutor, never a defense attorney. Just a good, solid civil trial lawyer. I think neither side gets an advantage with her.”

  “Wow, a judge who’s going to be impartial and fair. Imagine that.”

  She didn’t respond.

  “She set the first status conference in chambers. Wednesday morning at eight before court starts. You read anything into that?”

  This meant the judge wanted to meet the lawyers and discuss the case in chambers, starting things off informally and away from the lens of the media.

  “I think that’s good. She’s probably going to set the rules with media and procedure. It sounds to me like she’s going to run a tight ship.”

  “That was what I was thinking. You’re free Wednesday to be there?”

  “I’ll have to check my calendar but I think so. I’m trying to clear everything except for this.”

  “I gave Royce the first bit of discovery today. It was mostly composed of material from the first trial.”

  “You know you could have held off on that until the thirty-day marker.”

  “Yeah, but what’s the point?”

  “The point is strategy. The earlier you give it to him, the more time he has to be ready for it. He’s trying to put the squeeze on us by not waiving speedy trial. You should put the squeeze right back on him by not showing our hand until we have to. Thirty days before trial.”

  “I’ll remember that with the next round. But this was pretty basic stuff.”

  “Was Sarah Gleason on the witness list?”

  “Yes, but under the name Sarah Landy—as it was in ’eighty-six. And I gave the office as the address. Clive doesn’t know we found her.”

  “We need to keep it that way until we have to reveal it. I don’t want her harassed or feeling threatened.”

  “What did you tell her about coming down for the trial?”

  “I told her she would probably be needed for two days in trial. Plus the travel.”

  “And that’s not going to be a problem?”

  “Well… she runs her own business and has been at it only a couple years. She has one big, ongoing project but otherwise said that things are slow. My guess is we can get her down when we need her.”

  “Are you still in Port Townsend?”

  “Yes, we just got finished with her about an hour ago. We grabbed dinner and checked in at a hotel. It’s been a long day.”

  “And you’re coming back tomorrow?”

  “We were planning on it. But our flight’s not till two. We have to take a ferry—it’s a journey just to the airport.”

  “Okay, call me in the morning before you leave. Just in case I think of something involving the witness.”
>
  “Okay.”

  “Did either of you take notes?”

  “No, we thought it might freeze her.”

  “Did you record it?”

  “No, same reason.”

  “Good. I want to keep as much of this out of discovery as possible. Tell Bosch not to write anything up. We can copy Royce on the six-pack she made the ID off of, but that’s it.”

  “Right. I’ll tell Harry.”

  “When, tonight or tomorrow?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Nothing, never mind. Anything else?”

  “Yes.”

  I braced for it. My petty jealousy had slipped out for one small moment.

  “I would like to say good night to my daughter now.”

  “Oh,” I said, relief bursting through my body. “I’ll put her on.”

  I took the phone out to Hayley.

  “It’s your mother.”

  PART TWO

  —The Labyrinth

  Fourteen

  Tuesday, February 23, 8:45 P.M.

  Each of them worked in silence. Bosch at one end of the dining room table, his daughter at the other. He with the first batch of SIS surveillance logs, she with her homework, her school books and laptop computer spread out in front of her. They were close in proximity but not in much else. The Jessup case had become all-encompassing with Bosch tracing old witnesses and trying to find new ones. He had spent little time with her in recent days. Like her parents, Maddie was good at holding grudges and had not let go of the perceived slight of having been left for a night in the care of an assistant school principal. She was giving Harry the silent treatment and already at fourteen she was an expert at it.

  The SIS logs were another frustration to Bosch. Not because of what they contained but because of their delay in reaching him. They had been sent through bureaucratic channels, from the SIS office to the RHD office and then to Bosch’s supervisor, where they had sat in an in basket for three days before finally being dropped on Bosch’s desk. The result was he had logs from the first three days of the surveillance of Jason Jessup and he was looking at them three to six days after the fact. That process was too slow and Bosch was going to have to do something about it.

  The logs were terse accounts of the surveillance subject’s movements by date, time and location. Most entries carried only a single line of description. The logs came with an accompanying set of photos as well, but most of the shots were taken at a significant distance so the followers could avoid detection. These were grainy images of Jessup as he moved about the city as a free man.

  Bosch read through the reports and quickly surmised that Jessup was already leading separate public and private lives. By day his movements were in concert with the media as he very publicly reacquainted himself with life outside a prison cell. It was about learning to drive again, to choose off a menu, to go for a three-mile run without having to make a turn. But by night a different Jessup emerged. Unaware that he was still being watched by eyes and cameras, he went out cruising alone in his borrowed car. He went to all corners of the city. He went to bars, strip clubs, a prostitute’s trick pad.

  Of all his activities, one was most curious to Bosch. On his fourth night of freedom, Jessup had driven up to Mulholland Drive, the winding road atop the crest of the Santa Monica Mountains, which cut the city in half. Day or night, Mulholland offered some of the best views of the city. It was no surprise that Jessup would go up there. There were overlooks that offered north and south views of the shimmering lights of the city. They could be invigorating and even majestic. Bosch had gone to these spots himself in the past.

  But Jessup didn’t go to any of the overlooks. He pulled his car off the road near the entrance to Franklin Canyon Park. He got out and then entered the closed park, sneaking around a gate.

  This caused a surveillance issue for the SIS team because the park was empty and the watchers were at risk of being seen if they got too close. The report here was briefer than most entries in the log:

  02/20/10—01:12. Subject entered Franklin Canyon Park. Observed at picnic table area, northeast corner, blind man trailhead.

  02/20/10—02:34. Subject leaves park, proceeds west on Mulholland to 405 freeway and then south.

  After that, Jessup returned to the apartment where he was living in Venice and stayed in for the rest of the night.

  There was a printout of an infrared photograph taken of Jessup in the park. It showed him sitting at a picnic table in the dark. Just sitting there.

  Bosch put the photo print down on the table and looked at his daughter. She was left-handed like he was. It looked like she was writing out a math problem on a work sheet.

  “What?”

  She had her mother’s radar.

  “Uh, are you online there?”

  “Yes, what do you need?”

  “Can you pull up a map of Franklin Canyon Park? It’s off of Mulholland Drive.”

  “Let me finish this.”

  He waited patiently for her to complete her computations on a mathematical problem he knew would be light-years beyond his understanding. For the past four months he had lived in fear that his daughter would ask him for help with her homework. She had passed by his skills and knowledge long ago. He was useless in this area and had tried to concentrate on mentoring her in other areas, observation and self-protection chief among them.

  “Okay.”

  She put her pencil down and pulled her computer front and center. Bosch checked his watch. It was almost nine.

  “Here.”

  Maddie slid the computer down the table, turning the screen toward him.

  The park was larger than Bosch had thought, running south of Mulholland and west of Coldwater Canyon Boulevard. A key in the corner of the map said it was 605 acres. Bosch hadn’t realized that there was such a large public reserve in this prime section of the Hollywood Hills. He noticed that the map had several of the hiking trails and picnic areas marked. The picnic area in the northeast section was off of Blinderman Trail. He assumed it had been misspelled in the SIS log as “blind man trailhead.”

  “What is it?”

  Harry looked at his daughter. It was her first attempt at conversation in two days. He decided not to miss it.

  “Well, we’ve been watching this guy. The Special Investigations Section. They’re the department’s surveillance experts and they’re watching this guy who just got out of prison. He killed a little girl a long time ago. And for some reason he went to this park and just sat there at a picnic table.”

  “So? Isn’t that what people do at parks?”

  “Well, this was in the middle of the night. The park was closed and he snuck in… and then he sort of just sat there.”

  “Did he grow up near the park? Maybe he’s checking out the places where he grew up.”

  “I don’t think so. We have him growing up out in Riverside County. He used to come to L.A. to surf but I haven’t found any connection to Mulholland.”

  Bosch studied the map once more and noticed there was an upper and lower entrance to the park. Jessup had gone in through the upper entrance. This would have been out of his way unless that picnic area and Blinderman Trail were specific destinations for him.

  He slid the computer back to his daughter. And checked his watch again.

  “Are you almost done your work?”

  “Finished, Dad. Are you almost finished? Or you could say ‘done with.’ ”

  “Sorry. Are you almost finished?”

  “I have one more math problem.”

  “Good. I have to make a quick call.”

  Lieutenant Wright’s cell number was on the surveillance log. Bosch expected him to be home and annoyed with the intrusion but decided to make the call anyway. He got up and walked into the living room so he would not disturb Maddie on her last problem. He punched the number into his cell.

  “Wright, SIS.”

  “Lieutenant, it’s Harry Bosch.”

  “What
’s up, Bosch?”

  He didn’t sound annoyed.

  “Sorry to intrude on you at home. I just wanted—”

  “I’m not at home, Bosch. I’m with your guy.”

  Bosch was surprised.

  “Is something wrong?”

  “No, the night shift is just more interesting.”

  “Where is he right now?”

  “We’re with him at a bar on Venice Beach called the Townhouse. You know it?”

  “I’ve been there. Is he alone?”

  “Yes and no. He came alone but he got recognized. He can’t buy a drink in there and probably has his pick of the skanks. Like I said, more interesting at night. Are you calling to check up on us?”

  “Not really. I just have a couple of things I need to ask. I’m looking at the logs and the first thing is, how can I get them sooner? I’m looking at stuff from three days ago or longer. The other thing is Franklin Canyon Park. What can you tell me about his stop there?”

  “Which one?”

  “He’s been there twice?”

  “Actually, three times. He’s gone there the last two nights after the first stop four days ago.”

  This information was very intriguing to Bosch, mostly because he had no idea what it meant.

  “What did he do the last two times?”

  Maddie got up from the dining room table and came into the living room. She sat on the couch and listened to Bosch’s side of the conversation.

  “The same thing he did the first night,” Wright said. “He sneaks in there and goes to the same picnic area. He just sits there, like he’s waiting for something.”

  “For what?”

  “You tell me, Bosch.”

  “I wish I could. Did he go at the same time each night?”

  “Give or take a half hour or so.”

  “Does he go in through the Mulholland entrance each time?”