The Closers

by Michael Connelly

  "This is such an old case," Wood said. "Are you like on a cold case squad?"

  "We actually call it the Open-Unsolved Unit."

  "You know, we have a show called Cold Case. It's on Sunday nights. It's one of the shows I work on. I'm thinking . . . maybe you could visit the set and meet some of your television counterparts. I am sure they would love to meet you."

  Bosch realized she might be working up some sort of publicity angle. He looked through the glasses at Mackey staring up at the television and thought for a moment of trying to use her interest in the wiretap play they were going to put into motion. He then quickly shelved it, concluding that it would be easier to start the play with a newspaper plant.

  "Yeah, maybe, but I think that would have to wait awhile. We're working this case pretty hard right now and I just need to talk to you tomorrow."

  "No problem. I really hope you find who you are looking for. Ever since I was assigned to this show I've been thinking about Rebecca. You know, wondering if there was anything happening. Then out of the blue you called. It's weird, but in a good way. I'll see you tomorrow, Detective."

  Bosch said good night and hung up.

  A few minutes later, at midnight, the lights at the service station went out. Bosch knew that offering twenty-four-hour tow service didn't necessarily translate into being open twenty-four hours a day. Mackey or another driver was probably on call through the night.

  Bosch slipped from his hiding spot and hustled down Roscoe to the SUV. Just as he got to it he heard the deep thrumming sound of Mackey's Camaro coming to life. He started his engine, pulled away from the curb, and headed back toward the intersection. As he got there and was stopping for the red light he saw the Camaro with the gray-painted fenders cross the intersection, heading south on Tampa. Bosch waited a few moments, checked all lanes of the intersection for other cars, and blew through the red light to follow.

  Mackey's first stop was a bar called the Side Pocket. It was on Sepulveda Boulevard in Van Nuys near the railroad tracks. It was a small place with a blue neon sign and the barred windows painted black. Bosch had an idea what it would be like inside and what kind of men would be in there. Before leaving his car he took off his sport coat, wrapped his gun, handcuffs and extra clip in it and put it on the floor in front of the passenger seat. He got out and locked the door and headed toward the bar, pulling his shirt out of his jeans as he went.

  The inside of the bar was as he expected. A couple of pool tables, a stand-up bar and a row of scarred wood booths. Even though smoking inside the place was illegal, blue smoke was heavy in the air and hanging like a ghost beneath each table light. Nobody was complaining.

  Most of the men took their medicine straight up, meaning they were standing. Most had chains on their wallets and tattoos ringing their lower arms. Even with the changes to his appearance Bosch knew he would stand out, possibly even be advertising that he didn't belong. He saw an opening in the shadows where the bar curved under the television mounted in the corner. He slipped into the spot and leaned over the bar, hoping it helped hide his appearance.

  The bartender, a worn woman wearing a black leather vest over a T-shirt, ignored Bosch for a while but that was all right. He wasn't there to drink. He watched Mackey put quarters on one of the tables and wait for his turn to play. He hadn't ordered a drink either.

  Mackey spent ten minutes going through the assortment of pool cues on the wall racks until he found one he liked the feel of. He then stood by waiting and talking to some of the men standing around the pool table. It didn't appear to be anything more than casual conversation, as though he knew them but only from playing pool on previous nights.

  While he waited and watched, nursing the beer and whisky shot the bartender had finally delivered to him, Bosch at first thought people were watching him as well, but then realized they were only staring at the television screen less than a foot above his head.

  Finally Mackey got his game and he turned out to be good at it. He quickly won control of the table and defeated seven challengers, collecting money or beers from all of them. After a half hour he seemed to tire from the lack of competition and got sloppy. The eighth challenger beat him after Mackey missed a clean shot at the eight ball. Mackey took the loss well and slapped a five-dollar bill down on the green felt before stepping away. By Bosch's count he was at least twenty-five dollars and three beers ahead for the night.

  Mackey took his Rolling Rock to a space at the bar and that was Bosch's cue to withdraw. He put a ten under his empty shot glass and turned away, never giving Mackey his face. He left the bar and went back to his car. The first thing he did was put the gun back on his right hip, grip forward. He started the engine and drove out onto Sepulveda and then a block south. He turned around and pulled to the curb in front of a hydrant. He had a good angle on the front door of the Side Pocket and was in position to follow Mackey's car north on Sepulveda toward Panorama City. Mackey may have changed apartments after completing probation but Bosch expected that he had not moved far.

  The wait this time was not long. Mackey apparently only drank free beer. He left the bar ten minutes after Bosch had, got in the Camaro and headed south on Sepulveda.

  Bosch had guessed wrong. Mackey was driving away from Panorama City and the north Valley. This meant Bosch had to pull a U-turn on a largely deserted Sepulveda Boulevard in order to follow him. The move would be highly noticeable in Mackey's rearview mirror. So he waited, watching the Camaro get smaller in his side-view mirror.

  When he saw the turn signal on the Camaro start to blink he pinned the accelerator and took the SUV into a hard one-eighty. He almost lost it by overcompensating on the wheel but then righted the car and took off down Sepulveda. He turned right on Victory and caught up with the Camaro at the traffic signal at the 405 overpass. Mackey stayed off the freeway, however, and continued west on Victory.

  With Bosch employing a variety of driving maneuvers to avoid detection, Mackey drove all the way into Woodland Hills. On Mariano Street, a wide street near the 101 Freeway, he finally pulled down a long driveway and parked beside a small house. Bosch drove by and parked further down, then got out and doubled back on foot. He heard the front door of the house closing and then saw the light over the porch go out.

  Bosch looked around and realized it was a neighborhood of flag lots. When the neighborhood was first gridded decades before, the properties were cut into large pieces because they were meant to be horse ranches and small vegetable farms. Then the city grew out to the neighborhood and the horses and vegetables were crowded out. The lots were cut up, one property up front on the street and a narrow driveway running down the side of it to the property in the back-the flag-shaped lot.

  It made observation difficult. Bosch crept down the long driveway, watching both the house on the front property and Mackey's house on the back piece. Mackey had parked his Camaro next to a beat-up Ford 150 pickup. It meant Mackey might have a roommate.

  When he got closer Bosch stopped to write down the tag number on the F150. He noticed an old bumper sticker on the pickup that said WOULD THE LAST AMERICAN TO LEAVE L.A. PLEASE BRING THE FLAG. It was just one more small brushstroke on what Bosch felt was an emerging picture.

  As quietly as he could, Bosch walked down a stone pathway that ran alongside the house. The house was built on knee-high footings which put the windows too far up for him to see in. When he got to the back of the house he heard voices and then realized it was television when he saw the undulating blue glow on the shades of the back room. He started to cross the backyard when suddenly his phone started to chirp. He quickly reached for it and cut off the sound. At the same time he moved quickly back down the pathway and to the driveway. He then ran up the driveway toward the street. He listened for any sound behind him but heard none. When he made it to the street he looked back at the house but saw nothing that gave him reason to believe the chirping from his phone had been heard inside the house above the sounds of the television.

&nbs
p; Bosch knew it had been a close call. He was out of breath. He walked back to his car, trying to gather himself and recover from the near disaster. As with the badly handled interview with Daniel Kotchof, he knew he was showing signs of rust. He had forgotten to mute his phone before creeping the house. It was a mistake that could have blown everything and maybe put him into a confrontation with an investigative target. Three years ago, before he had left the job, it would never have happened. He started thinking about what Irving had said about his being a retread that would come apart at the seams, that would blow out.

  Inside the car he checked the caller ID list on his phone and saw that the call had come from Kiz Rider. He called her back.

  "Harry, I checked my call list and saw you had called me a little while ago. I had my phones off. What's up?"

  "Nothing much. I was checking in to see how it was going."

  "Well, it's going. I've got it all structured and most of the writing done. I'll finish tomorrow morning, then I'll start it through the channels."

  "Good."

  "Yeah, I'm about to call it a night. What about you? Did you find Robert Verloren?"

  "Not yet. But I've got an address for you. I followed Mackey after he left work. He's got a little house by the freeway in Woodland Hills. There might be a phone line in there that you'll want to add to the tap."

  "Good. Give me the address. That should be easy enough to check. But I'm not sure I want you following the suspect alone. That's not smart, Harry."

  "We had to find his address."

  He wasn't going to tell her about the near miss. He gave her the address and waited a moment while she wrote it down.

  "I've got some other stuff, too," he said. "I made some calls."

  "You've been busy for just a day back on the job. What've you got?"

  He recounted the phone calls he made and received after she had left the office. Rider asked no questions and then was silent after he finished.

  "That brings you up to date," Bosch said. "What do you think, Kiz?"

  "I think there might be a picture coming together, Harry."

  "Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. Plus, the year, nineteen eighty-eight. I think you were onto something about that. Maybe these assholes were trying to prove a point in 'eighty-eight. The problem is, it all went under the door at PDU. Who knows where all of that stuff ended up. Irving probably dumped it in the evidence incinerator at the ESB."

  "Not all of it. When the new chief came in he wanted a full assessment of everything. He wanted to know where the bodies were buried. Anyway, I wasn't involved in that but I knew about it and I heard that a lot of the PDU files were kept after the unit was disbanded. A lot of it Irving put in Special Archives."

  "Special Archives? What the hell is that?"

  "It just means limited access. You need command approval. It's all in the basement at Parker Center. It's mostly in-house investigations. Political stuff. Dangerous stuff. This Chatsworth business doesn't really seem to qualify, unless it was connected to something else."

  "Like what?"

  "Like somebody in the department or somebody in the city."

  The latter meant someone powerful in city politics.

  "Can you get in there and see if any files on this still exist? What about your pal on six? Maybe he'd -"

  "I can try."

  "Then try."

  "First thing. What about you? I thought you were going out to find Robert Verloren tonight, and now I hear you were following our suspect."

  "I went down there. I didn't find him."

  He proceeded to update her on his earlier swing through the Toy District, leaving out his encounter with the would-be robbers. That incident and the phone fiasco behind Mackey's house were not things he cared to share with her.

  "I'll go back out there tomorrow morning," he said in conclusion.

  "Okay, Harry. Sounds like a plan. I should have the warrant together by the time you get in. And I'll check on the PDU files."

  Bosch hesitated but then decided not to hold back any warnings or concerns with his partner. He looked out the windshield at the dark street. He could hear the hiss from the nearby freeway.

  "Kiz, be careful."

  "How do you mean, Harry?"

  "You know what it means when a case has high jingo?"

  "Yeah, it means it's got command staff's fingers in the pie."

  "That's right."

  "And so?"

  "So be careful. This thing has Irving all over it. It's not that obvious but it's there."

  "You think his little visit with you at the coffee counter wasn't coincidence?"

  "I don't believe in coincidences. Not like that."

  There was silence for a bit before Rider answered.

  "Okay, Harry, I'll watch myself. No holding back, though, right? We take it where it goes and let the chips fall. Everybody counts or nobody counts, remember?"

  "Right. I remember. I'll see you tomorrow."

  "Good night, Harry."

  She hung up and Bosch sat in the car for a long time before turning the key.

  19

  BOSCH STARTED THE ENGINE, pulled a slow U-turn on Mariano and drove by the driveway that led to Mackey's house. It appeared to be all quiet down there. He saw no lights behind the windows.

  He cut over to the freeway and took it east across the Valley and then down into the Cahuenga Pass. On the way he used his cell phone to call central dispatch and run the plate off the Ford pickup that Mackey had parked next to. It came back registered to a William Burkhart, who was thirty-seven years old and had a criminal record dating back to the late 1980s but nothing else in fifteen years. The dispatcher gave Bosch the California penal code numbers for his arrests because that's how they were listed on the computer.

  Bosch immediately recognized aggravated assault and receiving stolen property charges. But there was one charge in 1988 with a code that he didn't recognize.

  "Anybody there with a code book who can tell me what that is?" he asked, hoping things were quiet enough that the dispatcher would just do it herself. He knew that copies of the penal code were always in the dispatch center because officers often called in to get the proper citations when they were in the field.

  "Hold on."

  He waited. Meantime, he exited on Barham and took Woodrow Wilson up into the hills toward his home.

  "Detective?"

  "Still here."

  "That was a hate crime violation."

  "Okay. Thanks for looking it up."

  "No problem."

  Bosch pulled into his carport and killed the engine. Mackey's roommate or landlord was charged with a hate crime in 1988-the same year as the murder of Rebecca Verloren. William Burkhart was likely the same Billy Burkhart whom Sam Weiss had identified as a neighbor and one of his tormentors. Bosch didn't know how all of this fit together but he knew it was part of the same picture. He now wished he had taken home the Department of Corrections file on Mackey. He was feeling too tired to go all the way back downtown to get it. He decided he would leave it be for the night and read it cover to cover when he got back to the office the next day. He would also get the file on William Burkhart's hate crime arrest.

  The house was quiet when he got inside. He grabbed the phone and a beer out of the box and headed out onto the deck to check on the city. On the way he turned on the CD player. There was already a disc in the machine and he soon heard the voice of Boz Scaggs on the outside speakers. He was singing "For All We Know."

  The song competed with the muted sound of the freeway down below. Bosch looked out and saw there were no searchlights cutting across the sky from Universal Studios. It was too late for that. Still, the view was captivating in the way it could only be at night. The city shimmered out there like a million dreams, not all of them good.

  Bosch thought about calling Kiz Rider back and telling her about the William Burkhart connection but decided to let it wait until the morning. He looked out at the city and felt satisfied with the
day's moves and accomplishments, but he was also out of sorts. High jingo did that to you.

  The man with the knife had not been too far off in calling him a missionary man. He almost had it right. Bosch knew he had a mission in life and now, after three years, he was back on the beat. But he could not bring himself to believe it was all good. He felt that there was something out there beyond the shimmering lights and dreams, something he could not see. It was waiting for him.