Nine Dragons (7 page)

“She’s a
chin
derella,” Chu said. “Stays home and does the cooking and cleaning, stuff like that. Almost like a servant to her parents.”

“They don’t want them to get married and leave the house?”

“No, man, it’s free labor. Why would they want her to get married? Then they’d have to hire a maid and a chef and a driver. This way they get them all and don’t have to pay.”

Bosch drove silently for a while after that, thinking about the life Mia-ling Li lived. He doubted anything would change with the death of her father. There was still her mother to care for.

He remembered something relating to the case and spoke again.

“She said the family would probably close the store now and just keep the one in the Valley.”

“It wasn’t making any money, anyway,” Chu said. “They might be able to sell it to somebody in the community and make a little bit.”

“Not much for almost thirty years there.”

“The Chinese immigrant story is not always a happy one,” Chu said.

“What about you, Chu? You’re a success.”

“I’m not an immigrant. My parents were.”

“Were?”

“My mother died young. My father was a fisherman. One time his boat went out and it never came back.”

Bosch was silenced by the matter-of-fact way Chu had told his family tragedy. He concentrated on the drive. Traffic was rough and it took them forty-five minutes to get to Sherman Oaks. Fortune Fine Foods & Liquor was on Sepulveda just a block south of Ventura Boulevard. This put it in an upscale neighborhood of apartments and condominiums below the even more upscale hillside residences. It was in a good location but there didn’t seem to be enough parking. Bosch found a spot on the street in front of a fire hydrant. He flipped down the visor, which had a card clipped to it showing a city vehicle identification code, and got out.

Bosch and Chu had worked out a plan during the long ride up. They believed that if anyone knew about the triad payoffs besides the victim, it would be the son and fellow shop manager, Robert. Why he would not have told the detectives about this the day before was the big question.

Fortune Fine Foods & Liquor was something completely different from its counterpart in South L.A. This store was at least five times bigger and it was brimming with the high-end touches that befit its neighborhood.

There was a do-it-yourself coffee bar. The wine aisles had overhead signs displaying varietals and world regions of wine, and there were no gallon jugs stacked at the end. The cold cases were well lighted with open shelves instead of glass doors. There were aisles of specialty foods and hot and cold counters where customers could order fresh steaks and fish or precooked meals of roast chicken, meatloaf and barbecued ribs. The son had taken his father’s business and advanced it several levels. Bosch was impressed.

There were two checkout stations and Chu asked one of the women behind them where Robert Li was. The detectives were directed to a set of double doors that led to a stockroom with ten-foot-high shelves against all the walls. To the far left was a door marked
OFFICE
. Bosch knocked and Robert Li promptly answered the door.

He looked surprised to see them.

“Detectives, come in,” he said. “I am so sorry about not getting downtown today. My assistant manager called in sick and I can’t leave the place without a supervisor. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Bosch said. “We’re only trying to find your father’s killer.”

Bosch wanted to put the kid on the defensive. Interviewing him in his own surroundings put him at an advantage. Bosch wanted to bring some discomfort to the situation. If Li was on the defensive he’d be more forthcoming and willing to try to please his interviewers.

“Well, I am sorry. I thought all I needed to do was sign my statement, anyway.”

“We have your statement but it’s a little more involved than signing papers, Mr. Li. It’s an ongoing investigation. Things change. More information comes in.”

“All I can do is apologize. Have a seat, please. I’m sorry the space is so tight in here.”

The office was narrow and Bosch could tell it was a shared office. There were two desks side by side against the right wall. Two desk chairs and two folding chairs, probably for sales representatives and job interviews.

Li picked up the phone on his desk, dialed a number and told someone he was not to be disturbed. He then made an open-hands gesture, signaling he was ready to go.

“First of all, I’m a little surprised that you are working today,” Bosch said. “Your father was murdered yesterday.”

Li nodded solemnly.

“I am afraid that I have been given no time to grieve for my father. I must run the business or there will be no business to run.”

Bosch nodded and signaled to Chu to take over. He had typed up Li’s statement. As he went over it with Li, Bosch looked around the office. On the wall over the desks were framed licenses from the state, Li’s 2004 diploma from the business school at the University of Southern California and an honorable-mention certificate for best new store of 2007 from the American Grocers Association. There were also framed photos of Li with Tommy Lasorda, the former manager of the Dodgers, and a teenage Li standing at the steps of the Tian Tan Buddha in Hong Kong. Just as he had recognized Lasorda, Bosch recognized the one-hundred-foot-high bronze sculpture known as the Big Buddha. He had once journeyed with his daughter to Lantau Island to see it.

Bosch reached across and straightened the cockeyed frame of the USC diploma. In doing so he noticed that Li had graduated from the school with honors. He thought for a moment about Robert going off to the university and getting the opportunity to take his father’s business and turn it into something bigger and better. Meantime, his older sister dropped out of school, came home and made the beds.

Li asked for no changes to his statement and signed the bottom of each page. When he was finished he looked up at a wall clock hung over the door and Bosch could tell he thought they were done.

But they weren’t. Now it was Bosch’s turn. He opened his briefcase and removed a file. From it he took the photo print of the bagman who had collected money from Li’s father. Bosch handed it to Li.

“Tell me about this guy,” he said.

Li held the printout in both hands and knitted his eyebrows as he looked at it. Bosch knew that people did this to show they were earnestly concentrating, but it usually was a cover for something else. Bosch knew that he had probably taken a call in the last hour from his mother and had known that he might be shown the printout. However Li responded, Bosch knew he would not be truthful.

“I can’t tell you anything,” Li said after a few seconds. “I don’t recognize him. I’ve never seen him.”

He handed the printout back to Bosch but Harry didn’t take it.

“But you know who he is, don’t you.”

It wasn’t really said as a question.

“No, actually, I don’t,” Li said, mild annoyance in his voice.

Bosch smiled at him but it was one of those that carried no warmth or humor.

“Mr. Li, did your mother call you and tell you we would be showing you that picture?”

“No.”

“We can check the phones, you know.”

“So what if she did? She didn’t know who it was and neither do I.”

“You want us to find the person who killed your father, right?”

“Of course! What kind of question is that?”

“It’s the kind of question I ask when I know somebody is holding something back from me and that it—”

“What? How dare you!”

“—could be very useful to my investigation.”

“I am holding nothing back! I don’t know this man. I don’t know his name and I have never seen him before! That is the goddamn truth!”

Li’s face grew flushed. Bosch waited a moment and then spoke calmly.

“You might be telling the truth. You might not know his name and maybe you’ve never seen him before. But you know who he is, Robert. You know your father was making payoffs. Maybe you are, too. If you think there is any danger involved in talking to us, then we can protect you.”

“Absolutely,” Chu chimed in.

Li shook his head and smiled like he couldn’t believe the situation he had found himself in. He started breathing heavily.

“My father just died—he was killed. Can’t you leave me alone? Why am I being badgered? I’m a victim here, too.”

“I wish we could leave you alone, Robert,” Bosch said. “But if we don’t find the party responsible, there’s nobody else who will. You don’t want that, do you?”

Li seemed to compose himself and shook his head.

“Look,” Bosch continued. “We have a signed statement here. Nothing you tell us now has to go beyond this room. No one will ever know what you tell us.”

Bosch reached over and ticked the printout with his finger. Li was still holding it.

“Whoever killed your father took the disc out of the recorder in the back but left the old discs. This guy was on it. He took a payment from your father at the same time and on the same day a week before the murder. Your father gave him two hundred sixteen dollars as a payoff. The guy is triad and I think you know it. You have to help us out here, Robert. There’s nobody else who can.”

Bosch waited. Li put the printout on the desk and rubbed his sweating palms down the thighs of his blue jeans.

“Okay, yes, my father paid the triad,” he said.

Bosch breathed slowly. They had just made a big step. He wanted to keep Li talking.

“For how long?” he asked.

“I don’t know, all his life—all my life, I guess. It was just something he always did. To him, it was part of being Chinese. You paid.”

Bosch nodded.

“Thank you, Robert, for telling us this. Now, yesterday you told us that with the economy and everything, things were not going so well at the store. Do you know, was your father behind on his payments?”

“I don’t know, maybe. He didn’t tell me. We didn’t see eye to eye on that.”

“What do you mean?”

“I didn’t think he should pay. I told him a million times. This is America, Pop, you don’t have to pay them.”

“But he still paid.”

“Yeah, every week. He was just old school.”

“So you don’t pay here?”

Li shook his head but his eyes darted to the side a moment. An easy giveaway.

“You do pay, don’t you?”

“No.”

“Robert, we need the—”

“I don’t pay, because he paid for me. Now I don’t know what will happen.”

Bosch leaned closer to him.

“You mean your father paid for both stores.”

“Yes.”

Li’s eyes were cast down. He rubbed his palms on his pants again.

“The double payment—one oh eight times two—was to cover both stores.”

“That’s right. Last week.”

Li nodded and Bosch thought he saw tears welling in his eyes. Harry knew the next question was the most important one.

“What happened this week?”

“I don’t know.”

“But you have an idea, right, Robert?”

He nodded again.

“Both stores are losing money. We expanded at the wrong time—right before the downturn. The banks get the government bailout but not us. We could lose everything. I told him…I told my father we couldn’t keep paying. I told him we were paying for nothing and we were going to lose the stores if we didn’t stop.”

“Did he say he would stop making the payments?”

“He didn’t say that. He didn’t say anything. I thought that meant he was going to keep on paying until we were out of business. It was adding up. Eight hundred dollars a month is a lot in a business like this. My old man, he thought if he found other ways…”

His voice trailed off.

“Other ways of what, Robert?”

“Other ways of saving money. He became obsessed with catching shoplifters. He thought if he stopped the losses he’d make a difference. He was from a different time. He didn’t get it.”

Bosch leaned back in his chair and looked over at Chu. They had broken through and gotten Li to open up. It would now be Chu’s turn to move in with specific questions relating to the triad.

“Robert, you have been very helpful,” Chu said. “I want to ask you a few questions in regard to the man in the photo.”

“I was telling the truth. I don’t know who he is. I never saw him before in my life.”

“Okay, but did your father ever talk about him when, you know, you were discussing the payments?”

“He never used his name. He just said he would be upset if we stopped the payments.”

“Did he ever mention the name of the group he paid? The triad?”

Li shook his head.

“No, he never—wait, yes, he did once. It was something about a knife. Like the name came from a kind of knife or something. But I don’t remember it.”

“Are you sure? That could help us narrow it.”

Li frowned and shook his head again.

“I’ll try to remember it. I can’t right now.”

“Okay, Robert.”

Chu continued the interview but his questions were too specific and Li continually answered that he didn’t know. All that was okay with Bosch. They had made a big breakthrough. He saw the case coming together with a stronger focus now.

After a while Chu finished up and passed the baton back to Bosch.

“Okay, Robert,” Harry said. “Do you think the man or men your father was paying will now come to you for the money?”

The question prompted a deep frown from Li.

“I don’t know,” he said.

“Do you want protection from the LAPD?”

“I don’t know that either.”

“Well, you have our numbers. If someone shows up, cooperate. Promise him the money if you have to.”

“I don’t have the money!”

“That’s the point. Promise him the money but say it will take you a day to get it. Then call us. We’ll take it from there.”

“What if he just takes it out of the cash registers? You told me yesterday that the cash drawer was empty in my father’s store.”

“If he does that, let him and then you call us. We’ll get him when he comes back the next time.”

Li nodded and Bosch could see he had thoroughly spooked the young man.

“Robert, do you have a gun in the store?”

It was a test. They had already checked gun records. Only the gun in the other store was registered.