The Concrete Blonde (46 page)

“Too bad Locke's the fucking suspect. It'd be nice to ask him what all this means.”

“Detective Harry Bosch!” a voice called from downstairs. “Harry Bosch!”

Bosch walked to the top of the stairs and looked down. A young patrolman, the one who was keeping the scene attendance log at the tape, stood in the entry area looking up.

“Guy at the tape wants to come in. Said he's a shrink who's been working with you.”

Bosch looked over at Edgar. Their eyes looked. He looked back down at the patrolman.

“What's his name?”

The patrolman looked down at his clipboard and read off, “John Locke, from USC.”

“Send him in.”

Bosch started down the stairs and beckoned to Edgar with his hand. He said, “I'm taking him into her office. Tell Hans Off and then come down.”

Bosch told Locke to sit in the chair behind the desk while he chose to stay standing. Through the window behind the psychologist, Bosch saw the press gathering into a tight group in preparation for a briefing by someone from media relations.

“Don't touch anything,” Bosch said. “What're you doing here?”

“I came as soon as I heard,” Locke said. “But I thought you said you had the suspect under surveillance.”

“We did. It was the wrong guy. How did you hear?”

“It's all over the radio. I heard it while I was driving in and came right here. They didn't put out the exact address but once I got to Carmelina this wasn't hard to find. Just follow the helicopters.”

Edgar slipped into the room then and closed the door.

“Detective Jerry Edgar, meet Dr. John Locke.”

Edgar nodded but made no move to shake his hand. He stayed back, leaning against the door.

“Where've you been? We've been trying to find you since yesterday.”

“Vegas.”

“Vegas? Why'd you go to Vegas?”

“Why else, to gamble. I'm also thinking about a book project on the legal prostitutes that work in the towns north of—look, aren't we wasting time here? I'd like to view the body in situ. Then I could give you a read on it.”

“Body's already moved, Doc,” Edgar said.

“It is? Shit. Maybe I could survey the scene and—”

“We've already got too many people up there right now,” Bosch said. “Maybe later. What do you make of bite marks? Cigarette burns?”

“Are you saying that's what you've found this time?”

“Plus, it wasn't a bimbo from the sex tabs,” Edgar added. “He came here, she didn't come to him.”

“He is changing quickly. It appears to be complete disassembling. Or some unknown force or reason compelling his actions.”

“Such as?” Bosch asked.

“I don't know.”

“We tried to call you in Vegas. You never checked in.”

“Oh, the Stardust? Well, coming in I saw the new MGM had just opened and decided to see if they had a room. They did. I was there.”

“Anyone with you?” Bosch asked.

“The whole time?” Edgar added.

A puzzled look came over Locke's face.

“What is going—”

He understood now. He shook his head.

“Harry, are you kidding?”

“No. Are you, coming here like this?”

“I think you—”

“No, don't answer that. Tell you what, it would probably be best for all of us if you know your rights before we go any further. Jerry, you got a card?”

Edgar pulled out his wallet and from it took a white plastic card with the Miranda warning printed on it. He started reading it to Locke. Both Bosch and Edgar knew the warning by heart but a departmental memo that was distributed with the plastic card said it was best practice to read directly from a card. This made it difficult for a defense attorney to later attack in court how the police administered the rights warning to a client.

As Edgar read the card, Bosch looked out the window at the huge clot of reporters standing around one of the deputy chiefs. He saw that Bremmer was there now. But the deputy chief's words must not have meant much; the reporter was not writing anything down. He was just standing to the side of the pack and smoking. He was probably waiting for the real info from the real guns, Irving and Rollenberger.

“Am I under arrest?” Locke asked when Edgar was done.

“Not yet,” said Edgar.

“We just need to clear some things up,” Bosch said.

“I resent the hell out of this.”

“I understand. Now, do you want to clear this trip to Vegas up? Was there anyone with you?”

“From six o'clock Friday until I got out of my car down the block ten minutes ago, there has been a person with me every minute of every day except when I was in the bathroom. This is ridic—”

“And that is who, this person?”

“It's a friend of mine. Her name is Melissa Mencken.”

Bosch remembered the young woman named Melissa who was in Locke's front office.

“The child-psych major? From your office? The blonde?”

“That's right,” Locke answered reluctantly.

“And she will tell us you were together the whole time? Same room, same hotel, same everything, right?”

“Yes. She'll confirm it all. We were just coming back when we heard about this on the radio. KFWB. She's out there waiting for me in the car. Go talk to her.”

“What kind of car?”

“It's the blue Jag. Look, Harry, you go talk to her and clear this up. If you don't make noise about me being with a student, I won't make a sound about this … this interrogation.”

“This is no interrogation, Doctor. Believe me, if we interrogate you, you'll know it.”

He nodded to Edgar, who slipped out the door to go find the Jag. When they were alone, Bosch pulled a high-backed chair away from the wall and sat down in front of the desk to wait.

“What happened to the suspect you were following, Harry?”

“We did.”

“What's that supposed to—”

“Never mind.”

They sat in silence for nearly five minutes until Edgar stuck his head in the door and signaled Bosch to come out.

“Checks out, Harry. I talked to the girl and her story is the same. There also were credit card receipts in the car. They checked into the MGM Saturday at three. There was a gas receipt in Victorville, had the time on it. Nine o'clock in the morning Saturday. Victorville's what an hour away. Looks like they were on the road when Chandler got it. Besides, the girl says they also spent Friday night together at his house in the hills. We can do some more checking but I think he's being legit with us.”

“Well … ,” Bosch said, not completing the thought. “Why don't you go up and spread the word that he looks clear. I want to take him up to look around, if he still wants to.”

“Will do.”

Bosch went back into the study. He sat in the chair that was in front of the desk. Locke studied him.

“Well?”

“She's too scared, Locke. She isn't going along. She's telling us the truth.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Locke yelled.

Now Bosch studied him. The surprise on his face, the utter fright, was too genuine. Bosch was sure now. He was sorry, yet felt some perverse feeling of power, having run Locke through the scam.

“You're clear, Dr. Locke. Just had to be sure. I guess the criminal only comes back to the scene of the crime in movies.”

Locke took a deep breath and looked down into his lap. Bosch thought he looked like a driver who had just pulled to the side of the road to collect himself after missing a head-on collision with a truck by a matter of inches.

“Goddammit, Bosch, for a minute there, I had bad dreams, you know?”

Bosch nodded. He knew about bad dreams.

“Edgar's going up to smooth the way. He's going to ask the lieutenant if you can go up and give a read on the scene. If you still want to.”

“Excellent,” he said, but there wasn't much excitement left in him.

They sat in silence after that. Bosch took out his cigarettes and found the pack empty. But he put the pack back in his pocket so as not to leave false evidence in the trash can.

He didn't feel like talking to Locke anymore. Instead, he looked past him and out the window at the activity on the street. The media pack had dispersed after the briefing. Now some of the TV reporters were taping their reports with the “death house” behind them. Bosch could see Bremmer interviewing the neighbors across the street and writing feverishly in his notebook.

Edgar came in then and said, “We're ready for him upstairs.”

Staring out the window, Bosch said, “Jerry, can you take him up? I just thought of something I need to do.”

Locke stood up and looked at the two detectives.

“Fuck you,” he said, “Both of you. Fuck you… . There, I just had to say that. Now, let's forget about it and go to work.”

He crossed the room to Edgar. Bosch stopped him at the door.

“Dr. Locke?”

He turned back to Bosch.

“When we catch this guy, he'll want to gloat, won't he?”

Locke thought for a while and said, “Yes, he'll be very pleased with himself, his accomplishments. That might be the hardest part for him, keeping quiet when he knows he should. He'll want to gloat.”

They left then and Bosch looked out the window for a few more minutes before getting up.

Some of the reporters who knew who he was pressed against the yellow tape and began shouting questions as he came out. He ducked under the tape and said he could make no comment and that Chief Irving was coming out soon. That seemed to mollify them temporarily and he started walking down the street to his car.

He knew Bremmer was the master of the anti-pack. He always let the pack move in and do their thing, then he came in after, by himself, to get what he wanted. Bosch wasn't mistaken. Bremmer showed up at the car.

“Pullin' out already, Harry?”

“No, I just need to get something.”

“Pretty bad in there?”

“Is this on or off the record?”

“Whatever you like.”

Bosch opened the car door.

“Off the record, yes, it's pretty bad in there. On the record, no comment.”

He leaned in and made a show of looking in the glove compartment and not finding what he wanted.

“What are you guys calling this one? I mean, you know, since the Dollmaker was already taken.”

Bosch got back out.

“The Follower. That's off the record, too. Ask Irving.”

“Catchy.”

“Yeah, I thought you reporters would like that.”

Bosch pulled the empty cigarette pack out of his pocket, crumpled it and threw it into the car and closed the door.

“Give me a smoke, will you?”

“Sure.”

Bremmer pulled a soft pack of Marlboros out of his sport coat and shook one out for Bosch. Then he lit it for him with a Zippo. With his left hand.

“Hell of a city we live in, Harry, isn't it.”

“Yeah. This city …”

31

At 7:30 that night, Bosch was sitting in the Caprice in the back parking lot of St. Vibiana's in downtown. From his angle, he could look a half block up Second Street to the corner at Spring. But he couldn't see the
Times
building. That didn't matter, though. He knew that every
Times
employee without parking privileges in the executive garage would have to cross the corner of Spring and Second to get to one of the employee garages a half block down Spring. He was waiting for Bremmer.

After leaving the scene at Honey Chandler's house, Bosch had gone home and slept for two hours. Then he had paced in his house on the hill, thinking about Bremmer and seeing how perfectly he fit the mold. He called Locke and asked a few more general questions about the psychology of the Follower. But he did not tell Locke about Bremmer. He told no one about this, thinking three strikes and you're out. He came up with a plan, then dropped by Hollywood Division to gas up the Caprice and get the equipment he would need.

And now he waited. He watched a steady procession of homeless people walking down Second. As if heeding a siren's call, they were heading toward the Los Angeles Mission a few blocks away for a meal and a bed. Many carried with them or pushed in shopping carts their life's belongings.

Bosch never took his eyes off the corner but his mind drifted far from there. He thought of Sylvia and wondered what she was doing at that moment and what she was thinking. He hoped she didn't take too long to decide, because he knew his mind's instinctual protective devices and responses had begun to react. He was already looking at the positives that would come if she didn't come back. He told himself she made him weak. Hadn't he thought of her immediately when he found the note from the Follower? Yes, she had made him vulnerable. He told himself she might not be good for his life's mission, let her go.

His heartbeat jacked up a notch when he saw Bremmer step onto the corner and then walk in the direction of the parking garages. A building blocked Bosch's view after that. He quickly started the car and pulled out onto Second and up to Spring.

Down the block Bremmer entered the newer garage with a card key and Bosch watched the auto door and waited. In five minutes a blue Toyota Celica came out of the garage and slowed while the driver checked for traffic on Spring. Bosch could see clearly it was Bremmer. The Celica pulled onto Spring and so did Bosch.

Bremmer headed west on Beverly and into Hollywood. He made one stop at a Vons and came out fifteen minutes later with a single bag of groceries. He then proceeded to a neighborhood of single-family homes just north of the Paramount studio. He drove down the side of a small stuccoed house and parked in the detached garage in the back. Bosch pulled to the curb one house away and waited.

All the houses in the neighborhood were one of three basic designs. It was one of the cookie-cutter victory neighborhoods that had sprung up after World War II in the city, with affordable homes for returning servicemen. Now you'd probably need to be making a general's pay to buy in. The ‘80s did that. The occupation army of yuppies had the place now.

Each lawn had a little tin sign planted in it. They were from three or four different home-security companies but they all said the same thing. ARMED RESPONSE. It was the epitaph of the city. Sometimes Bosch thought the Hollywood sign should be taken down off the hill and replaced with those two words.