Michael Connelly: The Drop

“So how’s your girlfriend?” Chu asked, jabbing back at Bosch.

“My girlfriend? Uh, as soon as I meet her I’ll ask how she’s doing and let you know.”

“Come on, Harry. You gotta go for that. I saw the look, man.”

“Didn’t you just fall in and out of the shit by allowing a work relationship to become something more than a work relationship?”

“Your situation is something totally different.”

Bosch’s cell buzzed and he pulled it and looked at the screen. Speak of the devil, it was Hannah Stone. Bosch pointed to the phone as he answered it so Chu would know not to say anything in background.

“Dr. Stone?”

“I guess that means you’re not alone.”

There was stress in her voice.

“No, but what’s up?”

“Um, I don’t know if it means anything but Clayton Pell didn’t come back to the facility last night, and it turns out that he didn’t go to work when he left here after signing the statement for you.”

Bosch stopped on the sidewalk and took a moment to compute this.

“And he’s still not back?”

“No, I just found out when I came in.”

“Did you call his work?”

“Yes, I talked to his boss. He said Clayton called in sick yesterday and never showed. But he left here right after you left. He said he was going to work.”

“Okay, what about his PO? Was he informed last night?”

“Not last night. I just called him before calling you. He said he hadn’t heard anything but would do some checking. Then I called you.”

“Why did you wait until this morning? He’s gone almost twenty-four hours now.”

“I told you; I just found out. Remember, this is a voluntary program. We have rules and everyone must abide by them when they’re here, but when someone takes off like that, there’s really very little you can do about it. You wait and see if they come back and you inform Probation and Parole that he’s left the program. But because of what happened this week and him being a witness in the case, I thought you should know.”

“Okay, I get it. So any idea where he would have gone? Does he have friends or family around?”

“No, he’s got nobody.”

“Okay, I’ll make some calls. Let me know if you hear anything.”

Bosch closed the phone and looked at Chu. An uneasy feeling was rising in his chest. He thought he might know where Pell was.

“Clayton Pell is in the wind. He apparently took off right after we talked to him yesterday.”

“He’s probably. .”

But Chu didn’t finish because he didn’t have a good answer.

Bosch thought he did. He called the communications center and asked an operator to run the name Clayton Pell through the computer to see if he’d had any recent interaction with the justice system.

“Okay,” the operator said. “We have a Clayton Pell arrested yesterday on a two-forty-three felony class.”

Bosch didn’t need a translation on California Penal Code 243. Every cop knew it. Battery on a peace officer.

“What agency?” he asked.

“It was us. But I don’t have the details other than that he was taken into custody at the PAB.”

Bosch had been out of the PAB for most of Tuesday running down the final details for the prosecutor, but when he’d gotten back at the end of the day he’d heard some squad room chatter about a cop having been attacked in the plaza right out front. It was completely unprovoked. The cop suffered a broken nose when the attacker stopped him to ask a question and then inexplicably head-butted him in the face. But the attacker was dismissed in the banter as a crazy and his name was never mentioned.

Bosch now knew what had happened. Pell had made his way downtown and to the PAB with the purpose of getting arrested. This would ensure that he would be booked into the nearby Metropolitan Detention Center, where he knew Hardy was being held. Anyone arrested in downtown by the LAPD would be booked into the MDC, as opposed to any of the other city and county jails that served as regional booking locations.

Bosch disconnected the call, then went to the recent call list on his phone and picked the number of the MDC watch office. It was the number he had called earlier to check on Hardy’s schedule.

“What is it, Harry?” Chu asked.

“Trouble,” Bosch said.

His call was answered.

“Metro Detention, Sergeant Carlyle, can I put you on—”

“No, don’t put me on hold. This is Bosch, LAPD, we spoke a little while ago.”

“Bosch, we’re kind of busy at the moment. I need—”

“Listen, I think there is going to be an attempt on Chilton Hardy’s life. The guy I called about.”

“He’s already gone, Bosch.”

“What do you mean ‘gone’?”

“We put him on the sheriff’s bus. He’s headed to the courthouse for arraignment.”

“Who else is on the bus? Can you check a name? Clayton Pell. That’s Paul-Edward-Lincoln-Lincoln.”

“Hold on.”

Bosch looked at Chu and was about to update him when the watch sergeant came back on the line, unmistakable urgency in his voice.

“Pell is on the bus with Hardy. Who is this guy, and why weren’t we informed that these two had an issue?”

“We can talk about all of that later. Where’s the bus?”

“How would we know? It just left.”

“Do you know the route? Which way does it go?”

“Uh. . I think it’s San Pedro to First and then up to Spring. The garage is on the south side of the courthouse.”

“Okay, get on the phone to the sheriff’s office, tell them what they’ve got and stop the bus. Keep Pell away from Hardy.”

“If it’s not too late.”

Bosch disconnected without reply. He turned and started back toward the PAB.

“Harry, what’s happening?” Chu called out as he followed.

“Pell and Hardy are on the jail bus. We have to stop it.”

Bosch pulled his badge off his belt and held it up as he stepped into the intersection of Spring and First. He raised his hands to stop traffic and moved diagonally across the intersection. Chu followed.

Once they were safely across, Bosch ran to a row of three black-and-whites parked in front of the PAB plaza. A uniformed cop was leaning against the front fender of the first car and busy looking at his phone. Bosch slapped his hand on the roof as he ran up. He was still holding his badge out.

“Hey! Need your car. We’ve got an emergency.”

Bosch opened the front passenger door and jumped in. Chu got in the back.

The uniform jumped off the fender but didn’t go toward the driver’s side door.

“Can’t, man, we’re waiting on the chief. He’s got a homeowner’s mee—”

“Fuck the chief,” Bosch said.

He saw that the officer had left the keys in the ignition and the car running. He raised his legs out of the foot well and slid into the driver’s seat, moving around the shotgun rack and the mobile computer terminal.

“Hey, wait a minute!” the cop yelled.

Bosch dropped the car into drive and bolted away from the curb. He reached up to hit the siren and lights and then sped down First. He went three blocks in ten seconds and then took a wide left turn onto San Pedro, keeping as much speed as he could hold on the curve.

“There!” Chu yelled.

A sheriff’s bus was lumbering down the street and coming toward them. Bosch realized the driver hadn’t gotten the message relayed from Carlyle at MDC. He pinned the accelerator and moved on a direct line toward the bus.

“Harry?” Chu called out from the back. “What are you doing? That’s a bus!”

At the last moment, Bosch hit the brakes and yanked the wheel left, bringing the car into a sideways skid and stopping it in the direct path of the bus. The bus lurched into a skid as well and came to a stop four feet from Chu’s door.