Michael Connelly - 9 Dragons

As he walked out the store’s automatic door, Bosch was excited. The case had new life. He pulled his phone and checked on the suspect.

“We’re all the way back to his apartment,” Chu said. “No stops. I think he might be in for the night.”

“It’s too early. It’s not even dark.”

“Well, all I can tell you is that he booked it home. He pulled the curtains closed, too.”

“Okay. I’m heading that way.”

“You mind picking me up a tofu dog on the way, Harry?”

“No, you’re on your own there, Chu.”

Chu laughed.

“Figures,” he said.

Bosch closed the phone. Chu had obviously caught the case excitement, too.

Chang didn’t come out of his apartment until nine Friday morning. And when he did, he was carrying something that immediately put Bosch on high alert.

A large suitcase.

Bosch phoned Chu to make sure he was awake. They had split the overnight surveillance into four-hour shifts, each man taking a sleeping stint in his car. Chu had the four-to-eight sleep shift but Bosch hadn’t heard from him yet.

“You awake? Chang’s making a move.”

Chu still had sleep in his voice.

“Yeah, what move? You were supposed to call me at eight.”

“He put a suitcase in his car. He’s running. I think he was tipped.”

“To us?”

“No, to buying shares of Microsoft. Don’t play stupid.”

“Harry, who would tip him?”

Chang got into the car and started backing out of his space in the apartment complex parking lot.

“That’s a good goddamn question,” Bosch said. “But if anybody has the answer it’s you.”

“Are you suggesting I tipped off the subject of a major investigation?”

Chu’s voice carried the requisite outrage of the accused.

“I don’t know what you did,” Bosch said. “But you put our business out all over Monterey Park, so now it’s who knows who could’ve tipped this guy. All I know right now is that it looks like he’s splitting town.”

“All over Monterey Park? Are you just making this shit up?”

Bosch followed the Mustang north out of the parking lot, staying a block back.

“You told me the other night that the third guy you showed Chang’s photo to over there made the ID. Okay, so that’s three guys and they all have partners and they all have roll calls and they all talk.”

“Well, maybe this wouldn’t have happened if we didn’t tell Tao and Herrera to back off like we didn’t trust them.”

Bosch checked his mirror for Chu. He was trying not to let his anger distract him from the tail. They couldn’t lose Chang now.

“Move up. We’re heading to the ten. After he gets on, I want you to switch off with me and take the lead.”

“Got it.”

Chu’s voice still held anger. Bosch didn’t care. If Chang had been tipped to the investigation, then Harry would find out who had made the call and he would burn them to the ground, even if it was Chu.

Chang got on the westbound 10 Freeway and soon Chu passed Bosch to take the lead. Bosch glanced over and saw Chu flip him the bird.

Bosch moved over a lane, dropped back and made a call to Lieutenant Gandle.

“Harry, what’s up?”

“We’ve got problems.”

“Tell me.”

“The first one is that our guy put a suitcase in his trunk this morning and is on the ten heading toward the airport.”

“Shit, what else”

“It looks to me like he was tipped, maybe told to get out of town.”

“Or maybe he was told all along to split after he clipped Li. Don’t go off the deep end on that, Harry. Not until you know something for sure.”

It annoyed Bosch that his own lieutenant wasn’t backing him, but he could deal with it. If Chang had been tipped and somewhere along the line the cancer of corruption was in the investigation, Harry would find it. He was sure of that. He let it go for now and concentrated on the choices that involved Chang.

“Do we take Chang down?” he asked.

“You sure he’s flying? Maybe he’s making a delivery or something. How big’s the suitcase?”

“Big. The kind you pack when you’re not coming back.”

Gandle sighed as he put on his plate yet another dilemma and decision to be made.

“Okay, let me talk to some people and I’ll get back to you.”

Bosch assumed that would be Captain Dodds and possibly someone in the district attorney’s office.

“There is some good news, Lieutenant,” he said.

“Holy shit, imagine that,” Gandle exclaimed. “What good news?”

“Yesterday afternoon we tailed Chang to the other store. The one our victim’s son runs in the Valley. He extorted him, told the kid he had to start paying now that his old man was gone.”

“What, this is great! Why didn’t you tell me this?”

“I just did.”

“That gives us probable cause to arrest.”

“To arrest but probably not prosecute. The kid is a reluctant witness. He would have to come in to make the case and I don’t know if he’ll hold up. And either way, it’s not a murder charge. That’s what we want.”

“Well, at the very least, we could stop this guy from getting on a plane.”

Bosch nodded as the beginning of a plan started to form.

“It’s Friday. If we hold on to him and book him late in the day, he wouldn’t get a hearing till Monday afternoon. That would give us at least seventy-two hours to pull a case together.”

“With the extortion being the fallback position.”

“Right.”

Bosch was getting another call beeping in his ear and he assumed it was Chu. He asked Gandle to get back to him as soon as he had run the scenario by the powers that be.

Bosch took the other call without looking at the screen.

“Yeah?”

“Harry?”

It was a woman. He recognized the voice but couldn’t place it.

“Yeah, who’s this”

“Teri Sopp.”

“Oh, hi, I thought it was my partner calling. What’s up?”

“I just wanted you to know I convinced them to use the casing you gave me yesterday in the testing program for electrostatic enhancement. We’ll see if we can raise a print off it.”

“Teri, you’re my hero! Will that be today”

“No, not today. We’re not going back to that till next week. Probably Tuesday.”

Bosch hated to ask for a favor when he had just been given a favor, but he felt he had no choice.

“Teri, is there any way it can be done Monday morning?”

“Monday? I don’t think we’ll get to the actual application un-”

“The reason is, we may have our suspect in jail before the end of the day. We think he’s trying to leave the country and we might need to arrest him. That will give us till Monday to make the case, Teri. We’re going to need everything we can get.”

There was a hesitation before she responded.

“I’ll see what we can do. Meantime, if you arrest him, bring me down a print card so I can make the comparison as soon as I have something on this end. If I have something.”

“You got it, Teri. Thanks a million.”

Bosch closed his phone and searched the freeway in front of him. He saw neither Chu’s car-a red Mazda Miata-nor Chang’s silver Mustang. He realized he had fallen far behind. He hit Chu on speed dial.

“Chu, where are you?”

“South four oh five. He’s going to the airport.”

Bosch was still on the 10 Freeway and saw the 405 interchange up ahead.

“Okay, I’ll catch up.”

“What’s happening?”

“I’ve got Gandle making the call on whether we take Chang down or not.”

“We can’t let him go.”

“That’s what I say. We’ll see what they say.”

“You want me to get my boss involved?”