Michael Connelly - 9 Dragons

Even with the wadding around the gun, the two reports echoed loudly in the car. The car swerved slightly as Sun looked into the backseat. And Eleanor yelled.

“What the hell did you do?”

Bosch dropped the pillow to the floor and raised the window. The car smelled like burnt gunpowder but it was quiet again. He unwrapped the blanket and checked the weapon. It had fired easily and without a jam. He was down to fourteen bullets and was good to go.

“I had to make sure it worked,” he said. “You don’t carry a gun unless you’re sure.”

“ Are you crazy? You could get us arrested before we get a chance to do anything!”

“If you keep your voice down and Sun Yee stays in his lane, I think we’ll be fine.”

Bosch leaned forward and tucked the weapon into his waistband at the small of his back. Its slide was warm against his skin. Up ahead he saw light at the end of the tunnel. They would be in Kowloon soon.

It was time.

The tunnel delivered them to Tsim Sha Tsui, the central waterside section of Kowloon, and within a few minutes Sun turned the Mercedes onto Nathan Road. It was a wide, four-lane boulevard lined with high-rise buildings as far as Bosch could see. It was a crowded mix of commercial and residential uses. The first two floors of every building were dedicated to retail and restaurant space, while the floors rising above were residential or office space. The clutter of video screens and signs in Chinese and English was an intense riot of color and motion. The buildings ranged from dowdy midcentury construction to the slick glass-and-steel structures of recent prosperity.

It was impossible for Bosch to see the top of the corridor from the car. He lowered his window and leaned out in an effort to find the Canon sign, the first marker from the photo generated from his daughter’s abduction video. He couldn’t find it and pulled back into the car. He raised the window.

“Sun Yee, stop the car.”

Sun looked at him in the rearview.

“Stop here”

“Yes, here. I can’t see. I have to get out.”

Sun looked at Eleanor for approval and she nodded.

“We’ll get out. You find a place to park.”

Sun pulled to the curb and Bosch jumped out. He’d taken the photo print from his backpack and had it ready. Sun then pulled away, leaving Eleanor and Bosch on the sidewalk. It was now midmorning and the streets and sidewalks were crowded with people. Smoke was in the air and the smell of fire. The hungry ghosts were close. The streetscape was replete with neon, mirrored glass and giant plasma screens broadcasting silent images of jerking motion and staccato edits.

Bosch referred to the photo and then looked up and traced the skyline.

“Where’s the Canon sign?” he asked.

“Harry, you’re mixed up,” Eleanor said.

She put her hands on his shoulders and turned him completely around.

“Remember, everything is backwards.”

She pointed almost directly up, her finger drawing a line up the side of the building they were in front of. Bosch looked up. The Canon sign was directly overhead and at an angle that made it unreadable. He was looking at the bottom edge of the sign’s letters. It was rotating slowly.

“Okay, got it,” he said. “We start from there.”

He looked back down and referred to the photo.

“I think we have to go at least another block further in from the harbor.”

“Let’s wait for Sun Yee.”

“Call him and tell him where we’re going.”

Bosch started off. Eleanor had no choice but to follow.

“All right, all right.”

She pulled her phone and started to make the call. As he walked, Bosch kept his eyes high on the buildings, looking for air-conditioning units. A block here was several buildings long. Looking up as he walked, he had a few near misses with other pedestrians. There seemed to be no collective uniformity of walking to your right. People moved every which way and Bosch had to pay attention to avoid collisions. At one point the people moving in front of him suddenly stepped left and right and Bosch almost stumbled over an old woman lying on the pavement, her hands clasped in beseeching prayer above a coin basket. Bosch was able to avoid her and reached into his pocket at the same time.

Eleanor quickly put her hand on his arm.

“No. They say any money you give them is taken by the triads at the end of the day.”

Bosch didn’t question it. He stayed focused on what was ahead of him. They walked another two blocks and then Bosch saw and heard another piece of the puzzle drop into place. Across the street was an entrance to the Mass Transit Railway. A glass enclosure leading to the escalators down to the underground subway.

“Wait,” Bosch said, stopping. “We’re close.”

“What is it?” Eleanor asked.

“The MTR. You could hear it on the video.”

As if on cue the growing whoosh of escaping air rose as a train came into the underground station. It sounded like a wave. Bosch looked down at the photo in his hand and then up at the buildings surrounding him.

“Let’s cross.”

“Can we just wait a minute for Sun Yee? I can’t tell him where to meet us if we keep moving.”

“Once we’re across.”

They hurried across the street on a flashing pedestrian signal. Bosch noticed several ragtag women begging for coins near the MTR entrance. More people were coming up out of the station than were going down. Kowloon was getting more and more crowded. The air was thick with humidity and Bosch could feel his shirt sticking to his back.

Bosch turned around and looked up. They were in an area of older construction. It was almost like having walked through first class to economy on a plane. The buildings on this block and heading further in were shorter-in the twenty-story range-and in poorer condition than those in the blocks closer to the harbor. Harry noticed many open windows and many individual air-conditioning boxes hanging from windows. He could feel the reservoir of adrenaline inside open up.

“Okay, this is it. She’s in one of these buildings.”

He started moving down the block to get away from the crowding and loud conversations surrounding the MTR entrance. He kept his eyes on the upper levels of the buildings surrounding him. He was in a concrete canyon and somewhere up there in one of the crevices was his missing daughter.

“Harry, stop! I just told Sun Yee to meet us at the MTR entrance.”

“You wait for him. I’ll be just down here.”

“No, I’m coming with you.”

Halfway down the block, Bosch stopped and referred to the photo again. But there was no final clue that helped him. He knew he was close but he had reached a point where he needed help or it would be a guessing game. He was surrounded by thousands of rooms and windows. It was beginning to dawn on him that the final part of his search was impossible. He had traveled more than seven thousand miles to find his daughter and he was about as helpless as the ragtag women begging coins from the pavement.

“Let me see the photo,” Eleanor said.

Bosch handed it to her.

“There’s nothing else,” he said. “All these buildings look the same.”

“Let me just look.”

She took her time and Bosch watched her regress two decades to the time she was an FBI agent. Her eyes narrowed and she analyzed the photo as an agent, not as the mother of a missing girl.

“Okay,” she said. “There’s got to be something here.”

“I thought it would be the air conditioners but they’re on every building around here.”

Eleanor nodded but kept her eyes on the photo. Just then Sun came up, his face flushed from the exertion of trying to track a moving target. Eleanor said nothing to him but slightly moved her arm to share the photo with him. They had reached a point in their relationship where words weren’t necessary.