Michael Connelly - Trunk Music

But it was a weak answer and he knew it. A half million dollars was a lot of cash to use to set somebody up. It was the one flaw in the theory he had just spun.

“She got rid of her husband,” Rider said. “Maybe that was all that was important to her.”

“He’d been screwing around on her for years,” Edgar said. “Why now? What was different this time?”

“I don’t know,” Rider said. “But there was something different or something else we don’t know about. That’s what we have to find out.”

“Yeah, well, good luck,” Edgar said.

“I’ve got an idea,” Bosch said. “If anyone knows what that something else is, it’s Powers. I want to try to scam him and I think I know how. Kiz, you still got that tape, the one with Veronica in it?

“Casualty of Desire? Yeah. It’s in my drawer.”

“Go get it and set it up in the lieutenant’s office. I’m going to grab some more coffee and I’ll meet you there.”

Bosch stepped into interview room three with the box of cash turned so that the side that said Xmas on it was held against his chest. He hoped it looked like any common cardboard box. He watched Powers for a sign of recognition and got none. Powers was sitting just as Bosch had left him. Ramrod straight, his arms behind him as if by choice. He looked at Bosch with deadpan eyes that were ready and waiting for the next go-round. Bosch put the box on the floor where it would be shielded from view, pulled out the chair and sat across from him again. He then reached down, opened the box and took out a tape recorder and a file folder. He put them on the table in plain sight.

“I told you, Bosch, no taping. If you got the camera on the other side of the glass going, then you’re ripping off my rights, too.”

“No camera, no tape, Powers. This is just to play you something, that’s all. Now, where were we?”

“We were to the point of put up or shut up. You cut me loose or you get my lawyer in here.”

“Well, actually, a couple of things have come up. I thought you might want to know about them first. You know, before you make a decision like that.”

“Fuck that. I’m through with this shit. Get me the phone.”

“Do you own a camera, Powers?”

“I said get-a camera? What about it?”

“Do you own a camera? It’s a pretty straightforward question.”

“Yes. Everybody owns a camera. What about it?”

Bosch studied him for a moment. He could feel the momentum and control start to maybe shift just a bit. It was coming across the table from Powers. He could feel it. Bosch played a thin smile on his face. He wanted Powers to know that from this point on it was slipping away from him.

“Did you take the camera with you when you went to Vegas last March?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. I take it on all my vacations. Didn’t know it was a crime. The fucking legislature, what will they think of next?”

Bosch let him have his smile but didn’t return it.

“Is that what you called it?” he said quietly. “A vacation?”

“Yeah, that’s exactly what I called it.”

“That’s funny, because that’s not what Veronica is calling it.”

“I don’t know anything about that or her.”

His eyes momentarily looked away from Bosch. It was the first time, and again Bosch felt the balance shifting. He was playing it right. He felt it. Things were shifting.

“Sure you know about it, Powers. And you know her pretty good, too. She just told us all about it. She’s in the other room right now. Turns out she was weaker than I thought. My money had been on you. You know the saying, the bigger they are the harder they fall, all of that. I thought you’d be the one but it was her. Edgar and Rider broke her down a little while ago. Amazing how crime scene photos can work on somebody’s guilty conscience. She told us everything, Powers. Everything.”

“You’re so full of bullshit, Bosch, and it’s getting pretty old. Where’s the phone?”

“This is how she tells it. You-”

“I don’t want to hear it.”

“You met her when you went up there that night to take the burglary report. One thing led to another and pretty soon you two were having a little romance. An affair to remember. Only she came to her senses and broke it off. She still loved ol’ Tony. She knew he traveled a lot, strayed a lot, but she was used to that. She needed him. So she cut you off. Only, and this is according to her, you wouldn’t be cut off. You kept after her, calling her, following her when she’d leave the estate up there. It was getting scary. I mean, what could she do? Go to Tony and say this guy I had an affair with is following me all the time? She-”

“This is so much bullshit, Bosch. It’s a joke!”

“Then you started following Tony. You see, he was your problem. He was in the way. So you did your homework. You followed him to Vegas and you caught him in the act. You knew just what he was up to and how to put him down in a way that we’d go down the wrong path. Trunk music, they call it. Only you couldn’t carry the tune, Powers. We’re on to you. With her help, we’re going to put you down.”

Powers was looking down at the table. The skin around his eyes and his jawline had drawn tight.

“This is so much crap,” he said without looking up. “I’m tired of listening to it and to you. She’s not in the other room. She’s sitting up there in that big house on the hill. This is the oldest trick in the book.”

Powers looked up and a twisted smile cracked his face.

“You try to pull this shit on a cop? I can’t believe it. This is really weak, man. You’re weak. You’re embarrassing yourself here.”

Bosch reached over to the tape recorder and pushed the play button. Veronica Aliso’s voice filled the tiny room.

“It was him. He’s crazy. I couldn’t stop him until it was too late. Then I couldn’t tell anyone because it…it would look like I-”

Bosch turned it off.

“That’s enough,” he said. “It’s out of line for me to even play that for you. But I thought, cop to cop, you should know where you stand.”

Bosch silently watched Powers as he did a slow burn. Bosch could see the anger boiling up behind his eyes. He didn’t seem to move a muscle, yet he seemed all at once to become as hard as a stack of lumber. He finally was able to hold himself back, though, and compose himself.

“It’s just her word,” he said in a quiet voice. “There’s no corroboration of anything. It’s a fantasy, Bosch. Her word against mine.”

“It could be. Except we have these.”

Bosch opened the file and threw the stack of photos in front of Powers. Then he reached across and carefully fanned them on the table so they could be seen and recognized.

“That backs up a good part of her story, don’t you think?”

Bosch watched as Powers studied the photographs. Once again Powers seemed to go to the edge with an interior rage, but once more he contained it.

“It doesn’t back up shit,” he said. “She could’ve taken these herself. Anybody could have. Just because she gives you a stack of…She’s got you people wrapped up, doesn’t she? You’re buying every line she feeds you.”

“Maybe that would be so, only she didn’t give us the photos.”

Bosch reached into the file again and pulled out a copy of the search warrant. He reached over and put it on top of the photos.

“Five hours ago we faxed that to Judge Warren Lambert at his home in the Palisades. He faxed it back signed. Edgar and Rider have been in your little Hollywood bungalow most of the night. Among the items seized was a Nikon camera with telephoto lens. And these photos. They were under your mattress, Powers.”

He paused here to let it all sink in behind Powers’s darkening eyes.