Michael Connelly - Trunk Music

“They’re opening up,” a voice from the car radio reported.

“Gotcha, La Fuentes,” Lindell said back.

The bureau cars were each equipped with a radio pedal and overhead mike on the windshield visor, meaning the driver of each car simply depressed the foot pedal and spoke, avoiding having to raise a microphone to his mouth and possibly being noticed and identified as law enforcement. Bosch had heard that the LAPD was finally getting such equipment, but the narcotics units and specialized surveillance teams were getting it first.

“Lindell,” he said, “you ever go to talk on the radio and slam on the brakes by mistake?”

“Not yet, Bosch. Why?”

“Just curious how all this fancy equipment works.”

“It’s only as good as the people who work it.”

Bosch yawned. He couldn’t remember the last time he had slept. They had driven through the night to get to Las Vegas and then spent the rest of the time planning for the bank surveillance.

“So what do you think, Bosch?” Lindell asked him. “Sooner or later?”

“This morning. They’ll want their money. They don’t want to wait.”

“Yeah, maybe.”

“You think it’s later?”

“If it was me, I’d do it later. That way if there were people out there watching and waiting-whether it’s the bureau or LAPD or Powers or whoever-they’d get cooked in the sun. Know what I mean?”

“Yeah. We sit out here all day and we aren’t going to be very sharp when the time comes.”

Bosch was quiet for a little while after that. From the backseat he studied Lindell. He noticed that the agent had gotten a haircut. There was no sign of the spot where Bosch had hacked off his ponytail.

“You think you’re going to miss it?” Bosch asked.

“Miss what?”

“Being under. The life, I mean.”

“No, it was getting old. I’ll be happy to go straight.”

“Not even the girls?”

Bosch saw Lindell’s eyes take a quick swipe at Baker and then look at Bosch in the rearview mirror. That told Bosch to let that subject go.

“Whaddaya think about the lot now, Don?” Lindell said, changing the subject.

Baker scanned the lot. It was slowly filling up. There was a bagel shop on the far end from the bank, and that was responsible for most of the autos at the moment.

“I think we can take it in, park it by the bagel place,” Baker said. “There’s enough cover now.”

“Okay, then,” Lindell said. He tilted his head slightly so that he was projecting his voice toward the visor. “Uh, La Fuentes, this is Roy Rogers. We’re going to take our position in now. We’ll check ya from the bagel shop. That will be to your posterior. I believe.”

“Roger that,” came the return. “You always wanted to be on my tail end, didn’t you, Roy?”

“Funny guy,” Lindell said.

An hour went by while they watched from their new position and nothing happened. Lindell was able to move their car in closer, parking in front of a card-dealing school about half the parking lot’s length from the bank. It was class day and several would-be dealers had been pulling in and parking. It was good cover.

“I don’t know, Bosch,” Lindell said, breaking a long silence. “You think they’re going to show or not?”

“I never said it was anything more than a hunch. But I still think it all fits. It even fits better since we got here. Last week I found a matchbook in Aliso’s room at the Mirage. It was from La Fuentes. Whether they show or not, I say Tony’s got a box in that bank.”

“Well, I’m thinking about sending Don here in to ask about that. We might be able to call an end to this and stop wasting our time if we find out there’s no box.”

“Well, it’s your call.”

“You got that right.”

A couple more minutes of tense silence went by.

“What about Powers?” Lindell asked.

“What about him?”

“I don’t see him here, either, Bosch. When you got here this morning, you were all hot and heavy about him comin’ out here to find her and blast her full of holes. So where is he?”

“I don’t know, Lindell. But if we’re smart enough to figure this out, so is he. I wouldn’t doubt it if he knew from tailing Tony where the box was all along and just left that out of our little conversation.”

“Wouldn’t surprise me, either. But I still say it’d be stupid for him to come here. He’s got to know we have a fix on this.”

“Stupid isn’t the word. It’s suicidal. But I don’t think he cares. He just wants her to go down. And if he takes a bullet, too, then that’s the way it goes. Like I told you before, he was ready to do the kamikaze scene at the station when he thought she was there.”

“Well, let’s just hope he’s cooled down a little since-”

“There!” Baker barked out.

Bosch followed his pointing finger toward the far corner of the lot, where a white limousine had just pulled in and was moving slowly toward the bank.

“Jesus,” Lindell said. “Don’t tell me he is this stupid.”

All limos looked basically the same to Bosch but somehow Lindell and Baker had recognized the car.

“Is that Joey Marks?”

“It’s his limo. He likes those big whitewalls. It’s the wop in him. I just can’t-he can’t be in there. He’s not going to waste two years of my fucking life making this pickup, is he?”

The limo stopped in the lane in front of the bank. There was no further movement.

“You got this, La Fuentes?” Lindell asked.

“Yeah, we got it,” came a whispered reply, though there was clearly no way anyone in that van could be overheard by someone in the limo.

“Uh, one, two and three, standby,” Lindell continued. “Looks like we might have the fox in the henhouse. Air Jordan, you take five until further. I don’t want you swinging over and spooking anybody.”

This brought a chorus of rogers from the three other ground units and the helicopter.

“On second thought, three, why don’t you come on up by the southwest entrance and stand by there for me,” Lindell said.

“Roger that.”

Finally, the door to the limo opened, but it was on the side blocked from Bosch’s view. He waited, not breathing, and after a beat Captain John Felton emerged from the limo.

“Bingo,” the whisper came over the radio.

Felton then leaned back into the open door and reached in. Veronica Aliso now emerged, Felton’s hand tightly around her arm. Following her, another man emerged at the same time the trunk opened automatically. While this second man, who was wearing gray pants and a shirt with an oval name tag sewn above the breast pocket, went to the trunk, Felton bent down and said something to someone still inside the limo. He never took his hand off Veronica’s arm.

Bosch caught only a glimpse of Veronica’s face then. Though he was an easy thirty yards from her, he could see the fear and weariness. It had probably been the longest night of her life.

The second man pulled a heavy red toolbox from the trunk and followed behind as Felton walked Veronica toward the bank, his arm still gripping her and his head swiveling as he looked about. Bosch saw Felton’s focus linger on the van and then finally look away. The paint job had probably been the deciding factor. It had been a nice touch.

As they walked alongside the old Cadillac, Felton bent down to look at the man working under the hood. Satisfied he was not a threat, Felton straightened up and went on to the glass doors of the bank. Before they disappeared inside, Bosch saw that Veronica was clutching a cloth bag of some kind. Its dimensions were not discernible because it appeared to be empty and folded over on itself.

Bosch didn’t breathe again until they were no longer in sight.