Michael Connelly - The Closers

“Because, like we said, so far we can’t connect this guy to the girl in any way. So we’re thinking there is somebody in the middle in this thing. Mackey either did this for somebody or he got the gun for that somebody to do it himself.”

“There is a third possibility,” Rider added. “That he helped. That girl was carried up a steep hillside. It was either somebody big or somebody with help.”

Pratt took two spoonfuls of yogurt, frowning as he looked down into the tub, before responding.

“Okay, what about the newspaper? You going to be able to make a plant?”

“We think so,” Rider said. “We’re going to use Commander Garcia of Valley Bureau. He was on the case originally. Haunted by the one that got away, that sort of pitch. He says he’s got a connection at the Daily News. ”

“Okay, sounds like a plan. Write up the warrants and give them to me. The captain has to approve them and then they go to the DA’s office for approval before going to the judge. It’s going to take some time. Once we get a judge to okay it we’ll take the other teams off what they’re doing and put them on the wire while you watch our guy.”

Bosch and Rider stood up at the same time. Bosch felt a little charge of adrenaline drop into his blood.

“There’s no chance this guy Mackey is into something right now, is there?” Pratt asked.

“What do you mean?” Bosch asked.

“It’s just that if we could make a case that he was about to commit a crime we could probably expedite the warrants.”

Bosch thought about this.

“We don’t have that now,” he said. “But we could work on it.”

“Good. That would help.”

RIDER WAS THE WRITER. She had an ease with the computer as well as the language of law. Bosch had seen her put these skills to use on several previous investigations. So their decision was unspoken. She would write the warrants seeking court authorization to trace and listen to calls made by or to Roland Mackey on his cell phone, the office phone at the service station where he worked, and his home if an additional phone existed there. It would be painstaking work; she had to lay out the case against Mackey, making sure the chain of logic and probable cause had no weak links. Her paper case had to first convince Pratt, then Captain Norona, then a deputy district attorney charged with making sure local law enforcement did not run roughshod over civil liberties, and finally a judge who had the same responsibilities but also answered to the electorate should he make a mistake that blew up in his face. They had one shot at this and they had to do it right. Rather, Rider had to do it right.

But all of that came after the initial hurdle of getting Mackey’s various phone numbers without tipping the suspect to the investigation taking form around him.

They started with Tampa Towing, which ran a half-page ad in the yellow pages that carried two 24-hour phone numbers. Next, a call to directory assistance established that Mackey had no hardwired phone listing private or otherwise in his name. It meant he either had no phone at his home or he was living in a place where the phone was registered to someone else. That could be dealt with later once they established Mackey’s residence.

Last and most difficult was Mackey’s cell phone number. Directory assistance did not carry cell listings. To check every cellular service provider for a listing could take days if not weeks because most required a court-ordered search warrant before revealing a customer’s private number. Instead, law enforcement investigators routinely planned ruses in order to get the numbers they needed. This often entailed leaving innocuous messages at workplaces so that the cell phone number could be captured upon callback. The most popular of these was the standard call-back-for-your-prize message, promising a television or DVD player to the first one hundred people who returned the call. However, this involved setting up a non-police line and could also result in long waiting periods with no guarantee of success if the target had masked his or her cell number. Rider and Bosch did not feel they had the luxury of time. They had put Mackey’s name out into the public. They had to move quickly toward their goal.

“Don’t worry,” Bosch told Rider. “I’ve got a plan.”

“Then I’ll just sit back and watch the master.”

Since he knew Mackey was on duty at the service station Bosch simply called the station and said he needed a tow. He was told to hold on and then a voice he believed belonged to Roland Mackey came onto the line.

“You need a tow?”

“Either a tow or a jump. I can’t get it started.”

“Where?”

“The Albertson’s parking lot on Topanga near Devonshire.”

“We’re all the way over on Tampa. You can get somebody closer.”

“I know but I live by you guys. Right off Roscoe and behind the hospital.”

“Okay, then. What are you driving?”

Bosch thought of the car they had seen Mackey in earlier. He decided to use it to pull Mackey off the fence.

“’Seventy-two Camaro.”

“Restored?”

“I’m working on it.”

“It should be about fifteen minutes before I’m there.”

“Okay, great. What’s your name?”

“Ro.”

“Ro? Like row a boat?”

“Like in Roland, man. I’m on my way.”

He hung up. Bosch and Rider waited five minutes, during which Bosch told her the rest of the plan and what part she would play in it. Her goal was to get two things: Mackey’s cell number and his service provider so that a search warrant authorizing the wiretap could be delivered to the proper company.

Following Bosch’s instructions, Rider called the Chevron station and started making a service appointment, going into great detail in describing the screeching her car’s brakes made. While she was in the middle of it, Bosch called the station on the second line listed in the phone book. As expected Rider was put on hold. Bosch’s call was answered and he said, “Do you have a number I can reach Ro on? He’s coming here to give me a jump and I got it started already.”

Mackey’s harried co-worker said, “Try him on his cell.”

He gave Bosch the number and Bosch flashed the thumbs-up across the desk to Rider. She finished her call without breaking the act and hung up.

“One down, one to go,” Bosch said.

“You got the easy one,” Rider said.

With Mackey’s number in hand, Rider took over while Bosch listened on an extension. Putting a disinterested bureaucratic glaze over her voice she called the number and when Mackey answered-presumably while looking for a stalled ’72 Camaro in a shopping center parking lot-she announced that she was his AT amp;T Wireless provider and that she had some exciting news for savings over his current long-distance minutes plan.

“Bullshit,” Mackey said, interrupting her in the middle of her spiel.

“Excuse me, sir?” Rider replied.

“I said bullshit. This is some sort of scam to make me switch.”

“I don’t understand, sir. I have you listed as an AT amp;T Wireless customer. Is that not the case?”

“Yeah, that’s not the fucking case. I’m with Sprint and I like it and I don’t even have or want long-distance service. So fuck off. Can you hear me now?”

He hung up and Rider started laughing.

“This is an angry guy we’re dealing with,” she said.

“Well, he just drove all the way across Chatsworth for nothing,” Bosch said. “I’d be angry too.”

“He’s with Sprint,” she said. “I’m ready to rock and roll on the paper. But maybe you should call him, so he won’t be suspicious about you not calling when the guy in the shop tells him he gave out his number.”