Michael Connelly - The Overlook

“Doesn’t matter. Bottom line is that it’s a threat. I’m sure the FBI said that. Well, the bureau can talk about it. We’re going to do something about it.”

Bosch stepped back, trying to draw some fresh air into the discussion. This was moving too quickly.

“So you’re going to go in?” he asked.

Hadley was working his jaw in quick powerful bites of the gum. He seemed not to notice the strong odor of garbage emanating from the back of the truck.

“You’re damn right we’re going to go in,” he said. “Just as soon as that warrant gets here.”

“You got a judge to sign a warrant that’s based on a stolen car being parked in front of the house?” Bosch asked.

Hadley signaled to one of his men.

“Bring the bags, Perez,” he called. Then to Bosch he said, “No, that’s not all we got. Today’s trash day, Detective. I sent the garbage truck up the street and a couple of my men emptied the two cans that were in front of Samir’s house. Perfectly legal, as you know. And lookee at what we got.”

Perez hustled over with the plastic evidence bags and handed them to Hadley.

“Captain, I checked the OP,” Perez said. “Still quiet up there.”

“Thank you, Perez.”

Hadley took the bags and turned back to Bosch and Ferras. Perez went back to the SUV.

“Our observation post is a guy in a tree,” Hadley said with a smile. “He’ll let us know if anybody makes a move up there before we’re ready.”

He handed Bosch the bags. Two of them contained black woolen ski masks. The third contained a slip of paper with a hand-drawn map on it. Bosch looked closely at it. It was a series of crisscrossing lines with two of them marked as Arrowhead and Mulholland. Once he registered these he could tell the map was a fairly accurate rendering of the neighborhood where Stanley Kent had lived and died.

Bosch handed the bags back and shook his head.

“Captain, I think you should hold up.”

Hadley looked shocked by the suggestion.

“Hold up? We’re not holding up. If this guy and his pals contaminate the reservoir with that poison, do you think the people of this city are going to accept that we held up to make sure we dotted every i and crossed every t ? We’re not holding up.”

He underlined his resolve by taking the gum out of his mouth and throwing it into the back of the sanitation truck. He took his foot off the bumper and started heading back to his crew but then made a sudden U-turn and came back directly to Bosch.

“As far as I’m concerned we’ve got the leader of a terrorist cell operating out of that house and we’re going to go in and shut it down. What’s your problem with that, Detective Bosch?”

“It’s too easy, that’s my problem. It’s not about us dotting every i because that’s what the killers already did. This was a carefully planned crime, Captain. They wouldn’t have just left the car in front of the house or put this stuff in the trash cans. Think about it.”

Bosch held there and watched Hadley work it over for a few moments. He then shook his head.

“Maybe the car wasn’t left there,” he said. “Maybe they still plan to use it as part of the delivery. There are a lot of variables, Bosch. Things we don’t know. We’re still going in. We laid it all out to the judge and he said we have probable cause. That’s good enough for me. We’ve got a no-knock warrant coming and we’re going to use it.”

Bosch refused to give up.

“Where did the tip come from, Captain? How did you find the car?”

Hadley’s jaw started working but then he remembered he had tossed his gum.

“One of my sources,” he said. “We’ve been building an intelligence network in this city for almost four years. Today it’s paying off.”

“Are you telling me you know who the source is or did it come in anonymously?”

Hadley waved his hands in a dismissive manner.

“Doesn’t matter,” he said. “The info was good. That’s the car up there. There’s no doubt about that.”

He pointed in the direction of the reservoir. Bosch knew by Hadley’s sidestepping that the tip was anonymous, the hallmark of a setup.

“Captain, I urge you to stand down,” he said. “There is something not right about this. It’s too simple and this wasn’t a simple plan. It’s some sort of misdirection and we need to figure-”

“We’re not standing down, Detective. Lives could hang in the balance.”

Bosch shook his head. He wasn’t going to get through to Hadley. The man believed he was poised at the edge of some sort of victory that would redeem every mistake he had ever made.

“Where’s the FBI?” Bosch asked. “Shouldn’t they be-”

“We don’t need the FBI,” Hadley said, getting in Bosch’s face again. “We have the training, the equipment and the skills. What’s more, we have the balls. And for once we’re going to take care of what’s in our own backyard ourselves.”

He gestured to the ground as if the place where he stood was the last battlefield between the bureau and the LAPD.

“What about the chief?” Bosch tried. “Does he know? I was just-”

Bosch stopped, remembering the chief’s admonishment about keeping their meeting at the Donut Hole to themselves.

“You were just what?” Hadley asked.

“I just want to know if he knows and approves.”

“The chief has given me full authority to run my unit. Do you call the chief every time you go out and make an arrest?”

He turned and marched imperiously back to his men, leaving Bosch and Ferras to watch him go.

“Uh-oh,” Ferras said.

“Yeah,” Bosch said.

Bosch stepped away from the back of the foul-smelling sanitation truck and pulled out his phone. He scrolled through his directory to Rachel Walling’s name. He had just pressed the call button when Hadley was there in his face again. Bosch hadn’t heard him coming.

“Detective! Who are you calling?”

Bosch didn’t hesitate.

“My lieutenant. He told me to update him after we got here.”

“No cellular or radio transmissions. They could be monitoring.”

“They who?”

“Give me the phone.”

“Captain?”

“Give me the phone or I will have it taken from you. We’re not going to compromise this operation.”

Bosch closed the phone without ending the call. If he was lucky Walling would answer the call and be listening. She might be able to put it together and get the warning. The bureau might even be able to triangulate the cell transmission and get to Silver Lake before things went completely wrong.

He handed the phone to Hadley, who then turned to Ferras.

“Your phone, Detective.”

“Sir, my wife is eight months pregnant and I need-”

“Your phone, Detective. You are either with us or against us.”

Hadley held his hand out and Ferras reluctantly took his phone from his belt and gave it to him.

Hadley marched over to one of the SUVs, opened the passenger door and put the two phones into the glove box. He slammed the compartment shut with authority and looked back at Bosch and Ferras as if challenging them to try to retrieve their phones.

The captain’s attention was then distracted when a third black SUV pulled into the lot. The driver gave the captain a thumbs-up. Hadley then pointed a finger into the air and started a twirling motion.

“All right, everybody,” he called out. “We have the warrant and you know the plan. Perez, call air support and get us the eye in the sky. The rest of you warriors mount up! We’re going in.”

Bosch watched with growing dread as the members of the OHS chambered rounds in their weapons and put on helmets with face shields. Two of the men began putting on space suits, as they had been designated the radiation-containment team.