Майкл Коннелли - Law of Innocence

“So much for the vote of confidence.”

“It is what it is.”

“Thanks for the advice but I’ll pass. One way or another, I want this thing done.”

“I get it.”

“What about you? You okay? Still taking your pills?”

“Every day. So far, so good.”

“I like hearing that. And Maddie? How’s she doing?”

“She’s good. In the academy.”

“Man, the second generation, just like the first.”

“I thought Hayley wants to be a prosecutor.”

“She’ll change her mind.”

I smiled at him.

“Let’s go in.”

“One other thing. I just wanted to explain why I never came to see you in the jail.”

“I don’t think you need to, Harry. Don’t worry about it.”

“I should have visited, I know. But I didn’t want to see you in there.”

“I know. Lorna told me. To be honest, I didn’t even put you on my list. I didn’t want you to see me in there either.”

He nodded and we went inside. Christian, the tuxedo-clad maître d’, greeted me warmly and had the class not to mention that I hadn’t been there in more than six weeks, even though he probably knew why. I introduced Bosch as my brother. Christian escorted us to the table where the others were waiting: Jennifer, Lorna, and Cisco. It was a table for six but with Cisco in the mix it was crowded.

The smell of food on the tables around us was almost overpowering. I was distracted by it and found myself turning and craning my neck to see what other patrons had ordered.

“You all right, boss?” Cisco asked.

I turned back to him.

“Fine, I’m fine,” I said. “But let’s order first. Where’s Arturo?”

Lorna waved to someone behind me and soon Arturo was at our table with his order pad. It was orders of Steak Helen all around except for Jennifer, who wasn’t a red-meat eater. She went with eggplant parmigiana on Arturo’s recommendation. Lorna ordered a bottle of red wine for the drinkers, and I asked for a big bottle of sparkling water. I also told Arturo to bring bread and butter as soon as he could.

“Okay,” I said when we were alone. “Tonight we can celebrate because I’m free and we knocked the prosecution down a notch or two in court. But that’s it. No hangovers tomorrow because we go back to work.”

Everybody nodded except Bosch. He just stared at me from the opposite side of the table.

“Harry, you’re dying to say something,” I said. “Probably something bad. You want to start? You have the discovery file. Did you read it?”

“Uh, sure,” he said. “I read the discovery and I also talked to some people I know.”

“Like who?” Jennifer asked.

Bosch looked at her for a moment. I raised my hand a few inches off the table as a signal to her to cool it. Bosch was long retired from the LAPD but he was still tightly connected. I knew that firsthand and did not need him to name his sources.

“What did they tell you?” I asked.

“Well, they’re pretty pissed off over at the D.A.’s Office because of the way you sandbagged Berg,” Bosch said.

“They get caught cheating and they’re pissed at us,” Jennifer said. “That’s just beautiful.”

“What’s the upshot?” I said. “What are they going to do about it?”

“For one, they’re going to go after special circumstances like it’s the holy grail,” Bosch said. “They want to punish you for that stunt today, put you back in jail.”

“That’s bullshit,” Cisco said.

“Yeah, but they can do it,” Bosch said, “if they find the evidence.”

“There is no evidence,” Jennifer said. “Financial gain? Murder for hire? It’s ridiculous.”

“All I’m saying is they’re looking,” Bosch said, staring at me as though the others at the table didn’t count. “And you have to be careful with your own moves.”

“I don’t understand,” Lorna said.

“You raised hell about car and phone data,” Bosch said. “I assume you need it to prove you never left your house. That might just end up being evidence supporting that you paid somebody to grab Scales and bring him to you. That gets you close to murder for hire.”

“Like I said, bullshit,” Cisco said.

“I’m saying, this is how they’re thinking,” Bosch said. “It’s how I would think.”

“Sam owed me money,” I said. “Never paid me the back end on the last case and we sued him. What was it, Lorna? Sixty K?”

“Seventy-five,” Lorna said. “With interest and penalty, it’s over a hundred now. But we did it just to get a judgment and lien. We knew he’d never pay.”

“Still, they could point to that, make it look like murder for financial gain,” I said. “If they could prove Sam had money, the lien would carry over in death.”

“Did he?” Bosch asked. “Have money? They have a newsclip that says he ripped off ten million dollars through all his cons. Where’d it go?”

“I remember that article,” I said. “‘The Most Hated Man in America,’ they called him. It was exaggerated and didn’t make me any friends, especially at home. But Sam was always on the con. He always had money coming in. It went somewhere.”

“But this is crazy,” Jennifer said. “They think you would kill a former client for an unpaid bill? For seventy-five thousand dollars? A hundred thousand?”

“No, they don’t think that,” I said. “That’s not the point. The point is, they’re pissed and if they can push this into special circumstances, my bail is pulled and I go back to Twin Towers. That’s what they want. To fuck me over. To tilt the table their way. Doesn’t matter if the added charge doesn’t hold up later in court.”

Jennifer shook her head.

“It still makes no sense,” she said. “I think your sources are crap.”

She looked pointedly at Bosch. He was the new guy, the outsider, and was suspect in her eyes. I tried to push past the moment.

“Okay, so how long do I have before they pull this shit?” I asked.

“They have to find the money and prove you knew about it,” Bosch said. “If they get there, they’ll drop the current charges and go back to the grand jury. Then they refile with special circumstances.”

“That will restart the speedy-trial clock and mean the money posted today for bond goes down the toilet,” Jennifer said. “You go to jail, the bond is forfeited.”

“That’s bullshit,” Cisco said again.

“Okay, well, we should be ready to go in to see Warfield the minute this all breaks,” I said. “Harry, you let us know what you hear when you hear it. Jennifer, we’ll need an argument. They’re subverting speedy trial, maybe vindictive prosecution, something.”

“I’m on it,” Jennifer said. “This makes me so fucking mad.”

“Don’t let your emotions into it,” I cautioned. “Let’s not go in mad, let’s make the judge mad. I saw some of that today when we played the tape. I know it took her back to when she was a defense attorney. If the D.A. is doing this just to fuck with me, then Warfield will see it before we say it.”

Both Jennifer and Bosch responded with nods.

“Fucking cowards,” Cisco said. “Afraid to go straight up with you, boss.”

I liked that my team seemed angrier about the prosecution’s end run than I was. It would help keep them sharp in the days and weeks running up to trial.

I returned my attention to Bosch. I realized more than the others what an incredibly good break it was to have him in our court. I had taken his side the year before and now he was taking mine. But the moral support paled in comparison with what he brought as an investigator.

“Harry, did you ever work with Drucker and Lopes?” I asked.

Kent Drucker and Rafael Lopes were the LAPD leads on the case. They worked out of the elite Robbery-Homicide Division, where Bosch had worked until the end of his LAPD career.