Michael Connelly (128 page)

“Detective Bosch?” the judge prompted.

“I can’t answer the question without compromising an ongoing investigation,” Bosch finally said.

“Detective Bosch, we just went over this,” the judge said angrily. “Answer the question.”

Bosch knew that his refusal and jailing would not stop the story from getting out. Chandler would tell all the reporters as
the judge had given her the okay to do. So putting himself in jail, he knew, only stopped him from chasing the follower. He
decided to answer. He carefully composed a statement while stalling by taking a long, slow drink of water from the paper cup.

“Norman Church obviously stopped killing people after he was dead. But there was somebody — there is somebody else still out
there. A killer who uses the same methods as Norman Church.”

“Thank you, Mr. Bosch. And when did you come to that conclusion?”

“This week, when another body was found.”

“Who was that victim?”

“A woman named Rebecca Kaminski. She had been missing two years.”

“The details of her death matched the murders of the other Dollmaker victims?”

“Exactly, except for one thing.”

“And that was what?”

“She had been entombed in concrete. Hidden. Norman Church always discarded his victims in public places.”

“No other differences?”

“Not that I know of at the moment.”

“Yet, because she died two years after Norman Church was killed by you, there is no way possible that he is responsible.”

“Correct.”

“Because he was dead he has the perfect alibi, doesn’t he?”

“Correct.”

“How was the body found?”

“As I said, it had been buried in concrete.”

“And what led police to the spot where it was buried?”

“We received a note with directions.”

Chandler then offered a copy of the note as plaintiff’s exhibit 4A and Judge Keyes accepted it after overruling an objection
by Belk. Chandler then handed a copy to Bosch to identify and read.

“Out loud this time,” she said before he could start. “For the jury.”

Bosch felt eerie reading the words of the follower out loud in the quiet courtroom. After a beat of silence when he was done,
Chandler began again.

“‘I’m still in the game,’ he writes. What does that mean?”

“It means he is trying to take credit for all of the killings. He wants attention.”

“Could that be because he committed all of the murders?”

“No, because Norman Church committed nine of them. The evidence found in Church’s apartment irrefutably links him to those
nine. There is no doubt.”

“Who found this evidence?”

Bosch said, “Me.”

“So, then, isn’t there a lot of doubt, Detective Bosch? Isn’t this idea of a second killer who uses the exact same method
preposterous?”

“No, it’s not preposterous. It is happening. I did not kill the wrong man.”

“Isn’t it the truth that this talk of a copycat killer, a follower, is all an elaborate charade for covering up the fact that
you did exactly that, killed the wrong man? An innocent, unarmed man who had done nothing worse than hire a prostitute with
his wife’s tacit approval?”

“No, it’s not. Norman Church killed —”

“Thank you, Mr. Bosch.”

“— a lot of women. He was a monster.”

“Like the one who killed your mother?”

He unconsciously looked out into the audience, saw Sylvia and then looked away. He tried to compose himself, slow his breathing.
He was not going to let Chandler tear him open.

“I would say yes. They were probably similar. Both monsters.”

“That’s why you killed him, wasn’t it? The toupee wasn’t under the pillow. You killed him in cold blood because you saw your
mother’s killer.”

“No. You are wrong. Don’t you think if I was going to make up a story I could come up with something better than a toupee?
There was a kitchenette, knives in the drawer. Why would I plant —”

“Hold it, hold it, hold it,” Judge Keyes barked. “Now, we’ve gone off the tracks here. Ms. Chandler, you started making statements
instead of asking questions and, Detective Bosch, you did the same thing instead of answering. Let’s start over.”

“Yes, Your Honor,” Chandler said. “Isn’t it true, Detective Bosch, that the whole thing — this pinning all the murders on
Norman Church — was an elaborate cover-up that is now unraveling with the discovery of the woman in the concrete this week?”

“No, it is not true. Nothing is unraveling. Church was a killer and he deserved what he got.”

Bosch mentally flinched and closed his eyes as soon as the words were out of his mouth. She had done it. He opened his eyes
and looked at Chandler. Her eyes seemed flat and blank, emotionless.

Softly, she said, “You say he deserved what he got. When were you appointed judge, jury and executioner?”

Bosch drank more water from the cup.

“What I meant was that it was his play. Whatever happened to him, he was ultimately responsible. You put something in play
like that and you have to accept the consequences.”

“Like Rodney King deserved what he got?”

“Objection!” Belk shouted.

“Like André Galton deserved what he got?”

“Objection!”

“Sustained, sustained,” the judge said. “All right now, Ms. Chandler, you —”

“They’re not the same.”

“Detective Bosch, I sustained the objections. That means don’t answer.”

“No further questions at this time, Your Honor,” Chandler said.

Bosch watched her walk to the plaintiff’s table and drop her tablet onto the wooden surface. The loose strand of hair was
there at the back of her neck. He was sure now that even that detail was part of her carefully planned and orchestrated performance
during the trial. After she sat down, Deborah Church reached over and squeezed her arm. Chandler didn’t smile or make any
gesture in return.

Belk did what he could to repair the damage on redirect examination, asking more details about the heinous nature of the crimes,
and the shooting and investigation of Church. But it seemed as if no one was listening. The courtroom had been sucked into
a vacuum created by Chandler’s cross-examination.

Belk was apparently so ineffective that Chandler didn’t bother to ask anything on recross and Bosch was excused from the witness
seat. He felt as if the walk back to the defense table covered at least a mile.

“Next witness, Mr. Belk?” the judge asked.

“Your Honor, can I have a few minutes?”

“Surely.”

Belk turned to Bosch and whispered, “We’re going to rest, you have a problem with that?”

“I don’t know.”

“There is no one else to call, unless you want to get other members of the task force over here. They’ll say the same thing
you did and get the same treatment from Chandler. I’d rather leave that alone.”

“What about bringing Locke back? He’ll back me up on everything I said about the follower.”

“Too risky. He is a psychologist, for everything we get him to say is a possibility, she’ll also get him to concede it is
possibly not. He hasn’t been deposed on this matter and we won’t know for sure what he would say. Besides, I think we need
to stay off the second killer. It’s confusing the jury and we —”

“Mr. Belk,” the judge said. “We’re waiting.”

Belk stood up and said, “Your Honor, the defense rests.”

The judge stared a long moment at Belk before turning to the jury and telling them they were excused for the day because the
lawyers would need the afternoon to prepare closing arguments and he would need time to prepare jury instructions.

After the jury filed out, Chandler went to the lectern. She asked for a directed verdict in favor of the plaintiff, which
the judge denied. Belk did the same thing, asking for a verdict in favor of the defendant. In a seemingly sarcastic tone,
the judge told him to sit down.

Bosch met Sylvia in the hallway outside after the crowded courtroom took several minutes to empty. There was a large gathering
of reporters around the two lawyers and Bosch took her arm and moved her down the hall.

“I told you not to come here, Sylvia.”

“I know, but I felt I had to come. I wanted you to know that I support you no matter what. Harry, I know things about you
the jury will never know. No matter how she tries to portray you, I know you. Don’t forget that.”

She was wearing a black dress with a silvery-white pattern that Bosch liked. She looked very beautiful.

“I, uh, I — how long were you here?”

“For most of it. I’m glad I came. I know it was rough, but I saw the goodness of what you are come through all the harshness
of what you sometimes have to do.”

He just looked at her a moment.

“Be optimistic, Harry.”

“The stuff about my mother…”

“Yes, I heard it. It hurt me that this is where I learned about it. Harry, where are we if there are those kinds of secrets
between us? How many times do I have to tell you that it is endangering what we have?”

“Look,” he said, “I can’t do this right now. Deal with this and you, us — it’s too much for right now. It’s not the right
place. Let’s talk about it later. You’re right, Sylvia, but I, uh, I just can’t … talk. I —”

She reached up and straightened his tie and then smoothed it on his chest.

“It’s okay,” she said. “What will you do now?”

“Follow the case. Whether officially or not, I have to follow this. I have to find the second man, the second killer.”

She just looked at him for a few moments and he knew she had probably hoped for a different answer.

“I’m sorry. It’s not something I can put off. Things are happening.”

“I’m going to go in to school then. So I don’t lose the whole day. Will you be up to the house tonight?”

“I’ll try.”

“Okay, see you, Harry. Be optimistic.”

He smiled and she leaned into him and kissed him on the cheek. Then she walked off toward the escalator.

Bosch was watching her go when Bremmer came up.

“You want to talk about this? That was some interesting testimony in there.”

“I said all I’m saying on the stand.”

“Nothing else?”

“Nope.”

“What about what she says? That the second killer is really the first and that Church didn’t kill anybody.”

“What do you expect her to say? It’s bullshit. Just remember, what I said in the courtroom was under oath. What she says out
here isn’t. It’s bullshit, Bremmer. Don’t fall for it.”

“Look, Harry, I have to write this. You know? It’s my job. You going to understand that? No hard feelings?”

“No hard feelings, Bremmer. Everybody has got their job to do. Now I’m going to go do mine, okay?”

He walked off toward the escalator. Outside at the statue, he lit a cigarette and gave one to Tommy Faraway, who had been
sifting through the ash can.

“What’s happening, Lieutenant?” the homeless man asked.

“Justice is happening.”

Bosch drove over to Central Division and found an open parking space at the front curb. For a while, he sat in his car looking
at two trustees from the lockup washing the painted enamel mural that stretched along the front wall of the bunkerlike station.
It was a depiction of a nirvana where black and white and brown children played together and smiled at friendly police officers.
It was a depiction of a place where the children still had hope. In angry black spray paint along the bottom of the mural
someone had written, “This is a damnable lie!”

Bosch wondered whether someone from the neighborhood or a cop had done it. He smoked two cigarettes and tried to clear his
mind of what had happened in the courtroom. He felt strangely at peace with the idea that some of his secrets had been revealed.
But he held little hope for the outcome of the trial. He had moved into a feeling of resignation, an acceptance that the jury
would find against him, that the twisted delivery of evidence in the case would convince them that he had acted, if not like
the monster Chandler had described, then at least in an undesirable and reckless manner. They would never know what it was
like to have to make such decisions as he had made in so fleeting a moment.

It was the same old story that every cop knew. The citizens want their police to protect them, to keep the plague from their
eyes, from their doors. But those same John Q.’s are the first to stare wide-eyed and point the finger of outrage when they
see close up exactly what the job they’ve given the cops entails. Bosch wasn’t a hardliner. He didn’t condone the actions
taken by police in the André Galton cases and the Rodney King cases. But he understood those actions and knew that his own
actions ultimately shared a common root.

Through political opportunism and ineptitude, the city had allowed the department to languish for years as an understaffed
and underequipped paramilitary organization. Infected with political bacteria itself, the department was top-heavy with managers
while the ranks below were so thin that the dog soldiers on the street rarely had the time or inclination to step out of their
protective machines, their cars, to meet the people they served. They only ventured out to deal with the dirtbags and, consequently,
Bosch knew, it had created a police culture in which everybody not in blue was seen as a dirtbag and was treated as such.
Everybody. You ended up with your André Galtons and your Rodney Kings. You ended up with a riot the dog soldiers couldn’t
control. You ended up with a mural on a station house wall that was a damnable lie.