The Black Echo Part 13

"No thanks. Uh, this is Lieutenant Pounds, Hollywood detectives. Are they just out of the office? I need to check a point with them."

"I believe they are code seven till P.M. watch."

He hung up. They were off duty until four. They were scamming, or Bosch had simply kicked them too hard in the b.a.l.l.s this time and now they were going after him on their own time. He got back in the car and told Wish he had checked his office for messages. It was as she merged the car back into traffic that he saw the yellow motorbike leaning on a parking meter about a half block from Barnie's. It was parked in front of a pancake restaurant.

"There," he said and pointed. "Go on by and I'll get the number. If it's his, we'll sit on it."

It was Sharkey's bike. Bosch matched the plate to his notes from the kid's CRASH file. But there was no sign of the boy. Wish drove around the block and parked in the same spot in front of Barnie's that they had been in before.

"So, we wait," she said. "For this kid you think might be a witness."

"Right. It's what I think. But two of us don't need to waste the time. You can leave me here if you want. I'll go in the beanery, order a pitcher of Henry's and a bowl of chili and watch from the window."

"That's all right. I'm staying."

Bosch settled back for a wait. He took out his cigarettes but she nailed him before he got one out of the pack.

"Have you heard of the draft risk a.s.sessment?" she asked.

"The what?"

"Secondhand cigarette smoke. It's deadly, Bosch. The EPA came out last month, officially. Said it's a carcinogen. Three thousand people are getting lung cancer a year from pa.s.sive smoking, they call it. You are killing yourself and me. Please don't."

He put the cigarettes back in his coat pocket. They were quiet as they watched the bike, which was chain-locked to the parking meter. Bosch took a few glances at the sideview mirror but didn't see the IAD car. He glanced over at Wish, too, whenever he thought she wasn't looking. Santa Monica Boulevard steadily got crowded with cars as the apex of rush hour approached. Wish kept her window closed to cut down on the carbon monoxide. It made the car very hot.

"Why do you keep staring at me?" she asked about an hour into the surveillance.

"At you? I didn't know that I was."

"You were. You are. You ever have a female partner before?"

"Nope. But that's not why I would be staring. If I was."

"Why then? If you were."

"I'd be trying to figure you out. You know, why you are here, doing this. I always thought, I mean at least I heard, that the bank squad over at the FBI was for dinosaurs and f.u.c.kups, the agents too old or too dumb to use a computer or trace some white-collar sc.u.mbag's a.s.sets through a paper trail. Then, here you are. On the heavy squad. You're no dinosaur, and something tells me you're no f.u.c.kup. Something tells me you're a prize, Eleanor."

She was quiet a moment, and Bosch thought he saw the trace of a smile play on her lips. Then it was gone, if it had been there at all.

"I guess that is a backhanded compliment," she said. "If it is, thank you. I have my reasons for choosing where I am with the bureau. And believe me, I do get to choose. As far as the others in the squad, I would not characterize any of them as you do. I think that att.i.tude, which, by the way, seems to be shared by many of your fellow-"

"There's Sharkey," he said.

A boy with blond dreadlocks had come through a side alley between the pancake shop and a mini-mall. An older man stood with him. He wore a T-s.h.i.+rt that said The Gay 90s Are Back! Bosch and Wish stayed in the car and watched. Sharkey and the man exchanged a few words and then Sharkey took something from his pocket and handed it over. The man shuffled through what looked like a stack of playing cards. He took a couple of cards and gave the rest back. He then gave Sharkey a single green bill.

"What's he doing?" Wish asked.

"Buying baby pictures."

"What?"

"A pedophile."

The older man headed off down the sidewalk and Sharkey walked to his motorbike. He hunched over the chain and lock.

"Okay," Bosch said, and they got out of the car.

That would be enough for today, Sharkey thought. Time to kick. He lit a cigarette and bent over the seat of his motorbike to work the combination on the Master lock. His dreads flopped down past his eyes and he could smell some of the coconut stuff he had put in his hair the night before at the Jaguar guy's house. That was after Arson had broken the guy's nose and the blood got everywhere. He stood up and was about to wrap the chain around his waist when he saw them coming. Cops. They were too close. Too late to run. Trying to act like he hadn't yet seen them, he quickly made a mental list of everything in his pockets. The credit cards were gone, already sold. The money could have come from anywhere, some of it did. He was cool. The only thing they'd have would be the queer guy's identification if they had a lineup. Sharkey was surprised the guy had made a report. No one ever had before.

Sharkey smiled at the two approaching cops, and the man held up a tape recorder. A tape recorder? What was this? The man hit the play b.u.t.ton and after a few seconds Sharkey recognized his own voice. Then he recognized where it had come from. This wasn't about the Jaguar guy. This was about the pipe.

Sharkey said, "So?"

"So," said the man, "we want you to tell us about it."

"Man, I didn't have anything to do with it. You ain't going to put that-Hey! You're the guy from the police station. Yeah, I saw you there the next night. Well, you ain't going to get me to say I did that s.h.i.+t up there."

"Take it down a notch, Sharkey," the man said. "We know you didn't do it. We just want to know what you saw, is all. Lock your bike up again. We'll bring you back."

The man gave his name and the woman's. Bosch and Wish. He said she was FBI, which really confused things. The boy hesitated, then stooped and locked the bike again.

Bosch said, "We just want to take a ride over to Wilc.o.x to ask you some questions, maybe draw a picture."

"Of what?" Sharkey asked.

Bosch didn't answer; he just gestured with his hand to come along and then pointed up the block at a gray Caprice. It was the car Sharkey had seen in front of the Chateau. As they walked, Bosch kept his hand on Sharkey's shoulder. Sharkey wasn't as tall as Bosch yet, but they shared the same wiry build. The boy wore a tie-dyed s.h.i.+rt of purple and yellow shades. Black sungla.s.ses hung around his neck on orange string. The boy put them on as they approached the Caprice.

"Okay, Sharkey," Bosch said at the car. "You know the procedure. We've got to search you before you go in the car. That way we won't have to cuff you for the ride. Put everything on the hood."

"Man, you said I was no suspect," Sharkey protested. "I don't have to do this."

"I told you, procedure. You get it all back. Except the pictures. We can't do that."

Sharkey looked first at Bosch and then Wish, then he started putting his hands in the pockets of his frayed jeans.

"Yeah, we know about the pictures," Bosch said.

The boy put $46.55 on the hood along with a pack of cigarettes and book of matches, a small penknife on a key chain and a deck of Polaroid photos. They were photos of Sharkey and the other guys in the crew. In each, the model was naked and in various stages of s.e.xual arousal. As Bosch shuffled through them, Wish looked over his shoulder and then quickly looked away. She picked up the pack of cigarettes and looked through it, finding a single joint among the Kools.

"I guess we have to keep that, too," Bosch said.

They drove to the police station on Wilc.o.x because it was rush hour and it would have taken them an hour to get to the Federal Building in Westwood. It was after six by the time they got into the detective bureau, and the place was deserted, everybody having gone home. Bosch took Sharkey into one of the eight-by-eight interview rooms. There was a small, cigarette-scarred table and three chairs in the room. A handmade sign on one wall said No Sniveling! He sat Sharkey down in the Slider-a wooden chair with its seat heavily waxed and a quarter-inch of wood cut off the bottom of the front two legs. The incline was not enough to notice, but enough that the people who sat in the chair could not get comfortable. They would lean back like most hard cases and slowly slide off the front. The only thing they could do was lean forward, right into the face of their interrogator. Bosch told the boy not to move, then stepped outside to plan a strategy with Wish, shutting the door. She opened the door after he closed it.

She said, "It's illegal to leave a juvenile in a closed room unattended."

Bosch closed the door again.

"He isn't complaining," he said. "We've got to talk. What's your feel for him? You want him, or you want me to take it?"

"I don't know," she said.

That settled it. That was a no. An initial interview with a witness, a reluctant witness at that, required a skillful blend of scamming, cajoling, demanding. If she didn't know, she didn't go.

"You're supposed to be the expert interrogator," she said in what seemed to Bosch to be a mocking voice. "According to your file. I don't know if that's using brains or brawn. But I'd like to see how it's done."

He nodded, ignoring the jab. He reached into his pocket for the boy's cigarettes and matches.

"Go in and give him these. I want to go check my desk for messages and set up a tape." When he saw the look on her face as she eyed the cigarettes, he added, "First rule of interrogation: make the subject think he is comfortable. Give 'im the cigarettes. Hold your breath if you don't like it."

He started to walk away but she said, "Bosch, what was he doing with those pictures?"

So that was what was bothering her, he thought. "Look. Five years ago a kid like him would have gone with that man and done who knows what. Nowadays, he sells him a picture instead. There are so many killers-diseases and otherwise-these kids are getting smart. It's safer to sell your Polaroids than to sell your flesh."

She opened the door to the interview room and went in.

Bosch crossed the squad room and checked the chrome spike on his desk for messages. His lawyer had finally called back. So had Bremmer over at the Times Times, though he had left a pseudonym they had both agreed on earlier.

Bosch didn't want anybody snooping around his desk to know the press had called.

Bosch left the messages on the spike, took out his ID card and went to the supply closet and slipped the lock. He opened a new ninety-minute ca.s.sette and popped it into the recorder on the bottom shelf of the closet. He turned on the machine and made sure the backup ca.s.sette was turning. He set it on record and watched to make sure both tapes were rolling. Then he went back down the hallway to the front desk and told a fat Explorer Scout who was sitting there to order a pizza to be delivered to the station.

He gave the kid a ten and told him to bring it to the interview room with three c.o.kes when it came.

"What do you want on it?" the kid asked.

"What do you like?"

"Sausage and pepperoni. Hate anchovies."

"Make it anchovies."

Bosch walked back to the detective bureau. Wish and Sharkey were silent when he walked back into the small interview room, and he had the feeling they had not been talking much. Wish had no feel for the boy. She sat to Sharkey's right. Bosch took the seat on his left. The only window was a small square of mirrored gla.s.s in the door. People could look in but not out. Bosch decided to be up front with the boy from the start. He was a kid, but he was probably wiser than most of the men who had sat on the Slider before him. If he sensed deceit, he would start answering questions in one-syllable words.

"Sharkey, we are going to tape this because it might help us later to go over it," Bosch said. "Like I said, you are not a suspect, so you don't have to worry about what you say, unless of course you're going to say you did it."

"See what I mean?" the boy protested. "I knew you'd get around to saying that and putting on the tape. s.h.i.+t, I been in one of these rooms before, you know."

"That's why we aren't bulls.h.i.+tting you. So let's say it once for the record. I'm Harry Bosch, LAPD, this is Eleanor Wish, FBI, and you are Edward Niese, AKA Sharkey. I want to start by-"

"What's this s.h.i.+t? Was that the president what got dragged in that pipe? What's the FBI doing here?"

"Sharkey!" Bosch said loudly. "Cool it. It's just an exchange program. Like when you used to go to school and the kids would come from France or someplace. Think like she's from France. She's just kinda watching and learning from the pros." He smiled and winked at Wish. Sharkey looked over at her and smiled a little, too. "First question, Sharkey, let's get it out of the way so we can get to the good stuff. Did you do the guy up at the dam?"

"f.u.c.k no. I see-"

"Wait a minute, wait a minute," Wish broke in. She looked at Bosch. "Can we go outside a moment?"

Bosch got up and walked out. She followed, and this time she closed the interview room door.

"What are you doing?" he said.

"What are you you doing? Are you going to read that kid his rights, or do you want to taint this interview from the start?" doing? Are you going to read that kid his rights, or do you want to taint this interview from the start?"

"What are you talking about? He didn't do it. He isn't a suspect. I'm just asking him questions because I'm trying to establish an interrogation pattern."

"We don't know he isn't the killer. I think we should give him his rights."

"We read him his rights and he is going to think we think he's a suspect, not a witness. We do that and we might as well go in there and talk to the walls. He won't remember a thing."

She walked back into the interview room without another word. Bosch followed and picked up where he had left off, without saying anything about anybody's rights.

"You do the guy in the pipe, Sharkey?"

"No way, man. I seen him, that's all. He was already dead."

The boy looked to his right at Wish as he said this. Then he pulled himself up in his chair.

"Okay, Sharkey," Bosch said, "By the way, how old are you, where you from, tell me a couple of things like that."

"Almost eighteen, man, then I'm free," the boy said, looking at Bosch. "My mom lives up in Chatsworth, but I try not to live with-man, you already got all of this in one of your little notebooks."

"You a f.a.ggot, Sharkey?"

"No way, man," the boy said, staring hard at Bosch. "I sell them pictures, big f.u.c.king deal. I ain't one of 'em."

"You do more'n sell pictures to them? You roll a few when you get the chance? Bust 'em up, take their money. Who's going to file a complaint? Right?"

Now Sharkey looked back over to Wish and raised an open hand. "I don't do that s.h.i.+t. I thought we're talking about the dead guy."

"We are, Sharkey," Bosch said. "I just want to figure out who we're dealing with here, is all. Take it from the top. Tell us the story. I got pizza coming and there's more cigarettes. We got the time."

"It won't take any time. I din't see anything, except the body in there. I hope there's no anchovies."

He said this looking at Wish while pulling himself up in the chair. He had established a pattern in which he would look at Bosch when he was telling the truth, at Wish when he was shading it or outright lying. Scammers always play to the women, Bosch thought.

"Sharkey," Bosch said, "if you want we can take you up to Sylmar and have 'em hold you overnight. We can start again in the morning, maybe when you're memory's a little-"

"I'm worried about my bike back there, might get stole."

"Forget the bike," Bosch said, leaning into the boy's personal s.p.a.ce. "We aren't spoiling you, Sharkey, you haven't told us anything yet. Start the story, then we'll worry about the bike."

"Okay, okay. I'll tell you everything."

The boy reached for his cigarettes on the table and Bosch pulled back and got out one of his own. The leaning in and out of his face was a technique Bosch had learned while spending what seemed like ten thousand hours in these little rooms. Lean in, invade that foot and a half that is all theirs, their own s.p.a.ce. Lean back when you get what you want. It's subliminal. Most of what goes on in a police interrogation has nothing to do with what is said. It is interpretation, nuance. And sometimes what isn't said. He lit Sharkey's cigarette first. Wish leaned back in her chair as they exhaled the blue smoke.

"You wanna smoke, Agent Wish?" Bosch said.