The Concrete Blonde Part 40

"How they going to do that?" Bosch asked.

"What do you mean?"

"It's all fruit of the poison tree. The search, everything. All of it's illegal. We can't move against Mora."

"And we can't let him carry a badge, either," Rollenberger said testily. "The man should be in jail."

The following silence was broken by the sound of Mora's hoa.r.s.e but loud voice from upstairs. He had somehow slipped the gag.

"Bosch! Bosch! I wanna deal, Bosch. I'll give-" he began coughing "-I'll give him to you, Bosch. You hear me! You hear me!"

Sheehan headed toward the stairs, which began in the alcove outside the dining room. He said, "This time I'll make it so tight the f.u.c.k will strangle."

"Wait a minute," Rollenberger ordered.

Sheehan stopped at the archway leading to the alcove.

"What's he saying?" Rollenberger said. "Who will he give?"

He looked at Bosch, who shrugged his shoulders. They waited, Rollenberger looking up at the ceiling, but Mora was silent.

Bosch stepped over to the table and picked up the phone book. He said, "I think I've got an idea."

The odor of Mora's sweat filled the room. He sat on the floor, his hands cuffed behind him and to the work-out machine. The towel that had been wrapped around his mouth and taped had slipped down to his neck so that it looked like a cervical collar. The front of it was damp with spittle and Bosch guessed that Mora had loosened it by working his jaw up and down.

"Bosch, unhook me."

"Not yet."

Rollenberger stepped forward.

"Detective Mora, you have problems. You've-"

"You've got problems. You're the one. All of this is illegal. How you going to explain this? Know what I'm going to do? I'm going to hire that b.i.t.c.h Money Chandler and sue the department for a million dollars. Yeah, I'll-"

"Can't spend a million dollars in jail, Ray," Bosch said.

He held up Mora's phone book so that the vice cop could see it.

"This gets dropped off at Internal Affairs and they'll make a case. All those names and numbers, there's gotta be somebody that would talk about you. Somebody underage probably. Think we're giving you a hard time? Wait until IAD takes over. They'll make a case, Ray. And they'll make it without tonight's search. That will just be your word against ours."

Bosch saw a quick movement in Mora's eyes and he knew he had struck bone. Mora was afraid of the names in the book.

"So," Bosch said, "what deal did you have in mind, Ray?"

Mora looked away from the book, first to Rollenberger and then to Bosch and then back to Rollenberger.

"You can make a deal?"

"I have to hear it first," Rollenberger said.

"Okay, this is the deal. I walk and I give you the Follower. I know who it is."

Bosch was immediately skeptical but said nothing. Rollenberger looked at him and Bosch shook his head once.

"I know," Mora said. "The Peeping Tom I told you about. That was no bulls.h.i.+t. I got the ID today. It fits. I know who it is."

Now Bosch took him more seriously. He folded his arms in front of his body, threw a quick glance at Rollenberger.

"Who?" Rollenberger said.

"What's the deal first?"

Rollenberger stepped to the window and parted the curtains. He was turning it over to Bosch, who took a step forward and squatted like a baseball catcher in front of Mora.

"This is the deal. It is offered only this one time. Take it or let the chips fall where they may. You give the name to me and your badge to Lieutenant Rollenberger. You resign immediately from the department. You agree not to sue the department or any of us individually. In exchange, you walk."

"How do I know you'll-"

"You don't. And how do we know that you'll keep your end? I hang on to the phone book, Ray. You try to f.u.c.k us and it goes to IAD. Do we have a deal?"

Mora stared at him without speaking a long moment. Finally, Bosch got up and turned to the door. Rollenberger headed that way, too, and said, "Unhook him, Bosch. Take him to Parker and book him on a.s.sault on a police officer, unlawful s.e.x with a minor, pandering, anything you can think-"

"We gotta deal," Mora blurted. "But I've got no insurance."

Bosch turned back to look at him.

"That's right, you don't. The name?"

Mora looked from Bosch to Rollenberger.

"Unhook me."

"The name, Mora," Rollenberger said. "This is it."

"It's Locke. The f.u.c.king shrink. You a.s.sholes, you put the finger on me and the whole time he's the one pus.h.i.+ng the b.u.t.tons."

Bosch was jolted but in that same moment he began immediately to see how it could be. Locke knew the Dollmaker's program, he fit the Follower's profile.

"He was the Tom?"

"Yeah, it was him. Got'm ID'd by a producer today. He went around saying he was writin' a book so he could get close to the girls. Then he killed them, Bosch. The whole time he's been playing doctor with you, Bosch, he's been out there ... killing."

Rollenberger turned to Bosch and said, "What do you think?"

Bosch left the room without answering. He went down the stairs and trotted out the door to his car. Locke's book was on the back seat where Bosch had left it the day he bought it. As he headed back into the house with it he noticed that the first etchings of dawn's light were in the sky.

On Mora's dining room table, Bosch opened the book and began leafing through it until he came to a page marked Author's Note. In the second paragraph, Locke wrote, "The material for this book was gathered over the course of three years from interviews with countless adult film performers, many of whom requested that they remain anonymous or be identified only by their stage names. The author wishes to thank them and the film producers who granted him access to the sets and production offices at which these interviews were conducted."

The mystery man. Bosch realized Mora could be right that Locke was the man whom the video performer Gallery had reported as a suspect when she called the original task force tip number four years earlier. Bosch next flipped to the index of the book and ran his fingers down the names. Velvet Box was listed. So were Holly Lere and Magna c.u.m Loudly.

Bosch quickly reviewed in his mind Locke's involvement in the case. He would definitely fit as a suspect for the same reasons Mora had fit. He had had a foot in both camps, as Locke himself had described it. He had access to all information about the Dollmaker deaths and, at the same time, was conducting research for a book on the psychology of female performers in the p.o.r.nography industry.

Bosch became excited, but more so he was angry. Mora had been right. Locke had punched his b.u.t.tons, to the point that he had helped set the cops on the path to the wrong man. If Locke was the Follower, he had played Bosch perfectly.

Rollenberger dispatched Sheehan and Opelt to Locke's house to put him under immediate surveillance. "This time don't f.u.c.k it up," he said as he recovered some of his command presence.

Next he announced there would be a meeting of the task force at noon Sunday, little more than six hours away. He said they would then discuss seeking a search warrant for Locke's home and office and decide what moves to make. As he headed to the door, Rollenberger looked at Bosch and said, "Go cut him loose. Then, Bosch, you better go get some sleep. You're going to need it."

"What about you? How're you going to handle Irving on this?"

Rollenberger was looking down at the gold detective's s.h.i.+eld he held in his hand. It was Mora's. He closed his hand over it and put it in his sport coat pocket. Then he looked at Bosch.

"That's my business, isn't it, Bosch? Don't worry about it."

After the others had left, Bosch and Edgar went up the stairs to the gym room. Mora was silent and refused to look at them as they removed the handcuffs. They said nothing and left him there, the towel still around his neck like a noose, staring at his fractured image in the wall mirror.

Bosch lit a cigarette and looked at his watch when he got to his car. It was 6:20 and he was too wired to go home to sleep. He got in the car and pulled the rover from his pocket.

"Frankie, you up?"

"Yo," Sheehan responded.

"Anything?"

"Just got here. No life showing. Don't know whether he's here or not. Garage door is down."

"Okay, then."

Bosch thought of an idea. He picked up Locke's book and took the cover off it. He folded it and put it in his pocket, then he started the car.

After stopping for coffee at a Winch.e.l.l's, Bosch got to the Sybil Brand Inst.i.tute by seven. Because of the early hour, he had to get the watch commander's approval to interview Georgia Stern.

He could see she was sick as soon as she was brought into the interview room. She sat hunched over with her arms folded in front of her, as if she were carrying a bag of groceries that had broken and was guarding against losing anything.

"Remember me?" he asked.

"Man, you gotta get me out."

"Can't do that. But I can get them to take you into the clinic. You can get methadone in your orange juice."

"I wanna get out."

"I'll get you in the clinic."

She dropped her head in defeat. She started a slight rocking motion, back and forth. She seemed pitiful to Bosch. But he knew he had to let it go. There were more important things, and she couldn't be saved.

"You remember me?" he asked again. "From the other night?"

She nodded.

"We showed you pictures? I've got another."

He put the dust jacket from the book on the table. She looked at Locke's photo for a long while.

"Well?"

"What? I seen him. He talked to me once."

"About what?"

"Making movies. He was-I think he's an interviewer."

"Interviewer?"

"I mean like a writer. He said it was for a book. I told him don't use any of my names but I never checked."

"Georgia, think back. Hard. This is very important. Could he also be the one who attacked you?"

"You mean the Dollmaker? The Dollmaker's dead."

"I know that. I think it was someone else who attacked you. Look at the photo. Was it him?"

She looked at the photo and shook her head.

"I don't know. They told me it was the Dollmaker, so I forgot what he looked like after he was killed."

Bosch leaned back in his chair. It was useless.

"You still going to get me in the clinic?" she asked timidly after seeing his change in mood.

"Yeah. You want for me to tell them you've got the virus?"

"What virus?"

"AIDS."

"What for?"

"To get you whatever medicine you need."

"I don't have AIDS."

"Look, I know the last time Van Nuys Vice put the bust on you you had AZT in your purse."

"That's for protection. I got that from a friend-a-mine who's sick. He gave me the bottle and I put cornstarch in it."

"Protection?"