“Do you have a fax at home?”
“Yes, but if the deal went down, we’d have to get together in the office. We have a signing room, and all the forms are right there. My file on the property was in my office too.”
Bosch nodded. It sounded plausible, to a point.
“Okay, so you head off to the office . . .”
“Exactly. And two things happened . . .”
Helton brought his hands up into sight but only to hold them across his face to hide his eyes. A classic tell.
“What two things?”
“I got a call on my cell — from Arlene — and Willy fell asleep in his car seat. Do you understand?”
“Make me understand.”
“I was distracted by the call, and I was no longer distracted by Willy. He had fallen asleep.”
“Uh-huh.”
“So I forgot he was there. Forgive me, God, but I forgot I had him with me!”
“I understand. What happened next?”
Helton dropped his hands out of sight again. He looked at Bosch briefly and then at the tabletop.
“I parked in my assigned space behind PPG, and I went in. I was still talking to Arlene. One of our buyers is trying to get out of a contract because he’s found something he likes better. So we were talking about that, about how to finesse things with that, and I was on the phone when I went in.”
“Okay, I see that. What happened when you went in?”
Helton didn’t answer right away. He sat there looking at the table as if trying to remember so he could get the answer right.
“Stephen?” Bosch prompted. “What happened next?”
“I had told the buyer’s agent to fax me the offer. But it wasn’t there. So I got off the line from my wife and I called the agent. Then I waited around for the fax. Checked my slips and made a few callbacks while I was waiting.”
“What are your slips?”
“Phone messages. People who see our signs on properties and call. I don’t put my cell or home number on the signs.”
“How many callbacks did you make?”
“I think just two. I got a message on one and spoke briefly to the other person. My fax came in, and that was what I was there for. I got off the line.”
“Now, at this point it was what time?”
“I don’t know, about ten after ten.”
“Would you say that at this point you were still cognizant that your son was still in your car in the parking lot?”
Helton took time to think through an answer again but spoke before Bosch had to prompt him.
“No, because if I knew he was in the car, I would not have left him in the first place. I forgot about him while I was still in the car. You understand?”
Bosch leaned back in his seat. Whether he understood it or not, Helton had just dodged one legal bullet. If he had acknowledged that he had knowingly left the boy in the car — even if he planned to be back in a few minutes — that would have greatly supported a charge of negligent homicide. But Helton had maneuvered the question correctly, almost as if he had expected it.
“Okay,” Bosch said. “What happened next?”
Helton shook his head wistfully and looked at the sidewall as if gazing through a window toward the past he couldn’t change.
“I, uh, got involved in the deal,” he said. “The fax came in, I called my client, and I faxed back a counter. I also did a lot of talking to the other agent. By phone. We were trying to get the deal done, and we had to hand-hold both our clients through this.”
“For two hours.”
“Yes, it took that long.”
“And when was it that you remembered that you had left William in the car out in the parking lot, where it was about ninety-five degrees?”
“I guess as soon — first of all, I didn’t know what the temperature was. I object to that. I left that car at about ten, and it was not ninety-five degrees. Not even close. I hadn’t even used the air conditioner on the way over.”
There was a complete lack of remorse or guilt in Helton’s demeanor. He wasn’t even attempting to fake it anymore. Bosch had become convinced that this man had no love or affinity for his damaged and now lost child. William was simply a burden that had to be dealt with and therefore could easily be forgotten when things like business and selling houses and making money came up.
But where was the crime in all this? Bosch knew he could charge him with negligence, but the courts tend to view the loss of a child as enough punishment in these situations. Helton would go free with his wife as sympathetic figures, free to continue their lives while baby William moldered in his grave.
The tells always add up. Bosch instinctively believed Helton was a liar. And he began to believe that William’s death was no accident. Unlike his partner, who had let the passions of his own fatherhood lead him down the path, Bosch had come to this point after careful observation and analysis. It was now time to press on, to bait Helton and see if he would make a mistake.
“Is there anything else you want to add at this point to the story?” he asked.
Helton let out a deep breath and slowly shook his head.
“That’s the whole sad story,” he said. “I wish to God it never happened. But it did.”
He looked directly at Bosch for the first time during the entire interview. Bosch held his gaze and then asked a question.
“Do you have a good marriage, Stephen?”
Helton looked away and stared at the invisible window again.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, do you have a good marriage? You can say yes or no if you want.”
“Yes, I have a good marriage,” Helton responded emphatically. “I don’t know what my wife told you, but I think it is very solid. What are you trying to say?”
“All I’m saying is that sometimes, when there is a child with challenges, it strains the marriage. My partner just had a baby. The kid’s healthy, but money’s tight and his wife isn’t back at work yet. You know the deal. It’s tough. I can only imagine what the strain of having a child with William’s difficulties would be like.”
“Yeah, well, we made it by all right.”
“The nannies quitting all the time . . .”
“It wasn’t that hard. As soon as one quits, we put an ad on craigslist for another.”
Bosch nodded and scratched the back of his head. While doing this, he waved a finger in a circular motion toward the camera that was in the air vent up on the wall behind him. Helton could not see him do this.
“When did you two get married?” he asked.
“Two and a half years ago. We met on a contract. She had the buyer, and I had the seller. We worked well together. We started talking about joining forces, and then we realized we were in love.”
“Then William came.”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“That must’ve changed things.”
“It did.”
“So when Arlene was pregnant, couldn’t the doctors tell that he had these problems?”
“They could have if they had seen him. But Arlene’s a workaholic. She was busy all the time. She missed some appointments and the ultrasounds. When they discovered there was a problem, it was too late.”
“Do you blame your wife for that?”
Helton looked aghast.
“No, of course not. Look, what does this have to do with what happened today? I mean, why are you asking me all this?”
Bosch leaned across the table.
“It may have a lot to do with it, Stephen. I am trying to determine what happened today and why. The ‘why’ is the tough part.”
“It was an accident! I forgot he was in the car, okay? I will go to my grave knowing that my mistake killed my own son. Isn’t that enough for you?”
Bosch leaned back and said nothing. He hoped Helton would say more.
“Do you have a son, Detective? Any children?”
“A daughter.”
“Yeah, well then, happy F
ather’s Day. I’m really glad for you. I hope you never have to go through what I’m going through right now. Believe me, it’s not fun!”
Bosch had forgotten it was Father’s Day. The realization knocked him off his rhythm, and his thoughts went to his daughter living eight thousand miles away. In her ten years, he had been with her on only one Father’s Day. What did that say about him? Here he was, trying to get inside another father’s actions and motivations, and he knew his own could not stand equal scrutiny.
The moment ended when there was a knock on the door and Ferras came in, carrying a file.
“Excuse me,” he said. “I thought you might want to see this.”
He handed the file to Bosch and left the room. Bosch turned the file on the table in front of them and opened it, so that Helton would not be able to see its contents. Inside was a computer printout and a handwritten note on a Post-it.
The note said: “No ad on craigslist.”
The printout was of a story that ran in the LA Times ten months earlier. It was about the heatstroke death of a child who had been left in a car in Lancaster while his mother ran into a store to buy milk. She ran into the middle of a robbery. She was tied up along with the store clerk and placed in a back room. The robbers ransacked the store and escaped. It was an hour before the victims were discovered and freed, but by then the child in the car had already succumbed to heatstroke. Bosch scanned the story quickly, then dropped the file closed. He looked at Helton without speaking.
“What?” Helton asked.
“Just some additional information and lab reports,” he lied. “Do you get the LA Times, by the way?”
“Yes, why?”
“Just curious, that’s all. Now, how many nannies do you think you’ve employed in the fifteen months that William was alive?”
Helton shook his head.
“I don’t know. At least ten. They don’t stay long. They can’t take it.”
“And then you go to craigslist to place an ad?”
“Yes.”
“And you just lost a nanny on Friday?”
“Yes, I told you.”
“She just walked out on you?”
“No, she got another job and told us she was leaving. She made up a lie about it being closer to home and with gas prices and all that. But we knew why she was leaving. She could not handle Willy.”
“She told you this Friday?”
“No, when she gave notice.”
“When was that?”
“She gave two weeks’ notice, so it was two weeks back from Friday.”
“And do you have a new nanny lined up?”
“No, not yet. We were still looking.”
“But you put the feelers out and ran the ad again, that sort of thing?”
“Right, but listen, what does this have to — ”
“Let me ask the questions, Stephen. Your wife told us that she worried about leaving William with you, that you couldn’t handle the strain of it.”
Helton looked shocked. The statement came from left field, as Bosch had wanted it.
“What? Why would she say that?”
“I don’t know. Is it true?”
“No, it’s not true.”
“She told us she was worried that this wasn’t an accident.”
“That’s absolutely crazy and I doubt she said it. You are lying.”
He turned in his seat, so that the front of his body faced the corner of the room and he would have to turn his face to look directly at Bosch. Another tell. Bosch knew he was zeroing in. He decided it was the right time to gamble.
“She mentioned a story you found in the LA Times that was about a kid left in a car up in Lancaster. The kid died of heat-stroke. She was worried that it gave you the idea.”
Helton swiveled in his seat and leaned forward to put his elbows on the table and run his hands through his hair.
“Oh, my God, I can’t believe she . . .”
He didn’t finish. Bosch knew his gamble had paid off. Helton’s mind was racing along the edge. It was time to push him over.
“You didn’t forget that William was in the car, did you, Stephen?”
Helton didn’t answer. He buried his face in his hands again. Bosch leaned forward, so that he only had to whisper.
“You left him there and you knew what was going to happen. You planned it. That’s why you didn’t bother running ads for a new nanny. You knew you weren’t going to need one.”
Helton remained silent and unmoving. Bosch kept working him, changing tacks and offering sympathy now.
“It’s understandable,” he said. “I mean, what kind of life would that kid have, anyway? Some might even call this a mercy killing. The kid falls asleep and never wakes up. I’ve worked these kinds of cases before, Stephen. It’s actually not a bad way to go. It sounds bad, but it isn’t. You just get tired and you go to sleep.”
Helton kept his face in his hands, but he shook his head. Bosch didn’t know if he was denying it still or shaking off something else. He waited, and the delay paid off.
“It was her idea,” Helton said in a quiet voice. “She’s the one who couldn’t take it anymore.”
In that moment Bosch knew he had him, but he showed nothing. He kept working it.
“Wait a minute,” Bosch said. “She said she had nothing to do with it, that this was your idea and your plan and that when she called you, it was to talk you out of it.”
Helton dropped his hands with a slap on the table.
“That’s a lie! It was her! She was embarrassed that we had a kid like that! She couldn’t take him anywhere and we couldn’t go anywhere! He was ruining our lives and she told me I had to do something about it! She told me how to do something about it! She said I would be saving two lives while sacrificing only one.”
Bosch pulled back across the table. It was done. It was over.
“Okay, Stephen, I think I understand. And I want to hear all about it. But at this point I need to inform you of your rights. After that, if you want to talk, we’ll talk, and I’ll listen.”
WHEN BOSCH CAME out of the interview room, Ignacio Ferras was there, waiting for him in the hallway. His partner raised his fist, and Bosch tapped his knuckles with his own fist.
“That was beautiful,” Ferras said. “You walked him right down the road.”
“Thanks,” Bosch said. “Let’s hope the DA is impressed too.”
“I don’t think we’ll have to worry.”
“Well, there will be no worries if you go into the other room and turn the wife now.”
Ferras looked surprised.
“You still want me to take the wife?”
“She’s yours. Let’s walk them into the DA as bookends.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“Good. Go check the equipment and make sure we’re still recording in there. I’ve got to go make a quick call.”
“You got it, Harry.”
Bosch walked into the squad room and sat down at his desk. He checked his watch and knew it would be getting late in Hong Kong. He pulled out his cell phone anyway and sent a call across the Pacific.
His daughter answered with a cheerful hello. Bosch knew he wouldn’t even have to say anything and he would feel fulfilled by just the sound of her voice saying the one word.
“Hey, baby, it’s me,” he said.
“Daddy!” she exclaimed. “Happy Father’s Day!”
And Bosch realized in that moment that he was indeed a happy man.
About the Authors
James O. Born is the author of a series featuring Florida Department of Law Enforcement agent Bill Tasker. His newest novel, Field of Fire, follows the investigations of the ATF. His books capture the feeling and details of police work while following realistic procedure. He is a former U.S. drug agent and an agent with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. He has been writing for eighteen years and is published by Putnam.
Jon L. Breen is the author of seven novels, most recently Eye of God (Per
severance Press), and three short-story collections, most recently Kill the Umpire: The Calls of Ed Gorgon (Crippen & Landru). He won Edgar Awards in the biographical/critical category for What About Murder? (1981) and Novel Verdicts (1984) and is a book-review columnist for Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine and Mystery Scene. Retired as a librarian and professor of English at Rio Hondo College, he lives in Fountain Valley, California, with his wife and first line editor, Rita.
John Buentello is a writer who lives in San Antonio, Texas. He has published stories in a number of genres, including mystery, science fiction, fantasy, and horror. He and his brother Lawrence have published the anthology Binary Tales and have recently completed the novel Reproduction Rights. John has been married to his wife, Ann, for sixteen years, which makes him the luckiest man on earth.
A former deputy district attorney, Alafair Burke graduated with distinction from Stanford Law School and is now a professor at Hofstra Law School, where she teaches criminal law and procedure. She is the author of four novels, Dead Connection, Close Case, Missing Justice, and Judgment Calls. Her fifth novel, Angel’s Tip, featuring NYPD detective Ellie Hatcher, will be published by HarperCollins in 2008. She lives in New York City. Visit her at alafairburke.com.
Michael Connelly is the author of eighteen novels and one collection of nonfiction crime stories. Among his novels are The Black Echo, The Last Coyote, The Poet, Blood Work, and The Lincoln Lawyer. He is a past president of the Mystery Writers of America. He lives with his family in Florida.
About himself, Jack Fredrickson admits little other than that, after something of successful careers in productivity consulting and owning and managing an interior-design/commercial-furnishings firm, he abandoned productive employment to write in dark places. His first crime novel, A Safe Place for Dying (Publishers Weekly starred review), debuted in November 2006. He lives with his wife, Susan, west of Chicago. Check him out at jackfredrickson.com.
Leslie Glass is a playwright and the author of fourteen novels, including Over His Dead Body, For Love and Money, and nine bestselling novels of psychological suspense featuring NYPD detective April Woo. The founder of the Leslie Glass Foundation, Glass worked in advertising and publishing, was a script writer for a soap opera, and wrote the Intelligencer column for New York Magazine before turning to fiction fulltime. She now writes a column for Sarasota Magazine and develops original screenplays with her daughter and partner, Lindsey Glass.