The Crossing

  “Oh, then I’ll hurry up here so you don’t miss that.”

  “Maybe you should stay so you don’t miss it. Maybe loosen you up some, Harry.”

  Bosch glanced at her and then back at the book. He was looking for the autopsy report.

  “You think I’m too stiff, huh?”

  “Well, around me. I think you always thought I was too fragile for the work. Deep down, I think you think it’s men’s work.”

  “No, not true. For a long time my daughter wanted to do what you do. What I did. I didn’t discourage it.”

  “But now she wants to be a profiler, right?”

  “I think, but you never know.”

  “She probably got the same message I got from you. ‘You are not suited for this.’”

  “Yeah, well, maybe I’m old-fashioned. I kind of hate the idea of women seeing the evil men do. Something like that.”

  He found the autopsy. He had read a thousand autopsy reports in his time. He knew the form of the document by heart and that form had barely changed in the last four decades. He quickly paged through to the measurements of the body. He didn’t need any of the conclusions. He just wanted to know what the victim weighed.

  “Here it is,” he said. “Guy weighed a buck and a half. That’s not a lot but I’m thinking a lone killer drags a hundred fifty pounds. He doesn’t carry it.”

  “I’ll tell Ali and Mike,” Soto said.

  “No, you can’t. You never had this conversation.”

  “Right, right.”

  Bosch checked his watch. They had already been in the car an hour. He would have liked nothing more than to spend several hours scouring the murder book. He had yet to look at any records from the earlier murder, in which the victim was left in the same alley. But he knew he had to let Soto go soon. She had already gone above and beyond the call of duty to a former partner. Especially one who was no longer a cop.

  “Let me just take a quick run through the rest of this and then I’ll get you out of here,” he said.

  “It’s okay, Harry,” Soto said. “You know, after you walked out the door of the squad, I thought I’d never get a chance to see you work again. I like this. I learn from you.”

  “What, just sitting there watching me read a murder book?”

  “Yes. I learn what you think is important, how you put things together, make conclusions. You remember you told me once that all the answers are usually in the murder book. We just don’t see them.”

  Bosch nodded.

  “Yeah, I remember.”

  He was looking at James Allen’s lengthy arrest record. It was six pages in the book. He scanned them quickly because they were routinely repetitive with several prostitution and loitering arrests plus a few drug possession busts spanning the last seven years. It was a very common rap sheet for a prostitute. Several of the arrests were suspended or not prosecuted as Allen was initially diverted into pre-trial sex-worker and drug-rehab programs. Once that string was played out, his arrests started resulting in convictions and jail time. Never anything in a state correctional facility, always short stints in county jail. Thirty days here, forty-five there, the jail becoming not so much a deterrent as a revolving door—the sad norm for a recidivist sex worker.

  The only unusual thing about Allen’s rap sheet was his last arrest—a loitering-with-intent-to-commit-prostitution bust. What caught Bosch’s eye was that the arrest came fourteen months prior to his death and had resulted in a nolle pros—meaning no charges were ever filed against him. Allen was simply released.

  “Wait a minute,” Bosch said.

  He flipped to the front of the murder book and scanned the crime report and then the first summary filed by Karim and Stotter.

  “What is it?” Soto asked.

  “This guy hadn’t been arrested in over a year,” Bosch said as he was reading.

  “So?”

  “Well, he was sort of camped out there on Santa Monica…”

  “So?”

  Bosch flipped back to the rap sheet and turned the book so she could see it. He started flipping through the pages.

  “This guy gets busted three or four times a year for five years and then nothing for the last fourteen months before he gets killed,” he said. “That makes me think he had a guardian angel.”

  “What do you mean, someone in the LAPD watching out for him?”

  “Yeah, that he was working for somebody. But there’s nothing in here about him being a snitch. No CI number, no report.”

  There were protocols for dealing with confidential informants, including in the event that an informant was murdered. But there was nothing in the murder book that clearly indicated that James Allen was an informant.

  “Maybe he just got lucky and avoided arrest in that last year,” Soto said. “I mean, arrests have been down across the board the last year. All these shootings with cops and Ferguson and Baltimore and all of that, the uniforms are doing the minimum required. Nobody’s proactive anymore.”

  “Do the math,” Bosch said. “These fourteen months go back way before Baltimore, way before Ferguson.”

  Bosch shook his head. He had now counted seventeen arrests in five years for Allen on the rap sheet, then more than a year of clean living.

  “I think he was working for somebody,” he said. “Off book.”

  It was a violation of department policy for an officer to work a snitch without registering the individual with a supervisor and entering the name in the CI Tracking System database. But Bosch knew it regularly occurred. Snitches were procured over time and often used in test situations. Still, fourteen months seemed like a long time to test whether Allen would be a reliable informant.

  Stotter and Karim had pulled all of the arrest reports and Bosch started going through these. The names of arresting officers were not on the abbreviated summaries but their unit call signs were listed. He noted that one number was the same on three of Allen’s last five arrests before the fourteen months of non-activity. It was 6-Victor-55. Hollywood Division was denoted by the 6, Victor meant Vice, and 55 indicated it was a two-officer undercover team. He wrote it down on a page of his notebook, then wrote it again on the next page. He tore the second page out and handed it to Soto.

  “I think these are probably the guys that were working him,” he said. “Next time you’re on the company computer, see if you can get me their names out of Hollywood Vice. I want to talk to them.”

  She looked at the number, then folded the piece of paper and put it into the pocket of her jeans.

  “Sure.”

  Bosch closed the murder book and handed it to her. She returned it to the red tote bag.

  “You sure you can get that back without causing a stir?” he asked.

  “They’ll never know,” she said.

  “That’s good. And thanks, Lucia. It’s going to help a lot.”

  “Anytime. You want to go back in and get another beer?”

  Bosch thought for a moment and then shook his head.

  “Nah, I got the vibe on this thing. I should stay with it.”

  “Big Mo, huh?”

  “Yeah, I got momentum back—thanks to you.”

  “Okay, Harry, roll with it. Stay safe.”

  “You, too.”

  She opened the door and got out. Bosch started the engine but didn’t move the car until he watched her walk safely through the back door of the bar.

  24

  Bosch pulled into the alley off El Centro and checked his watch. It was 10:40 p.m. and he knew that he was inside the window of time during which it was estimated that James Allen was murdered and left propped against the wall behind the car repair shop on the night of March 21. Though time of death in the autopsy was estimated to have been anywhere from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m., he knew he would be encountering the same general environmental conditions as on the night of the murder. Evening temperatures in L.A. did not fluctuate much between March and May. But beyond climate, Bosch was interested in ambient light and its sources, a
sense of how sound carried in the alley, and any other factors that might have been in play the night James Allen’s body was left behind.

  Bosch drove past the repair shop and stopped in the parking lot behind the loft building. The lot was deserted. He killed the engine, took a flashlight out of the glove box, and got out of the car.

  Walking back toward the repair shop, he stopped once to take a wide shot of the alley and the scene of the crime with his phone. He then proceeded to the rear wall of the repair shop. To his disappointment, he found that the graffiti on the wall had been painted over since the night James Allen’s body had been left in the alley. There was only one tag so far on the fresh paint, a depiction of a snake that formed the number 18—the mark of the notorious 18th Street gang out of Rampart that had sets all over the city, including Hollywood.

  He pulled up the photo of the wall that he had copied from the murder book earlier and using a portion of the crumbled asphalt in the picture was still able to place the spot where James Allen’s body had been propped up.

  He stepped over to the spot and put his back to the wall. He looked up and down the alley, then up at the apartment building across from him. One of the small bathroom windows on the second floor had a light on. It was cracked open a few inches. Bosch grew annoyed with himself. He had been so concerned about not robbing Soto of her whole evening that he had not taken the proper time—or at least as much time as she would have allowed—to read through all sections of the murder book. He had not seen a report on the canvass of the neighborhood following the discovery of the body. Now he was looking at a lighted and open window that conceivably had a view of the crime scene. Had the resident there been questioned by police? Probably, but Bosch didn’t know for sure.

  He considered calling Soto and asking her to look in the book for him but decided he had already asked too much of her. With each call and request, he was putting her in more danger of being found consorting with the enemy. He thought about the sign he used to hang on the partition in his cubicle when he had worn a badge: Get Off Your Ass and Knock On Doors.

  Bosch pushed off the wall and walked out of the alley onto El Centro. The apartment building that backed the alley was a pink stucco affair built quickly and cheaply during a boom in the eighties. Its architectural flourishes were few, unless the filigreed design of the gated entrance counted. Bosch had to step back and look up at the two-story structure to try to figure out which apartment the lighted bathroom might belong to and then what number that unit would be.

  The directory next to the gate’s phone listed eight units—101 through 104 and 201 through 204. He went with the twos and decided on unit 203 first. He picked up the phone and followed the prompts and the call went unanswered. He tried 204 next and this time got a response.

  “Qué?”

  “Hola,” Bosch said haltingly. “Policía. Abierto por favor.”

  He realized that he only had his policeman’s Spanish. He didn’t know how to say that he was a private investigator.

  The person on the other end of the line—a woman—said something too quickly to understand. He responded with the old standby said more sternly.

  “Policía. Abierto.”

  The lock on the metal door buzzed and he pulled it open. He stepped in. There were stairs on either end of the building. He took the set on the right and they delivered him to a walkway leading to two apartment doors on the side of the building that backed up to the alley. Though it had been the person in 204 who had let him through the gate, Bosch now could confirm that unit 203 was the one with the open window and light on in the bathroom. He went to that door first and knocked. While he waited for a response, the door to 204 opened and an old woman stuck her head out to look at him. Bosch knocked again, louder this time, on the door to 203 but then walked over to the woman in the open doorway.

  “Do you speak English?” he asked.

  “Poquito,” she said.

  “The murder in the alley? Two months ago? El asasinato?”

  “Sí.”

  Bosch pointed to his ear and then his eye.

  “Did you hear anything? Did you see anything?”

  “Oh, no. They very quiet. I hear nothing.”

  “They?”

  “Los matadores.”

  Bosch now held up two fingers.

  “Matadores? Two?”

  The old lady shrugged.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Why did you say ‘they?’”

  She pointed to the door that Bosch had just knocked on.

  “She say.”

  Bosch looked at the unanswered door and then back at the old woman.

  “Where is she?”

  “She work now.”

  “Do you know where?”

  The woman brought her arms together in a rocking motion.

  “Babysitting?” Bosch asked. “Child care?”

  “Sí, sí, sí.”

  “Do you know when she comes home?”

  The woman looked at him and he could tell she didn’t understand.

  “Uh, finito?”

  He walked two fingers across the palm of his hand and pointed at the door to unit 203. The woman shook her head. She either didn’t know or she still didn’t understand. Bosch nodded. It was the best he could do for now.

  “Gracias.”

  He headed back to the stairs and went down. Before he got to the gate, he heard a voice from behind.

  “Hey, policía.”

  Bosch turned. There was a man standing in the alcove by the door to apartment 103. He was smoking a cigarette under the light above the door. Bosch walked back to him.

  “Are you police?” the man asked.

  Up close Bosch could see the Latino man was about thirty with a strong build. He wore a white T-shirt that had been bleached so many times it glowed under the light. He had no visible tattoos, which made Bosch think he wasn’t a gang member.

  “A detective,” Bosch said. “I’m working on the murder that happened in the alley in March. Do you know anything about it?”

  “Just that some faggot whore got his throat cut or some shit,” the man said.

  “Were you home that night?”

  “Sure.”

  “Did you see anything?”

  “Nah, man, I didn’t see nothing. I was in bed.”

  “Hear anything?”

  “Well, yeah, I heard ’em but I didn’t think it was anything so I didn’t get up to look.”

  “What did you hear?”

  “I heard them dump the guy out.”

  “What’s that sound like?”

  “Well, I heard a trunk. You know, like a trunk closing. It came from the alley.”

  “A trunk.”

  “Yeah, a trunk. You know how you can tell the difference between the sound of a car door and a trunk? It was a trunk.”

  “Did you also hear a car door?”

  “Yeah, I heard that. I heard the trunk, then I heard the doors close.”

  “Doors?”

  “Yeah, two doors.”

  “You heard two car doors close? You sure?”

  The man shrugged.

  “I hear all kinds of stuff from that alley. All night some nights.”

  “Okay. Did you tell what you just told me to the police?”

  “Nope.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t know, they left a card one day in my door, asking me to call. I never got around to calling. I stay busy, you know what I mean?”

  “You mean a business card? Do you still have it?”

  “Yeah, on the fridge. I guess I could still call but I’m talkin’ to you, right?”

  “Right. Can I see it? I want to get the name.”

  “Yeah, sure. Hold on.”

  The man opened his door and went in. He left the door open and Bosch saw a living room that was sparsely furnished. There was a crucifix on the wall and a couch with Mexican blankets draped over it. No expense had been spared on the large flat-screen television
on the wall. It was showing a soccer game somewhere.

  The man came from the kitchen and closed the door as he stepped back out. He handed Bosch a standard-issue LAPD business card with the name Edward Montez on it. On the flip side a handwritten note in two languages. The English said, “Please call.”

  Bosch knew the name Montez but not the man. He and his partner must have been charged by Stotter and Karim with handling the neighborhood canvas. Montez had done a poor job if he left cards in doors and never followed up. It was not surprising, however. So few people in minority neighborhoods wished to get involved as witnesses in cases that most efforts of investigators were focused on looking for non-human witnesses—cameras.

  “So you’ve never talked to the police about that night,” Bosch said.

  “No, man. Nobody came that night and I work during the day. That’s when they left the card.”

  “Do you know, did anybody in this building talk to the police?”

  “Mrs. Jiminez did. She lives upstairs. But she didn’t see shit and she can’t hear too good.”

  “What else did you hear besides the sound of the trunk and then the doors?”

  “Nothing, man, that was it.”

  “You didn’t look through a window to see what it was about?”

  “No, man, I was tired. I didn’t want to get up. Besides…”

  “Besides what?”

  “You stick your nose into stuff like that, you might get a problem.”

  “You mean a gang problem?”

  “Yeah, like that.”

  Bosch nodded. The 18th Street gang was not known for its peaceful coexistence in the neighborhoods it claimed as its turf. He could not second-guess someone for not rushing to his window to check out the activity in an alley.

  “You remember what time it was when you heard the trunk and the doors?”

  “Not really, not anymore. But it was definitely the night of the murder because the next morning all the police were in the alley. I saw them when I left for work.”

  “Where do you work?”

  “LAX.”

  “TSA?”

  He laughed like Bosch had made a joke.

  “No, man, baggage. I work for Delta.”

  Bosch nodded.

  “Okay. What’s your name?”