Angle of Investigation: Three Harry Bosch Stories

“Is there anything else you want to add 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 it 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 em've chathings.”

“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 of 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 Father’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 only been with her on 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 L.A. 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 stotoucked thre 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 L.A. 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 of 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 L.A. Times that was about a kid left in a car up in Lancaster. The kid died of heatstroke. 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