'She said she knew you. She knows my mother knew you, too.'
'The only person I am protecting is you, Bosch. Can't you see that? I'm ordering you to stop this investigation.' 'You can't. I don't work for you anymore. I'm on leave, remember? Involuntary leave. That makes me a citizen now, and I can do whatever I goddamn want to do as long as it's legal.'
'I could charge you with possession of stolen documents — the murder book.'
'It wasn't stolen. Besides, what if you bullshit a case, what's that, a misdemeanor? They'll laugh you out of the city attorney's office on your ass with that.' 'But you'd lose your job. That would be it.'
'You're a little late with that one, Chief. A week ago that would've been a valid threat. I'd have to consider it. But it doesn't matter anymore. I'm free of all of that bullshit now and this is all that matters to me and I don't care what I have to do, I'm doing it.'
Irving was silent and Bosch guessed that the assistant chief was realizing that Bosch had moved beyond his reach. Irving's hold over Bosch's job and future had been his leverage before. But Bosch had finally broken free. Bosch began again in a low, calm voice.
'If you were me, Chief, could you just walk away? What does doing what I do for the department matter if I can't do this for her ... and for me?'
He stood up and put the notebook into his jacket pocket.
'I'm going. Where's the rest of my stuff?'
'No.'
Bosch hesitated. Irving looked up at him and Bosch saw the anger was gone now.
'I did nothing wrong,' Irving said quiedy.
'Sure you did,' Bosch said just as quietly. He leaned over the table until he was only a few feet away. 'We all did, Chief We let it go. That was our crime. But not anymore. At least, not with me. If you want to help, you know how to reach me.'
He headed toward the door.
'What do you want?'
Bosch looked back at him.
'Tell me about Pounds. I need to know what happened. It's the only way I'll know if it's connected.'
'Then sit down.'
Bosch took the chair by the door and sat down. They both took some time to calm down before Irving finally spoke.
'We started looking for him Saturday night. We found
his car Sunday noon in Griffith Park, One of the tunnels closed after the quake. It was like they knew we'd be looking from the air, so they put the car in a tunnel.'
'Why'd you start looking before you knew he was dead?'
'The wife. She started calling Saturday morning. She said he'd gotten a call Friday night at home, she didn't know who. But whoever it was managed to convince Pounds to leave the house and meet him. Pounds didn't tell his wife what it was about. He said he'd be back in an hour or two. He left and never came back. In the morning she called us.'
'Pounds is unlisted, I assume.'
'Yes. That gives rise to the probability it was someone in the department.'
Bosch thought about this.
'Not necessarily. It just had to be someone with connections to people in the city. People that could get his number with a phone call. You ought to put out the word. Grant amnesty to anyone who comes forward and says they gave up the number. Say you'll go light in exchange for the name of the person they gave it to. That's who you want. Chances are whoever gave out the number didn't know what was going to happen.'
Irving nodded.
'That's an idea. Within the department there are hundreds who could get his number. There may be no other way to go.'
'Tell me more about Pounds.'
'We went to work right there in the tunnel. By Sunday the media had wind that we were looking for him, so the tunnel worked to our advantage. No helicopters flying over, bothering us. We just set up lights in the tunnel.'
'He was in the car?'
Bosch was acting like he knew nothing. He knew that if
he expected Hinojos to respect his confidences, he must in turn respect hers.
'Yes, he was in the trunk. And, my God, was it bad. He... He'd been stripped of his clothes. He'd been beaten. Then — then there was the evidence of torture
Bosch waited but Irving had stopped.
'What? What did they do to him?'
'They burned him. The genitals, nipples, fingers ... My God.'
Irving ran his hand over his shaven scalp and closed his eyes while he did it. Bosch could see that he could not get the images out of his mind. Bosch was having trouble with it, too. His guilt was like a palpable object in his chest.
'It was like they wanted something from him,' Irving said. 'But he couldn't give it. He didn't have it and ... and they kept at him.'
Suddenly, Bosch felt the slight tremor of an earthquake and reached for the table to steady himself. He looked at Irving for confirmation and realized there was no tremor. It was himself, shaking again.
'Wait a minute.'
The room tilted slightly then righted itself.
'What is it?'
'Wait a minute.'
Without another word Bosch stood up and went out the door. He quickly went down the hall to the men's room by the water fountain. There was someone in front of one of the sinks shaving but Bosch didn't take the time to look at him. He pushed through one of the stall doors and vomited into the toilet, barely making it in time.
He flushed the toilet but the spasm came again and then again until he was empty, until he had nothing left inside but the image of Pounds naked and dead, tortured.
'You okay in there, buddy?' a voice said from outside the stall.
'Just leave me alone.'
'Sorry, just asking.' ,
Bosch stayed in the stall a few more minutes, leaning against the wall. Eventually, he wiped his mouth with toilet paper and then flushed it down. He stepped out of the stall unsteadily and went to the sink. The other man was still there. Now he was putting on a tie. Bosch glanced at him in the mirror but didn't recognize him. He bent over the sink and rinsed his face and mouth out with cold water. He then used paper towels to dry off. He never looked at himself once in the mirror.
'Thanks for asking,' he said as he left.
Irving looked as if he hadn't moved while Bosch was gone.
'Are you all right?'
Bosch sat down and took out his cigarettes.
'Sorry, but I'm gonna smoke.'
'You already have been.'
Bosch lit up and took a deep drag. He stood up and walked to the trash can in the corner. There was an old coffee cup in it and he took it to use as an ashtray.
'Just one,' he said. 'Then you can open the door and air the place out.'
'It's a bad habit.'
'In this town so is breathing. How did he die? What was the fatal injury?'
'The autopsy was this morning. Heart failure. The strain on him was too much, his heart gave way.'
Bosch paused a moment. He felt the beginning of his strength coming back.
'Why don't you tell me the rest of it?'
'There is no rest of it. That's it. There was nothing there. No evidence on the body. No evidence in the car.
