So I threw in with him, you could say. He wanted a better hold on the golden boy. He wanted an ace up his own sleeve. So I helped.'
'By killing yourself? I don't get it.'
'Mittel told me that supreme power over someone is the power they don't know you have until you need to use it. You see, Bosch, Mittel always suspected that Conklin was really the one who did your mother.'
Bosch nodded. He saw where the story was going.
'And you never told Mittel that Conklin wasn't the killer.'
'That's right. I never told him about Meredith. So knowing that, look at it from his side. Mittel figured that if Conklin was the doer and he believed I was dead, then he'd think he was home free. See, I was the only loose end, the one who could tie him in. Mittel wanted him to think he was clear. He wanted it because he wanted Conklin at ease. He didn't want him to lose his drive, his ambition. Conklin was going places and Mittel didn't want him to even hesitate. But he also wanted to keep an ace up his sleeve, something that he could always pull out if Conklin tried to step out of line. That was me. I was the
ace. So we arranged that little hit and run, me and Mittel. Thing is, Mittel never had to play the ace with Conklin. Conklin gave Mittel a lot of good years after that. By the time he backed out on that attorney general thing, Mittel was well diversified. By then he had a congressman, a senator, a quarter of the local pols on his client list. You could say by then he had already climbed on Conklin's shoulders to the higher ground. He didn't need Arno anymore.'
Bosch nodded again and thought a moment about the scenario. All those years. Conklin believed it had been Mittel who killed her and Mittel believed it had been Conklin. It was neither.
'So who was the one you ran over?' 'Oh, just somebody. It doesn't matter. He was just a volunteer, you could say. I picked him up on Mission Street. He thought he was handing out Conklin fliers. I planted my ID in the bottom of the satchel I gave him. He never knew what hit him or why.'
'How'd you get away with it?' Bosch asked, though he thought he already knew the answer to that as well.
'Mittel had Eno on the line. We set it up so that it happened when he was next up on call. He took care of everything and Mittel took care of him.'
Bosch could see that the setup also gave Fox a share of power over Mittel. And he'd ridden along with him ever since. A little plastic surgery, a nicer set of clothes, and he was Jonathan Vaughn, aid to the wunderkind political strategist and rainmaker.
'So how'd you know I'd show up here?' 'I'd kept tabs on her over the years. I knew she was here. Alone. After our little run-in on the hill the other night, I came here to hide, to sleep. You gave me a headache — what the hell you hit me with?' 'The eight ball.'
'I guess I should have thought of that when I put you in there. Anyway, I found her like that in the bed. I read the note and knew who you were. I figured you'd be back. Especially after you left that message on the phone yesterday.'
'You've been here all this time with ...'
'You get used to it. I put the air on high, closed the door. You get used to it.'
Bosch tried to imagine it. Sometimes he believed that he was used to the smell, but he knew he wasn't.
'What did she leave out of the note, Fox?'
'That was the part about her wanting Conklin for herself. See, I tried her with Conklin first. But it didn't take. Then I set him up with Marjorie and got the fireworks. Nobody expected that he'd want to end up marrying her, though. Least of all Meredith. There was only room on the horse with the white knight for one rider. That was Marjorie. Meredith couldn't handle that. Must've been a hell of a cat fight.'
Bosch said nothing. But the truth stung his face like a sunburn. That's what it had all come down to, a cat fight between whores.
'Let's go to your car now,' Fox said.
'Why?'
'We need to go to your place now.'
'For what?'
Fox never answered. A Santa Monica squad car stopped in front of the house just as Bosch asked his question. Two officers started getting out.
'Be cool, Bosch,' Fox said quietly. 'Be cool if you want to live a little longer.'
Bosch saw Fox turn the aim of his gun toward the approaching officers. They could not see it because of the thick bougainvillea running along the front of the porch. One of them started to speak.
'Did someone here call nine -'
Bosch took two steps and launched himself over the railing to the lawn. As he did it, he yelled a warning. 'He's got a gun! He's got a gun!'
On the ground, Bosch heard Fox start running on the wood decking of the porch. He guessed he was going for the door. Then came the first shot. He was sure it came from behind him, from Fox. Then the two cops opened up like the Fourth of July. Bosch couldn't count all the shots. He stayed on the grass with his arms spread wide and his hands up, just hoping they wouldn't send one his way.
It was over in no more than eight seconds. When the echoes died and silence returned, Bosch yelled again.
'I'm unarmed! I'm a police officer! I am no threat to you! I am an unarmed police officer!'
He felt the end of a hot gun barrel pressed against his neck.
'Where's the ID?'
'Right inside coat pocket.'
Then he remembered he still didn't have it. The cop's hands grasped him by the shoulders.
'I'm going to roll you over.'
'Wait a minute. I don't have it.'
'What is this? Roll over.'
Bosch complied.
'I don't have it with me. I've got other ID though. Left inside pocket.'
The cop started going through his jacket. Bosch was scared.
'I'm not going to do anything wrong here.'
'Just be quiet.'
The cop got Bosch's wallet out and looked at the driver's license that was behind a clear plastic window.
'Whaddaya got, Jimmy?' the other cop yelled. Bosch couldn't see him. 'He legit?'
'Says he's a cop, got no badge. Got a DL here.'
Then he hunched back down over Bosch and patted the rest of his body in a search for weapons.
'I'm clean.'
'All right, turn back over.'
Bosch did so and his hands were cuffed behind his back. He then heard the man above him call in for backup and an ambulance on his radio.
'All right, get up.'
Bosch did as he was told. For the first time he could see the porch. The other cop stood with his handgun pointing down at Fox's crumpled body at the front door. Bosch was led up the steps to the porch. He could see Fox was still alive. His chest was heaving, he had wounds in both legs and the stomach and it looked like one slug had gone through both cheeks. His jaw hung open. But his eyes seemed even wider as he stared at death coming for him.
'I knew you'd fire, you fuck,' Bosch said to him. 'Just die now.'
'Shut up,' the one called Jimmy ordered. 'Right now.'
The other cop pulled him away from the front door. Out in the street, Bosch could see neighbors joining together in litde knots or watching from their own porches. Nothing like gunshots in suburbia for getting people together, he thought. The smell of spent gunpowder in the air does it better than a barbecue any day.
The young cop got right up in Bosch's face. Harry could see that his name plate identified him as D. Sparks.
