“When did you place the can of lighter fluid in front of the store?”
“Oh, that was when I was walking away. I just took it out, wiped it off and put it down.”
“Did Mr. Fitzpatrick call out for help at any time?”
Waits paused as if to ponder the question.
“Well, that’s hard to say. He was yelling something, but I am not sure it was for help. He just kind of sounded like an animal to me. I closed the door on my dog’s tail once when I was kid. It sort of reminded me of that.”
“What were you thinking as you were walking home?”
“I was thinking, Far-fucking-out! I finally did it! And I knew I was going to get away with it, too. I felt like I was pretty goddamn invincible, if you want to know the truth.”
“How old were you?”
“I was… I was twenty, man, and I fuckin’ did it!”
“Did you ever think about the man you killed, who you burned to death?”
“No, not really. He was just there. There for the taking. Like the rest of them that came after. It was like they were there for me.”
Rider spent another forty minutes questioning him, eliciting smaller details that nonetheless matched those contained in the investigative reports. Finally, at 11:15 she seemed to relax her posture and pull back from her place at the table. She turned to look at Bosch and then at O’Shea.
“I think I have enough for the moment,” she said. “Maybe we could take a short break at this point.”
She turned off the tape recorder, and the three investigators and O’Shea stepped out into the hallway to confer. Swann stayed in the interview room with his client.
“What do you think?” O’Shea said to Rider.
She nodded.
“I’m satisfied. I don’t think there is any doubt that he did it. He solved the mystery of how he got to him. I don’t think he’s telling us everything but he knows enough of the details. He either did it or he was right there.”
O’Shea looked at Bosch.
“Should we move on?”
Bosch thought about this for a moment. He was ready. As he had watched Rider interview Waits his anger and disgust had grown. The man in the interview room showed such a callous disregard for his victim that Bosch recognized it as the classic profile of a psychopath. As before, he dreaded what he would next hear from the man but he was ready to hear it.
“Let’s do it,” he said.
They all moved back into the interview room and Swann immediately suggested that they break for lunch.
“My client is hungry.”
“Gotta feed the dog,” Waits added with a smile.
Bosch shook his head, taking charge of the room.
“Not yet,” he said. “He’ll eat when we all eat.”
He took the seat directly across from Waits and turned the recorder back on. Rider and O’Shea took the wing positions and Olivas sat once again in the chair by the door. Bosch had taken the Gesto file back from Olivas but had it closed in front of him on the table.
“We’re going to move on now to the Marie Gesto case,” he said.
“Ah, sweet Marie,” Waits said.
He looked at Bosch with a brightness in his eyes.
“Your attorney’s proffer suggests that you know what happened to Marie Gesto when she disappeared in nineteen ninety-three. Is that true?”
Waits frowned and nodded.
“Yes, I’m afraid so,” he said with mock sincerity.
“Do you know the current whereabouts of Marie Gesto or the location of her remains?”
“Yes, I do.”
Here it was, the moment Bosch had waited on for thirteen years.
“She’s dead, isn’t she?”
Waits looked at him and nodded.
“Is that a yes?” Bosch asked for the tape.
“That is a yes. She’s dead.”
“Where is she?”
Waits broke into a broad smile, the smile of a man who had not an atom of regret or guilt in his DNA.
“She’s right here, Detective,” he said. “She’s right here with me. Just like all the others. Right here with me.”
His smile turned into a laugh and Bosch almost went across the table at him. But Rider moved her hand under the table and put it on his leg. It immediately calmed him.
“Hold on a second,” O’Shea said. “Let’s step out again, and this time I would like you to join us, Maury.”
12
O’SHEA CHARGED INTO THE hallway first and managed to pace back and forth twice before all the others were out of the interview room. He then instructed the two deputies to go into the room and keep an eye on Waits. The door was then closed.
“What the fuck, Maury?” O’Shea barked. “We’re not going to spend our time in there laying the groundwork for an insanity defense for you. This is a confession, not a defense maneuver.”
Swann turned his palms up in a what-can-I-do gesture.
“The guy obviously has issues,” he said.
“Bullshit. He’s a stone-cold killer and he’s in there vamping like Hannibal Lecter. This isn’t a movie, Maury. This is real. You hear what he said about Fitzpatrick? He was more worried about a little burn on his hand than he was about the guy whose face he spit flames into. So I’ll tell you what, you go back in there and take five minutes with your client. Set him straight or we walk away from this and everybody takes their chances.”
Bosch was unconsciously nodding. He liked the anger in O’Shea’s voice. He also liked the way this was going.
“I’ll see what I can do,” Swann said.
He went back into the interview room and the deputies came back out to give the attorney and his client privacy. O’Shea continued to pace while he cooled down.
“Sorry about that,” he said to no one in particular. “But I’m not going to let them control this thing.”
“They already are,” Bosch said. “Waits is, at least.”
O’Shea looked at him, ready for a fight.
“What are you saying?”
“I mean we’re all here because of him. The bottom line is, we are engaged in an effort to save his life-at his own request.”
O’Shea emphatically shook his head.
“I’m not going to go back and forth on that issue with you again, Bosch. The decision has been made. At this point, if you’re not on board, the elevator’s right down the hall to the left. I’ll handle your part of the interview. Or Freddy will.”
Bosch waited a beat before answering.
“I didn’t say I wasn’t on board. Gesto is my case and I will see it through.”
“Nice to hear it,” O’Shea said with full sarcasm. “Too bad you weren’t so attentive back in ’ninety-three.”
He reached over and knocked harshly on the interview room door. Bosch stared at his back with anger welling up from some place deep inside. Swann opened the door almost immediately.
“We’re ready to continue,” he said as he stepped back to let them in.
After everyone retook their seats, and the recorder was turned back on, Bosch shook off his anger at O’Shea and locked eyes with Waits again. He repeated the question.
“Where is she?”
Waits smiled slightly, like he was tempted to set things off again, but then the smile turned into a smirk and he answered.
“Up in the hills.”
“Where in the hills?”
“Up near the stables. That’s where I got her. Right when she was getting out of her car.”
“Is she buried?”
“Yes, she is buried.”
“Exactly where is she buried?”
“I would have to show you. It’s a place I know but I can’t describe… I would just have to show you.”
“Try to describe it.”
“It’s just a place in the woods near where she parked. You go in and there’s a path and then I went off the path. Way off the path. You could go look and either find it right away or maybe never find it. There’s a lot of territory up there. You remember, they searched up there but they never found her.”
“And after thirteen years you believe you could lead us to this spot?”
“It hasn’t been thirteen years.”
A sudden rush of horror came over Bosch. The idea that he had held her captive was too abhorrent to think about.
“It’s not what you think, Detective,” Waits said.
“How do you know what I am thinking?”
“I just do. But it’s not what you think. Marie has been buried for thirteen years. But it has not been thirteen years since I was there. That’s what I’m saying. I visited her, Detective. I visited her there quite often. So I can certainly lead you there.”
Bosch paused, took out a pen and wrote a note on the inside flap of the Gesto file. It wasn’t a note of any importance. It just gave him a moment to disengage from the emotions that were coming up.
“Let’s go back to the beginning,” he said. “Did you know Marie Gesto before September nineteen ninety-three?”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Had you ever seen her before the day you abducted her?”
“Not that I remember.”
“Where did you first cross paths with her?”
“At the Mayfair. I saw her in there shopping and she was just my type. I followed her.”
“Where?”
“She got in her car and drove up Beachwood Canyon. She parked in the gravel lot below the stables. I believe it is called Sunset Ranch. There was no one around when she was getting out, so I decided to take her.”
“It wasn’t planned before you saw her in the store?”
“No, I went there to buy some Gatorade. It was a hot day. I saw her and decided right then that I had to have her. You know, it was an impulse. I couldn’t do anything about it, Detective.”
“You approached her in the lot below the stables?”