He saw nothing.
Soto called him back just as they got to the bottom of the hill and had turned south on Cahuenga toward Hollywood. She had come up with a residential address for Schubert on Elevado in the flats of Beverly Hills.
“It comes up the same on three different searchwares, so I think it’s legit and current,” she said.
“Excellent,” Bosch said. “Thank you.”
“Glad to help, Harry. Anything else?”
“Uh, actually one other thing. Did you ever get the names on that Vice Unit I gave you the call sign for? The guys that might’ve been working James Allen off book as an informant?”
“Yeah, I thought I sent that to you,” Soto said.
“You mean an e-mail? I haven’t checked. I’ll do it as soon—”
“Just hold on. I have it right here.”
Bosch waited and listened as he heard her flip through the pages of a notebook. In the short period they had been partners, she had adopted Bosch’s habit of carrying a small notebook with her at all times.
“Okay,” she finally said. “That was six-Victor-fifty-five and that belongs to Don Ellis and Kevin Long. Do you know them?”
Bosch thought for a moment. The names meant nothing to him. It had been more than ten years since he worked out of Hollywood Division. The personnel there were probably 95 percent different now.
“No, I don’t know them,” he said.
“How are you going to check that?” she asked. “If they were working an informant off book, they’re not going to just tell you about it.”
“I don’t know yet.”
He thanked her again and told her to get some sleep. He disconnected and then told Marko to work his way down to Sunset and head west toward Beverly Hills.
“You sure?” Marko said. “Sunset Strip will be very slow this time of the night. I think Santa Monica better.”
“Santa Monica is better but I want to take Sunset,” Bosch said. “There’s something I want to see.”
“Okay, you be the boss.”
Marko drove as instructed and was dead-on about the traffic on Sunset. Late-evening cruisers slowed movement to a crawl on the Strip. Bosch saw black-clad crowds lining up outside the clubs, tourist vans on nighttime celebrity patrols, minimum-wage hustlers waving flashlights toward overpriced parking lots, Sheriff’s patrol cars flashing blues to keep people moving along. He gazed out past the neon reflected on the windshield of the Tesla but was deep in reflective thought, the colors not penetrating his dark eyes.
He was thinking about Vin Scully, the Los Angeles Dodgers broadcaster. He had been calling games for more than sixty years — more than ten thousand games in all. There was no voice that was as iconic or as synonymous with Los Angeles as his. He had called so many games and yet never lost his love of the game or the city of his team. And he was always and repeatedly tickled when the vagaries of coincidence produced a running line of twos on the scoreboard. The deuces are wild, he would announce before a pitch. Two balls, two strikes, two out, two on, and two to two in the bottom of the second.
Bosch could hear Scully’s voice in his head as he considered that the deuces were now wild in his own game. Two murders possibly connected and followed by two brothers killed in the back room of a jewelry store. Two possible killers at the jewelry store. Two car doors heard in the alley where James Allen’s body was left propped against a wall. Two watches said to be stolen and then not. Two vice cops who pull over Mickey Haller on a DUI and two vice cops who may have worked James Allen as an informant. Coincidence? Bosch had a feeling Vin Scully wouldn’t think so, and he didn’t either.
The deuces were wild all right and Bosch was on the case. He called Haller and woke him up.
“What’s wrong?” the lawyer said.
“Nothing,” Bosch said. “Got a question. Your DUI. You said you were pulled over by a couple of plainclothes guys.”
“That’s right. They were lying in wait for me. What’s the question?”
“Were they vice cops?”
“Could have been.”
“What were their names?”
“I don’t know. They passed me off to the backup team. A couple of patrol cops.”
“Aren’t their names on the arrest report?”
“Maybe but I haven’t gotten it yet.”
“Shit.”
“Why are you calling me up at this hour, asking about those bastards?”
“Not sure. When I know more I’ll call you back.”
“Make sure it’s tomorrow. I’m going back to sleep.”
Bosch disconnected and bounced the phone a couple times off his chin as he thought about what he could do to answer the question he had just posed to Haller. He knew he could go back to Lucia Soto but he also knew that a records search for an arrest report would leave digital fingerprints. He couldn’t put her in that kind of danger. He had to find another way of getting there.
When they drove by Nelson Grant & Sons in Sunset Plaza the media trucks were gathered along the curb in front of the jewelry store. Bosch saw television reporters and videographers claiming spots and setting up for live reports at eleven. Looking past them Bosch could see mobile lights set up in the store’s showroom. The crime scene was still being processed twelve hours after the murders. Two Sheriff’s deputies were stationed outside the door for security.
“Something bad happen there,” Marko said.
“Yeah,” Bosch said. “Something really bad.”
Once into Beverly Hills they made a left on Camden and dropped down into the flats, a square mile or so of residences between Sunset and Santa Monica Boulevard that comprised one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in all of California. It was a cool, crisp night with wind rippling through the fronds of the palm trees that lined the streets. The Tesla took one more turn and then came to a silent stop against the curb on Elevado. The house where George Schubert lived was a mansion of Spanish design that sprawled across two lots and stood tall behind a wide and deep lawn displayed beneath lights attached to the palm trees. The lawn’s edges were cut razor sharp and it seemingly was untouched by the ravages of the California drought. In Beverly Hills the lawns always somehow managed to stay green even in times of water restriction.
Bosch made no move to get out. He just studied the home through the car’s window. Finally, Marko spoke.
“You get out here?” Marko asked.
“No, I’m just looking,” Bosch said.
“What you look for?”
“Nothing. Nobody. Just looking.”
Several lights were on behind the windows of the house and as he lowered his window Bosch thought he could hear music coming from within. He made no move to get out of the car. Music and lights aside, he saw no movement behind the windows. He checked his watch — it was 11 o’clock — and knew it was too late to brace Schubert at his door.
“So, are you pie?” Marko asked.
Bosch turned his eyes from the house to look at him.
“Excuse me?” he asked.
“You know, pie,” Marko said. “You watch people and investigate?”
Bosch understood.
“You mean a PI. Private investigator. Yeah, I’m a PI.”
“PI. Very cool, yes?”
Bosch shrugged and turned back to look at the house. He thought that the lighting configuration had changed. Bosch was sure a light had been turned out behind one of the windows but he couldn’t remember which one had been lit.
“So,” Marko said. “We stay?”
Bosch didn’t look back at him this time. He kept his eyes on the house.
“You still get paid for sitting here, right?” he asked.
“Yes, I make pay,” Marko said.
“Okay, then let’s sit here for a little while, see what happens.”
“Is it dangerous, this work? If so, I should get extra pay.”