“Why’d you warn me about Brody if you want to be left alone?”
“Because he’s an animal, and one doesn’t have anything to do with the other.”
“Got it.”
She tried to turn even further away from Bosch, but the lower edge of the pale yellow jacket she wore was trapped under his leg. The move pulled the jacket down over her shoulder, exposing the tank top below it and part of a tattoo.
ISY
— 2009
She angrily jerked her jacket out from under his leg and back into place, but Bosch had seen enough to know it was part of an RIP tattoo on the back of her shoulder. She had lost someone important eight years before. Important enough to always carry the reminder. He wondered if it was that loss that ultimately put her on the plane.
Bosch leaned away from her and caught Brody watching them from the bench on the other side of the plane. He gave Bosch a knowing smile and Bosch realized he had made a mistake. Brody had recognized Bosch’s attempt to connect to the woman. He would now realize that he could get to him through her.
The plane landed an hour later with an easier glide pattern and touchdown. Bosch couldn’t tell where they were until he climbed out the jump door and recognized that he was inside the hangar at Whiteman. There were two vans waiting and this time he tried to stick close to the woman with the stars. When the group was split, he ended up in a van with her as well as Brody.
From Whiteman the van turned right on San Fernando Road but then took Van Nuys Boulevard to the first pharmacy stop. They were in Pacoima and apparently staying clear of San Fernando.
The driver, who was the same Russian who had punched Bosch while in the clinic the day before, broke his seven shills into two groups and sent Bosch and two others into the pharmacy first. Brody and the woman with the stars were left in the second group. Bosch went through the process of providing a prescription and bogus ID to the pharmacist and then waited for the pills to be put into the bottle. In most of the previous stops, the pills were already bottled and ready, the pharmacists wanting to limit the time the shills spent in the drugstore. But in this store Bosch was told to either wait outside or come back in thirty minutes.
Bosch went outside and told the Russian. He was not happy. He told Bosch and the two other shills to go back and wait inside the drugstore in order to hurry the pharmacist along. Bosch did as instructed and was milling about in the foot-care aisle, within full view of the pharmacist, when he turned around and saw another shopper looking at the Dr. Scholl’s insole cushions. It was Bella Lourdes. She spoke in a low voice without looking at Bosch.
“How are you doing, Harry?”
Bosch checked the location of the other two shills before responding. They had separated and one was looking in the Mexican apothecary aisle and the other was maintaining a vigil at the prescription counter.
“I’m good. What are you doing in here?”
“Needed to check. We lost contact with you last night. Didn’t pick you up till you landed at Whiteman.”
“Are you shitting me? Hovan said they were the eye in the sky. They lost the plane?”
“They did. Hovan claimed upper atmospheric interference. Valdez hit the ceiling about it. Where’d they take you?”
“Jerry Edgar’s intel was on the button. It’s an encampment near Slab City, southeast of the Salton Sea.”
“And you’re okay?”
“I am but I almost wasn’t. I think I met the two shooters. One of them played Russian roulette on me with that revolver the DEA gave me.”
“Jesus.”
“Yeah. Lucky it was tricked out.”
“I’m sorry. Do you want out? I give the word and we’ll swarm this place and pull you out, make it look like a bust.”
“No, but I want you to do something else. Where’s Jerry?”
“He’s out there watching. We obviously freaked last night when they lost you, but now we’re on you and won’t drop the ball.”
Bosch checked the shills again. They were not paying attention to him. He checked the front door of the drugstore and saw no sign of the Russian driver.
“Okay, as soon as we get our scrips filled and are out of here, they’re going to send in four more. A woman and three men.”
“Okay.”
“Have Jerry swing in on random enforcement and bust them for fraudulent IDs, prescriptions, the whole works.”
“All right, we can do that. Why?”
“The guy named Brody is causing me a problem. I need him gone. He’s got a line of purple down the right side of his face.”
Bosch proffered the cane in explanation.
“And the woman, I want to get her into detox and rehab.”
For the first time, Lourdes looked up from her shelf-shopping and tried to get a read on him.
“You sound sympathetic. Is this getting personal? You heard what the DEA undercover trainer said about that.”
“I’ve only been under twenty-four hours, and I don’t even know her name. It’s not personal. I just saw some stuff down there in Slab City and I want her pulled out. Besides, the more people they’re down, the more important I become. Maybe they’ll think twice about playing Russian roulette with me again.”
“Okay, we’ll do it. But that will pull a lot of us off the surveillance. I’ll make sure at least one car stays with you.”
“Doesn’t matter. You can wait for us at Whiteman. We’ll be going back for the plane.”
Bosch heard the name that was on his phony ID called out by the pharmacist.
“Gotta go.”
“What about tomorrow?”
“What about it?”
“It’s Sunday. These mom-and-pop places are usually closed Sundays.”
“Then I guess I get a day off in Slab City. Tell them not to lose me this time.”
“You better believe I will. Take care of yourself.”
Bosch pointed the cane toward the ceiling and twirled it like a musketeer brandishing a sword. He then limped toward the counter to get his pills.
Twenty minutes later he was sitting in the back of the van, waiting for the second crew of shills to complete their pharmacy run. He watched Edgar and Hovan enter the pharmacy, and fifteen minutes after that, with the van’s driver getting restless and talking to himself in Russian, a pair of LAPD cruisers pulled up.
The Russian cursed.
“Tvoyu mat’!”
He turned around in his seat and looked at the three men sitting in the back. He pointed at Bosch.
“You. You go in and see. Find out what is going on in there.”
Bosch slid off his seat and moved to the side door. He got out and crossed the parking lot to the pharmacy. He guessed he had been chosen by the driver because he had the cleanest clothes of those in the van. He walked in, saw the four shills lined up and in handcuffs by the pharmacy counter. The uniformed officers were checking their pockets.
Bosch’s entering had rung an overhead bell. The woman with the stars on her hand looked over her shoulder and saw Bosch. She widened her eyes and jutted her chin in the direction of the door. Bosch turned around and walked back out.
Acting as though he had just seen a ghost, Bosch quickly legged it back to the van, dropping any gentleness about his knee. He jumped in through the side door.
“The cops got them! They’re all in handcuffs.”
“Close the door! Close the door!”
The van was moving before Bosch could pull the sliding door closed. The driver took an exit onto Van Nuys Boulevard and headed back toward Whiteman. He hit a speed dial on his phone and soon was yelling in Russian at someone at the other end of the line.