Edgar returned from his search for Rohat.
“He’s gone. He must’ve slipped out after he let me in.”
He looked relieved and Bosch realized it had nothing to do with Rohat. It was because Elizabeth was now fully dressed.
“Probably because I told him he was going to jail. Doesn’t matter. We can hook him up later. Let’s get her out of here.”
“To where? No shelter’s going to take her in this condition. We have to go to a hospital, Harry.”
“No, no hospital, and I’m not talking about a shelter. Hold her steady.”
“You can’t be serious, Harry. You’re not taking her home.”
“I’m not taking her home. Let’s get her to the door and then I’ll pull my car up.”
It took almost ten minutes to move Elizabeth through the clinic and out the exit to the passage connecting the front and back of the plaza.
“This way,” Bosch said.
He led her toward the front parking area. Once there, he left her leaning against Edgar and ran across the asphalt to his Jeep. He scanned his surroundings as he went and saw no sign of Brody.
Bosch brought the Jeep up to Edgar and Elizabeth and then hopped out to help get her into the front passenger seat and secure her with the seat belt.
“Harry, where are you going?”
“A treatment center.”
“Which one?”
“It doesn’t have a name.”
“Harry, what the fuck?”
“Jerry, you gotta trust me. I’m doing what’s best for her, and it doesn’t have anything to do with what the rules are. I am past all of that, okay? What you need to worry about is how to secure these premises now that Chemical Ali is on the run. There are probably enough pills in that clinic to create an army of zombies like her.”
Bosch stepped back, closed the door to the Jeep, and moved around to the driver’s side.
“And that army’s going to be here by sunup.”
As Bosch slipped into the Jeep, he saw Edgar glance back at the entrance to the unlocked clinic. Once inside the car, he checked Elizabeth and saw that she was leaning her head against the window of the passenger-side door and already nodding off.
Bosch pulled away and headed for the parking lot exit. He checked Edgar in the rearview. His former partner was just standing there, watching Bosch drive away.
The good news was that they didn’t have far to go. He got back over to Van Nuys Boulevard and took it north to Roscoe. He turned west at that point and took Roscoe under the 405 freeway and into an industrial neighborhood dominated by the size and smell of the giant Anheuser-Busch brewery, its stacks billowing beer smoke into the night.
Bosch made two wrong turns in the neighborhood before finally finding the place he was looking for. The entrance gate in the metal and barbed-wire fence that surrounded the property was open. There was no sign on the building, not even an address, but the row of six Harleys parked out front was the dead giveaway.
Bosch parked as close as he could to the black door at the center of the structure’s facade. He got out and went around to help Elizabeth. He put his arm across her back and half held her up as they approached the door.
“Come on, Elizabeth, help me here. Walk. You gotta walk.”
The door opened before they got to it.
Cisco stood there.
“How is she?” he asked.
“She was able to get a heavy hit before I could find her,” Bosch said. “She OD’d and then was given Narcan and is coming out of it. Are you ready for her?”
“We’re ready. Let me take her.”
Cisco bent down and simply picked Elizabeth up and carried her inside. Bosch followed and, once past the threshold, saw what was not revealed on the outside — a clubhouse. There were two pool tables in a large room, as well as an unmanned bar, couches, tables, and chairs. Neon signs depicted skulls and motorcycle wheels with halos — the symbols of the Road Saints. A couple of large men with long beards watched Cisco and company parade through.
Bosch followed Cisco down a dimly lit hallway and into a small room that was equally dim and contained only an army cot like the one Bosch had spent the past two nights on in the migrant bus in the desert.
Cisco put Elizabeth down gently on the cot and then took a step back and looked at her skeptically.
“You sure you shouldn’t have taken her to the hospital?” he asked. “We can’t have her croak in here. If she does, she disappears. They aren’t going to call in the coroner, you know what I mean.”
“I know,” Bosch said. “But she’s coming out of it. I think she’ll be okay. The doctor said so.”
“The quack doctor, you mean?”
“He wouldn’t have wanted her dying in his place either.”
“How much did she take?”
“She crushed two eighties.”
Cisco whistled.
“Sounds like she maybe kinda wanted to end things, you know?”
“Maybe, maybe not. So... this is where you did it? This room?”
“Different room, same place. I was nailed in. This one’s got locks on the outside of the door.”
“And she’s safe here?”
“I guarantee it.”
“Okay. I’m going to leave and come back in the morning. Early. I’ll talk to her then. And you’re all set?”
“We’re set. I’ll wait on the Suboxone until you come back and she can decide. Remember, she’s gotta make the call or we’re done here.”
“I know. Just keep an eye on her and I’ll be back.”
“Will do.”
“And thanks.”
“Pay it forward, isn’t that what they say? This is me paying it forward.”
“That’s good.”
Bosch stepped close to the cot and bent over to look down at Elizabeth. She was already asleep but seemed to be breathing normally. He then straightened up and turned toward the door.
“Need me to bring anything when I come back?” he asked.
“Nope,” Cisco said. “Unless you want to bring me back my cane and knee brace, if you’re done with them.”
“Uh, yeah, that might be a problem. Both were seized as evidence in the case.”
“Evidence of what?”
“That’s a long story. But I may have to replace those for you.”
“Forget it. In a way, they were a temptation. Good to be rid of them, I guess.”
“I get that.”
Bosch got back into the Jeep and considered the trek home — at least forty minutes in Sunday-night traffic — and felt so besieged and tired that he knew he could not make it. He thought about how easily Elizabeth had fallen asleep with her head against the glass. He reached down to the seat’s side lever and popped the back rest to its farthest recline angle.
He closed his eyes and was soon dead to the world in a deep sleep.
Eight hours later the unfiltered light of dawn snuck in under Bosch’s eyelids and woke him. He looked around and saw that there was only one motorcycle parked next to the Jeep. The others had somehow left in the night without their pipes penetrating his sleep. It was a testament to his exhaustion.
The one remaining bike had a black fuel tank with orange flames painted on it. Bosch recognized a match to the paint job of the cane Cisco had lent him. It told him that Cisco was still on duty.
After getting his bearings, Bosch unlocked the glove compartment and checked to make sure his gun and badge were still there.
Nothing had been taken. He relocked the compartment, climbed out of the Jeep, and went inside. He saw no one in the front room and proceeded down the hallway toward the rear of the structure. He found Cisco sitting on a cot that had been set up across the door to the room where Bosch had left Elizabeth Clayton almost eight hours before.