“Harry, I was going to call you, but I thought maybe you’d be out celebrating.”
“Oh, you mean the case? No, no celebration. Just glad it’s over.”
“I’ll say. Well, I was also going to call to tell you they ID’d the other Russian off his prints. You know how you were calling him Igor for the sake of keeping all the parties straight when you were telling the story?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, the guy’s name actually was Igor. I mean, what are the chances?”
“Probably pretty good if you’re Russian.”
“Anyway, Igor Golz — G-O-L-Z — age thirty-one. Interpol had him as another member of the Bratva and longtime associate of Sluchek’s. They met in a Russian prison and probably came over here together.”
“Well, I guess that wraps things up on the farmacia case, huh?”
“I was nailing down the paperwork today. You back in tomorrow, now that your court thingy is over?”
“Yeah, my thingy’s over and I’ll be in tomorrow.”
“Sorry, you know what I mean. It’ll be nice to have you back around.”
“Listen, I was calling to ask you something. The other day you mentioned that you had been around addicts, including someone in your own family. Do you mind if I ask who that was?”
“Yeah, my sister. Why do you want to know?”
“Is she all right now? I mean, not addicted?”
“As far as we know. We don’t see her that much. Once she got clean, she didn’t really want to be around the people who saw her at the low points, you know what I mean?”
“I think so.”
“She stole like crazy from my parents. Me too.”
“That’s what happens.”
“So we saved her but consequently we lost her. At least in a good way. She lives up in the Bay Area, and like I said, she’s supposedly four years sober and clean.”
“That part’s great. How did you get her clean?”
“Well, we didn’t actually do it. It was rehab.”
“Which one did you use? That’s why I’m calling. I need to get somebody into a place and I don’t know where to start.”
“Well, there’s the fancy ones that cost a fortune and those that don’t. You get what you pay for as far as creature comforts, but my sister was basically on the streets. So the place we got her into was like heaven. A room and a bed, you know? It was a mixture of circle jerks and private sessions with the shrinks. A piss test every day.”
“Where was it? What was it called?”
“It was called the Start. It was over there in Canoga Park. Four years ago it was like twelve hundred a week. There was no insurance, so we all chipped in. It’s gotta be more now. The opioid thing has made it hard to find a bed in some of these places.”
“Thanks, Bella. I’m going to check it out.”
“See you tomorrow at the station?”
“I’ll be there.”
Bosch was on the 101, transitioning north to the 405. He could see the plume of smoke from the brewery up ahead.
He called directory assistance and was connected to the Start. After being put on hold twice he was finally speaking to someone called the director of placement. She explained that the facility specialized in treating opioid addiction and that they did not reserve beds, choosing to work strictly on a first-come, first-served basis. At the moment, there were three beds open in the forty-two-bed facility.
Bosch asked about pricing and learned that the weekly all-inclusive fee had jumped more than fifty percent in four years to $1,880, paid in advance with a recommended four-week minimum of treatment. Bosch was reminded of Jerry Edgar’s sermon about the crisis being too big to shut down because everybody was making money on it.
Bosch thanked the director of placement and disconnected. Five minutes later he was pulling into the Road Saints compound. This time there were several motorcycles parked about the front yard and he wondered if he had stumbled into the monthly membership meeting. Before getting out of the Jeep, he called Cisco to see if he had arrived at the wrong time.
“No, man, I’ll come out and bring you in. Wednesdays are always big here for some reason. I don’t even know why.”
Bosch was leaning against the Jeep when Cisco came out.
“So how’s she doing?” he asked.
“Uh, resentful as ever,” Cisco said. “But I think that’s a good sign. I remember Mick Haller came by to visit me when I was in day four or five. I told him through the door that he could take his job and shove it up his ass. ’Course, a week later I had to ask him to pull it out of his ass and give it back to me.”
Bosch laughed.
“So have you heard about this place over in Canoga Park called the Start?” he asked.
“Yeah, the rehab,” Cisco said. “I’ve heard of it. But I don’t really know anything about it.”
“I heard from somebody that it was good. It got results for them. It costs about two grand a week, so it better.”
“That’s a lot of bread.”
“When Elizabeth is finished here, I want you to take her there, try to get her in. It’s first come, first served, but there are beds open now.”
“I think she’s going to need at least another day here, maybe two, before she gets cleaned up and can take that next step.”
“That’s fine. Whenever she’s ready.”
Bosch reached into the pocket of his jacket and pulled out the sock containing the cash roll. He handed it to Cisco.
“Use this. It should get a month at that place. Maybe longer if she needs it.”
Cisco reluctantly took it.
“This is cash? You just want to give it to me?”
Cisco looked around the yard and through the fencing to the outside streets. Bosch realized how it might look to anyone watching.
“Shit, I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”
Now Bosch looked around. He saw no sign of surveillance, but he probably wouldn’t have.
“No worries,” Cisco said. “For a good cause.”
“So, you’ll handle that?” Bosch asked. “You’ve been paying forward, backward, and sideways with this.”
“I don’t mind. We’re doing a good thing. You want to go in now?”
“You know what? I was thinking maybe I shouldn’t. If she’s going to get agitated, then she doesn’t need to see me. I don’t want to set her off.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah, if she’s doing good, keep her doing good. I’m happy with that.”
Cisco tossed the sock up and then caught it.
“Let me guess,” he said. “Earthquake money?”
“Yeah,” Bosch said. “I thought, what the hell, put it to good use.”
“Yeah, but you know you just jinxed the whole city. As soon as you spend the earthquake money, the big one hits. Everybody knows that.”
“Yeah, well, we’ll just have to see. I’ll let you get back to it. Thanks, Cisco.”
“No, thank you. And someday I think she’ll be doing the thanking.”
“Not necessary now, not necessary then. Let me know how it goes with that other place if you get her in.”
“Will do.”
After driving away, Bosch cut west and went by the Start after Googling its location on his phone. He could tell it had once been a Holiday Inn or some other midrange hotel. It was now painted stark white. It looked clean and cared for — at least on the outside. He was happy with that.
He kept driving and started heading home. Almost the whole way he thought about his decision not to go in and visit Elizabeth Clayton. He wasn’t sure what that meant or what he was doing. She had tapped into a need he had to reach out and help someone, whether they welcomed his help or not. He was sure that if he sat down with a shrink for an hour — maybe his longtime LAPD counselor Carmen Hinojos — there would be a whole raft of psychological underpinnings to his actions. And the money. He had very specifically committed funds that would not upset any financial aspect of his life. So was there a sacrifice in that?