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“I’m here,” Haller said. “Go on.”
“I run the Open-Unsolved Unit. You heard about the Ted Rawls case?”
“Of course. I also heard it was Harry who was on one side of that gun fight. I’ve left him five messages this week, but he hasn’t called me back.”
“He probably didn’t get them. His phone is still in evidence. Anyway, Ochoa was convicted of killing his girlfriend. It was a slam dunk DNA case. Only he didn’t kill her. Rawls did.”
“So the shorthand is, you found evidence linking Rawls to Olga Reyes and the D.A.’s sitting on it.”
“You’re good.”
“Good and pissed off. This guy Jorge is where now?”
“Corcoran.”
“Okay, what do I subpoena? Who do I subpoena?”
“You subpoena me and all evidence related to the Olga Reyes case. I gave you the number. We found items missing from the Reyes crime scene in a dumpster behind Rawls’s business office. He had just dumped it when he saw that Harry was watching him. The rest you know from the news.”
Haller made a slight whistling sound, then spoke.
“What’s the evidence?”
“Her nightgown and a bracelet Jorge gave her. I went to see his mother and she confirmed the bracelet.”
“That’s how I get into this. I go see the mother, sign her up,and take it from there. Nobody will ever know the tip came from you.”
“I appreciate that. Also, we have the murder weapon, a hammer. Rawls kept it all. You can match the hammer to the autopsy report.”
“You’re putting this on a silver platter for me. You got the mother’s name and address handy?”
“As soon as I’m off the road, I’ll send them to you.”
“Okay, then. I think I’m good to go.”
“Thank you for doing this.”
“A pleasure, Detective Ballard. You’ll be hearing from me, and if I get this into court and put you on the stand, you may regret this phone call.”
“I’m not worried about that. If you treat me as a hostile witness, it will be good cover. But you’ll also be calling Harry Bosch. He worked this with me.”
“I guess we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”
After disconnecting, Ballard called the KWPD to arrange for an officer to meet her at the Pier House so she could have the door to Bosch’s room opened by security. She wanted to read the note he had sealed and addressed to her. She believed it would give her insight into where Bosch was and what he was up to.
When she got to the Pier House fifteen minutes later, there was already a KWPD car in the parking lot. Ballard parked next to it and entered the lobby and found two uniformed officers waiting for her with the resort’s head of security. She showed her badge and credentials, and the resort security man, Munoz, said he had a key card to Bosch’s room ready to go. They all walked out a rear door of the lobby and onto a pathway through a maze of lush tropical trees and plants,around a pool, and toward a building containing four floors of rooms.
They squeezed into a small elevator, because the security man said it was closer than the stairs to room 202.
At the door of the room, the security man knocked and leaned his head toward the doorjamb to listen.
“Resort security,” he called out. “Mr. Bosch? Security.”
He waited a few seconds and then knocked again. He pulled a key card from his pocket to unlock the door.
“Security,” he said. “We are opening the door.”
54
