Angels Flight (1998)

by Michael Connelly

  “Join the club.”

  More silence.

  “I have the files here. The whole box. I was just typing out my final report. I’ll pack it all up and try to drop it off tomorrow. But I can’t be held to it — I’m on patrol until things calm down on the South Side.”

  “That will be fine.”

  “Are you taking over his office, too? Is that where I should bring everything?”

  “Yes. That’s the plan. That would be fine.”

  Bosch nodded but he knew she couldn’t see this.

  “Well,” he said. “Thanks for your help. I don’t know if Irving has said anything, but the lead to Sheehan came out of the files. One of the old cases. I guess you heard about that.”

  “Actually . . . no. But you’re welcome, Detective Bosch. I’m curious, though. About Sheehan. He was your former partner . . .”

  “Yes. He was.”

  “Does all of this seem plausible? That he would first kill Howard and then himself? That woman on the train, too?”

  “If you asked me that yesterday I would have said never in a million years. But today I feel like I couldn’t read myself let alone anybody else. We have a saying when we can’t explain things. The evidence is what it is . . . And we leave it at that.”

  Bosch leaned back on the bed and stared up at the ceiling. He held the phone to his ear. After a long moment she spoke.

  “But is it possible that there is another interpretation of the evidence?”

  She said it slowly, concisely. She was a lawyer. She chose her words well.

  “What are you saying, Inspector?”

  “It’s just Carla now.”

  “What are you saying, Carla? What are you asking me?”

  “You have to understand, my role is different now. I am bound by attorney-client ethics. Michael Harris is now my client in a lawsuit against your employer and several of your colleagues. I have to be care — ”

  “Is there something that clears him? Sheehan? Something you held back before?”

  Bosch sat up and now leaned forward. He was staring wide-eyed at nothing. He was all internal, trying to remember something he could have missed. He knew Entrenkin had held back the trial strategy file. There must have been something in there.

  “I can’t answer your — ”

  “The strategy file,” Bosch cut in excitedly. “It was something in there that puts the lie to this. It . . .”

  He stopped. What she was suggesting — or the suggestion he was reading in her words — did not make sense. Sheehan’s service weapon had been linked to the Angels Flight shootings. There was a ballistics match. Three bullets from the body of Howard Elias, three matches. End of argument, end of case. The evidence is what it is.

  That was the hard fact he was up against, yet his gut instinct still told him Sheehan was all wrong for this, that he wouldn’t have done it. Yes, he would have gladly danced on Elias’s grave but he wouldn’t have put the lawyer in that grave. There was a big difference. And Bosch’s instincts — though abandoned in light of the facts — were that Frankie Sheehan, no matter what he had done to Michael Harris, was still too good a man at his core to have done the latter. He had killed before, but he was not a killer. Not like that.

  “Look,” he said. “I don’t know what you know or think you know, but you’ve got to help me. I can’t — ”

  “It’s there,” she said. “If you have the files, it’s there. I held something back that I was bound to hold back. But part of it was in the public files. If you look, you’ll find it. I’m not saying your partner is clear. I’m just saying there was something else here that probably should have been looked at. It wasn’t.”

  “And that’s all you are going to tell me?”

  “That’s all I can tell you — and even that I shouldn’t have.”

  Bosch was silent for a moment. He didn’t know whether to be angry with her for not telling him specifically what she knew or just happy that she had given him the clue and the direction.

  “All right,” he finally said. “If it’s here I’ll find it.”

  35

  IT took Bosch nearly two hours to make his way through the Black Warrior case files. Many of the folders he had opened previously, but some had been viewed by Edgar and Rider or left to others on the squad Irving had put together at Angels Flight less than seventy-two hours earlier. He looked at each file as if he had never seen it before, looking for the thing that had been missed — the telling detail, the boomerang that would change his interpretation of everything and send it in a new direction.

  That was the problem with gang-banging a case — putting multiple investigative teams on it. No single pair of eyes saw all of the evidence, all of the leads or even all of the paperwork. Everything was split up. Though one detective was nominally in charge, it was rare that everything crossed his radar screen. Now Bosch had to make sure it did.

  He found what he believed he was looking for — and what Carla Entrenkin had hinted at — in the subpoena file, the folder where receipts from the process server were stored. These receipts were received by Howard Elias’s office after the subject of the subpoena had been served with the summons to appear for a deposition or as a witness in court. The file was thick with the thin white forms. The stack was in chronological order of service. The first half of the stack consisted of subpoenas for depositions and these dated back several months. The second half of the stack consisted of witness subpoenas for the court case that had been scheduled to start that day. These were summonses to the cops being sued as well as other witnesses.

  Bosch remembered that Edgar had looked through this file earlier — he had come across the subpoena for the car wash records. But that discovery must have distracted him from other things in the file. As Bosch looked through the subpoenas another filing caught his eyes as being worthy of a second look. It was a subpoena for Detective John Chastain of the Internal Affairs Division. This was surprising because Chastain had never mentioned any involvement in the lawsuit. Chastain had headed the internal investigation of Michael Harris’s allegations that had cleared the RHD detectives of any wrongdoing, so the fact that he had been called wasn’t unusual. It would stand to reason that he would be called as a witness in defense of the detectives accused of wrongdoing by Michael Harris. But the fact that Chastain had not told anyone he was a subpoenaed witness for the plaintiffs in the lawsuit was. If that had been known he might have been disqualified from the team investigating the murders for the same reason that the RHD bulls had been removed. There was a clear conflict. The subpoena needed explanation. And Bosch’s interest in it increased further when he saw that the date of service was Thursday, the day before Elias’s murder. But curiosity turned to suspicion when Bosch saw the note handwritten by the process server at the bottom of the subpoena.

  Det. Chastain refused acceptance at vehicle. Server placed under wiper.

  The note made it very clear that Chastain didn’t want any part of the case. And it turned Bosch’s attention into a sharp focus. The city could have been burning from Dodger Stadium to the beach and he probably wouldn’t have noticed the television now.

  He realized as he stared at the subpoena that the subject — Chastain — had been given a specific date and time to appear in court to give testimony. He shuffled through the court subpoenas and realized that they were placed in the file in order of service, not in the order that those summoned would appear in trial. He knew then that by placing them in order according to the appearance dates and times, he would have the chronological order of Elias’s case and a better understanding of how he planned the trial.

  It took him two minutes to put the subpoenas in the proper order. When he was done, he looked at the documents one by one, envisioning the process of the trial. First Michael Harris would testify. He would tell his story. Next would come Captain John Garwood, head of RHD. Garwood would testify about the investigation, giving the sanitized version. The next subpoena was for Chastain. He would follow
Garwood. Reluctantly — he had tried to refuse service — he would follow the RHD captain.

  Why?

  Bosch put the question aside for the moment and began going through the other subpoenas. It became clear that Elias was following an age-old strategy of alternating positive and negative witnesses. He was planning to alternate the testimony of the RHD men, the defendants, with witnesses who would obviously benefit Michael Harris. There was Harris, the doctor who treated his ear, Jenkins Pelfry, his boss at the car wash, the two homeless men who had found Stacey Kincaid’s body, and finally Kate Kincaid and Sam Kincaid. It was clear to Bosch that Elias was going to attack the RHD case, expose the torture of Michael Harris, and establish his defense of having done nothing wrong. He would then blow the RHD completely out of the water by bringing in Kate Kincaid to detail the car wash connection and the explanation for the fingerprints. Then most likely it would be Sam Kinkaid’s turn. Elias would use him to expose the Charlotte’s Web Site and the horror of Stacey Kincaid’s young life. It was clear that the case Elias was going to present to the jury followed the same line of investigation Bosch and his team had followed — that Harris was innocent, that there was an explanation for his fingerprints, and that Sam Kincaid or someone connected to him and the pedo net killed his stepdaughter.

  Bosch knew it was a good strategy. He believed Elias would have won the case. He flipped back to the front of the court subpoenas. Chastain was third in line, putting him on the positive side of the alternating strategy — coming after Garwood and before one of the RHD defendants. He was going to be a positive witness for Elias and Harris but he had attempted to refuse being served the subpoena.

  Bosch read the name of the service company off the form and called information. It was late but process serving was an odd-hours job. People weren’t always served nine to five. A man answered the phone and Bosch, reading from the Chastain subpoena, asked for Steve Vascik.

  “He’s not here tonight. He’s home.”

  Bosch identified himself and explained that he was conducting a homicide investigation and needed to talk to Vascik immediately. The man on the other end of the line was reluctant to give out Vascik’s phone number but agreed to take Bosch’s number and contact Vascik with the message.

  After disconnecting the call Bosch got up and paced around his house. He wasn’t sure what he had. But he had the fluttering feeling in his stomach that often came when he was on the edge of a breakthrough to something hidden. He was flying on instinct and his instinct told him he was close to something he would soon be able to wrap his hands around.

  The phone rang and he grabbed it off the couch and pushed the connect button.

  “Mr. Vascik?”

  “Harry, it’s me.”

  “Eleanor. Hey, how are you? Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine. But I’m not the one in a city about to burn. I’ve been watching the news.”

  “Yeah. It looks bad.”

  “I’m sorry it turned out that way, Harry. You told me about Sheehan once. I know you guys were close.”

  Bosch realized that she didn’t know that the friend’s home where Sheehan had killed himself was theirs. He decided not to say anything. He also wished he had call waiting service on his line.

  “Eleanor, where are you?”

  “I’m back in Vegas.” She gave an unhumorous laugh. “The car barely made it.”

  “At the Flamingo?”

  “No . . . I’m somewhere else.”

  She didn’t want to tell him where and that hurt.

  “Is there a number I can call you at?”

  “I’m not sure how long I’m going to be here. I just wanted to call and make sure you were okay.”

  “Me? Don’t worry about me. Are you okay, Eleanor?”

  “I’m fine.”

  Bosch didn’t care about Vascik anymore.

  “Do you need anything? What about your car?”

  “No. I’m fine. Now that I’m here I’m not worried about the car.”

  There was a long moment of silence. Bosch heard one of the electronic sounds that he had once heard somebody call digital bubbles.

  “Well,” he finally said, “can we talk about this?”

  “I don’t think this is a good time. Let’s think about things for a couple of days and then we’ll talk. I’ll call you, Harry. Be careful.”

  “Do you promise? To call?”

  “I promise.”

  “Okay, Eleanor. I’ll wait.”

  “Good-bye, Harry.”

  She hung up before he could say good-bye. Bosch stood there next to the couch for a long time, thinking about her and what had happened to them.

  The phone rang while still in his hand.

  “Yes?”

  “Detective Bosch? I got a message to call you.”

  “Mr. Vascik?”

  “Yes. From Triple A Process. My boss Shelly said you — ”

  “Yes, I called.”

  Bosch sat down on the couch and pulled a notebook onto his thigh. He took a pen out of his pocket and wrote Vascik’s name on the top of a page. Vascik sounded young and white to him. He had some Midwest in his voice.

  “How old are you, Steve?”

  “I’m twenty-five.”

  “You been with Triple A very long?”

  “A few months.”

  “Okay, last week, on Thursday, you served paper on an LAPD detective named John Chastain, do you remember that?”

  “Sure. He didn’t want to be served. Most cops I’ve done don’t really care. They’re used to it.”

  “Right. That’s what I wanted to ask you about. When you say he didn’t want to be served, what do you mean exactly?”

  “Well, the first time I tried to serve him he refused to take the subpoena and walked away. Then when — ”

  “Wait a minute, go back. When was the first time?”

  “It was Thursday morning. I went to the lobby at Parker Center and had the cop at the desk call him and tell him to come down. I didn’t say what it was for. It said on the paper he was IAD so I just said I was a citizen with something for him that he needed. He came down and when I said who I was he just backed off and went back to the elevator.”

  “What you’re saying is that it was like he knew you had a subpoena and even what case it was?”

  “Right. Exactly.”

  Bosch thought about what he had read in Elias’s last notebook. His feuding with a source named “Parker.”

  “Okay, then what?”

  “Well, then I went and did some other jobs and I came back about three-thirty and watched the employee lot at Parker. I saw him come out to go home, I guess, and I cut between some cars and ducked down and sort of came up just as he was opening his door. I had my spiel all worked out and told him he was served and said the case number and all of that. He still wouldn’t take the paper but that didn’t matter because under California law all you — ”

  “Right, I know. You can’t refuse a subpoena once you have been advised that it is a legal, court-ordered subpoena. So what did he do?”

  “Well, first he scared the shit out of me. He put his arm under his coat like he was going for his gun or something.”

  “Then what?”

  “Then he sort of stopped. I guess he thought about what he was doing. He relaxed a little bit but he still wouldn’t take the paper. He told me to tell Elias to fuck off. He got in his car and started pulling out. I knew he was served so I just put the paper under his windshield wiper. He drove off with it like that. I don’t know what happened to it after that. Could’ve blown off but it doesn’t matter. He was legally served.”

  Bosch thought for a moment while Vascik went on about the intricacies of process serving. He finally cut him off.

  “Did you know Elias got killed Friday night?”

  “Yes, sir. Sure. He was our client. We did all his cases.”

  “Well, did you ever think to call the department after he was killed and tell someone about this thing with
Chastain?”

  “I did,” Vascik answered defensively. “I called.”

  “You called? Who’d you call?”

  “I called Parker Center and said I had information. I was transferred to an office and told the guy who answered who I was and that I had some information. He took my name and number and said someone would call me back.”

  “Nobody ever did?”

  “No, somebody called in like five minutes. Maybe less. Right away. I told him.”

  “When was this?”

  “Sunday morning. I was out climbing all day Saturday. Up at Vasquez Rocks. I didn’t hear about Mr. Elias until I read the Times on Sunday morning.”