9 Dragons

surveillance video and confirmed that Chang had come in and made his way back to Li’s office, then left after three minutes off camera with Li and Lam. He then collected the disc and returned to the office to go over Li’s account of what happened with Chang one more time. Li’s reluctance seemed to grow with Bosch’s more detailed questioning. Harry began to believe that the murder victim’s son would eventually refuse to cooperate with a prosecution. Still, there was another positive aspect to this latest development. Chang’s attempted extortion could be used in other ways. It could provide probable cause. And with probable cause Bosch could arrest Chang and search his belongings for evidence in the murder, whether Li eventually cooperated with a prosecution or not.
    As he walked out the store’s automatic door, Bosch was excited. The case had new life. He pulled his phone and checked on the suspect.
    “We’re all the way back to his apartment,” Chu said. “No stops. I think he might be in for the night.”
    “It’s too early. It’s not even dark.”
    “Well, all I can tell you is that he booked it home. He pulled the curtains closed, too.”
    “Okay. I’m heading that way.”
    “You mind picking me up a tofu dog on the way, Harry?”
    “No, you’re on your own there, Chu.”
    Chu laughed.
    “Figures,” he said.
    Bosch closed the phone. Chu had obviously caught the case excitement, too.

15
    C hang didn’t come out of his apartment until nine Friday morning. And when he did, he was carrying something that immediately put Bosch on high alert.
    A large suitcase.
    Bosch phoned Chu to make sure he was awake. They had split the overnight surveillance into four-hour shifts, each man taking a sleeping stint in his car. Chu had the four-to-eight sleep shift but Bosch hadn’t heard from him yet.
    “You awake? Chang’s making a move.”
    Chu still had sleep in his voice.
    “Yeah, what move? You were supposed to call me at eight.”
    “He put a suitcase in his car. He’s running. I think he was tipped.”
    “To us?”
    “No, to buying shares of Microsoft. Don’t play stupid.”
    “Harry, who would tip him?”
    Chang got into the car and started backing out of his space in the apartment complex parking lot.
    “That’s a good goddamn question,” Bosch said. “But if anybody has the answer it’s you.”
    “Are you suggesting I tipped off the subject of a major investigation?”
    Chu’s voice carried the requisite outrage of the accused.
    “I don’t know what you did,” Bosch said. “But you put our business out all over Monterey Park, so now it’s who knows who could’ve tipped this guy. All I know right now is that it looks like he’s splitting town.”
    “All over Monterey Park? Are you just making this shit up?”
    Bosch followed the Mustang north out of the parking lot, staying a block back.
    “You told me the other night that the third guy you showed Chang’s photo to over there made the ID. Okay, so that’s three guys and they all have partners and they all have roll calls and they all talk.”
    “Well, maybe this wouldn’t have happened if we didn’t tell Tao and Herrera to back off like we didn’t trust them.”
    Bosch checked his mirror for Chu. He was trying not to let his anger distract him from the tail. They couldn’t lose Chang now.
    “Move up. We’re heading to the ten. After he gets on, I want you to switch off with me and take the lead.”
    “Got it.”
    Chu’s voice still held anger. Bosch didn’t care. If Chang had been tipped to the investigation, then Harry would find out who had made the call and he would burn them to the ground, even if it was Chu.
    Chang got on the westbound 10 Freeway and soon Chu passed Bosch to take the lead. Bosch glanced over and saw Chu flip him the bird.
    Bosch moved over a lane, dropped back and made a call to Lieutenant Gandle.
    “Harry, what’s up?”
    “We’ve got problems.”
    “Tell me.”
    “The first one is that our guy put a suitcase in his trunk this morning and is on the ten heading toward the airport.”
    “Shit, what else”
    “It looks to me like he was tipped, maybe told to get out of town.”
    “Or maybe he was told all along to split after he clipped Li. Don’t go off the deep end on that, Harry. Not until you know something for sure.”
    It annoyed Bosch that his own lieutenant wasn’t backing him, but he could deal with it. If Chang had been tipped and somewhere along the line the cancer