Angels Flight

phones?”
    “Me mostly. A couple of the others.”
    “Did you take a call from a guy said he was a process server?”
    “Sounds familiar. But we were getting lots of calls that morning. Reporters and people thinking they knew something. People threatening the cops.”
    “A process server named Vascik. Steve Vascik. He said he had some information that might be important.”
    “Like I said, it’s familiar. What about it, Bosch? I thought this case was over.”
    “It is. I’m just checking some loose ends. Who’d you give the call to?”
    “I gave those kind of calls – you know, info off the street – to the IAD guys. To keep them busy.”
    “Which one did you give the process server to?”
    “I don’t know, probably Chastain. He was in charge of that group. He might’ve taken it or told one of the others to call the guy back. See, Irving set up some shitty phones in there. We couldn’t transfer one to the other and I wanted the main line free. So we took numbers and passed them on.”
    “Okay, thanks, man. Have a nice night.”
    “Hey, what is – ”
    Bosch disconnected before he had to answer any questions. He thought about the information from Lindell. He believed there was a high probability that the call from Vascik had been routed to Chastain himself, who then called back – probably taking the message to his own office for privacy – and posed as Edgar.
    Bosch had one more call to make. He opened his phone book and found a number that he had not used in many years. He called Captain John Garwood, head of Robbery-Homicide Division, at home. He knew it was late but he doubted very many people were sleeping in Los Angeles tonight. He thought about what Kiz Rider had said about Garwood reminding her of Boris Karloff and only coming out at night.
    Garwood answered after two rings.
    “It’s Harry Bosch. We need to talk. Tonight.”
    “About?”
    “John Chastain and the Black Warrior case.”
    “I don’t want to talk on the phone.”
    “Fine. Name the place.”
    “Frank Sinatra?”
    “How soon?”
    “Give me half an hour.”
    “I’ll be there.”

Chapter 36
    IN the long run, Frank Sinatra got ripped off. Decades ago, when the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce put his star down on the sidewalk, they put it on Vine Street rather than on Hollywood Boulevard. The thinking probably was that the Sinatra star would be a draw, people would come down from the boulevard to see it, to take a picture. But if that was the plan, it didn’t work. Frank was alone in a spot that probably saw more hypes than tourists. His star was at a crosswalk between two parking lots and next to a residence hotel where you had to convince the security guard to unlock the lobby door if you wanted to go in.
    When Bosch had been in RHD years before, the Sinatra star had often been a meeting spot between detectives in the field or between detectives and their snitches. It hadn’t surprised Bosch that Garwood had suggested it for their meeting. It was a way of meeting on neutral ground.
    By the time Bosch got to the star Garwood was already there. Bosch saw his unmarked Ford LTD in the parking lot.
    Garwood flashed his lights. Bosch pulled to the curb in front of the hotel and got out. He crossed Vine to the parking lot and got in the front passenger seat. Garwood was wearing a suit, even though called from home. Bosch realized that he had never seen Garwood in anything other than a suit, the tie always pulled tight, the top button of his shirt never undone. Again Bosch thought of Rider’s Boris Karloff comment.
    “Those fucking cars,” Garwood said, looking across the street at Bosch’s slickback. “I heard about you getting potshotted.”
    “Yeah. That wasn’t fun.”
    “So what brings you out tonight, Harry? How come you’re still investigating a case that the chief of police and everybody else has already closed?”
    “Because I have a bad feeling about it, Cap. There are loose ends. Things can unravel when you have loose ends.”
    “You never could leave things alone. I remember that from when you worked for me. You and your fucking loose ends.”
    “So tell me about Chastain.”
    Garwood said nothing, just stared ahead through the windshield, and Bosch realized that his former captain was unsure about things.
    “We’re off the record here, Captain. Like you said, the case is closed. But something about Chastain and Frankie Sheehan bothers me. You should know, a couple nights ago Frankie told me