Echo Park

off the path. You could go look and either find it right away or maybe never find it. There’s a lot of territory up there. You remember, they searched up there but they never found her.”
    “And after thirteen years you believe you could lead us to this spot?”
    “It hasn’t been thirteen years.”
    A sudden rush of horror came over Bosch. The idea that he had held her captive was too abhorrent to think about.
    “It’s not what you think, Detective,” Waits said.
    “How do you know what I am thinking?”
    “I just do. But it’s not what you think. Marie has been buried for thirteen years. But it has not been thirteen years since I was there. That’s what I’m saying. I visited her, Detective. I visited her there quite often. So I can certainly lead you there.”
    Bosch paused, took out a pen and wrote a note on the inside flap of the Gesto file. It wasn’t a note of any importance. It just gave him a moment to disengage from the emotions that were coming up.
    “Let’s go back to the beginning,” he said. “Did you know Marie Gesto before September nineteen ninety-three?”
    “No, I didn’t.”
    “Had you ever seen her before the day you abducted her?”
    “Not that I remember.”
    “Where did you first cross paths with her?”
    “At the Mayfair. I saw her in there shopping and she was just my type. I followed her.”
    “Where?”
    “She got in her car and drove up Beachwood Canyon. She parked in the gravel lot below the stables. I believe it is called Sunset Ranch. There was no one around when she was getting out, so I decided to take her.”
    “It wasn’t planned before you saw her in the store?”
    “No, I went there to buy some Gatorade. It was a hot day. I saw her and decided right then that I had to have her. You know, it was an impulse. I couldn’t do anything about it, Detective.”
    “You approached her in the lot below the stables?”
    He nodded.
    “I pulled in right next to her in my van. She didn’t think a thing about it. The parking area is down the hill from the ranch, from the stables. There was no one around, no one who could see. It was perfect. It was like God said I could have her.”
    “What did you do?”
    “I went into the back of the van and I opened the sliding door on the side where she was. I had a knife and I just stepped out and told her to get in. She did. It was a simple operation really. She was no trouble at all.”
    He spoke as if he were a babysitter reporting on a child’s behavior when the parents have returned home.
    “Then what?” Bosch asked.
    “I asked her to remove her clothes and she complied. She told me she would do whatever I wanted as long as I didn’t hurt her. I agreed to that deal. She folded her clothes very nicely. As if she thought she would get the chance to put them back on again.”
    Bosch rubbed a hand over his mouth. The most difficult part of his job were the times he was face-to-face with a killer, when he saw firsthand the intersection of their warped and terrifying world with reality.
    “Go on,” he said to Waits.
    “Well, you know the rest. We had sex but she was no good at it. She couldn’t relax. So I did what I had to do.”
    “Which was what?”
    Waits locked eyes with Bosch.
    “I killed her, Detective. I put my hands around her neck and I squeezed and then I squeezed harder and I watched her eyes go still. Then I finished up.”
    Bosch stared at him but couldn’t bring himself to open his mouth. It was moments like these that made him feel inadequate as a detective, moments when he was cowed by the depravity that was possible in the human form. They stared at each other for a long moment until O’Shea spoke.
    “You had sex with her body?” he asked.
    “That’s right. While she was still warm. I always say a woman is at her best when she is dead but still warm.”
    Waits glanced at Rider to see if he had gotten a reaction. She showed nothing.
    “Waits,” Bosch said. “You are a worthless piece of trash.”
    Waits looked back at Bosch and put the smirk back on his face.
    “If that is your best shot, Detective Bosch, then you’ll have to do much better. Because it will only get worse for you from here. Sex is nothing. Alive or dead, it is transitory. But I took her soul and no one will ever get that back from me.”
    Bosch looked down at the open file in front of him but did not see the words printed on the documents.
    “Let’s move on,” he finally said. “What did you do next?”
    “I