Echo Park

phone off his belt. He listened to the caller and then took a sweeping look around the woods, doing a 360-degree turn. Bosch ducked back.
    “No, Lieutenant,” Osani said. “We don’t see him. The car’s in the lot but we don’t see him. We don’t see anybody out here.”
    Osani listened some more and said yes several times before closing the phone and returning it to his belt. He went back to work with the tape measure and within another minute or so the two OIS men had what they needed.
    Osani’s partner climbed the ladder and then both men pulled it up the embankment. It was at that moment that Osani noticed the rope looped around the trunk of the white oak at the edge of the embankment. He put the ladder down on the ground and went to the tree. He pulled the rope from around the trunk and started coiling it. He looked out into the woods as he did this and Bosch moved back behind one of the eucalyptus’s two trunks.
    A few minutes later they were gone, loudly trudging back through the woods to the parking clearing, the ladder carried between them. Bosch went to the embankment but waited until he could no longer hear the OIS men before using the roots as handholds to climb up.
    When he got to the parking clearing, there was no sign of Osani and his partner. Bosch turned his phone back on and waited for it to boot up. He wanted to see if the caller from Parker Center had left a message. Before he could listen, the phone started vibrating in his hand. He recognized the number as one of the lines from the Open-Unsolved Unit. He took the call.
    “This is Bosch.”
    “Harry, where are you?”
    It was Abel Pratt. There was an urgency in his voice.
    “Nowhere. Why?”
    “Where
are
you?”
    Something told Bosch that Pratt knew exactly where he was.
    “I’m in Beachwood Canyon. What’s going on?”
    There was a moment of silence before Pratt responded, the urgent tone replaced with one of annoyance.
    “What’s going on is that I just got a call from Lieutenant Randolph at OIS . He says there’s a Mustang registered to you sitting in the lot up there. I tell him that’s really strange, because Harry Bosch is on home duty and is supposed to be staying a million miles away from the investigation in Beachwood Canyon.”
    Thinking quickly, Bosch came up with what he thought was a way out.
    “Look, I’m not investigating anything. I’m looking for something. I lost my challenge coin out here yesterday. I’m just looking for it.”
    “What?”
    “My RHD chip. It must’ve come out of my pocket when I was sliding down the embankment or something. I got home last night and it wasn’t in my pocket.”
    As he spoke Bosch reached into his pocket and pulled out the coin he was claiming to have lost. It was a heavy metal coin about the size and width of a casino chip. One side showed a gold detective’s badge and the other side showed the caricature of a detective—suit, hat, gun and exaggerated chin—set against an American flag background. It was known as a challenge coin or chip and was a carryover from the practice of elite and specialized military units. Upon acceptance into the unit a soldier is given a challenge coin and is expected to carry it always. At any time or place a fellow unit member can ask to see the coin. This most often takes place in a bar or canteen. If the soldier fails to be carrying the coin, then he picks up the tab. The tradition had been observed for several years in the RHD . Bosch had been given his coin upon returning from retirement.
    “Fuck the coin, Harry,” Pratt said angrily. “You can replace it for ten bucks.
Stay away
from the investigation. Go home and stay home until you hear from me. Am I clear?”
    “You’re clear.”
    “Besides, what the fuck? If you lost your coin out there the Forensics people would have found it already. They went over that scene with a metal detector looking for cartridges.”
    Bosch nodded.
    “Yeah, I sort of forgot about that.”
    “Yeah, Harry, you forgot? Are you bullshitting with me?”
    “No, Top, I’m not. I forgot. I was bored and decided to come look for it. I saw Randolph’s people and decided to keep my head down. I just didn’t think they’d call in my plate.”
    “Well, they did. And then I got the call. I don’t like blowback like this, Harry. You know that.”
    “I’m going home right now.”
    “Good. Stay there.”
    Pratt didn’t wait for Bosch’s response. He clicked off and Bosch closed his phone. He