Lost Light

Freelance, you could say. That’s where I have to go now, to go talk to an investigator at the FBI.”
    “Oh. Well, go. Be careful.”
    “I will. So can we get together maybe one night next week or something?”
    “Sure, Harry. I’d like that.”
    “Okay, good. I want to, Melissa.”
    I nodded and she nodded and then she made a move toward me and came up on her toes. She put one hand on my shoulder and kissed me on the cheek. Then she continued down the hallway. I turned and watched her go.
    I walked out of that place wondering what I was doing. I was holding out hope of something to that woman that I knew deep down I could not deliver. It was a mistake that was born of good intentions but that would ultimately hurt her. As I got into the Mercedes I told myself I had to end it before it started. Next time I saw her I would have to tell her I was not the man she was looking for. I couldn’t keep that smile on her face.

10
    It was 4:15 by the time I got to the federal building in Westwood. As I was heading through the parking lot toward the security entrance my cell phone rang. It was Keisha Russell.
    “Hey, Harry Bosch,” she said. “Wanted to let you know, I printed out everything and put it in the mail. But I was wrong about something.”
    “What was that?”
    “There was an update on the case. It ran a couple months ago. I was on vacation. You stick around here long enough and they give you four weeks paid vacation. I took it all at once and went to London. While I was gone it was the third anniversary of Martha Gessler’s disappearance. People were poaching on my beat right and left, I tell you. David Ferrell did an update. Nothing new, though. She’s still in the wind.”
    “In the wind? That suggests you-or the bureau-think she’s still alive. Before, you said she was presumed dead.”
    “Just an expression, mon. I don’t think anybody’s holding their breath for her, if you know what I mean.”
    “Yeah. Did you put that update in the clips you’re sending me?”
    “It’s all there. And you remember who sent it. Ferrell’s a nice guy but I don’t want you calling him if something you’re doing breaks big.”
    “Never happen, Keisha.”
    “I know you are up to something. I did my homework on you.”
    That made me pause as I was halfway across the building’s front plaza. If she had called the bureau and spoken to Nunez, the agent wasn’t going to be happy about me involving a nosy reporter.
    “What do you mean?” I asked calmly. “What did you do?”
    “I did more than just check the clips. I called Sacramento. The state licensing board. I found out that you applied for and received a private investigator’s license.”
    “Yeah, so? Every cop who retires does that. It’s part of the process of letting go of the badge. You think, Oh, well, I’ll just get a PI ticket and keep on catching the bad guys. My ticket is in a drawer in my house, Keisha. I’m not in business and I’m not working for anybody.”
    “Okay, Harry, okay.”
    “Thanks for the clips. I’ve gotta go.”
    “Bye, Harry.”
    I closed the phone and smiled. I liked sparring with her. Ten years covering cops and she seemed no more cynical than the first day I talked to her. That was amazing for a journalist, even more so for a black journalist.
    I looked up at the building. It was a concrete monolith that eclipsed the sun from the angle I had. I was thirty feet from the entrance. But I walked over to a row of benches to the right of the entranceway and sat down. I checked my watch and saw that I was very late for my appointment with Nunez. The trouble was I didn’t know what I was walking into up there and that made me reluctant to go through the doors. The federals always had a way of putting you off balance, of making it clear that it was their world and you were only an invited visitor. I assumed that now without a badge I would be treated more like an uninvited visitor.
    I opened the phone back up and called the general number for Parker Center, one of the few numbers I still remembered. I asked for Kiz Rider in the chief’s office and was transferred. She picked up immediately.
    “Kiz, it’s me, Harry.”
    “Hello, Harry.”
    I tried to read something in her tone but she had flat-lined her response. I couldn’t tell how much of the morning’s anger and animosity remained.
    “How are you doing? You feeling any… uh, better?”
    “Did you get my message, Harry?”
    “Message? No, what did it