The Black Echo

asked.
    “Hey, come on, man,” Plaid Shirt said. “This is bullshit. She pulled me in from the street. And let me at least button my goddam pants. This is bullshit.”
    “Give me my money, fucker,” the girl said.
    She jumped from the bed, the sheet falling to the floor, and lunged naked at the john’s pants pockets.
    “Get her off me, get her off,” he called out as he squirmed to avoid her hands. “See, you see! She should be going, not me.”
    Bosch moved in and separated the two and pushed the girl back to the bed. He moved behind the man and said to Wish, “Give me your key.”
    She made no move, so he reached into his own pocket and got out his own cuff key. One size fits all. He unlocked the cuffs and walked Plaid Shirt over to the room’s front door. He opened it and pushed him through. In the hallway the man stopped to button his pants, which gave Bosch the opportunity to put his foot on his butt and push. “Get out of here, short eyes,” he said as the man stumbled down the hall. “This is your lucky day.”
    The girl was wrapped in the dirty sheet again when Bosch went back into the room. He looked at Wish and saw anger in her eyes. He knew it wasn’t just for the man in the plaid shirt. Bosch looked at the girl and said, “Get your clothes, go into the bathroom and get dressed.” When she didn’t move, he said, “Now! Let’s go!”
    After she grabbed up some clothes from the floor next to the bed and walked to the bathroom, letting the sheet fall to the ground, Bosch turned to Wish.
    “We’ve got too much else to do,” he began. “You would have spent the rest of the afternoon getting her statement and booking that guy. In fact, it’s a state beef, so I would’ve had to book him. And it’s a flopper; can go felony or misdemeanor. And one look at that girl and the DA would have gone misdee if he filed it at all. It wasn’t worth it. It’s the life down here, Agent Wish.”
    She looked at him with smoldering eyes, the same eyes he had seen when he had gripped her wrist to keep her from leaving the restaurant.
    “Bosch, I had decided it was worth it. Don’t ever do that again.”
    They stood there trying to outstare each other until the girl came out of the bathroom. She wore faded jeans that were split at the knees and a black tank top. No shoes, and Bosch noticed her toenails were painted red. She sat on the bed without saying anything.
    “We need to find Sharkey,” Bosch said.
    “About what? You got a cigarette?”
    He pulled out a pack of cigarettes and shook one out for her. He gave her a match and she lit it herself.
    “About what?” she said again.
    “About Saturday night,” Wish said curtly. “We do not want to arrest him. We do not want to hassle him. We only want to ask him a few questions.”
    “What about me?” the girl said.
    “What about you?” Wish said.
    “Are you going to hassle me?”
    “You mean are we going to turn you over to Division of Youth Services, don’t you?” Bosch looked at Wish to try to gauge a reaction. He got no reading. He said, “No, we won’t call DYS if you help us. What’s your name? Your real name.”
    “Bettijane Felker.”
    “All right, Bettijane, you don’t know where Sharkey is? All we want to do is talk to him.”
    “All I know is that he’s working.”
    “What do you mean? Where?”
    “Boytown. He’s probably taking care of business with Arson and Mojo.”
    “Those the other guys in the crew?”
    “Right.”
    “Where in Boytown did they say they were going?”
    “They didn’t. They just go where the queers are, I guess. You know.”
    The girl either couldn’t be more specific or wouldn’t be. Bosch knew it didn’t matter. He had the addresses from the shake cards and knew he’d find Sharkey somewhere on Santa Monica Boulevard.
    “Thank you,” he said to the girl and started heading toward the door. He was halfway down the hall before Wish came out of the room, walking after him at a brisk, angry pace. Before she said anything he stopped at a pay phone in the hallway by the office. He took out a small phone book he always carried, looked up the number for DYS and dialed. He was put on hold for two minutes before an operator transferred him to an automated tape line on which he reported the date and time and the location of Bettijane Felker, suspected runaway. He hung up wondering how many days it would be before they got the message and how many days after that it would be before they got to