The Closers

the door during the interview. He and Garcia thanked them both for coming in and said good-bye. Bosch remained in the office with Garcia.
    “I think that went well,” Garcia said after the door had closed.
    “I hope so,” Bosch said. “It cost me a cell phone number. I’ve had that number for three years. Now I’ll have to change it and notify everybody about the new number. A big pain in the ass is what it’s going to be.”
    Garcia ignored the complaint.
    “How sure are you that this guy Mackey will even see the story?”
    “We’re not. In fact, we believe he’s dyslexic. He might not read at all.”
    Garcia’s jaw dropped.
    “Then what are we doing?”
    “Well, we have a plan for making sure he’s aware of the story. Don’t worry about that. We’ve got it covered. There’s also another name that’s come up since yesterday. An associate of Mackey then and now. His name is William Burkhart. Back when you were on the case he was known as Billy Blitzkrieg. That ring a bell?”
    Garcia put on his best deep thinking look, like the one he had used for the camera, and moved around behind his desk. He then shook his head.
    “Don’t think it came up,” he said.
    “Yeah, you probably would have remembered.”
    Garcia remained standing but leaned over the desk to look at his schedule.
    “Let’s see. What have I got next?”
    “You’ve got me, Commander,” Bosch said.
    Garcia looked at him.
    “Excuse me?”
    “I need a few more minutes to clear up some of this stuff that’s come up.”
    “What stuff? You mean this new guy, Blitzkrieg?”
    “Yes, and the stuff the reporter asked about and we lied about. The racial angle.”
    Bosch watched Garcia’s face set sternly into stone.
    “I didn’t lie to her and I didn’t lie to you yesterday. We didn’t find it. We didn’t see a racial angle to this.”
    “We?”
    “My partner and I.”
    “Are you sure about that?”
    The phone on his desk buzzed. Garcia grabbed it up angrily and said, “No calls, no intrusions,” into it before dropping it back into its cradle.
    “Detective, I want to remind you whom you are talking to,” Garcia said evenly. “Now what the fuck do you mean, ‘Are you sure?’ What are you saying?”
    “With all due respect to the rank, sir, the case was pushed away from the racial angle in ’eighty-eight. I believe you when you say you didn’t see it. Otherwise, I can’t see you calling Pratt down at Open-Unsolved and reminding him there was DNA in the case. But if you didn’t know what was happening, then your partner certainly did. Did he ever talk about the pressure brought to bear on him from the command side on this case?”
    “Ron Green was the finest detective I ever knew or worked with. I’m not going to let you besmirch his reputation.”
    They stood just a few feet apart, the desk between them, their eyes locked in battle.
    “I’m not interested in reputations. I’m interested in the truth. You said yesterday he ate his own gun a few years after this case. Why? Was there a note?”
    “The burden, Detective. He couldn’t carry it anymore. He was haunted by the ones who got away.”
    “What about the ones he
let
get away?”
    Garcia pointed an angry finger at Bosch.
    “How fucking dare you? You are on thin ice here, Bosch. I could make one call to the sixth floor and you’d be out on the street before sundown. You understand me? I know about you. You’re just back from retirement and that makes you expendable with one phone call. You understand me?”
    “Sure. I understand you.”
    Bosch sat down in one of the chairs in front of the desk, hoping it might defuse the tension in the room a little bit. Garcia hesitated and then he sat down as well.
    “I find what you have just said to me completely insulting,” he said, his voice juiced with anger.
    “I’m sorry, Commander. I was trying to see what you knew.”
    “I don’t understand.”
    “I am sorry, sir, but the case was definitely stonewalled by chain of command. I don’t want to get into names with you at this point. Some of them are still active. But I think this case revolved on race-the connection to Mackey and now Burkhart proves it. And you didn’t have Mackey or Burkhart back then, but you had the gun and there were other things. I needed to find out if you were part of it. I would say by your reaction that you weren’t.”
    “But you are telling me my partner was, and that he kept it from me.”
    Bosch