The Concrete Blonde (hb-3)

the siren, the cars began to part in front of him and he remembered how easy it could be. He had just gotten onto the Hollywood Freeway and was speeding north through the Cahuenga Pass when Jerry Edgar’s voice came up on the rover on the seat next to him.
    “Harry Bosch?”
    “Yeah, Edgar, listen. I want you to call the sheriff’s department, Valencia station, and tell them to get a car to Sylvia’s house code three. Tell them to make sure she’s okay.”
    Code three meant lights and siren, an emergency. He gave Edgar her address.
    “Make the call now and then come back up.”
    “Okay, Harry. What’s going on?”
    “Make the call now!”
    Three minutes later Edgar was back on the radio.
    “They’re on the way. What’ve you got?”
    “I’m on my way, too. What I want you to do is go in to the division. I left a note on my desk. It’s from the Follower. Secure it and then call Rollenberger and Irving and tell ‘em what’s happening.”
    “What is happening?”
    Bosch had to swerve into the median to avoid hitting a car that pulled into the lane in front of him. The driver hadn’t seen Bosch coming and Bosch knew he was going too fast-a steady ninety-three-for the siren to give much of a warning to the cars ahead of him.
    “The note’s another poem. He says he is going to take the blonde off my hands. Sylvia. There’s no answer at her house but there still may be time. I don’t think I was supposed to find the note until Monday, when I came in for work.”
    “On my way. Be careful, buddy. Stay cool.”
    Stay cool, Bosch thought. Right. He thought of what Locke had told him about the Follower being angry, wanting to get back at him for putting down the Dollmaker. Not Sylvia, he hoped. He wouldn’t be able to live with it.
    He picked the radio back up.
    “Team One?”
    “Yo,” Sheehan replied.
    “Go get him. If he’s there, bring him in.”
    “You sure?”
    “Bring him in.”

    * * *

    There was a lone sheriff’s car in front of Sylvia’s house. When Bosch pulled to a stop, he saw a uniform deputy standing on the front step, back to the door. It looked as if he was guarding the place. As if he was protecting a crime scene.
    As he started to get out, Bosch felt a sharp stabbing pain on the left side of his chest. He held still for a moment and it eased. He ran around the car and across the lawn, working his badge out of his pocket as he went.
    “LAPD, what’ve you got?”
    “It’s locked. I walked around, all windows and doors secured. No answer. Looks like nobody’s-”
    Bosch pushed past him and used his key to open the door. He ran from room to room, making a quick search for obvious signs of foul play. There were none. The deputy had been right. Nobody was home. Bosch looked in the garage and Sylvia’s Cherokee was not there.
    Still, Bosch made a second sweep of the house, opening closets, looking under beds, looking for any indication that something was amiss. The deputy was standing in the living room when Bosch finally came out of the bedroom wing.
    “Can I go now? I was pulled off a call that seems a little more important than this.”
    Bosch noted the annoyance in the deputy’s voice and nodded for him to go. He followed him out and got the rover out of the Caprice.
    “Edgar, you up?”
    “What do you have there, Harry?”
    There was the sound of genuine dread in his voice.
    “Nothing here. No sign of her or anything else.”
    “I’m at the station, you want me to put a BOLO out?”
    Bosch described Sylvia and her Cherokee for the Be On Look Out dispatch that would go out to all patrol cars.
    “I’ll put it out. We got the task force coming in. Irving, too. We’ll be meeting here. There’s nothing else to do but wait.”
    “I’m going to wait here a while. Keep me posted... Team One, you up?”
    “Team One,” Sheehan said. “We went up to the door. Nobody home. We’re standing by. If he shows, we’ll bring him in.”
    Bosch sat in the living room, his arms folded in front of him, for more than an hour. He now knew why Georgia Stern had held herself this way at Sybil Brand. There was comfort in it. Still, the silence of the house was nerve-racking. He was staring at the portable phone he had put on the coffee table, waiting for it to ring, when he heard a key hit the lock on the front door. He jumped up and was moving toward the entry when the door opened and a man stepped in. It wasn’t Locke. It wasn’t anyone Bosch knew, but he had a key.
    Without