The Concrete Blonde (hb-3)

were a dozen men, including the secret agent, looking. Appraising the scene and the number of video boxes, Bosch somehow was reminded of how he once had read all the names on the Vietnam War Memorial wall while on a case. It had taken several hours.
    The video wall proved to be less time consuming. Skipping the gay and black performer videos he scanned each box for a face like the concrete blonde’s or the name Maggie. The videos were in alphabetical order and it took him nearly an hour to get to the T’s. A face on the box of a video called
Tails from the Crypt
caught his eye. There was a nude woman lying in a coffin on the front. She was blonde and had an upturned nose like the plaster face in the box. He turned the box over and there was another photo of the actress, on her hands and knees with a man pressed up behind her. Her mouth was slightly open and her face was turned back toward her sex partner.
    It was her, Bosch knew. He looked at the credits and saw that the name fit. He took the empty video box to the counter.
    “‘Bout time,” said the small guy. “We don’t allow loitering here. The cops give us a hard time on that.”
    “I want to rent this.”
    “Can’t, it’s already rented. See, the box is empty.”
    “She in anything else you know of?”
    The small guy took the box and looked at the photographs.
    “Magna Cum Loudly, yeah. I don’t know. She was just getting started and then dropped out. Probably married a rich guy, lots of them do.”
    The big guy stepped over to look at the box and Bosch stepped back, out of his odor zone.
    “I’m sure they do,” he said. “What else was she in?”
    “Well,” the small guy said, “she had just made her way out of the loops and then, pfffft, she’s gone.
Tails
was her first top billing. She did a fabulous two-way in
Whore of the Roses
and that’s what got her started. Before that it was just the loops.”
    Bosch went back to the W’s and found the box for
Whore of the Roses
. It also was empty and there were no photos of Magna Cum Loudly on it. Her name was last billing on the credits. He went back to the small guy and pointed to the
Tails from the Crypt
box.
    “What about the box, then? I’ll buy it.”
    “We can’t sell you just the box because then how do we display the video when it comes back? We don’t sell many boxes here. Guys want stills, they buy magazines.”
    “What’s the price of the whole video? I’ll buy it. When the renter brings it back you can hold it for me and I’ll come pick it up. How much?”
    “Well,
Tails
is popular. We’re going with a $39.95 price tag but for you, Officer, I’ll give our law enforcement discount. Fifty bucks.”
    Bosch said nothing to that. He had the cash and paid it.
    “I want a receipt.”
    After the purchase was completed, the small guy put the video box in a brown paper bag.
    “You know,” he said, “Maggie Cum Loudly is still on a couple of our loops in the back. You might want to check it out.”
    He smiled and pointed to a sign on the wall behind him.
    “We have a no-exchange policy, by the way.”
    Bosch smiled back.
    “I’ll check it out.”
    “Hey, by the way, what name you want us to hold this video under when it comes back in?”
    “Carlo Pinzi.”
    It was the name of the Outfit’s L.A. capo.
    “Very fucking funny, Mr. Pinzi, we’ll do that.”
    Bosch went through the curtain into the back rooms and was almost immediately met by a woman wearing high heels, a black G-string and an ice-cream man’s coin changer on a belt, nothing else. Her large silicone-perfected breasts were dotted by unusually small nipples. Her dyed blonde hair was short and she had too much makeup around her glassy brown eyes. She looked like she was either nineteen or thirty-five.
    “Do you want a private encounter or change for the video booths?” she asked.
    Bosch took out his now thin fold of cash and gave her two dollars for quarters.
    “Can I keep a dollar for myself? I don’t get paid nothin’, just tips.”
    Bosch gave her another dollar and took his eight quarters to one of the small curtained booths where the occupied light wasn’t on.
    “Let me know if you need anything in there,” the woman in the G-string called after him.
    She was either too stoned or too stupid or both not to have made him as a cop. Bosch waved her away and pulled the curtain shut behind him. The space he had was about the size of a phone booth. There was a glass viewing window through which he