The Concrete Blonde (hb-3)

you’re not where it’s at anymore. This isn’t negotiable. Unless you want to take your chances with IAD. But either you go to Pounds or I go to them. I can’t work with you anymore. That’s it.”
    He looked back at the band. Edgar was silent and after a few moments Bosch told him to leave.
    “You go first. I can’t walk with you back to Parker.”
    Edgar stood up and hovered near the table for a few moments before saying, “Someday, you’re going to need all the friends you can get. That’s the day you’ll remember doing this to me.”
    Without looking at him, Bosch said, “I know.”

    * * *

    After Edgar had gone Bosch got the barmaid’s attention and ordered another round. The quartet played “Rain Check” with some improvisational riffs that Bosch liked. The whiskey was beginning to warm his gut and he sat back and smoked and listened, trying not to think about anything to do with cops and killers.
    But soon he felt a presence nearby and turned to see Bremmer standing there with his bottle of beer in hand.
    “I take it by the look on Edgar’s face when he left that he won’t be coming back. Can I join you?”
    “No, he won’t be back and you can do whatever you want, but I’m off duty, off the record and off the road.”
    “In other words, you ain’t saying shit.”
    “You got it.”
    The reporter sat down and lit a cigarette. His small but sharp green eyes squinted through the smoke.
    “It’s okay, ‘cause I’m not working either.”
    “Bremmer, you’re always working. Even now, I say the wrong word and you aren’t going to forget about it.”
    “I suppose. But you forget the times we worked together. The stories that helped you, Harry. I write one story that doesn’t go the way you want and all of that is forgotten. Now I’m just ‘that damn reporter’ who-”
    “I haven’t forgotten shit. You’re sitting here, right? I remember what you did for me and I’ll remember what you did against me. It all evens out in the end.”
    They sat in silence for a while and listened to the music. The set ended just as the barmaid was putting Bosch’s third double Jack Black on the table.
    “I’m not saying I would ever reveal it,” Bremmer said, “but how come my source on the note story was so important?”
    “It’s not that important anymore. At the time I just wanted to know who was trying to nail me.”
    “You said that before. That someone was setting you up. You really think that?”
    “It doesn’t matter. What kind of story did you write for tomorrow?”
    The reporter straightened up and and his eyes brightened.
    “You’ll see it. Pretty much a straight court story. Your testimony about someone else continuing the killings. It’s going out front. It’s a big story. That why I’m here. I always come in for a pop after I hit the front page.”
    “Party time, huh? What about my mother? Did you put that stuff in?”
    “Harry, if that’s what you are worried about, forget it. I didn’t even mention that in the story. To be honest, it’s of course vitally interesting to you, but as far as a newspaper story goes, I thought it was too much inside baseball. I left it out.”
    “Inside baseball?”
    “Too arcane, like the stats those sports guys on TV throw around. You know, like how many fastballs Lefty So and So threw during the third inning of the fifth game of the 1956 World Series. I thought the stuff with your mother-Chandler’s attempt to use it as your motivation for dropping this guy-was going too far inside.”
    Bosch just nodded. He was glad that part of his life would not be in the hands of a million newspaper buyers tomorrow, but he acted nonchalant about it.
    “But,” Bremmer said, “I gotta tell you, if we get a verdict back on this that goes against you and the jurors start saying they thought you did it to avenge your mother’s death, then that is usable and I won’t have a choice.”
    Bosch nodded again. It seemed fair enough. He looked at his watch and saw it was nearly ten. He knew he should call Sylvia and he knew he should get out of there before the next set started and he became entranced by the music again.
    He finished his drink and said, “I’m gonna hit it.”
    “Yeah, me, too,” Bremmer said. “I’ll walk out with you.”
    Outside, the chilled night air cut through Bosch’s whiskey daze. He said good-bye to Bremmer and put his hands in his pockets as he started down the sidewalk.
    “Harry, you walking all the way back to