The Reversal

key to the padlock.
    Jessup stepped back and Bosch saw a slash of light cross his face as he turned and scanned the entire storage area, making sure he was alone. He then went inside the room.
    For several seconds, there was no sound or movement, then Jessup reappeared in the doorway. He stepped out and closed the door, relocking it. He then stepped back into the light and did a 180-degree scan of the larger storage area. Bosch lowered his body even further. He guessed that Jessup was suspicious because he had found the hole under the wall freshly dug out.
    “Who’s there?” he called out.
    Bosch didn’t move. He didn’t even breathe.
    “Show yourself !”
    Bosch snaked his hand under the raid jacket and closed his hand on his gun’s grips. He knew the indications were that Jessup had obtained a weapon. If he made even a feint in Bosch’s direction, Harry was going to pull his own weapon and be ready to fire first.
    But it never happened. Jessup started moving quickly back to the entrance hole and soon he disappeared in the darkness. Bosch listened but all he could hear was the crashing of the waves. He waited another thirty seconds and then started moving toward the opening in the wall. He didn’t turn on the light. He wasn’t sure Jessup had actually left.
    As he moved around the stack of scaffolding frames, he banged his shin hard on a metal pipe that was extending out from the pile. It sent a sudden burst of pain up his left leg and shifted the balance of metal frames. The top two loudly slid off stack, clattering to the sand. Bosch threw himself to the sand next to the pile and waited.
    But Jessup didn’t appear. He was gone.
    Bosch slowly got up. He was in pain and he was angry. He pulled his phone and called SIS dispatch.
    “You were supposed to call me when Jessup moved!” he whispered angrily.
    “I know that,” said the dispatcher. “He hasn’t moved.”
    “What? Are you—patch me through to whoever’s in charge out there.”
    “I’m sorry, Detective, but that’s not how—”
    “Look, shithead, Jessup is not tucked in for the night. I just saw him. And it almost turned bad. Now let me talk to somebody out there or my next call is to Lieutenant Wright at home.”
    While he waited Bosch moved to the sidewall so he could get out of the storage area. His leg hurt badly and he was walking with a limp.
    In the darkness he couldn’t find the spot where he could slip under the wall. Finally, he put the light on, holding it low to the ground. He found the spot but saw that Jessup had pushed sand into the hole, just as he had the night before.
    A voice finally came to him over the phone.
    “Bosch? This is Jacquez. You claim you just saw our subject?”
    “I don’t claim I saw him. I did see him. Where are your people?”
    “We’re sitting on his zero, man. He hasn’t left.”
    Zero was a surveillance subject’s home location.
    “Bullshit, I just saw him under the Santa Monica pier. Get your people up here. Now.”
    “We got his zero down tight, Bosch. There’s no—”
    “Listen, Jackass, Jessup is my case. I know him and he almost just crawled up my ass. Now call your men and find out which one went off post because—”
    “I’ll get back to you,” Jacquez said curtly and the line went dead.
    Bosch turned the phone’s ringer back on and put it in his pocket. Once again he dropped to his knees and quickly dug out the hole, using his hands as a scoop. He then pushed his body through, half expecting Jessup to be waiting for him when he came up on the other side.
    But there was no sign of him. Bosch got up, gazed south down the beach in the direction of Venice and saw no one in the light from the Ferris wheel. He then turned and looked up toward the hotels and apartment buildings that ran along the beach. Several people were on the beach walk that fronted the buildings but he didn’t recognize any of the figures as Jessup.
    Twenty-five yards up the pier was a set of stairs leading topside and directly to the pier’s parking lot. Bosch headed that way, still limping badly. He was halfway up the stairs when his phone rang. It was Jacquez.
    “All right, where is he? We’re on our way.”
    “That’s the thing. I lost him. I had to hide and I thought you people were on him. I’m going to the top of the pier now. What the hell happened, Jacquez?”
    “We had a guy step out to drop a deuce. Said his stomach was giving him trouble. I don’t think he’ll be in the unit after