The Reversal

his own guy looking. She can be found. Harry proved that.”
    “There’s not a whole lot we can do about it. Speaking of Harry, where is he this morning?”
    “He called me and said he had some things to check out. He’ll be around later. You didn’t really answer my question about Sarah. What should—?”
    “Tell her that she might have another visitor, somebody working for the defense, but that she doesn’t have to talk to anybody unless she wants to.”
    We headed out into the hallway and then went left toward the elevator bank.
    “If she doesn’t talk to them, Royce will complain to the judge. She’s the key witness, Mickey.”
    “So? The judge won’t be able to make her talk if she doesn’t want to talk. Meantime, Royce loses prep time. He wants to play games like he did with the judge in there, then we’ll play games, too. In fact, how about this? We put every convict Jessup ever shared a prison cell with on the witness list. That should keep his investigators out of the way for a while.”
    A broad smile broke across Maggie’s face.
    “You really are getting it, aren’t you?”
    We squeezed onto the crowded elevator. Maggie and I were close enough to kiss. I looked down into her eyes as I spoke.
    “That’s because I don’t want to lose.”

Sixteen
    Wednesday, February 24, 8:45 A.M .
    A fter school drop-off Bosch turned his car around and headed back up Woodrow Wilson, past his house, and to what those in the neighborhood called the upper crossing with Mulholland Drive. Both Mulholland and Woodrow Wilson were long and winding mountain roads. They intersected twice, at the bottom and top of the mountain, thus the local description of upper and lower crossings.
    At the top of the mountain Bosch turned right onto Mulholland and followed it until it crossed Laurel Canyon Boulevard. He then pulled off the road to make a call on his cell. He punched in the number Shipley had given him for the SIS dispatch sergeant. His name was Willman and he would know the current status of any SIS surveillance. At any given time, SIS could be working four or five unrelated cases. Each was given a code name in order to keep them in order and so that the real names of suspects did not ever go out over the radio. Bosch knew that the Jessup surveillance had been termed Operation Retro because it involved an old case and a retrial.
    “This is Bosch, RHD. I’m lead on the Retro case. I want to get a location on the suspect because I’m about to pull into one of his favorite haunts. I want to make sure I don’t run into him.”
    “Hold one.”
    Bosch could hear the phone being put down, then a radio conversation in which the duty sergeant asked for Jessup’s location. The response was garbled with static by the time it reached Bosch over the phone. He waited for the sergeant’s official response.
    “Retro is in pocket right now,” he promptly reported to Bosch. “They think he’s catching Zs.”
    In pocket meant he was at home.
    “Then I’m clear,” Bosch said. “Thank you, Sergeant.”
    “Any time.”
    Bosch closed the phone and pulled the car back onto Mulholland. A few curves later he reached Fryman Canyon Park and turned in. Bosch had talked to Shipley early that morning as he was passing surveillance off to the day team. He reported that Jessup had once again visited both Franklin and Fryman canyons. Bosch was becoming consumed with curiosity about what Jessup was up to and this was only increased by the report that Jessup had also driven by the house on Windsor where the Landy family had once lived.
    Fryman was a rugged, inclined park with steep trails and a flat-surface parking and observation area on top and just off Mulholland. Bosch had been there before on cases and was familiar with its expanse. He pulled to a stop with his car pointing north and the view of the San Fernando Valley spread before him. The air was pretty clear and the vista stretched all the way across the valley to the San Gabriel Mountains. The brutal week of storms that had ended January had cleared the skies out and the smog was only now climbing back into the valley’s bowl.
    After a few minutes Bosch got out and walked over to the bench where Shipley had told him Jessup had sat for twenty minutes while looking out at the lights below. Bosch sat down and checked his watch. He had an eleven o’clock appointment with a witness. That gave him more than an hour.
    Sitting where Jessup had sat brought no vibe or insight