Trunk Music

have an answer from ballistics by then.”
    “Okay, I’ll grab a plane.”
    “Good.”
    Bosch sensed something off about her tone. She was preoccupied by something other than ballistics and what she was eating.
    “Lieutenant,” he said. “What’s up? Is there something I don’t know about?”
    She hesitated a moment and Bosch waited her out.
    “Actually, something’s come up.”
    Bosch’s face flashed warm. He guessed that Felton had screwed him and told Billets about the Eleanor Wish situation.
    “What is it?”
    “I’ve made an ID on the guy who was in Tony Aliso’s office.”
    “That’s great,” Bosch said, relieved but confused by her somber tone. “Who?”
    “No, it’s not great. It was Dominic Carbone from OCID.”
    Bosch was stunned into silence for a long moment.
    “Carbone? What the…?”
    “I don’t know. I’ve got some feelers out. I’d like you back here until we figure out what to do with this. Goshen will keep until the extradition hearing. He’s not going to be talking to anyone but his lawyer. If you can get back, I’d like us all to get together and hash this around. I haven’t talked to Kiz and Jerry yet today. They’re still working the financial trail.”
    “How’d you make the ID on Carbone?”
    “Pure luck. Things were kind of slow after I talked to you and the captain out there this morning. I took a drive downtown and stopped by Central. I’ve got a friend, she’s a lieutenant, too, up in OC. Lucinda Barnes, you know her?”
    “No.”
    “Anyway, I went up to see her. I wanted to kind of feel around, maybe get an idea why they took the pass on this one. And, lo and behold, we’re sitting there talking and this guy walks through the squad and I think I recognize him but I’m not sure from where. I ask who he is and she tells me that’s Carbone. And that’s when I remembered. He’s the guy on the tape. He had his suit jacket off and his sleeves rolled up. I even saw the tattoo. It’s him.”
    “You tell all this to your friend?”
    “Hell no. I just acted natural and got the hell out of there. I tell you, Harry, I don’t like this inside stuff. I don’t know what to do.”
    “We’ll figure something. Look, I’m going to go. I’ll be there as soon as I can. What you might want to do in the meantime, Lieutenant, is try to use some juice with ballistics. Tell them we’ll be coming in with a code three in the morning.”
    Billets said she would do what she could on that.
    After making arrangements to fly back to L.A., Bosch barely had time to take a cab back to the Mirage and check out and still make it by Eleanor’s apartment to say good-bye. But his knock on her door went unanswered. He didn’t know what kind of car she had, so it was impossible for him to check the lot to make sure she was gone. He went back to his rental and sat inside and waited as long as he could, until he was at risk of missing his flight. He then scribbled a message on a page from his notebook saying he would call her and went back to the door. He folded the page up tight and stuck it in the crack of the door jamb so that it would fall and be noticed the next time she opened the door.
    He wanted to wait around longer and talk to her in person but he couldn’t. Twenty minutes later he was leaving the security office of the airport. The gun from Goshen’s house was wrapped in an evidence bag and safely in his briefcase. Five minutes later he was aboard a jet headed for the city of angels.

PART III
    BILLETS HAD A weighted and worried look on her face when Bosch stepped into her office.
    “Harry.”
    “Lieutenant. I dropped the gun at ballistics. They’re waiting on the bullets. Whoever it was you talked to over there, they snapped to.”
    “Good.”
    “Where is everybody?”
    “They’re both over at Archway. Kiz spent the morning at the IRS and then went over to help Jerry with the interviews with Aliso’s associates. I also borrowed a couple of people from Major Fraud to help with the books. They’re tracing down these dummy corporations. They’re going to go after the bank accounts. Search and seizure. When we freeze the money, then maybe some real live people will come out of the woodwork and claim it. My theory is that this Joey Marks was not the only one Aliso was washing money for. There’s too much involved-if Kiz’s numbers are right. Aliso was probably working for every mob combine west of Chicago.”
    Bosch nodded.
    “Oh, by the way,” she