Trunk Music

knew exactly what was coming.
    “So the deal I’m talking about is this,” Bosch said. “You for her. Joey Marks said if you never get to L.A., then my friend comes back. And vice versa. You understand what I’m telling you?”
    Goshen looked down at the table and slowly nodded.
    “Do you?”
    Bosch pulled his gun and pointed it three inches from the big man’s face. Goshen went cross-eyed looking at the barrel’s black hole.
    “I could blow your shit away right here. Hackett would come in here and I’d tell him you made a move for my gun. He’d go along. He set the meeting up here. It’s against the rules. He’d have to go along.”
    Bosch withdrew the gun.
    “Or tomorrow. This is how it goes tomorrow. At the airport we’re waiting for our flight. There’s a commotion over at the machines. Somebody’s won a big fucking jackpot and my partner and I make the mistake of looking over there. Meantime, somebody-maybe it’s your pal Gussie-puts a six-inch stiletto in your neck. End of you, my friend comes home.”
    “What do you want, Bosch?”
    Bosch leaned across to him.
    “I want you to give me the reason not to do it. I don’t give a shit about you, Goshen, dead or alive. But I’m not going to let any harm befall her. I’ve made mistakes in my life, man. I once got somebody killed that shouldn’t have been killed. You understand that? It’s not going to happen again. This is redemption, Goshen. And if I have to give a piece of shit like you up to get it, I’ll do it. There’s only one alternative. You know Joey Marks, where would he have her?”
    “Oh, Jesus, I don’t know.”
    Goshen rubbed a hand over his scalp.
    “Think, Goshen. He’s done this kind of thing before. It’s routine for you people. Where would he hold somebody he doesn’t want anyone to find?”
    “There was…there’s a couple of safe houses he uses. He’d, uh,…I think for this he’d use the Samoans.”
    “Who are they?”
    “These two big fuckers he uses. Samoans. They’re brothers. Their names are too hard to say. We call them Tom and Jerry. They’ve got one of the safe houses. Joey would use their place for this. The other place is mostly for counting cash, putting up people from Chicago.”
    “Where is the house with the Samoans?”
    “It’s in North Vegas, not too far from Dolly’s, actually.”
    On a piece of notebook paper Bosch gave him, Goshen drew a crude map with directions to the house.
    “You’ve been there, Goshen?”
    “A few times.”
    Bosch turned the piece of paper over on the table.
    “Draw the layout of the house.”
    Bosch pulled the dusty detective car he had picked up at the airport into the valet circle at the Mirage and jumped out. A valet approached but Bosch walked past him.
    “Sir, your keys?”
    “I’ll only be a minute.”
    The valet was protesting that he couldn’t just leave the car there when Bosch disappeared through the revolving door. As he crossed through the casino toward the lobby, Bosch scanned the players for Edgar, his eyes stopping on every tall black man, of whom there were few. He didn’t see Edgar.
    On a house phone in the lobby he asked for Edgar’s room and then breathed an almost audible sigh of relief when his partner picked up the phone.
    “Jerry, it’s Bosch. I need your help.”
    “What’s up?”
    “Meet me out front at the valet.”
    “Now? I just got room service. When you didn’t call I-”
    “Right now, Jerry. And did you bring your vest from L.A.?”
    “My vest? Yeah. What’s-”
    “Bring your vest with you.”
    Bosch hung up before Edgar could ask any questions.
    As he turned to head back to the car, he came face to face with someone he knew. At first, because the man was well dressed, Bosch thought it was one of Joey Marks’s men, but then he placed him. Hank Meyer, Mirage security.
    “Detective Bosch, I didn’t expect to see you here.”
    “Just got in tonight. Came to pick somebody up.”
    “You got your man then?”
    “We think so.”
    “Congratulations.”
    “Listen, Hank, I gotta go. I’ve got a car blocking traffic in the front circle.”
    “Oh, that’s your car. I just heard that on the security radio. Yes, please move it.”
    “I’ll talk to you later.”
    Bosch made a move to pass him.
    “Oh, Detective? Just wanted you to know we still haven’t had that betting slip come in.”
    Bosch stopped.
    “What?”
    “You asked if we’d check to see if anyone cashed the bet your victim put down Friday night.