From the envelope Portugal took a stack of Polaroid photos. He started looking through them.

“Oh, God,” he said almost immediately. “Is this her? The daughter? I don’t want to look at these.”

He shuffled through the remaining photos quickly and put them down on the desk. Edgar got up and leaned over the desk. With one finger he spread the photos out on the desk so he could view them. His jaw drew tight but he didn’t say anything.

The photos were old. The white borders were yellowed, the colors of the images almost washed out by time. Bosch used Polaroids on the job all the time. He knew by the degradation of the colors that the photos on the desk were far more than a decade old and some of them were older than others. There were fourteen photos in all. The constant in each was a naked girl. Based on physical changes to the girl’s body and hair length, he had guessed that the photos spanned at least a five-year-period. The girl innocently smiled in some of the photos. In others there was sadness and maybe even anger evident in her eyes. It had been clear to Bosch from the moment he first looked at them that the girl in the photos was Sheila Delacroix.

Edgar sat back down heavily. Bosch could no longer tell if he was upset by being so far behind on the case or by the content of the photos.

“Yesterday this was a slam dunk,” Portugal said. “Today it’s a can of worms. I assume you are going to give me your theory on these, Detective Bosch?”

Bosch nodded.

“You start with a family,” he said.

As he spoke he leaned forward and collected the photos, squared the edges and put them back in the envelope. He didn’t like them being on display. He held the envelope in his hand.

“For one reason or another, the mother’s weak,” he said. “Too young to marry, too young to have kids. The boy she has is too hard to handle. She sees where her life is going and she decides she doesn’t want to go there. She ups and splits and that leaves Sheila… to pick up with the boy and to fend for herself with the father.”

Bosch glanced from Portugal to Edgar to see how he was playing so far. Both men seemed hooked by the story. Bosch held the envelope with the photos up.

“Obviously, a hellish life. And what could she do about it? She could blame her mother, her father, her brother. But who could she lash out against? Her mother was gone. Her father was big and overpowering. In control. That only left… Arthur.”

He noticed a subtle shake of Edgar’s head.

“What are you saying, that she killed him? That doesn’t make sense. She’s the one who called us and gave us the ID.”

“I know. But her father doesn’t know she called us.”

Edgar frowned. Portugal leaned forward and started doing his hand exercise again.

“I don’t think I am following you, Detective,” he said. “How does this have anything to do with whether or not he killed the son?”

Bosch also leaned forward and became more animated. He held the envelope up again, as if it was the answer to everything.

“Don’t you see? The bones. All the injuries. We had it wrong. It wasn’t the father who hurt him. It was her. Sheila. She was abused and she turned right around and became the abuser. To Arthur.”

Portugal dropped his hands to the desk and shook his head.

“So you are saying that she killed the boy and then twenty years later called up and gave you a key clue in the investigation. Don’t tell me, you’re going to say she has amnesia about killing him, right?”

Bosch let the sarcasm go.

“No, I’m saying she didn’t kill him. But her record of abuse led her father to suspect she did. All these years Arthur’s been gone, the father thought she did it. And he knew why.”

Once more Bosch proffered the envelope of photos.

“And so he carried the guilt of knowing his actions with Sheila caused it all. Then the bones come up, he reads it in the paper and puts two and two together. We show up and he starts confessing before we’re three feet in the door.”

Portugal raised his hands wide.

“Why?”

Bosch had been turning it over in his mind ever since he had found the photos.

“Redemption.”

“Oh, please.”

“I’m serious. The guy’s getting old, broken down. When you have more to look back at than forward to, you start thinking about the things you’ve done. You try making up for things. He thinks his daughter killed his son because of his own actions. So now he’s willing to take the fall for her. After all, what’s he got to lose? He lives in a trailer next to the freeway and works at a driving range. This is a guy who once had a shot at fame and fortune. Now look at him. He could be looking at this as his last shot at making up for everything.”

“And he’s wrong about her but doesn’t know it.”

“That’s right.”

Portugal kicked his chair back from his desk. It was on wheels and he let it bang into the wall behind his desk.

“I got a guy waiting down there I could put in Q with one hand tied to my balls and you come in here and want me to kick him loose.”

Bosch nodded.

“If I’m wrong, you could always charge him again. But if I’m right, he’s going to try to plead guilty down there. No trial, no lawyer, nothing. He wants to plead and if the judge lets him, then we’re done. Whoever really killed Arthur is safe.”

Bosch looked over at Edgar.

“What do you think?”

“I think you got your mojo working.”

Portugal smiled but not because he found any humor in the situation.

“Two against one. That’s not fair.”

“There’s two things we can do,” Bosch said. “To help be sure. He’s probably down there in the holding tank by now. We can go down there, tell him it was Sheila who gave us the ID and flat out ask him if he’s covering for her.”

“And?”

“Ask him to take a polygraph.”

“They’re worthless. We can’t admit them in-”

“I’m not talking about court. I’m talking about bluffing him. If he’s lying, he won’t take it.”

Portugal pulled his chair back to his desk. He picked up the paper and glanced at the story for a moment. His eyes then appeared to take a roving inventory of the desktop while he thought and came to a decision.

“Okay,” he finally said. “Go do it. I’m dropping the charge. For now.”

Chapter 44

BOSCH and Edgar walked out to the elevator alcove and stood silently after Edgar pushed the down button.

Bosch looked at his blurred image reflected in the stainless steel doors of the elevator. He looked over at Edgar’s reflection and then directly at his partner.

“So,” he said. “How pissed off are you?”

“Somewhere between very and not too.”

Bosch nodded.

“You really left me with my dick in my hand in there, Harry.”

“I know. I’m sorry. You want to just take the stairs?”

“Have patience, Harry. What happened to your cell phone last night? You break it or something?”

Bosch shook his head.

“No, I just wanted to-I wasn’t sure of what I was thinking and so I wanted to check things out on my own first. Besides, I knew you had the kid on Thursday nights. Then running into Sheila at the trailer, that was out of left field.”

“What about when you started searching the place? You coulda called. My kid was back home asleep by then.”

“Yeah, I know. I should have, Jed.”

Edgar nodded and that was the end of it.

“You know this theory of yours puts us at ground zero now,” he said.

“Yeah, ground zero. We’re gonna have to start over, look at everything again.”

“You going to work it this weekend?”

“Yeah, probably.”

“Then call me.”

“I will.”

Finally, Bosch’s impatience got the better of him.

“Fuck it. I’m taking the stairs. I’ll see you down there.”

He left the alcove and went to the emergency stairwell.