“I’m outta here,” he said to Edgar and Burns while picking up the two files he had pulled. “I don’t want Ninety-eight to see me and throw a fit. Good luck, boys.”

On the way out, Bosch stopped and gave the hype another cigarette. The lockdown who had complained before was no longer on the bench or Bosch would have given him one, too.

Back in the Mustang, he dumped the files on the backseat and took his empty badge wallet out of his briefcase. He slipped Pounds’s badge into place next to his own ID card. It would work, he decided, as long as no one looked too closely at it. The badge said LIEUTENANT across it. Bosch’s ID card identified him as a detective. It was a minor discrepancy and Bosch was happy with it. Best of all, he thought, there was a good chance Pounds would not notice that the badge was missing for some time. He rarely left the station to go to crime scenes and so rarely had to open the wallet or show his badge. There was a good chance its disappearance would go unnoticed. All he had to do was get it back into place when he was done with it.

Chapter Twenty-one

BOSCH ENDED UP outside the door of Carmen Hinojos’s office early for his afternoon session. He waited until exactly three-thirty and knocked. She smiled as he entered her office and he noticed that the late-afternoon sun came through the window and splashed light directly across her desk. He moved toward the chair he usually took but then stopped himself and sat on the chair to the left of the desk. She noticed this and frowned at him as if he were a schoolboy.

“If you think I care which chair you sit in, you are wrong.”

“Am I? Okay.”

He got up and moved to the other chair. He liked being near the window.

“I might not be here for Monday’s session,” he said after settling in.

She frowned again, this time more seriously.

“Why not?”

“I’m going away. I’ll try to be back.”

“Away? What happened to your investigation?”

“It’s part of it. I’m going to Florida to track down one of the original investigators. One’s dead, the other one’s in Florida. So I’ve got to go to him.”

“Couldn’t you just call?”

“I don’t want to call. I don’t want to give him the chance to put me off.”

She nodded.

“When do you leave?”

“Tonight. I’m taking a red-eye to Tampa.”

“Harry, look at you. You practically look like the walking dead. Can’t you get some sleep and take a plane in the morning?”

“No, I’ve gotta get out there before the mail arrives.”

“What’s that mean?”

“Nothing. It’s a long story. Anyway, I wanted to ask you something. I need your help.”

She contemplated this for several seconds, apparently weighing how far she wanted to go into the pool without knowing how deep it was.

“What is it you want?”

“Do you ever do any forensic work for the department?”

She narrowed her eyes, not seeing where this was going.

“A little. From time to time somebody will bring me something, or maybe ask me to do a little profiling of a suspect. But mostly the department uses outside contractors. Forensic psychiatrists who have experience with this.”

“But you’ve been to crime scenes?”

“Actually, no. I’ve only looked at photos brought to me and worked from them.”

“Perfect.”

Bosch pulled his briefcase onto his lap and opened it. He took out the envelope of crime scene and autopsy photos that had been in the murder book and gently placed them on her desk.

“Those are from this case. I don’t want to look at them. I can’t look at them. But I need someone to do it and tell me what’s there. There’s probably nothing but I’d like another opinion. The investigation these two guys did on this case was…well, it was almost like there was no investigation.”

“Oh, Harry.” She shook her head. “I’m not sure this is wise. Why me?”

“Because you know what I’m doing. And because I trust you. I don’t think I can trust anybody else.”

“Would you trust me if there was no ethical constraint on me telling others about what we’ve talked about here?”

Bosch studied her face.

“I don’t know,” he finally said.

“I thought so.”

She slid the envelope to the side of the desk.

“Let’s put these aside for now and go on with the session. I really have to think about this.”

“Okay, you can take them. But let me know, okay? I just want your feel for them. As a psychiatrist and as a woman.”

“We’ll see.”

“What do you want to talk about?”

“What is happening with the investigation?”

“Is that a professional question, Dr. Hinojos? Or are you just curious about the case?”

“No, I’m curious about you. And I’m worried about you. I’m still not convinced that what you are doing is safe-either psychologically or physically. You’re mucking around in the lives of powerful people. And I’m caught in the middle. I know what you’re doing but am almost powerless to make you stop. I’m afraid you tricked me.”

“Tricked you?”

“You pulled me into this. I bet you’ve wanted to show me these pictures since you told me what you’re doing.”

“You’re right, I have. But there was no trick. I thought this was a place where I could talk about anything. Isn’t that what you said?”

“Okay, I wasn’t tricked, just led down the path. I should’ve seen it coming. Let’s move on. I want to talk more about the emotional aspect of what you are doing. I want to know more about why finding this killer is so important to you after so many years?”

“It should be obvious.”

“Make it more obvious for me.”

“I can’t. I can’t put it into words. All I know is that everything changed for me after she was gone. I don’t know how things would have been if she hadn’t been taken away but…everything changed.”

“Do you understand what you’re saying and what it means? You’re looking at your life in two parts. The first part is with her, which you seem to have imbued with a happiness I’m sure was not always there. The second part is your life after, which you acknowledge has not met expectations or is in some way unsatisfactory. I think you’ve been unhappy for a long time, possibly all of that time. This recent relationship you had may have been a highlight but you were still and, I think, have always been, an unhappy man.”

She rested a moment but Bosch didn’t speak. He knew she wasn’t done.

“Now, maybe the traumas of the last few years-both personally for you and for your community at large-have made you take stock of yourself. And I fear that you believe, whether subconsciously or not, that by going back and bringing some form of justice to what happened to your mother, you will be righting your life. And there’s the problem. Whatever happens with this private investigation of yours, it’s not going to change things. It just can’t be done.”

“You’re saying that I can’t blame what happened then for what I am now?”

“No, listen to me, Harry. All I’m saying is you are the sum of many parts, not the sum of one. It’s like dominoes. Several different blocks must click together for you to arrive at the end, at the point you are at now. You don’t jump from the first domino to the last.”

“So I should just give it up? Just let it go?”

“I’m not saying that. But I am finding it hard to see the emotional benefit or healing you will get from this. In fact, I think there is the possibility that you may do yourself more damage than repair. Does that make any sense?”

Bosch stood up and went to the window. He stared out but didn’t compute what he saw. He felt the warmth of the sun on him. He didn’t look at her as he spoke.

“I don’t know what makes sense. All I know is that on every level it seems to make sense that I do this. In fact, I feel…I don’t know what the word is, maybe ashamed. I feel ashamed that I haven’t done this long before now. A lot of years have gone by and I just let them go. I feel like I let her down somehow…that I let myself down.”