loose so you could make your deal with Richard Ross. Mackey should’ve been in jail. Instead he used the gun from one of his little burglaries to kill an innocent sixteen-year-old girl.”
Bosch waited but Irving didn’t say anything.
“That’s right,” Bosch said. “I might have Roland Mackey’s blood on my hands but you’ve got Rebecca Verloren’s on yours. You want to go to the media and IAD with it? Fine, take your best shot and we’ll see how it all comes out.”
A pinched look formed in Irving ’s eyes. He took a step toward Bosch until their faces were only inches apart.
“You are wrong, Bosch. All of those kids back then, they were cleared of involvement in Verloren.”
“Yeah, how? Who cleared them? Green and Garcia sure didn’t. They were pushed away from them by you. Just like the girl’s father. You and one of your dogs scared him away from it, too.”
Bosch pointed a finger at his chest.
“You let murderers walk so you could keep your little deal intact.”
An urgency entered Irving ’s voice when he responded.
“You are completely wrong on this,” he said. “Do you really think that we would let murderers walk?”
Bosch shook his head, stepped back and almost laughed.
“As a matter of fact, I do.”
“Listen to me, Bosch. We checked alibis on every last one of those boys. They were all clean. For some of them, we were the alibi because we were still watching them. But we made sure every member of that group was clean on this, then we told Green and Garcia to back off. The father was told, too, but he wouldn’t stand down.”
“So you pushed him down, right, Chief? Pushed him into a hole.”
“Things had to be done. The city was very tense back then. We couldn’t have her father running around saying things that weren’t true.”
“Don’t give me that good-of-the-community bullshit, Chief. You had your deal, that’s all you cared about. You had Ross and IAD in your pocket and you wanted to keep it that way. Only you were dead wrong. The DNA proves it. Mackey was good for Verloren and your investigation was for shit.”
“No, wait just a minute. It only proves one thing. That he had the gun. I read the story you planted in the paper today, too. The DNA connects him to the gun, not to the murder.”
Bosch waved him off. He knew there was no sense going back and forth with Irving. His only hope was that his own threat to go to the media and IAD would neutralize Irving ’s threat. He believed they were at a stalemate.
“Who checked the alibis?” he asked calmly.
Irving didn’t answer.
“Let me guess. McClellan. He’s got his prints all over this.”
Again Irving didn’t answer. It was like he had drifted off into the memory of seventeen years before.
“Chief, I want you to call your dog. I know he still works for you. Tell him I want to know about the alibis. I want details. I want reports. I want everything he’s got by seven a.m. today or that’s it. We do what we have to do and we see where the chips fall.”
Bosch was about to turn away when Irving finally spoke.
“There are no alibi reports,” he said. “There never would have been any.”
Bosch heard the elevator open and Rider soon rounded the corner, carrying a file. She stopped dead when she saw the confrontation. She said nothing.
“No reports?” Bosch said to Irving. “Then you better hope he’s got a good memory. Good night, Chief.”
Bosch turned and started down the hall. Rider hurried to catch up to him. She looked back over her shoulder to make sure Irving was not following. After they turned in through the double doors to RHD, she spoke.
“Are we in trouble, Harry? Is he going to turn this against the man up on six?”
Bosch looked at her. The mix of dread and fear on her face told him how important his answer was going to be.
“Not if I can help it,” he told her.
34
WILLIAM BURKHART and Belinda Messier were being held in separate interview rooms. Bosch and Rider decided to take Messier first so that Burkhart would have to sit and wait and wonder. It would also give them time to let Marcia and Jackson get the warrant and get into the house on Mariano. What they found might be helpful during the interview with Burkhart.
Belinda Messier had come up in the investigation before. The number on the cell phone Mackey carried around was registered