Red Eye by Dennis Lehane & Michael Connelly

Author:Dennis Lehane & Michael Connelly
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster

PATRICK TOOK THE FRONT DOOR while Bosch went around back. Patrick had told the LA cop he was reasonably proficient picking a lock, but Paisley’s front door sported a lock Patrick had never seen before. New, too. And expensive by the looks of it—a five-hundred-dollar lock on a forty-dollar door. Patrick tried a series of picks but none of them could get to first base with the cylinders. It was like trying to pass a plastic stirrer through a rock.

The second time he dropped a pick, he bent to retrieve it and the door opened in front of him.

He looked up at Harry Bosch standing on the threshold, a Glock dangling from his left hand. “I thought you said you could pick a lock.”

“I clearly overestimated my prowess.” He straightened. “How’d you get in?”

“He left a window unlocked.” Bosch shrugged. “People, right?”

Patrick had expected a dump inside but the house was quite clean and mostly bare. The furniture was modern Scandinavian—lots of bright white and brighter chrome that clashed with the older wainscoting and dark wallpaper. Paisley was renting; the landlord probably had no idea about the lock.

“Something in here he doesn’t want people to see,” Patrick said.

“Gotta be in the basement, then,” Bosch said. He jerked a thumb back at the shotgun layout of the apartment—foyer and living room and then a long corridor that went straight back to the kitchen, all the other rooms branching off it. “I cleared this floor.”

“You cleared this floor? How long were you planning to leave me out on the front porch?”

“I figured another half an hour before you snapped and kicked in the door. I didn’t have that kinda time.”

“LA sarcasm,” Patrick said as they headed down the hallway. “Who knew?”

Halfway down the hall, on the right, was a door the same dark brown as the wainscoting. Patrick exchanged a look with Bosch and the cop nodded—now would be the time.

Patrick drew the .45 Colt Commander off his hip and flicked the safety off. “You see a bulkhead around back?”

Bosch looked puzzled. “A bulkhead?”

“You know, an entrance to the basement. Double doors, steps down.”

Bosch nodded. “Locked from the inside.” And then, as though further explanation were needed, he said, “We generally don’t have basements in LA.”

“You don’t have snow or a wind chill factor, either, so, you know, fuck you.” He tossed Bosch a bright, tight smile. “Any basement windows out back?”

Another nod. “Black curtains over them.”

“Well that’s bad,” Patrick said.

“Why?”

“No one puts curtains over their basement windows around here unless they got a home theater or they’re playing Dead Hooker Storage.” He looked around the apartment. “Edward does not strike me as the home theater type.”

Bosch nodded, his pupils adrenalized to twice their size. “Let’s go back out, call it in legit.”

“What if he’s down there with her right now?”

That was the dilemma, wasn’t it?

Bosch exhaled a long breath. Patrick did the same. Bosch held his hand over the doorknob and said, “On three?”

Patrick nodded. He wiped his right palm on his jeans and readjusted a two-handed grip on his gun.

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