Trunk Music - Michael Connelly [94]
“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. On the Dodgers?”
“Oh, yeah, right.”
“Well, we went through the computer tapes and located the sequence number. I then checked the number on the computer. No one has collected on it yet.”
“Okay, thanks.”
“I called your office today to let you know but you weren’t there. I didn’t know you were coming here. We’ll keep an eye out for it.”
“Thanks, Hank. I gotta go.”
Bosch started walking away but Meyer kept talking.
“No problem. Thank you. We look forward to opportunities to cooperate with and hopefully help our law enforcement brethren.”
Meyer smiled broadly. Bosch looked back at him and felt like he had a weight tied to his leg. He couldn’t get away from him. Bosch just nodded and kept going, trying to remember the last time he had heard the phrase law enforcement brethren. He was almost across the lobby when he glanced back and saw that Meyer was still behind him.
“One more thing, Detective Bosch.”
Bosch stopped but lost his patience.
“Hank, what? I’ve got to get out of here.”
“It will just take a second. A favor. I assume your department will go to the press with this arrest. I’d appreciate it if you kept any mention of the Mirage out of