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Back Brass Verdict Save as PDF
Chapters (64)
  1. PART ONE
  2. One
  3. Two
  4. Three
  5. PART TWO
  6. Four
  7. Five
  8. Six
  9. Seven
  10. Eight
  11. Nine
  12. Ten
  13. Eleven
  14. Twelve
  15. Thirteen
  16. Fourteen
  17. Fifteen
  18. Sixteen
  19. Seventeen
  20. Eighteen
  21. Nineteen
  22. Twenty
  23. Twenty-one
  24. Twenty-two
  25. Twenty-three
  26. Twenty-four
  27. Twenty-five
  28. Twenty-six
  29. Twenty-seven
  30. Twenty-eight
  31. Twenty-nine
  32. Thirty
  33. Thirty-one
  34. Thirty-two
  35. Thirty-three
  36. PART THREE
  37. Thirty-four
  38. Thirty-five
  39. PART FOUR
  40. Thirty-six
  41. Thirty-seven
  42. Thirty-eight
  43. Thirty-nine
  44. Forty
  45. Forty-one
  46. Forty-two
  47. Forty-three
  48. Forty-four
  49. Forty-five
  50. Forty-six
  51. PART FIVE
  52. Forty-seven
  53. Forty-eight
  54. Forty-nine
  55. Fifty
  56. Fifty-one
  57. Fifty-two
  58. Fifty-three
  59. PART SIX
  60. Fifty-four
  61. Fifty-five
  62. Acknowledgments
  63. About the Author
  64. ALSO BY MICHAEL CONNELLY

I put the car in park and got out and looked around. The lights of the Valley spread out below the precipice for miles and miles.

“Bosch, I gotta go. I have to try to find—”

I saw movement in my peripheral vision to the left. I turned and saw a crouching figure coming out of the tall brush next to the parking clearing. At first I thought coyote but then I saw that it was a man. He was dressed in black and a ski mask was pulled down over his face. As he straightened from the crouch, I saw that he was raising a gun at me.

“Wait a minute,” I said. “What is—”

“Drop the fucking phone!”

I dropped the phone and raised my hands.

“Okay, okay, what is this? Are you with Bosch?”

The man moved quickly toward me and shoved me backwards. I stumbled to the ground and then felt him grab the back of my jacket’s collar.

“Get up!”

“What is—?”

“Get up! Now!”

He started pulling me up.

“Okay, okay. I’m getting up.”

The moment I was on my feet I was shoved forward and crossed through the lights at the front of my car.

“Where are we going? What is—?”

I was shoved again.

“Who are you? Why are you—?”

“You ask too many questions, lawyer.”

He grabbed the back of my collar and shoved me toward the precipice. I knew it was almost a sheer drop-off at the edge. I was going to end up in somebody’s backyard hot tub — after a three-hundred-foot high dive.

I tried to dig my heels in and slow my forward momentum but that resulted in an even harder shove. I had velocity now and the man in the mask was going to run me off the edge into the blackness of the abyss.

“You can’t—”

Suddenly there was a shot. Not from behind me. But from the right and from a distance. Almost simultaneously, there was a metal snapping sound from behind me and the man in the mask yelped and fell into the brush to the left.

Then came voices and shouting.

“Drop your weapon! Drop your weapon!”

“Get on the ground! Get down on the ground!”

I dove facedown to the dirt at the edge of the precipice and put my hands over my head for protection. I heard more yelling and the sound of running. I heard engines roaring and vehicles crunching across the gravel. When I opened my eyes, I saw blue lights flashing in repeated patterns off the dirt and brush. Blue lights meant cops. It meant I was safe.

“Counselor,” a voice said from above me. “You can get up now.”

I craned my neck to look up. It was Bosch, his shadowed face silhouetted by the stars above him.

“You cut that one pretty close,” he said.

Fifty-two

Fifty-two