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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

“Because your client’s dead. Somebody — probably our friend over there who wants to make a deal — took Elliot and his girlfriend out tonight when they came home from dinner. His electric gate wouldn’t open and when he got out to push it open, somebody came up and put a bullet in the back of his head. Then he hit the woman in the car.”

I took a half step back in shock. I knew the gate Bosch was talking about. I had been to Elliot’s mansion in Beverly Hills just the other night. And as far as the girlfriend went, I also thought I knew who that would be. I’d had Nina Albrecht figured for that position ever since Elliot told me he’d had help on the day of the murders in Malibu.

Bosch didn’t let the stunned look on my face keep him from continuing.

“I got tipped from a friend in the medical examiner’s office and figured that somebody might be out there cleaning the slate tonight. I figured I ought to call the team back and see what happens at your place. Lucky for you I did.”

I stared right through Bosch when I answered.

“Yeah,” I said. “Lucky for me.”

Fifty-three

Fifty-three

There was no longer a trial but I went to court on Tuesday morning to see the case through to its official end. I took my place next to the empty seat Walter Elliot had occupied for the past two weeks. The news photographers who had been allowed access to the courtroom seemed to like that empty chair. They took a lot of photos of it.

Jeffrey Golantz sat across the aisle. He was the luckiest prosecutor on earth. He had left court one day, thinking he was facing a career-hobbling loss, and came back the next day with his perfect record intact. His upward trajectory in the DA’s office and city politics was safe for now. He had nothing to say to me as we sat and waited for the judge.

But there was a lot of talk in the gallery. People were buzzing with news of the murders of Walter Elliot and Nina Albrecht. No one made mention of the attempt on my life and the events at the Fryman Canyon overlook. For the moment, that was all secret. Once McSweeney told Bosch and Armstead that he wanted to deal, the investigators had asked me to keep quiet so they could move slowly and carefully with their cooperating suspect. I was happy to cooperate with that myself. To a point.

Judge Stanton took the bench promptly at nine. His eyes were puffy and he looked like he’d had very little sleep. I wondered if he knew as many details of what had transpired the night before as I did.