“I don’t really remember,” Hastings said. “I kind of went dark when he said, ‘She’s looking at you, man, and you’d better be careful.’”

“Anything else that you can remember?” she pressed.

“No, I just wanted to get off the phone,” Hastings said. “I was so angry once I realized what that meeting between us had really been about.”

“Who else have you talked to about this?” Bosch asked. “Did you tell the councilman?”

“No, I was going to tell him all about it tomorrow when I told him you needed to be fired,” Hastings said. “I talked to Rita about it, but she hasn’t told anyone.”

He held Ballard’s eyes for a long moment.

“You can’t talk to anybody else about this,” Ballard said. “Not the councilman and certainly not Ted Rawls. Rita, too.”

“We keep quiet while you do what?” Hastings asked.

“Continue the investigation,” Ballard said. “We’re very close, and you and the councilman will be the first we call when we get there.”

“What if Ted calls me?” Hastings said. “What do I say?”

“Just don’t take the call,” Bosch said. “If you talk to him, he might be able to read that you know something.”

“My god,” Hastings said. “I really can’t believe this.”

Ballard stood up and Bosch did the same. He knew that she understood that they had to get moving on Rawls—if it wasn’t already too late.

Hastings remained seated and looked like he was deep in thought.

“I just realized something,” he said.

“What?” Ballard asked.

“That I gave my kidney to the guy who killed Sarah,” Hastings said. “And Laura Wilson and who knows who else. I kept this guy alive to do that.”

“Nelson, we don’t know that yet,” Ballard said. “We are working this one step at a time. You’ve been very helpful but we need to continue our work. I promise I will personally keep you in the loop.”

Hastings was staring blankly at nothing.

“Are you okay, Nelson?” Ballard asked.

“Yeah,” Hastings said in a flat voice. “I’m just dandy.”

They left him there with his thoughts. Bosch looked around for Rita Ford as they were exiting the house but didn’t see her. It looked like Hastings was on his own for now.

33

THE FIRST THING Ballard did after she and Bosch got back in her city car was call Paul Masser on his cell.

“Paul, I need you to come in,” she said.

“Really?” he said. “It’s Sunday—what’s going on?”

“I need a search warrant and I want it to be ironclad. It can never come back on us in court.”

“And you need this today?”

“I need it ten minutes ago. Can you come in? I’ll have it roughed out for you. I promise, you’ll be in and out.”