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.""Exactly.You're working alone, against the grain, but you obviously have good instincts and probably know things about this we don't know yet.Why not work together?""And what happens when Agent Dei and the rest of the FBI hear about this?""I take the risk, I take the fall.But it won't be too hard.What are they going to do to me? Send me back to Minot? Big deal."He nodded.She watched him, tried to look through those dark eyes to see how his mind worked.Her take on Bosch was that he put case sense ahead of vanity and petty things.He would churn through it and ultimately know this was the way to go.He finally nodded again and spoke."What are you doing tomorrow morning?""Watching you.Why?""Where are you staying?""The Embassy Suites on Paradise near Harmon.""I'll pick you up at eight.""And where are we going?""To the top of the triangle.""What do you mean? Where?""I'll explain tomorrow.I'm thinking I can trust you, Rachel.But let's take it one step at a time.Are you going with me?""All right, Bosch, I'll go with you.""You getting formal with me now?""Just a slip.I don't want to get formal with you." She smiled and she watched him try to read it."All right, then I'll see you tomorrow," he said."I have to get ready now to go see my kid."He stood up and so did she.She took one more drink from her beer and put it down half finished on the dinette table."Eight o'clock tomorrow," she said."You pick me up?""Right.""You sure you don't want me to drive? Uncle Sugar pay for the gas?""That's all right.Can you get the photos of the missing men? I had them on the newspaper clip but Agent Dei took it from me.""I'll see what I can do.There's probably a six-pack that won't be missed at the FO.""And one other thing.Bring both your friends.""What friends?""Sig and Glock."She smiled and shook her head at him."You can't carry a weapon now, can you? Legally, anyway.""No, I can't.I don't.""Must feel naked.""Yeah, you could say that."She gave him another smile."Well, I'm not giving you a weapon, Harry.No way."He shrugged."Had to ask."He opened the door and she walked out.After he closed it she walked down the steps to the parking lot and looked back up at the door.She wondered if he was watching her through the peephole.She got into the Crown Vic she had signed out of the car pool.She knew she was close to the edge of trouble.What she had revealed to Bosch and agreed to do the next day with him guaranteed the final stage of the destruction of her career if things went sideways.But she didn't care.It was a gambling town.She trusted Bosch and she trusted herself.She would not let them win.As she backed the Crown Vic out she noticed a cab pull to a stop in the parking lot.A chubby man with sun-bleached hair and a loud Hawaiian shirt got out and studied the numbers on the doors of the rooms.He was carrying a thick envelope or a file folder that looked yellowed and old.Rachel watched as he bounded up the steps and walked to number 22, Bosch's door.The door was opened before he had to knock.Rachel backed out and drove out of the lot onto Koval.She drove around the block and parked in a spot that gave her a good view of both of the parking lot exits of Bosch's sorry motel.She was sure Bosch was up to something and she was going to find out what it was.CHAPTER 25Backus had caught only a glimpse of the man who answered the motel room door when Rachel Walling knocked.But he thought he recognized him from a time many years before.He felt his pulse quicken.If he was right about the man she was meeting in room 22, then the stakes had grown considerably higher.He studied the motel and his situation.He had located the three bureau surveillance cars.The agents were hanging back.One agent had deployed and was sitting across Koval on a bus bench.He looked out of place, wearing a gray suit and supposedly waiting for a bus, but that was the FBI's style.That left the motel clear for Backus to move about.It was L-shaped with parking on all sides.He realized that if he was on the other side of the building, he might catch another glimpse of the man Rachel was with through a rear window or balcony.He decided not to risk moving the car from the front parking lot to the rear.It might draw the attention of the bench warmer across the street.Instead he cracked the door and slipped out of his car.He had the interior light switched off so there was no threat of exposure.He crab-walked between two other cars and straightened up, pulling a baseball cap over his head and yanking the brim down as he emerged.The hat said unlv on it.Backus walked through the breezeway on the bottom floor of the two-story motel.He passed the soda and candy machines and came out on the other side and started walking through the rear parking lot as if looking for his car.He glanced up at the lighted balcony that he believed corresponded with the door to room 22, where he had seen Rachel enter.He could see the sliding door was open.Glancing around as if looking for his lost car, Backus saw that the agent on the bench did not have a visual angle on the rear lot.No one was watching him here.He casually moved to a position directly below the balcony of room 22.He tried to listen for any verbal morsel that would spill through the open slider.He heard Rachel's voice but could not make out the words until he very clearly heard her say, "Must feel naked."This confused and intrigued him.He was thinking about the possibility of climbing up to the second level so that he could hear the conversation in room 22.The sound of a door shutting ended that idea.He guessed Rachel had just left.Backus returned to the breezeway and hid behind a Coke machine when he heard a car's ignition fire.He waited and listened.He detected the sound of another car entering the lot.He moved from the Coke machine to the corner and glanced out.A man was getting out of a taxi and Backus recognized him, too.It was Terry McCaleb's charter partner.There was no doubt.Backus felt like he had just tripped across a treasure of intrigue and mystery.What was Rachel up to? How had she connected with the charter partner so quickly? And what was the LAPD doing here?He looked past the taxi and saw Rachel's Crown Victoria pull out onto the street and drive away.He waited a moment and saw one of the Grand Ams stop and pick up the man on the bus bench and then take off.Backus yanked the brim of his hat down again and stepped out of the breezeway.He walked toward his car.CHAPTER 26I was looking through the peephole, thinking about Agent Walling, and wondering how the brutal terrain of the FBI and the Dakotas had not robbed her of her fire and sense of humor.I liked her for that and sensed a connection.I was thinking that I might be able to trust her at the same time I was thinking I had just been played by a pro.I was sure she hadn't told me everything she was up to, nobody ever does, but she had told me enough.We wanted the same thing, maybe for different reasons.But I wasn't second-guessing my decision to take on the extra rider in the morning.The view through the peephole was suddenly filled with the concave image of Buddy Lockridge.I opened the door before he could knock and quickly pulled him inside.I wondered if Walling had seen him on her way out"Perfect timing, Buddy.Did anybody talk to you or stop you out there?""Where, here?""Yeah, here." "No, I just got out of the cab.""Okay, then where have you been?"He explained his lateness by saying there were no cabs at the Bellagio, a story I didn't believe
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