Page 7 of Resurrection Walk

“Thanks. Are you with Harry Bosch?”

“Sittin’ right next to him.”

Haller looked at Bosch and nodded as if he were making up for jumping in the back seat earlier.

“Are we on speaker?” Aronson said. “Can I talk to him?”

“Sure can,” Haller said. “Go.”

He pointed to Bosch.

“You’re on,” he said.

“Harry, I know you’ve drawn a line about not doing defense work per se,” Aronson said.

Bosch nodded his head but then realized she couldn’t see this.

“Right,” he said.

“Well, I could really use you to just look at a case,” Aronson said. “No investigatory work. Just look at what I’ve got so far from the DA.”

Bosch knew that the main juvenile detention center for the north county was in Sylmar in the San Fernando Valley.

“It’s a juvie case?” he asked.

“Yes, my sister’s son,” Aronson said. “Anthony Marcus. He’s sixteen but they’re going to move to try him as an adult. There’s a hearing next week and I’m desperate, Harry. I need to help him.”

“What’s the charge?”

“They say he shot a cop but there’s just nothing in this boy’s character that says he would do something like this.”

“Where? What agency?”

“LAPD. It’s a West Valley case. It happened in Woodland Hills.”

“Is he alive or dead? The cop.”

“He’s alive. He only got shot in the leg or something. But Anthony wouldn’t have done this and he told me he didn’t. He said there had to be another shooter because it wasn’t him.”

Bosch reached up to the dashboard screen and punched the mute button. He looked over at Haller.

“Are you kidding?” Bosch said. “You want me to work for a kid who shot an LAPD cop? I’m already looking at this case from Chino where the woman shot a LEO. You know what this could do to me out there?”

“Hello?” Aronson said. “Did I lose you?”

“I’m not asking you to work the case,” Haller said. “She is, and all she wants is for you to look at the file she has. That’s it. Just read the reports and tell her what you think. Then you’re done with it. You won’t be attached to it and nobody will ever know.”

“But I’ll know,” Bosch said.

“Hello?” Aronson repeated.

Bosch shook his head and unmuted the call.

“Sorry,” he said. “Lost you for a few seconds there. What kind of documents do you have?”

“Well, there’s an investigator’s chronology,” Aronson said. “And there’s an incident report and the medical report on the officer. There’s an evidence report but there’s really nothing on it. I was going to call the assigned prosecutor today and see when the next discovery drop will be. But bottom line is I just think there’s something wrong here. I’ve known this kid all his life and he is not violent. He’s gentle. He’s —”

“Are there any witness reports?” Bosch asked.

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