She looked at the faces gathered in the room. Finally, Rider spoke up.

“My guess is that the IRS audit brought it all about,” she said. “He got the notice in the mail and he made a fatal mistake. He told this guy in Vegas, Joey Marks, that the government was going to look at his books and his cheap movies and the scam was likely going to come out. Joey Marks responded the way you expect these guys to respond. He whacked him. He had his man Goshen follow Tony back home from Vegas so it would happen far away from him and Goshen puts him in the trunk.”

The others nodded their heads in agreement. This included Bosch. The information he’d received from Fitzgerald fit with this scenario as well.

“It was a good plan,” Edgar said. “Only mistake was the fingerprints Artie Donovan got off the jacket. That was pure luck and if we didn’t have that, we probably wouldn’t have any of this. That was the only mistake.”

“Maybe not,” Bosch said. “The prints on the jacket just hurried things along, but Metro in Vegas was already working a tip from an informant who overheard Lucky Goshen talking about hitting somebody and putting them in a trunk. It would’ve gotten back to us. Eventually.”

“Well, I’d rather be already on it than waiting for eventually,” Billets said. “Any alternative theories we should also be chasing? Are we clear on the wife, the angry screenwriter, his other associates?”

“Nothing that sticks out,” Rider said. “There definitely was no love lost between the victim and the wife but she seems clean so far. I pulled the gatehouse log up there with a warrant and her car never left Hidden Highlands on Friday night. She seems clean.”

“What about the letter to the IRS?” Gregson asked. “Who sent it? Obviously, someone with pretty good knowledge of what this man was doing, but who would that be?”

“This could all be part of a power play within the Joey Marks group,” Bosch said. “Like I said before, something about the look on Goshen’s face when he saw that gun and his claims later that it was a plant…I don’t know, maybe somebody tipped the IRS knowing it would get Tony whacked and that they could then possibly lay it off on Goshen. With Goshen gone, this person moves up.”

“You’re saying Goshen didn’t do it?” Gregson asked, his eyebrows arched.

“No. I think Goshen is probably good for it. But I don’t think he was counting on that gun showing up behind the toilet. It doesn’t make sense, anyway, to keep it around. So say he whacks out Tony Aliso on orders from Joey Marks. He gives the gun to somebody in his crew to get rid of. Only that person goes and plants it at the house-this is the same person who sent the letter to the IRS in the first place to get the whole thing going. Now we come along and wrap Goshen up in a bow. The guy who stashed the gun and sent the letter, he’s in a position to move up.”

Bosch looked at their faces as they tried to follow the logic.

“Maybe Goshen isn’t the intended target,” Rider said.

Everyone looked at her.

“Maybe there’s one more play. Maybe it’s someone who wants Goshen and Joey Marks out of the way so he can move in.”

“How will they get Marks now?” Edgar asked.

“Through Goshen,” she said.

“If those ballistics come back a match,” Bosch said, “then you can stick a fork in Goshen because he’ll be done. He’ll be looking at the needle or life without possibility. Or a reduced sentence if he gives us something.”

“Joey Marks,” Gregson and Edgar said at the same time.

“So who is the letter writer?” Billets asked.

“Who knows?” Bosch answered. “I don’t know enough about the organization over there. But there’s a lawyer who was mentioned by the cops there. A guy who handles everything for Marks. He’d know about Aliso’s scam. He could pull this off. There’s probably a handful of people close to Marks capable of doing it.”

They all were silent for a long moment, each one thinking the story through and seeing that it could work. It was a natural conclusion to the meeting and Billets stood up to end it.

“Let’s keep up the good work,” she said. “Matthew, thanks for coming out. You’ll be the first one I call when we get the ballistics in the morning.”

Everyone else started standing up.

“Kiz and Jerry, flip a coin,” Billets said. “One of you will have to go to Vegas to work the extradition escort with Harry. It’s regulations. Oh, and Harry, could you wait a minute? There’s something I need to discuss with you about another case.”

After the others left, Billets told Bosch to close the door. He did so and then sat down in one of the chairs in front of her desk.

“So what happened?” she asked. “Did you really talk to Fitzgerald?”

“Well, I guess it was more that he talked to me, but, yeah, I met with him and Carbone.”

“What’s the deal?”

“Basically, the deal is that they didn’t know Tony Aliso from a hole in the ground until they, too, got a letter, probably the same one that went to the IRS. I’ve got a copy of it. It has details. It was from somebody with knowledge, just like Kiz said. The letter OCID got also was postmarked in Las Vegas and it was addressed specifically to Fitzgerald.”

“So their response was to bug his office phone.”

“Right, illegal bug. They had just started-I have nine days’ worth of tapes to listen to-when I call up and say Tony got whacked. They panicked. You know his situation with the chief. If it came out that first of all they illegally put the bug on Tony and second of all might have somehow been the cause of his death because Joey Marks found out, then the chief would pretty much have all he’d need to move Fitzgerald out and reestablish controls on OCID.”

“So Fitzgerald sends Carbone in to get the bug and they play dumb about Tony.”

“Right. Carbone didn’t see the camera or we wouldn’t know any of this.”

“That prick. When this is over, the first thing I’m going to do is give it all to the chief.”

“Uh…”

Bosch wasn’t sure how to say it.

“What is it?”

“Fitzgerald could see that coming. I cut a deal with him.”

“What?”

“I cut a deal. He gave me everything, the tapes, the letter. But their activities go no further than you and me. The chief never knows.”

“Harry, how could you? You had no-”

“He’s got something on me, Lieutenant. He’s got something on you, too…and Kiz.”

A long silence followed and Bosch watched the anger flush her cheeks.

“That arrogant bastard,” she said.

Bosch told her what it was Fitzgerald had come up with. Since Bosch now was privy to her secret, he thought it was only fair that he tell her about Eleanor. Billets just nodded. She was clearly thinking more about her own secret and the consequences of Fitzgerald having knowledge of it.

“Do you think he actually put people on me? A tail?”

“Who knows? He’s the kind of guy who sees opportunities and acts on them. He keeps information like money in a bank. In case of a rainy day. This was a rainy day for him and he pulled it out. I made the deal. Let’s forget about it and move on with the case.”

She was silent a moment and Bosch watched her for any sign of embarrassment. There was none. She looked directly at Bosch, her eyes searching him for any sign of judgment. There was none. She nodded.

“What else did they do after the letter came?”

“Not much. They put Aliso on a loose surveillance. I have the logs. But they weren’t watching him Friday night. They knew he’d gone to Las Vegas, so they were planning to pick him up again after the holiday if he was back. They were really just getting started when it all went down.”

She nodded again. Her mind wasn’t on the subject. Bosch stood up.

“I’ll listen to the tapes tonight. There’s about seven hours but Fitzgerald said it’s mostly Aliso talking to his girlfriend in Vegas. Nothing much else. But I’ll listen anyway. You need anything else, Lieutenant?”