Dark Sacred Night (Harry Bosch Universe #31)(61)

“Can you open the door so we don’t have to talk so loudly? People are sleeping.”

The door was flung open. The anger was clear on Prada’s face.

“I know people are sleeping. I want to be one of them. What is it now?”

“I’m sorry. I left my flashlight. I think it might be in Jacob’s closet. Could you get it?”

“Jesus Christ!”

Prada turned and headed toward the hallway that led to both of the condo’s bedrooms. Ballard noticed that Prada had now put on a T-shirt with a pink silhouette of a whale on it.

The moment Prada was out of sight, Ballard moved into the living room and went to the coffee table. She grabbed her flashlight from where it was partially hidden by the torso sculpture and pocketed it. She then stepped back and lifted a cushioned chair off the corner of the area rug. She put the chair down quietly on the wood floor, then stooped and flipped the corner of the rug back as far as was possible, laying it over the coffee table.

Ballard squatted down and looked at the floor. The gray-washed wood had been bleached of its stain in a pattern of semi-circular swipes. Someone had scrubbed this area of the floor with a powerful cleanser. Ballard noted the seams between the planking. It was a tongue and groove floor, meaning that there was a good chance that residue from whatever had been cleaned up could have seeped down into the subflooring.

Ballard felt the heavy footfalls of Prada approaching. She flipped the carpet back down, then stood and quickly swung the chair back into place just as he entered the room.

“Nothing,” he said. “It’s not there.”

“Are you sure?” Ballard said. “I know I had it in that closet.”

“I’m sure. I looked. You can look if you want to.”

“I’ll take your word for it.”

Ballard pulled the rover off her belt and keyed it twice before speaking into it.

“Six-Adam-Fourteen, did one of you pick up my flashlight in the apartment?”

Prada threw his hands up in dismay.

“Couldn’t you have asked them first before waking me up again?” he said.

Ballard kept her hand depressed on the rover so that she was still transmitting.

“Calm down, Mr. Prada,” she said. “Do you mind if I ask you one last question and then I’ll get out of your hair?”

“Whatever,” Prada said. “Just ask it and go.”

“What happened to the living room rug?”

“What?”

Ballard had seen the tell when she asked the question. A moment of surprise in his eyes. It was Prada who had moved the rug.

“You heard me,” she said. “What happened to the rug?”

“The rug is right there,” Prada said, like he was talking to an imbecile.

“No, that’s the dining room rug. See, it still has the marks from the legs of the table. You moved it in here because you got rid of the rug that was in this spot. What happened to it? Why’d you have to get rid of it?”

“Look, I’ve had enough of this. You can ask Jacob all about the rugs when he comes back and you see that there’s nothing wrong.”

“He’s not coming back. We both know that. Tell me what happened, Tyler.”

“That’s not my name. My name is—”

Prada suddenly charged across the room at Ballard, raising his hands like claws as he aimed for her throat. But Ballard was ready, knowing her words might push him toward extreme measures. She turned and pivoted, sidestepping the rush like a bullfighter while bringing her hand holding the rover up and behind his back. She drove the heel of the radio into his spine and tripped him with her leg. Prada went down face-first into the corner of the room. Ballard dropped the radio and pulled her sidearm. She planted a foot on his back and pointed her weapon at his head.

“You try to get up and I’m going to put a hole in your spine. You’ll never walk again.”

Ballard felt him tense and test the pressure of her foot. But then he relaxed and gave up.

“Smart boy,” she said.

As she was cuffing him and reciting the rights advisory, she heard the elevator door open and then running steps as Herrera and Dyson rushed down the hall.

Soon they were in the condo and by Ballard’s side.

“Get him up and put him in a chair,” Ballard ordered. “I’m going to have to call homicide.”

The two officers moved in and grabbed Prada by the arms.

“He was going to kill me,” Prada suddenly announced. “He wanted my business, everything I’ve worked for. I fought him. He fell and hit is head. I didn’t want him to die.”

“And that’s why you rolled him up in a rug and dumped his body somewhere?” Ballard asked.

“No one would have believed me. You don’t believe me now.”

“Did you understand the rights I recited to you?”

“He was going to cut me into pieces.”

“Stop talking and answer the question. Do you understand the rights I just recited? Do you want me to say them again?”

“I understand, I understand.”

“Okay. Where’s Jacob Cady’s body?”

Prada shook his head.

“You’ll never find it,” he said. “I put it in a dumpster. It’s wherever the trash goes. And it’s what he deserves.”