Bosch entered an even larger room, with a desk area to the left and an informal seating area to the right, where a couple of couches faced each other across a glass-topped coffee table. Creighton was sitting behind his desk, indicating Bosch’s appointment was going to be formal.
It had been more than a decade since Bosch had seen Creighton in person. He could not remember the occasion but assumed it was a squad meeting where Creighton had come in and made an announcement concerning the overtime budget or the department’s travel protocols. Back then Creighton was the head bean counter—in charge of budgeting for the department among his other management duties. He was known for instituting strict policies on overtime that required detailed explanations to be written on green slips that were subject to supervisor approval. Since that approval, or disapproval, usually came after the extra hours were already worked, the new system was viewed as an effort to dissuade cops from working overtime or, worse yet, get them to work overtime and then deny authorization or replace it with comp time. It was during this posting that Creighton became universally known as “Cretin” by the rank and file.
Though Creighton left the department for the private sector not long after that, the “greenies” were still in use. The mark he left on the department had not been a daring rescue or a gun battle or the takedown of an apex predator. It had been the green overtime slip.
“Harry, come in,” Creighton said. “Sit down.”
Bosch moved to the desk. Creighton was a few years older than Harry but in good shape. He stood behind the desk with his hand held forward. He wore a gray suit that was tailor-cut to his taut frame. He looked like money. Bosch shook his hand and then sat down in front of the desk. He hadn’t gotten dressed up for the appointment. He was in blue jeans, a blue denim shirt, and a charcoal corduroy jacket he’d had for at least twelve years. These days Bosch’s work suits from his days with the department were wrapped in plastic. He didn’t want to pull one of them out just for a meeting with Cretin.
“Chief, how are you?” he said.
“It’s not ‘chief’ anymore,” Creighton said with a laugh. “Those days are long ago. Call me John.”
“John, then.”
“Sorry to keep you waiting out there. I had a client on the phone and, well, the client always comes first. Am I right?”
“Sure, no problem. I enjoyed the view.”
The view through the window behind Creighton was in the opposite direction, stretching northeasterly across the Civic Center and to the snowcapped mountains in San Bernardino. But Bosch guessed that the mountains weren’t the reason Creighton picked this office. It was the Civic Center. From his desk Creighton looked down on the spire of City Hall, the Police Administration Building, and the Los Angeles Times Building. Creighton was above them all.
“It is truly spectacular seeing the world from this angle,” Creighton said.
Bosch nodded and got down to business.
“So,” he said. “What can I do for you…John?”
“Well, first of all, I appreciate you coming in without really knowing why I wished to see you. Gloria told me she had a difficult time persuading you to come.”
“Yeah, well, I’m sorry about that. But like I told her, if this is about a job, I’m not interested. I’ve got a job.”
“I heard. San Fernando. But that’s gotta be part-time, right?”
He said it with a slightly mocking tone and Bosch remembered a line from a movie he once saw: “If you’re not cop, you’re little people.” It also held that if you worked for a little department, you were still little people.
“It keeps me as busy as I want to be,” he said. “I also have a private ticket. I pick up stuff from time to time on that.”
“All referrals, correct?” Creighton said.
Bosch looked at him a moment.
“Am I supposed to be impressed that you checked me out?” he finally said. “I’m not interested in working here. I don’t care what the pay is, I don’t care what the cases are.”
“Well, let me just ask you something, Harry,” Creighton said. “Do you know what we do here?”
Bosch looked over Creighton’s shoulder and out at the mountains before answering.
“I know you are high-level security for those who can afford it,” he said.
“Exactly,” Creighton said.
He held up three fingers on his right hand in what Bosch assumed was supposed to be a trident.
“Trident Security,” Creighton said. “Specializing in financial, technological, and personal security. I started the California branch ten years ago. We have bases here, in New York, Boston, Chicago, Miami, London, and Frankfurt. We are about to open in Istanbul. We are a very large operation with thousands of clients and even more connections in our fields of expertise.”
“Good for you,” Bosch said.
He had spent about ten minutes on his laptop reading up on Trident before coming in. The upscale security venture was founded in New York in 1996 by a shipping magnate named Dennis Laughton, who had been abducted and ransomed in the Philippines. Laughton first hired a former NYPD police commissioner to be his front man and had followed suit in every city where he opened a base, plucking a local chief or high-ranking commander from the local police department to make a media splash and secure the absolute must-have of local police cooperation. The word was that ten years ago Laughton had tried to hire L.A.’s police chief but was turned down and then went to Creighton as a second choice.
“I told your assistant I wasn’t interested in a job with Trident,” Bosch said. “She said it wasn’t about that. So why don’t you tell me what it is about so we can both get on with our days.”
“I can assure you, I am not offering you a job with Trident,” Creighton said. “To be honest, we must have full cooperation and respect from the LAPD to do what we do and to handle the delicate matters that involve our clients and the police. If we were to bring you in as a Trident associate, there could be a problem.”
“You’re talking about my lawsuit.”
“Exactly.”
For most of the past year Bosch had been in the middle of a protracted lawsuit against the department where he had worked for more than thirty years. He sued because he believed he had been illegally forced into retirement. The case had drawn ill will toward Bosch from within the ranks. It did not seem to matter that during his time with a badge he had brought more than a hundred murderers to justice. The lawsuit was settled but the hostility continued from some quarters of the department, mostly the quarter at the top.
“So if you brought me into Trident, that would not be good for your relations with the LAPD,” Bosch said. “I get that. But you want me for something. What is it?”
Creighton nodded. It was time to get down to it.
“Do you know the name Whitney Vance?” he asked.
Bosch nodded.
“Of course I do,” he said.
“Yes, well, he is a client,” Creighton said. “As is his company, Advance Engineering.”
“Whitney Vance has got to be eighty years old.”
“Eighty-five, actually. And…”
Creighton opened the top middle drawer of his desk and removed a document. He put it on the desk between them. Bosch could see it was a printed check with an attached stub. He wasn’t wearing his glasses and was unable to read the amount or the other details.
“He wants to speak to you,” Creighton finished.
“About what?” Bosch asked.
“I don’t know. He said it was a private matter and he specifically asked for you by name. He said he would discuss the matter only with you. He had this certified check drawn for ten thousand dollars. It is yours to keep for meeting him, whether or not the appointment leads to further work.”