In the years since, the crime has echoed through many lives. The victim’s parents have split up and Muriel Verloren could not say where her husband, Robert Verloren, a former Malibu restaurateur, is now located. She said the disintegration of their marriage was directly attributed to the strain and grief brought on by their daughter’s murder.
One of the original investigators on the case, Ronald Green, retired early from the department and later committed suicide. Garcia said he believes the unsolved Verloren case played a part in his former partner’s decision to end his life.
“Ronnie took things to heart, and I think this one always bothered him,” Garcia said.
And at Hillside Preparatory School, where Rebecca Verloren was a popular student, there is a daily reminder of her life and death. A plaque erected by her classmates remains affixed to the wall in the exclusive school’s main hallway.
“We don’t ever want to forget someone like Rebecca,” said Principal Gordon Stoddard, who was a teacher when Verloren was a student at the school.
One of Rebecca’s friends and classmates is now a teacher at Hillside. Bailey Koster Sable spent an evening with Rebecca just two days before she was murdered. The loss has haunted her, and she says she thinks about her friend all the time.
“I think about it because it feels like it could have happened to anybody,” Sable said after classes yesterday. “So it leads me to always ask the same thing: why her?”
That is a question the Los Angeles police hope to finally answer soon.
Bosch looked at the photo on the inside page where the story jumped to. It showed Bailey Sable and Gordon Stoddard standing on either side of the plaque on the wall at Hillside Prep. Emerson Ward was credited with this photo as well. The caption read: “FRIEND AND TEACHER: Bailey Sable went to school with Rebecca Verloren, and Gordon Stoddard taught her science class. Now school principal, Stoddard said, ‘Becky was a good kid. This shouldn’t have happened.’”
Bosch poured coffee into a mug and then read the story again while sipping his breakfast. He then excitedly grabbed the phone off the counter and called Kizmin Rider’s home number. She answered with a blurry voice.
“Kiz, the story is perfect. She put in everything we wanted.”
“Harry? What time is it, Harry?”
“Almost seven. We’re in business.”
“Harry, we have to work all night. What are you doing awake? What are you doing calling me at seven o’clock?”
Bosch realized his mistake.
“I’m sorry. I’m just excited about it.”
“Call me back in two hours.”
She hung up. There had not been a pleasant tone in her voice.
Undaunted, Bosch pulled a folded sheet of paper from his jacket pocket. It was the sheet of numbers Pratt had passed out during the staff meeting. He called Tim Marcia’s cell number.
“It’s Bosch,” he said. “You guys in position?”
“Yeah, we’re here.”
“Anything shaking?”
“It’s a sleepy hollow right now. We figure if this guy worked till midnight last night, then he’s going to be sleeping late.”
“His car is there? The Camaro?”
“Yes, Harry, it’s here.”
“Okay. Did you read the story in the paper?”
“Not yet. But we’ve got two teams sitting on this house for Mackey and Burkhart. We’re about to break off to get coffee and pick up the paper.”
“It’s good. It’s going to work.”
“Let’s hope so.”
After Bosch hung up he realized that until Mackey or Burkhart left the house on Mariano there would be double surveillance on the place. It was a waste of time and money but he didn’t see any way around it. There was no telling when one of the surveillance subjects might take off from the house. They knew very little about Burkhart. They didn’t even know if he had a job.
He next called Renner in the sound room at ListenTech. He was the oldest detective on the squad and had used seniority to get him and his partner the day shift in the sound room.
“Anything yet?” Bosch asked him.
“Not yet, but you’ll be the first to know.”
Bosch thanked him and hung up. He checked his watch. It wasn’t even seven-thirty and he knew it was going to be a long day waiting for his surveillance shift to begin. He refilled his coffee mug and looked at the paper again. The photo of the dead girl’s bedroom bothered him in a way he could not pinpoint. There was something there but he could not pull it out. He closed his eyes for a five count and then brought them open, hoping the trick would jar something loose. But the photo did not reveal the secret. A sense of frustration started to rise in him but then the phone rang.
It was Rider.
“Great, now I can’t go back to sleep. You better be bright-eyed tonight, Harry, because I won’t be.”
“Sorry, Kiz. I will.”
“Read me the story.”
He did, and when he was finished she seemed to have caught some of his excitement. They both knew that the story would play perfectly into provoking a response from Mackey. The key would be to make sure that he saw it and read it, and they thought they had that covered.
“Okay, Harry, I’m going to get going. I have some things to do today.”
“All right, Kiz, see you up there. How ’bout we meet at quarter to six on Tampa about a block south of the service station?”
“I’ll be there unless something happens before.”
“Yeah, me too.”
After hanging up, Bosch went into his bedroom and changed into fresh clothes that would be comfortable during an all-night surveillance and useful as well for the play he intended for Mackey. He chose a white T-shirt that had been washed many times and had shrunk so that its sleeves were tight and short on his biceps. Before putting on a shirt over it he checked his look in the mirror. A full half of the skull was exposed and the SS bolts pointed up above the cotton on his neck.
The tattoos looked more authentic than they had the night before. He had taken a shower at Vicki Landreth’s and she told him that the water would slightly blur the ink on his skin as was the case with most prison-applied tattoos. She warned him that the ink would start to wash away after two or three showers and, if needed, she could maintain his look with further applications. He told her he wasn’t planning on needing the tattoos more than one day. They would work or not work when he made his play.
He put on a long-sleeved button-down shirt over the T-shirt. He checked this in the mirror and thought he could see details of the skull tattoo bleeding through the cotton. The thick black swastika on the crown was coming through.
Ready to go but with hours before he was needed, Bosch paced nervously around his living room for a few moments, wondering what to do. He decided to call his daughter, hoping that her sweet voice and cheerfulness would give him an added charge for the day.
He got the number for the Intercontinental Hotel in Kowloon off the Post-it on his refrigerator and punched it into his phone. It would be almost 8 p.m. there. His daughter should still be awake. But when his call was connected to Eleanor Wish’s room there was no answer. He wondered if he had the time change wrong. Maybe he was calling too early or too late.
After six rings an answering service picked up, giving Bosch instructions in English and Cantonese in how to leave a message. He left a short message for both Eleanor and his daughter and hung up the phone.
Now not wanting to dwell on his daughter or thoughts about where she was, Bosch opened the murder book and began reviewing its contents again, always looking for details of the case he had possibly missed. Despite everything he had learned about the case and how it was pushed off track by the powers that be, he still believed in the book. He believed the answers to the mysteries were always found in the details.
He finished a read-through and was going to take up the copy of Mackey’s probation file when he thought of something and called Muriel Verloren. She was at home.