The Drop(94)

Soon beating her old man with his own guns was not enough. And that brought them to Catalina. Maddie’s first competition was a junior match at the gun club on the back side of the island. It was a single-elimination pistol match that would pit her against all teenage entrants. Each face-off involved shooting six rounds at paper targets from ten, fifteen and twenty-five yards.

They had chosen Catalina for her first foray into competitive shooting because it was a small tournament and they knew they could make a fun day of it no matter how she performed. Maddie had never been to Catalina, and Harry had not been out to the barrier island in years.

As it turned out, she was the only girl in the competition. It was Maddie and seven boys, randomly bracketed into one-on-one matches. She won her first match going away, overcoming a weak grouping on the ten-yard target to hit seven of eight rings in the fifteen- and twenty-five-yard distances. Bosch was so proud and happy for her that he wanted to rush to the line and hug her. But he held back, knowing it would only underline that she was the only girl. Instead, he was the lone spectator applauding from the picnic tables behind the shooting line. He then put on his sunglasses so no stranger would see the look in his eyes.

His daughter was eliminated in the next round by a single-ring shot but took the disappointment well. The fact that she had competed and won her first match had made the journey worth it. She and Bosch stuck around to watch the final round and then the start of the adult competition. Maddie tried to goad Harry into entering the adult round but he demurred. His eyes were not what they once were and he knew he didn’t stand a chance.

They ate a late lunch at the Busy Bee and window-shopped along Crescent before catching the four-o’clock ferry back to the mainland. They sat inside because the sea air was cold, and along the way, Bosch put his arm around his daughter’s shoulders. He knew that other girls her age weren’t learning about guns and shooting. They weren’t watching their fathers at night poring over murder books and autopsies and crime scene photos. They weren’t left alone in the house while their fathers went out with their guns to chase bad guys. Most parents were raising citizens of the future. Doctors, teachers, mothers, keepers of family businesses. Bosch was raising a warrior.

A momentary thought of Hannah Stone and her son shot through him and he squeezed his daughter’s shoulder again. He had been thinking about something and it was now time to discuss it.

“You know,” he said, “you don’t have to do any of this if you don’t want to. Don’t do it for me, Mads. The gun stuff. The being a cop thing, too. You do what you want to do. You make your own choices.”

“I know, Dad. I do make my own choices and it’s what I want. We talked about this a long time ago.”

It was Bosch’s hope that she would be able to leave her past behind and forge something new. He had been unable to do it himself and it haunted him that she might be the same way.

“Okay, baby. There’s a lot of time between now and then anyway.”

A few minutes went by while he thought of things. He could see the disguised oil derricks in the harbor just coming into view. A call came in on his cell and he saw it was from David Chu. He let it go to message. He wasn’t going to spoil this moment with work or, more likely, Chu groveling for a second chance. He put the phone away and kissed the top of his daughter’s head.

“I guess I’ll always have to worry about you,” he said. “It’s not like you could want to be a teacher or something safe like that.”

“I hate school, Dad. Why would I want to be a teacher?”

“I don’t know. To change the system, make it better so the next kids don’t hate it.”

“One teacher? Forget it.”

“It just takes one. It always starts with one. Anyway, like I said, you do what you want. You’ve got time. I guess I’ll worry about you no matter what you do.”

“Not if you teach me all you know. Then you won’t have to worry because I’ll be like you out there.”

Bosch laughed.

“If you’re like me out there, then I’ll have to walk around all day with rosary beads in one hand, a rabbit’s foot in the other and maybe a four-leaf clover tattooed on my arm.”

She drove an elbow into his side.

Bosch let another few minutes go by. He pulled his phone and checked to see if Chu had left a message. There was nothing and Bosch figured his partner had been calling to once again plead his case. It was not the kind of thing you would put into a voicemail.

He put the phone away and turned the father-daughter conversation more serious.

“Look, Mads, I’ve been wanting to tell you something else, too.”