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Bosch believed he was looking at a murder weapon.
“Do you think we can connect it?” Maddie asked.
“Long shot,” Soto said. “But we can look at autopsy photos, see if there are comparison points.”
“Threads,” Bosch said. “The crime scene photos show thread marks on the ceiling. And on the victims.”
“That could work,” Soto said. “We’ll also get it processed for biologicals.”
“And look at this,” Bosch said.
The pipe was two inches in diameter with what looked like a thick wall. As he’d rolled it on the workbench, Bosch saw a series of hash marks scratched into the brass.
///// ///// //
Shear and Soto stepped closer and looked down at the pipe.
“You think it’s a kill count?” she asked.
“That’s what I’m thinking,” Bosch said. “It would certainly cover Wonderland.”
“And then some,” Shear said.
“I want to repackage it the way I found it,” Soto said. “Then we’ll wrap it for the lab.”
“Anybody else find anything so far?” Shear asked.
“No,” Bosch said. “But I’m not finished with my section.”
“Not yet,” Maddie said. “There’s a lot of medical equipment in my corner. Was Novak into that with any of his businesses?”
“Not that’s come up,” Shear said.
“Okay, well, I’m ready to switch grids if anybody is finished with theirs,” Maddie said.
“Not me,” Soto said. “I need to deal with this before I get back into the search.”
She pulled out her phone and took photos of the brass pipe and the PVC tube in which it had been hidden.
“Maddie, could you get me something from my car?” she said. “In the trunk I have a folded plastic sheet. Can you bring that in here so I can wrap this up?”
“Be right back,” Maddie said.
“I’ll take your corner, Maddie,” Shear said. “You can take mine after you’re back.”
He walked off. Bosch stepped over to Soto.
“You got this?” he asked.
“I do,” Soto said.
“Seems a little easy, doesn’t it?”
“You mean him keeping a murder weapon? Nobody said the bad guys have to be smart. If they were, we probably wouldn’t catch them.”
“True.”
“We also don’t know if we’ll be able to connect this to any crime.”
