“Okay, anything else happen today?”

“Not too much. A couple suicides, that’s it so far.”

“Okay, when are you going to start tomorrow?”

“I’d like to get out there early. I’ll make some calls and see what I can get going. And get the bone the dog found confirmed before we start anything.”

“Okay, let me know.”

Bosch agreed and hung up the phone. He next called Teresa Corazon, the county medical examiner, at home. Though their relationship outside of work had ended years before and she had moved at least two times since, she had always kept the same number and Bosch knew it by heart. It came in handy now. He explained what he had going and that he needed an official confirmation of the bone as human before he set other things in motion. He also told her that if it was confirmed he would need an archeological team to work the crime scene as soon as possible.

Corazon put him on hold for almost five minutes.

“Okay,” she said when she came back on the line. “I couldn’t get Kathy Kohl. She’s not home.”

Bosch knew that Kohl was the staff archeologist. Her real expertise and reason for her inclusion as a full-time employee was retrieving bones from the body dump sites up in the desert of the north county, which was a weekly occurrence. But Bosch knew she would be called in to handle the search for bones off Wonderland Avenue.

“So what do you want me to do? I want to get this confirmed tonight.”

“Just hold your horses, Harry. You are always so impatient. You’re like a dog with a bone, no pun intended.”

“It’s a kid, Teresa. Can we be serious?”

“Just come here. I’ll look at this bone.”

“And what about tomorrow?”

“I’ll get things in motion. I left a message for Kathy and as soon as we hang up here I’ll call the office and have her paged. She’ll head up the dig as soon as the sun is up and we can get in there. Once the bones are recovered, there is a forensic anthropologist at UCLA we have on retainer and I can bring him in if he’s in town. And I’ll be there myself. Are you satisfied?”