The hand swept under the pillow.

“DON’T DO IT!”

The hand was closing on something beneath the pillow. The man had never taken his eyes off Bosch. Then Bosch realized it wasn’t terror in his eyes. It was something else. Anger? Hate? The hand was coming out from beneath the pillow now.

“NO!”

Bosch fired one shot, his gun kicking up in his two-handed grasp. The naked man jerked upright and backward. He hit the wood-paneled wall behind him, then bounced forward and fell across the bed thrashing and gagging. Bosch quickly moved into the room and to the bed.

The man’s left hand was reaching again for the pillow. Bosch brought his left leg up and knelt on his back, pinning him to the bed. He pulled the cuffs off his belt and grabbed the groping left hand and cuffed it. Then the right. Behind the back. The naked man was gagging and moaning.

“I can’t-I can’t,” he said, but his statement was lost in a bloody coughing fit.

“You can’t do what I told you,” Bosch said. “I told you not to move!”

Just die, man, Bosch thought but didn’t say. It will be easier for all of us.

He moved around the bed to the pillow. He lifted it, stared at what was beneath it for a few moments and then dropped it. He closed his eyes for a moment.

“Goddammit!” he called at the back of the naked man’s head. “What were you doing? I had a fucking gun and you, you reach-I told you not to move!”

Bosch came around the bed so he could see the man’s face. Blood was emptying from his mouth onto the dingy white sheet. Bosch knew his bullet had hit the lungs. The naked man was the dying man now.