“Is okay,” Perez said. “Uh, you said you work for the lawyer?”
“Yes, we both do.”
“Do you think the woman is innocent?”
“I do. But we have to prove it.”
“Okay, I see.”
“Do you know her?”
“Oh, no, I don’t. I just... I just wondered what would happen.”
“Okay.”
Bosch waited to see if she would say more, but she didn’t.
“Well, thank you,” he said.
He went down the two steps and joined Arslanian in the yard. She had collapsed her tripod and was stowing it in a carrying bag.
“When she bought the house, did she know what happened here?” she asked.
“She’s just renting,” Bosch said. “Her landlord didn’t tell her.”
“Was she freaked out when you told her?”
“Not so much. It’s L.A., you know. There’s probably a history of violence wherever you go.”
“That’s sad.”
“That’s L.A.”
22
On the drive back from the desert, Arslanian didn’t have to be told to sit up front. She took the seat next to Bosch but focused her attention on her notes and a laptop she opened once they were on the smooth surface of the Antelope Valley Freeway. She spoke without taking her eyes off the screen or interrupting the input of data into her computer program.
“Funny that they call it the Antelope Valley,” she said.
“Why is that?” Bosch asked.
“I did my research on the plane. There haven’t been any antelope here in over a century. The species was hunted out by the Indigenous people before it was ever called the Antelope Valley.”
“Didn’t know that.”
“I was thinking I might see antelope roaming free. But then I looked it up.”
Bosch nodded and tried to draw her attention away from the computer screen.
“Do you see that?” he said. “The rock outcropping.”
Arslanian looked up at the jagged formation they were passing to the north of the freeway.
“Wow, beautiful,” she said. “And immense!”
“Vasquez Rocks,” Bosch said. “They call it that because about a hundred and fifty years ago a bandido named Tiburcio Vasquez hid out in there, and the sheriff’s posse never found him.”
Arslanian studied the formation for a long moment before responding.
“Not many places are named after bad guys,” she said.
“How about Trump Tower?” Bosch responded.
“Self-named. And I guess it depends on who you talk to about that.”
“I guess so.”
She lapsed into silence and Bosch wondered if he had offended her. He had just been trying for some kind of reaction. He was intrigued by her and the way she did her work and looked at things. He wanted to know her better but knew her time in L.A. would be short. After the hearing she would return to New York.
When, after a few minutes, they had connected to the Golden State Freeway, she spoke again.
“Mickey told me you two are brothers.”
“Half brothers, actually.”
“Ah. Which was the common parent?”
“Father.”
“But you two didn’t know about each other until you were grown up?”
“Yeah. Our father was a lawyer like Mickey. Mickey’s mother was his wife. My mother was a client.”
“I think I see why you were kept apart. Was it consensual — your mother and father?”
It was a surprising question. Bosch didn’t answer at first because he realized he had never asked himself that. It was now too late to ever know for sure.
“I’m sorry, you don’t have to talk about it,” Arslanian said. “Sometimes I’m too blunt with people I feel comfortable with.”
“No, it’s not that,” Bosch said. “I just never thought about it that way before. I assumed it was consensual. Started as a business arrangement — payment for services rendered. My mother was gone by the time I figured out who he was. And I met him only once, and very briefly at that. He was dying at the time, and soon afterward he was gone too.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Nothing really to be sorry about. I didn’t know the guy.”
“I mean sorry you had to grow up... like that.”
Bosch just nodded. She moved on.
“So, how’d you and Mickey meet? One of those DNA services?”
“No, it was a case. We met on a case and sort of figured it out.”
“Harry, can I ask you something? Something personal?”
“Seems like all you ask are personal questions.”
“True. I guess that’s just me.”
“So, go ahead. Ask away.”
“Are you ill?”
The question caught Bosch off guard. His vanity had led him to believe she was going to ask whether he was married. It took a few moments for him to form a response.
“Mickey told you that?”
“Uh, no. I just could tell. Your aura. It feels weakened, you could say.”
“My aura... well, I was sick but I’m getting better.”
“Sick how?”
“Cancer. But like I said, it’s under control.”
“No, you said you were getting better. That could mean something different from ‘under control.’ I assume you are under care. What kind of cancer is it — or was it?”
“It’s called CML for short.”
“Chronic myeloid leukemia. That’s not a hereditary cancer. It comes from chromosomal changes. Any idea how — I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be asking you this.”
The freeway traffic became clogged and slowed down as they dropped back into Los Angeles at the top of the Valley.
“It’s okay,” Bosch said. “I worked a case where I got exposed to radioactive material. I didn’t know it until it was too late. Anyway, it could have been that, but it could have been a lot of things. I used to smoke. Diagnosing origin is not an exact science. I’m sure as a person of science, you know that.”
Arslanian nodded.
“You said both that the cancer is under control and that you’re getting better,” she said. “Which is it?”
“You’d have to ask my doctor,” Bosch said. “Mickey got me into a clinical trial. That’s why I’ve been working for him — health insurance and the access he has to the upper levels of medical care. Anyway, the doctor in charge of the trial said the treatment they’d tested on me worked. To an extent. It was not full remission but close. They want to do it again and hopefully knock the rest of it out.”
“I hope so too. Where did you go for this trial?”
“UCLA Med.”
Arslanian nodded her approval.
“That’s a good facility,” she said. “Would you allow me to take a DNA sample from you?”
“Why?” Bosch asked.
“It could give us further insight into what’s going on with you biologically. Did they run genetic tests on you at UCLA?”
“Not that I know of. I don’t ask them about everything they’re doing. It’s kind of above my pay grade. But they sure took a lot of blood.”
“Of course. But you might ask them. It could be part of the clinical trial. If not, I’d like to do it.”
“Why? Is this something Mickey wants from me?”
“You are such a detective, Harry Bosch. No, Mickey knows nothing about this. But I would also go to him for a DNA sample. Since you’re half brothers, you have very similar genomes. A comparison might be beneficial to you both. Have you heard of precision medicine?”
“Uh... no, not really.”
“It’s got a lot to do with genetic makeup and targeting care and treatment. Do you have children?”
“A daughter.”
“Same as Mickey. This could be beneficial to them as well.”
Bosch had always been suspicious of science and technology. Not that he didn’t believe that the advances made were good for the world, but he had a detective’s suspicion about early adopters and didn’t buy into the cult-like belief that all scientific discoveries were beneficial. He knew this put him on the outside looking in, an analog man in a digital world, but his instincts had always served him well. For every great technological advancement, there were always people out there looking to misuse it.