Page 66 of Resurrection Walk

“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.”

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