The Burning Room

by Michael Connelly

  “Okay, I’m going to get out, act casual, and wait for him,” Bosch said. “You stay in the car. I’ll signal you if I need you.”

  “Okay,” Soto said. “What are you going to do?”

  “Not sure yet. Play it as it lays.”

  “Sounds good.”

  Bosch unbuckled his seatbelt and got out of the car. He walked to the front and leaned against the grille in a very casual pose, hands back on the hood for balance. The house was about fifty yards up the driveway. Soon he saw the garage door open and a pickup truck that had been backed into it start down the driveway to the gate. As it got closer, the automatic gate in front of Bosch began to slide open. He could see a man behind the wheel and a dog on the seat beside him. He then saw a rifle in the rack behind the driver’s head. Bosch started to get concerned but tried not to show it. The truck stopped twenty feet short of the gate and the man left it idling as he climbed out. Bosch heard him tell the dog to be good.

  The first thing Bosch saw when the man closed the truck door was that he had a western-style holster on his belt and strapped around his right thigh. There was a pistol in it. This escalated things quickly and Bosch dropped the casual pose and stood up off the front of his car. He pointed at the man and issued a command.

  “Stop right there, sir!”

  The man stopped in his tracks and looked around as if confused by the circumstances. He was shorter than Bosch expected. For some reason his adversaries always loomed large in his imagination, and then, more often than not, they didn’t measure up to what he expected. Burrows had a beefy physique beneath his plaid shirt and jeans. He had a bushy red beard and wore an old John Deere hat.

  “What is it?” he asked.

  “Sir, why are you wearing a holstered weapon?” Bosch called back.

  “Because I always do and because I have a right to bear arms on my own goddamn property.”

  “What is your name, sir?”

  “Rodney Burrows and would you stop with the ‘sir’ all the time?”

  “Okay, Mr. Burrows, I want you to reach across your body with your left hand, take the gun out of the holster, and put it on the hood of your truck.”

  Perhaps sensing something in the tone of Bosch’s voice, the dog started barking and had moved over to the driver’s seat to be closer to its master.

  “Why would I do that?” Burrows asked. “I’m on my own property.”

  “For my safety, sir—Mr. Burrows,” Bosch responded. “I want the gun on the hood of the truck.”

  By pointing at the truck, Bosch set off another paroxysm of barking from the dog. It started moving back and forth in the truck cab, jumping from seat to seat. Bosch heard the passenger door of the Ford open behind him and knew Soto was getting out. But he did not want to turn his eyes away from the armed man in front of him.

  When he saw Burrows start to raise his hands, palms out, he knew Soto had drawn her weapon.

  “Sir!” Soto yelled, her voice high and tense. “Put the weapon on the hood!”

  “Soto, I have this,” Bosch said. “Stand down.”

  “Sir!” she called again, ignoring Bosch. “The weapon!”

  “Okay, okay,” Burrows said. “I’m doing it.”

  He started moving his right hand toward the holster.

  “Left hand!” Bosch yelled. “Left hand!”

  “Sorry,” Burrows said casually. “Left hand. Jesus!”

  He removed the gun from the holster with his left hand and casually tossed it onto the pickup’s hood. It banged hard on the steel and caused the dog to increase its volume and animation.

  “Lola, shut up!” Burrows yelled.

  The dog did not oblige. With the gun on the hood of the truck Bosch felt safe enough to glance back at Soto. She was behind the open passenger door of the plain-wrap in a two-handed combat stance, arms braced on the windowsill, her weapon still aimed at Burrows’s center mass.

  “Soto, cool it,” Bosch said. “I’ve got this.”

  “I’ve got you covered, partner,” she said.

  “Stand down,” Bosch said evenly. “Holster your weapon.”

  He waited for Soto to comply, then turned back to Burrows and stepped forward, putting his body in the line between Burrows and Soto.

  Bosch pulled Burrows away from the truck and over to the plain-wrap. He proned him over the hood and started checking him for other weapons. He looked over him at Soto, giving her a hard stare.

  “Here’s a tip,” he said to Burrows. “When the cops knock on your door, don’t answer it with a gun on your belt and a rifle in your truck.”

  “I don’t know what you’re doing, man,” Burrows protested. “I am on my own land. I have every right to—”

  “You are a convicted felon in possession of a firearm,” Bosch said. “That trumps any of your bullshit.”

  “I don’t recognize your law.”

  “Yeah, well good for you. The law recognizes you. Do you have any other weapons?”

  “I got a knife,” Burrows said. “Back pocket. This is bullshit. This is government harassment. And this hood is fucking hot!”

  Bosch didn’t respond. He didn’t care how hot the hood was. He dug the knife out. It was a switchblade. He pushed the spring lock and a four-inch blade popped out. He held it up high so Soto could see it and would be able to deflect any claim that Bosch had planted it. He closed it and put it on the car’s hood, sliding it out of reach.

  Bosch leaned his weight on Burrows, pushing his chest down on the hood. He could feel the heat Burrows had complained about. Then in a long-practiced maneuver, he kept a forearm on the man’s spine to hold him in place while he pulled the handcuffs off his belt and hooked one onto Burrows’s left wrist.

  “Hey, what are you doing?” Burrows asked.

  Bosch brought Burrows’s left arm up behind his back and shifted his weight to the other forearm so he could bring the right wrist back to complete the cuffing. He then stood Burrows back up and turned him around.

  “You can’t do this,” Burrows said. “Arrest me on my own property.”

  “Wrong,” Bosch said. “I own you now, Burrows. Is there anyone else in your house?”

  “What? No, no one.”

  “Any other dogs besides the one in the truck?”

  “No. What is this? What do you want?”

  “I told you. We want to talk about a missing person.”

  “Who?”

  “Ana Acevedo.”

  Bosch watched his reaction, seeing how long it took Burrows to recognize and remember the name. It took a few seconds and then it hit.

  “I haven’t seen her in, like, years.”

  “Good. We’ll talk about that. You now have a big decision, Rodney. You want to go inside and talk here? Or do you want to drive back to L.A. with us and do it at the station?”

  “You’re from L.A.?”

  “That’s right. I guess I forgot to mention that. You want to answer questions here or there?”

  “How about I just ask for my lawyer and you don’t ask me a fucking thing?”

  “That would be a choice. We’ll take you down to L.A. and get you a phone as soon as we get there. I promise.”

  “No, right now. Here. My lawyer’s up here. L.A. is a shithole. I don’t want to ever go there again.”

  “Then make a choice. Talk to us here or call your lawyer from L.A. I’m sure he’ll be able to get you out by morning—after a night in the zoo.”

  Burrows shook his head and said nothing. Bosch knew they were skirting very closely around an interpretation of whether or not he had just asked for an attorney.

  “Okay,” Bosch said.

  He pulled Burrows back from the hood and started walking him toward the rear door of the car.

  “We’ll get animal control out here for the dog,” he said.

  Immediately Burrows tensed and tried to stop moving.

  “Okay, okay,” he said. “We can go inside but I don’t know anything about Ana Acevedo.”

  “W
e’ll see,” Bosch said.

  “What about my dog? And my truck?”

  Bosch looked back at the truck. It was still running. The dog had its front paws up on the dashboard and was looking intently back at Bosch.

  “They’ll be fine,” he said.

  He turned Burrows toward the house, keeping one hand on his upper arm. With the other he signaled to Soto to get the gun and the knife.

  “You have to close the gate,” Burrows protested. “Otherwise, they’ll come in.”

  “Who will?” Bosch asked.

  “The people out there. The kids on the street.”

  “How do we close it?”

  “There’s a clicker in the truck.”

  “We’re not opening the truck.”

  “The dog is harmless. She likes to bark.”

  “Okay, I’ll open the truck. But just so you know, if the dog comes at me, I’m going to shoot it.”

  “She won’t.”

  Bosch signaled Soto over so she could take control of Burrows while he walked over to the pickup. He drew his weapon and then lowered it to his side. He opened the door and was greeted with a paroxysm of barking. But the dog backed up against the passenger door. Bosch reached in and pushed the button on a remote clipped to the windshield visor. The gate to the Burrows compound started to close.

  “Lola, down,” Burrows shouted.

  The dog leaped out of the truck and past Bosch in a gray blur. By the time he had raised his gun, the dog was already on the ground and by Burrows’s side.

  “Good girl,” Burrows said. “Can you kill the engine? Gas ain’t cheap around here.”

  “It ain’t cheap anywhere,” Bosch said.

  He reached in and turned off the engine, then grabbed the rifle off the rack.

  32

  Bosch kept Burrows in the cuffs until they were inside the house and he had made a complete walk-through to confirm there was no one else inside. He found a table and chairs in the kitchen and sat Burrows down against a wall adorned with a Nazi flag. He put the two weapons on a counter, then returned to Burrows, uncuffed him, and took the seat across the table from him. Soto stood to the right, next to the counter by the guns. The nearby sink was overflowing with dirty plates and glasses. She took out her phone, turned on its recording app, and placed it down on the counter while Burrows exaggeratedly rubbed his wrists to restore feeling in them.

  The dog went to the bowl by the back door and started loudly lapping up water. They waited until the noise subsided.

  “What is she?” Bosch asked.

  “Part pit, part Rotter,” Burrows said.

  Bosch nodded toward the flag.

  “Goes with the flag, huh?” he said.

  Burrows didn’t respond. The dog found a spot by the door, circled around twice, and then lay down.

  “Do you live here alone?” Bosch asked.

  “Yes, I do,” Burrows said. “Can we skip the small talk now? I just want to get this over with.”

  “Sure. Where did you get the guns?”

  “A gun show in Tucson. All legal. I was living there at the time.”

  “Except you forgot to mention you were a convicted felon.”

  “I bought from a private citizen and he didn’t have to ask. Besides, my attorney is petitioning the court to have that conviction expunged from my record. I served the time and completed the probation.”

  “Yeah, good luck with that. Do you have any other firearms in the house?”

  Burrows didn’t answer right away.

  “Don’t lie,” Bosch said. “We’ll tear this place apart.”

  “I have a shotgun next to my bed,” Burrows said. “I’m surprised you didn’t see it when you tromped all through my home. I only hesitated just now because you asked about firearms in the house. I also have a Colt .45 in the glove box of the truck, but you didn’t ask about the truck.”

  Bosch nodded to Soto and she left the kitchen to collect the weapons. Harry checked to see that she had left her phone still recording on the counter and then turned back to Burrows.

  “Okay, I’m going to read you your rights now.”

  “What do you mean? I thought we were just going to talk?”

  “We are. But I haven’t decided what to do about the firearms yet. The switchblade is illegal, too. Let’s just see how we get along here and let’s do everything right.”

  Without taking his eyes off the man in front of him, Bosch pulled his badge wallet. He then glanced down and read Burrows his rights off a card he kept in it.

  “Do you understand these rights as I have read them?” he asked.

  “I don’t recognize these rights,” Burrows said.

  “I don’t care if you recognize them. Do you understand what I just read to you?”

  “Yes, but I don’t—”

  “I bet you’re paying your taxes now, right?”

  “Under protest.”

  “Okay, same thing. These are your rights under the government of this land. You can protest that government but those are the rules. Do you want to proceed with the interview or do you want to get in the back of the car and head on down to L.A.?”

  “I understand the rights. I will talk to you without my attorney present.”

  “Good, we’re making progress here. Where’s Ana Acevedo?”

  Burrows physically moved back in his seat as if Bosch’s bluntness was a solid object he had been struck with.

  “Look, that’s what I’ve been trying to tell you from the start,” he protested. “I have no idea where she is. I haven’t seen that girl in twenty years.”

  “When and under what circumstances did you see her last?”

  Before he could answer, Soto came back into the kitchen. She put the two new weapons she had collected with the others, then reclaimed her position by the counter.

  Bosch turned back to Burrows and repeated his question.

  “Tell us about the last time you saw Ana Acevedo.”

  “I don’t—we’re talking about the nineties here. How can I remember the exact—”

  “But you lived with her. You ought to be able to remember when you—”

  “No, I did not. Who said that? I would never . . .”

  His voice trailed off.

  “Never what?” Soto asked. “Never live with a brown person?” Bosch threw Soto a back-off look. He wanted to keep Burrows off guard and the best way to do that was to have one person in control of the interview.

  “If you didn’t live with her, then you at least visited her at the Bonnie Brae,” he said. “We have witnesses.”

  “Yes, yes, that’s exactly right,” Burrows said. “I visited her there. I didn’t live there. I never lived there and I never lived with her.”

  The plan was to use Ana Acevedo to get Burrows to admit things that could be useful and used against him in a case involving the Bonnie Brae fire. Bosch had just checked the first and most important box. Burrows had just admitted that he had been in the Bonnie Brae Arms to visit Acevedo. This started them down the road toward establishing familiarity with the place. That road ended with Burrows knowing where the trash chute was located.

  “Then, what exactly was your relationship with her?”

  “She and me worked together and it was her who came on to me. It was against the rules but she came on to me, and so we had a thing. It was all less than six months long.”

  Soto made a derisive sound with her mouth. Bosch ignored it.

  “You’re talking about the check-cashing business?” he asked. “It was against the rules there?”

  “Yes, we both worked there,” Burrows said. “For a year. I did the security. Then she quit the job and she quit me and I never saw her again. I swear, that’s it.”

  “Why did she quit?”

  “There had been a robbery. And I got assaulted and she got roughed up. They held a gun to her head. An AR-15. She got spooked and didn’t want to work there anymore—like PTS syndrome or something, but they never called it that back then. I nev
er saw her again after that. She visited me one time in the hospital after the robbery and that was it.”

  “Where did she go?”

  “I just told you, I don’t know.”

  “And you never tried to find her.”

  “No. I wasn’t . . . look, it was just sex. We weren’t in love. I let it go.”

  “Did your buddies in WAVE know about her?”

  A glimmer of surprise showed in Burrows’s eyes. Bosch knew about WAVE. Burrows didn’t answer, but Bosch pushed it.

  “Did you tell them?” he asked. “Did you brag to the guys at the clubhouse about banging a Mexican? What is it you people would have called her, a ‘border monkey’?”

  “No, I didn’t tell them,” Burrows said. “I didn’t tell any of them and I didn’t call her that.”

  Bosch stared at him for a long moment, assessing him, thinking about where to go next.

  “How many nights did you stay at the Bonnie Brae?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” Burrows said. “Thirty, forty, I was there a lot. We were . . .”

  “You were what? In love?”

  “No, no way. It wasn’t love.”

  “Did you leave clothes there?”

  “Yeah, I left some work uniforms there so I would have them.”

  “Did you do laundry, take out the trash?”

  “I helped out, yeah. It doesn’t mean we—”

  “You took out the trash for a woman you didn’t love?”

  “Look, man, you’re totally twisting this.”

  “How? Did you take out the trash or not?”

  “I took out the trash but it didn’t mean shit and it doesn’t matter, because I still haven’t heard from her in twenty years and I don’t know where the fuck she’s at.”

  Bosch paused. He let things calm down even though inside he was roaring because he had everything he needed from Burrows.

  “What do you do for a living now, Rodney?” he asked.

  “I drive a parts truck,” Burrows said.

  “What parts?”

  “American auto parts.”

  “Where is Ana Acevedo? What did you do with her?”

  “What? I did nothing! I don’t know where she is!”