Bosch moved to the place in the room from which he believed the e-mail photo had been taken. He scanned the room, hoping something would poke through and speak to him. He noticed the dead clock on the bed table and then checked it against the e-mail photo. The clock was dead in the photo, too.

Bosch walked over to the table, crouched and looked behind it. The clock was unplugged. He reached behind the table and plugged it back in. The digital screen started flashing 12:00 in red numerals. The clock worked. It just needed to be set.

Bosch thought about this and knew it would be something to ask Alicia Kent about. He assumed the men who were in the house had unplugged the clock. The question was why. Perhaps they didn’t want Alicia Kent to know how much or how little time had gone by while she waited tied up on the bed.

Bosch put the clock issue aside and moved to the bed, where he opened one of the files and took out the crime scene photographs. He studied these and noticed that the closet door was open at a slightly different angle from the one in the e-mail photo and that the robe was gone, obviously because Alicia Kent had put it on after her rescue. He stepped over to the closet, matched the door’s angle to the one in the crime scene photograph, and then stepped back to the door and scanned the room.

Nothing broke through. The transfer still eluded him. He felt discomfort in his gut. He felt as though he was missing something. Something that was right there in the room with him.

Failure brings pressure. Bosch checked his watch and saw that the federal meeting-if there was actually going to be one-was to begin in less than three hours.

He left the bedroom and made his way down the hall toward the kitchen, stopping in each room and checking closets and drawers and finding nothing suspicious or amiss. In the workout room he opened a closet door and found it lined with musty cold-weather clothes on hangers. The Kents had obviously migrated to L.A. from colder climes. And like most people who came from somewhere else, they refused to part with their winter gear. Nobody ever knew for sure how much of L.A. they could take. It was always good to be ready to run.

He left the contents of the closet untouched and closed the door. Before leaving the room he noticed a rectangular discoloration on the wall next to the hooks where rubber workout mats hung. There were slight tape marks indicating that a poster or maybe a large calendar had been taped to the wall.

When he got to the living room Maxwell was still on the floor, red-faced and sweating from struggling. He now had one leg through the loop created by his cuffed wrists, but he apparently couldn’t get the other through in order to bring his hands to the front of his body. He was lying on the tiled floor with his wrists bound between his legs. He reminded Bosch of a five-year-old holding himself in an effort to maintain bladder control.

“We’re almost out of here, Agent Maxwell,” Bosch said.

Maxwell didn’t respond.

In the kitchen Bosch went to the back door and stepped out onto a rear patio and garden. Seeing the yard in daylight changed his perspective. It was on an incline and he counted four rows of rosebushes going up the embankment. Some were in bloom and some weren’t. Some relied on support sticks that carried markers identifying the different kinds of roses. He stepped up the hillside and studied a few of these, then returned to the house.

After locking the door behind him, he walked across the kitchen and opened another door, which he knew led to the adjoining two-car garage. A bank of cabinets stretched along the back wall of the garage. One by one he opened them and surveyed the contents. There were mostly tools for gardening and household chores, and several bags of fertilizer and soil nutrients for growing roses.

There was a wheeled trash can in the garage. Bosch opened it and saw one plastic trash bag in it. He pulled it out, loosened the pull strap and discovered it contained what appeared to be only basic kitchen trash. On top was a cluster of paper towels that were stained purple. It looked like someone had cleaned up a spill. He held one of the towels up and smelled grape juice on it.

After returning the trash to the container Bosch left the garage and ran into his partner in the kitchen.

“He’s trying to get loose,” Ferras said of Maxwell.

“Let him try. Are you finished in the office?”

“Just about. I was wondering where you were.”

“Go finish up and we’ll be out of here.”

After Ferras was gone Bosch checked the kitchen cabinets and the walk-in pantry and studied all the groceries and supplies stacked on the shelves. After that he went to the guest bathroom in the hall and looked at the spot where the cigarette ash had been collected. On the white porcelain tank top there was a brown discoloration about half the length of a cigarette.

Bosch stared at the mark, curious. It had been seven years since he had smoked but he didn’t remember ever leaving a cigarette to burn like that. If he had finished it he would have thrown it into the toilet and flushed it away. It was clear that this cigarette had been forgotten.

With his search complete, he stepped back into the living room and called to his partner.

“Ignacio, you ready? We’re leaving.”

Maxwell was still on the floor but looked tired from his struggle and resigned to his predicament.

“Come on, damn it!” he finally cried out. “Uncuff me!”

Bosch stepped close to him.

“Where’s your key?” he asked.

“Coat pocket. Left side.”

Bosch bent over and worked his hand into the agent’s coat pocket. He pulled out a set of keys and fingered through them until he found the cuff key. He grabbed the chain between the two cuffs and pulled up so he could work the key in. He wasn’t gentle about it.

“Now be nice if I do this,” he said.

“Nice? I’m going to kick your fucking ass.”

Bosch let go of the chain and Maxwell’s wrists dropped to the floor.

“What are you doing?” Maxwell yelled. “Undo me!”

“Here’s a tip, Cliff. Next time you threaten to kick my ass, you might want to wait until after I’ve cut you loose.”

Bosch straightened up and tossed the keys onto the floor on the other side of the room.

“Uncuff yourself.”

Bosch headed to the front door. Ferras was already going through it. As Bosch was pulling it closed he looked back at Maxwell sprawled on the floor. The agent’s face was as red as a stop sign as he sputtered one last threat in Bosch’s direction.

“This isn’t over, asshole.”

“Got it.”

Bosch closed the door. When he got to the car he looked over the roof at his partner. Ferras looked as mortified as some of the suspects who had ridden in the backseat.

“Cheer up,” Bosch said.

As he got in he had a vision of the FBI agent crawling in his nice suit across the living room floor to the keys.

Bosch smiled.