Tilly was surprised that he’d driven for this long with it off. He must be really excited, she realized. Her fingers grazed her vest. Bland trap music drifted from the speakers; the lead elements were unsubtle bass and a corny, ecstatic organ. The producer was probably from Gothenburg or Toronto, somewhere with health care. Tilly didn’t recognize the rapper, undoubtedly some rando from some mixtape Rick would swear by this week and then condemn next week. She was annoyed that she knew it was trap music. But it was hard not to know when Rick was such a flowing faucet. He had a blog—he’d told her, multiple times, until she finally read it—but she’d only viewed it once, its thousands of posts too much to even consider parsing. There was something repugnant about being too immersed in the moment, too coated in the contemporary. There was also something fearless about drowning in the moment, something brave, but she had bills. Bravery was for college students and dogs.

Tilly’s attention returned to the odd weather unfolding on South Cobb Drive. The sun was back, producing iridescent sparks that danced on the backs of the rain-splashed cars. Moments later, they pulled into a nondescript neighborhood filled with manicured lawns and expensive cars, mostly Escalades. She drove a Cadillac herself, but Escalades had always disgusted her. The name was too militant, upward mobility as siege.

Rick slowed his Lincoln Navigator to a crawl as they approached Theo Santos’s address. The surveillance team had reported that Santos was the only one home, but Tilly didn’t want any surprises. The music seemed to slow as well, but Tilly realized the song was actually just chopped and screwed, another genre she had learned about from Rick.

Rick parked the car in the driveway, and they stepped out slowly, their training and experience and fear muffling their footsteps, heightening their awareness. Tilly was sure that Santos wouldn’t be a threat, but procedure didn’t call for certainty. Since they had acquired the tag numbers for the Civic and the MINI Cooper from surveillance footage, they had been watching Santos and his friends for weeks while their arrest warrant was finalized. Other than their love for graffiti, they seemed normal, but that NSA agent had been right: normal teens didn’t have encrypted emails and scrambled IP addresses. Something was up.

“I’ve always felt like no-knock warrants were made for people in apartment buildings. Everybody else has doorbells,” Rick said as he mashed the doorbell.

“Rick, until about forty years ago, law enforcement never knocked on anything but skulls,” Tilly sighed. “Especially for people of color,” she added obligatorily, her hand on her holster.

The door swung open, Santos eyeing them. His clothing was oddly formal, Tilly noted. Dark slacks and a gray collared shirt clung to him like bedsheets. He looked like he was about to testify.