Tilly continued. “How old were they? Where were they from, you’d say?”

“I don’t know where they were from. They were bumping Gucci when they pulled up, but Gucci is global these days, so I don’t know. The kid had kind of an accent, but he could have just went to private school. He was American, though, if that’s what you’re asking. Speaking of school, I’d say he was still in it. He had no facial hair, and he had those baby waves. You could tell he hadn’t had to work for them.”

“How had you corresponded with him? Phone? Internet?”

“Both. Most of my clients pick one and stick to it, but he emailed me and called me. He was very suspicious.”

“Do you still have his contact information on your computer?”

“Computer? Bitch, I’m modern. I do all my business through my phone. But yeah, I keep all of my clients’ records. I gave my phone to the guy who signed me in. I hope it will help, but he probably had a burner. Those car thieves, I hear they like those. I think I saw that in a VICE documentary.” He winked again.

“Were the perps armed?”

“How the hell would I know? I didn’t pat them down. I just sold them a fucking vehicle.” Tilly rose from her seat. Sims was well past being useful. Before she could click off the recorder, he added, “But based on what I’ve seen in my experiences, they weren’t intimidating, you know? I’m no criminal profiler or anything because I’m just a businessman, but they seemed super focused, like they had a mission. If I was rolling five deep and I was a criminal, I probably would have just taken the van, but they paid me for it.”

“How much?” Tilly asked.

“A thousand. But I gave them three hundred back. The brakes weren’t so good. I wanted them to be safe. Dead clients don’t come back, you know?”

“Thank you very much, Mr. Curio. I will be in contact if I need anything else from you.”

Tilly clicked off the recorder and exited the room. Houndum was gone. He’d probably left after he’d realized she was nowhere near resolving the Black Lives Matter development. Whatever, that wasn’t her job. She hoped he had caught the choking before he left. “You know we’re not cops, right?” he had asked her after supervising her first suspect interview when she moved to the Atlanta office. She didn’t know what he meant then, but she’d learned. Cops were defined by their authority. That’s why they wigged out when they lost it or it was questioned. Tilly had scoffed when she saw her coworkers supporting #BlueLivesMatter on Facebook. Cops were so fucking needy.