"Since 2019."
"Where you from originally?"
"The Philippines."
The cop nodded as if this confirmed something, though Lorenz could not imagine what. He put the cards back in the wallet and kept the wallet. "Okay, Lorenz," he said, pronouncing it Lo-RENZ, with the weight on the wrong half. "Here's where we are. I've been sitting on this night drop three nights a week for five weeks. You know why?"
"No, sir."
"Because in the last two months, three businesses that bank at this branch have made deposits in this drop that never showed up in the vault. Three. Logged, signed, carried here, put in the box, gone. You know what the bank says? The bank says, our vault was locked, our camera on the vault room shows nobody went in, there's no bag. So what does that leave?"
Lorenz said nothing.
"That leaves the guy carrying the bag," Brodersen said. "That's all that's left. And here's how it goes. You sign the log back at the restaurant, so your boss sees the money go out the door. You come down here and you open the box and you make a nice little show of it. And then you come back later, when nobody's watching, with whatever you got, a coat hanger, a hook, your hand, and you fish it back out. Maybe you got it rigged somehow so it doesn't fall all the way. I don't know how yet. I'll find out. And in the morning the bank says, no bag. And your boss looks at the bank and the bank looks at your boss and everybody looks around and nobody thinks to look at the sweet, quiet guy who always does the deposit." He tapped the notebook against the top of the door. "Except I'm looking. And you're pulling a deposit bag out of a night drop at one in the morning with your arm in it up to the elbow and a phone in your mouth. And you've got six hundred and forty bucks in your jacket. In twenties. What's that, your cut from last time?"
"That's for my mother," Lorenz said. "It's written on it. My mother is on dialysis. In Angeles City. I send money every month on the eighth. I cash my check at the place on Calhoun, I go to the padala, the remittance shop, on Lima Road. They open at nine. You can call them. You can see I go every month. Six years."
"Para kay," Brodersen read off the envelope, holding it up to the dome light. He did not try to pronounce the rest. "What's that mean?"
"For. For my mother. Para kay Nanay. For Mom."