"Ma'am—"
"I am Thuy Phan. I own that lot. I am the licensed dealer. I sold Mr. Cole that van. I issued that permit on the back of it at five forty-seven p.m. today, from that office, under my login, on the state's system, and I have the original title in my hands. The original, Officer, not a copy. I'll hold it up. I'm going to hold it up now. Don't—I'm only going to hold it up."
She shifted the other papers into the crook of one arm, slowly, and with her free hand held up the green certificate by one corner so that the last of the light came through it and showed the watermark, and so that the dealer reassignment on the back, with the two signatures in blue, faced him.
"I know who you are, Ms. Phan," the officer said.
"I know who you are too. You were at my lot in April of last year."
For a second neither of them said anything. On the edge of the asphalt, Alton Cole had turned his head to look at her, and she did not look at him, because she knew that if she did she would not be able to keep her voice where she needed it.
"Your dealer number is flagged," the officer said. "Every permit off your printer gets verified. That's the bulletin."
"I know about the bulletin. Look at the date on it."
He did not answer.
"Look at the date on the bulletin," she said again. "April of last year. Before the state finished its investigation. Before they turned my permits back on. The state reinstated my access on September twenty-fifth. You can call them. I have the investigator's cell phone number. I have it right here, on his card, in this folder, the state investigator who did the case, and he will tell you, and he will tell you that bulletin should have been pulled two weeks ago. And you can scan that barcode on the back of that van with your phone or with the reader in your car, and it will show you that permit was issued today, at five forty-seven, to Alton Cole, for that VIN, by me." She heard her voice go up and brought it down. "Mr. Cole paid for that van. He paid for it three hundred dollars at a time. Every Friday since February. I have every receipt. I have the bank statement for the account where I held his money. I can show you every dollar."
"Ma'am, I've already requested a wrecker."