Byron answered with the same careful restraint he had used from the beginning. "That is my personal money. It's connected to a purchase I arranged in Washington. My phone contains the seller's message, and the withdrawal record is with the envelope."
"Everyone's got a story for cash," Hollister said. "Maybe you ought to carry a better one."
"You can examine the documentation before making a decision."
Hollister ignored the offer. "Gallagher, bag it. Evidence of suspicious financial activity."
Gallagher did not move immediately. The teller slip remained visible. He looked from it to Byron and then to the sergeant. "We haven't established what offense it would be evidence of," he said quietly.
Hollister's expression hardened. "What was that?"
"I'm asking what we should put on the property form," Gallagher replied, retreating toward the safest version of his objection.
"Write what I just said. I'll handle the rest."
A semi passed, sending a gust of hot air across the shoulder. Byron stepped back from its wake and looked steadily at Gallagher. He did not ask the younger deputy to disobey, and he did not deliver a speech. He merely said, "Please make certain the documentation reflects that I did not consent to the search."
Gallagher's pen paused. Hollister laughed and asked whether Byron planned to dictate their reports as well. Gallagher wrote something on the property form, but he angled the clipboard away before Byron could read it. The little movement would trouble him more than any shouted insult that afternoon.
A roadside camera in Hollister's cruiser continued recording. Gallagher's body camera caught most of the conversation, including the pauses, the claims that a government registration was probably fraudulent, and the remarks about Byron's race and supposed financial circumstances. The devices were so familiar to Hollister that he had stopped treating them as witnesses. He had worked too many shifts believing footage was useful only when it supported what a deputy had already decided to write.
Hollister took out his own phone and began a conversation with someone Byron could not identify. "Another one," the sergeant said with a laugh. "Two grand today. No, I'm serious. Easy as it gets." His voice carried over the traffic, casual enough to suggest he did not expect the remark ever to matter.
Byron felt anger, but it was not the kind that moved quickly through his face. He had spent years listening to witnesses explain how officials took advantage of the expectation that a frightened person would become emotional and thereby seem less credible. He knew his own composure did not make the encounter harmless. It gave him a way to preserve details, to remember words, and to avoid escalating a situation in which somebody else possessed the immediate power to hurt him.
Then Hollister pointed at the gravel. "Sit down."
Byron looked toward the Tahoe's passenger door. "I can sit inside the vehicle, or on the bumper if you need me to remain here."
"I didn't ask you for options. Sit."