Warren looked toward his gate.
Boarding had started.
He could see passengers gathering.
He had a choice.
Refuse.
Create another argument.
Possibly miss the flight anyway.
Or comply.
He raised his arms.
Not because he believed the search justified.
Because being legally right did not make him physically invulnerable.
Brennan patted his sides harder than necessary.
Waist.
Back.
Pockets.
Thighs.
Then his hand stopped against Warren’s inner jacket pocket.
“What’s this?”
Warren knew immediately.
Credential case.
“My identification.”
Brennan stepped around.
“You had another ID?”
“Yes.”
“You hid it?”
“No.”
“You didn’t show it.”
“You did not ask whether I had a second credential.”
The officer’s face hardened.
“Take it out.”
Warren looked at him.
Slowly.
The word mattered.
He knew it.
“Take it out slowly.”
Warren lowered his right hand.
Two fingers moved toward the inside pocket.
No sudden movement.
No resistance.
No reach toward the waistband.
Nothing remotely resembling a weapon draw.
Then Brennan shouted.
“Gun!”
Everything happened too fast for thought.
There was no gun.
Warren knew that.
Holloway knew it.
Perhaps even Brennan knew it a fraction of a second after the word left his mouth.
But the word had already changed the physical world.
Brennan seized the back of Warren’s sweater and neck.
Warren’s body jerked backward.
Then sideways.
A hand slapped his reaching arm away.
The credential case fell.
He tried to say something.
“Officer—”
A hard shove drove him toward the pillar.
His shoulder struck first.
The impact shocked him.
Then Brennan hooked one boot behind Warren’s leg and kicked sharply into the back of his knee.
His leg collapsed.
Warren turned instinctively to keep from falling.
Brennan interpreted the movement as resistance.
Or said he did.
The officer drove him down.
Tile rushed upward.
Warren’s hands could not protect his face because one arm was twisted behind him.
His cheek struck the floor.
Hard.
White pain exploded across his jaw.
His lower lip split against a tooth.
Someone screamed.
Then weight pressed across his upper back.
A knee between his shoulder blades.
His right arm pulled higher.
Too high.
Pain shot into the shoulder.
“Stop resisting!”
“I’m not—”
“Stop!”
“I am not resisting.”
Metal closed around one wrist.
Then the other.
Click.
Click.
Warren lay face-first on the airport floor.
For three seconds he could not process what had happened.
Not emotionally.
Physically.
The cold tile against his cheek.
The taste of blood.
The pressure on his back.
His heart pounding violently.
The sound of strangers shouting.