The supervisor ended the interviews without making any dramatic announcement. He explained that the evidence would be reviewed through the appropriate process and that any further action would be determined by officials who weren't involved in the incident.
I accepted that.
I didn't ask for special treatment.
I didn't demand immediate charges.
And I didn't use my title to dictate what should happen to the teenager.
What I wanted was an accurate record.
Because I had a feeling the HOA president had spent a long time making sure other people's complaints never reached one.
My wife came home at eleven-thirty.
She was carrying groceries when she noticed the patrol vehicles had gone and the driveway camera was still pointed toward the Mustang. She stopped beside the blue car, studied the damage, and immediately set the grocery bags on the ground.
"What happened?"
I looked up from the garage workbench.
"We had visitors."
She stared at the dent.
"Who did that?"
"The HOA president's son."
Her face changed.
"Are you serious?"
I nodded.
She examined the scratch.
Then she looked toward me.
"Did you tell them who you are?"
"Eventually."
She sighed.
I knew that sigh.
It meant she was deciding which of several things to say first.
My wife worked as a middle-school science teacher, and she had the rare ability to remain patient with children while being completely unimpressed by adults who behaved badly. We'd been married eleven years, and she'd seen me deal with everything from difficult investigations to neighborhood complaints that should never have become police matters.
But she also knew what that car meant to me.
She touched the edge of the fender.
"Your dad would be heartbroken."
I swallowed.
"I know."
She turned toward me.
"You're going to get it repaired."
"Of course."
"Properly."
"Yes."
She looked toward the house.
"Has our daughter seen it?"
I shook my head.
"Not yet."
She sighed.
"She'll be upset."
I looked toward the Mustang.
Our daughter was ten years old, and she'd grown up hearing stories about her grandfather and his favorite car. She knew that he bought it before I was old enough to remember, that he'd spent years restoring it, and that the blue paint was the exact color he chose after visiting a classic-car show with me.