His eyebrows moved.
He typed again.
Harlan leaned on the counter.
“What?”
The sergeant stared at the monitor.
Then at Sloane.
Then back at the screen.
“What?”
Harlan repeated.
The sergeant’s voice changed.
“Date of birth?”
Sloane gave it.
He entered it.
Another screen opened.
The sergeant went still.
Quinn looked up.
Harlan frowned.
“Something wrong?”
The phone rang.
The desk sergeant answered.
“Fairview Police, Sergeant Dorsey.”
He listened.
His face drained.
“Yes.”
Another pause.
“Yes, she’s here.”
Every sound in the booking area seemed to stop.
Harlan straightened.
The sergeant looked at Sloane.
Then toward a glass office at the rear.
“Hold, please.”
He covered the receiver.
“Commander.”
A middle-aged woman in a white command shirt stepped out of the office.
“What?”
Dorsey held out the phone.
“It’s the U.S. Attorney’s Office.”
Harlan’s posture changed.
Not dramatically.
Enough.
The commander took the call.
“This is Watch Commander Ellis.”
She listened.
Her eyes moved toward Sloane.
“Yes.”
Another pause.
“No, she has not been booked.”
Sloane’s jaw tightened.
Yet.
The commander continued listening.
Then said, “Understood.”
She hung up.
Silence.
Commander Ellis looked at Sloane.
“Ms. Mercer.”
Harlan glanced at her.
Not Miss.
Not ma’am.
Ms. Mercer.
Ellis walked around the desk.
“I understand you are Deputy Chief of the Criminal Division at the U.S. Attorney’s Office.”
Harlan’s face changed.
There it was.
The moment.
Sloane had imagined such moments in fiction.
The reveal.
The reversal.
The room realizing who somebody “really” was.
She felt none of the satisfaction those stories promised.
Instead, she felt worse.
Because the cuffs only became alarming to them after the title.
The facts had not changed.
The house had not changed.
The deed had not changed.
Her behavior had not changed.
Only their knowledge of her professional power.
Sloane held Ellis’s gaze.
“Yes.”
The commander looked toward Harlan.
Then Quinn.
Then back to Sloane.
“Remove the handcuffs.”
Harlan stepped forward.
Sloane shook her head.
“No.”
Everyone stopped.
Ellis frowned.
“You want them left on?”