The handcuffs were too tight.
Maya Brooks had noticed that before she noticed the laughter.
The steel bit into the skin beneath the sleeves of her mustard-yellow jacket each time she moved her wrists. She could have complained. She could have told the officer who cuffed her that his technique was careless and that the pressure against the base of her thumb would be documented the moment she reached a federal office.
She said nothing.
Instead, she sat upright in a hard plastic chair beside the booking desk of Chicago’s Twelfth District police station and watched Sergeant Danny Reyes make the worst decision of his career.
He stood ten feet away with Maya’s FBI credential wallet in one hand.
Three uniformed officers were gathered around him.
Reyes flipped the wallet open.
The gold shield caught the fluorescent light.
He laughed.
“Fake FBI.”
One of the younger officers grinned uncertainly.
Reyes raised the credentials higher.
“Can you believe this?”
Maya lifted her eyes.
She was thirty-four, tall and athletic, with deep-brown skin, a sharp oval face, almond-shaped brown eyes, sculpted cheekbones and an expression that had become very difficult to read after nine years of federal work. Her exceptionally long straight black hair disappeared beneath a patterned tan headscarf. A white cropped tank top showed beneath the open mustard-colored jacket. Loose blue jeans fell over nude heels.
Nothing about the outfit said government agent.
That had been intentional.
Reyes apparently believed government authority came with a dress code.
He turned the credential wallet toward another officer.
“Look at this.”
Maya spoke.
“You never verified my badge.”
The laughter faded slightly.
Reyes looked at her.
“What?”
“You never called the FBI field office.”
He smiled again.
“I don't need to.”
“Yes, you do.”
“You were trespassing in a restricted municipal garage.”
“No.”
“You ran when ordered to stop.”
“I moved away from an unidentified armed man approaching me from behind.”
“That unidentified man was me.”
“You weren't in uniform.”
Reyes shrugged.
“Still a cop.”
Maya looked at the body camera mounted on his chest.
Its indicator was off.
That mattered.
She stored the detail away.
Reyes walked closer.
He leaned over her.
“Here's what I think.”
Maya waited.
“I think you bought this thing online.”
He shook the credential wallet.
“I think you've been watching too many movies.”
Maya glanced toward the officers behind him.
One looked amused.
One looked uncomfortable.
The third, Officer Priya Malik, was not looking at Maya.
She was looking at the badge.
Priya was twenty-nine, South Asian American, with black hair pulled into a practical ponytail and the still-alert posture of someone who had not spent enough years in the job to stop paying attention.
She stepped closer.
“Sergeant.”
Reyes ignored her.
Maya said:
“Call the number printed inside the credential cover.”
Reyes laughed.
“You mean the number your boyfriend answers?”
Maya's expression did not change.
Priya stepped closer again.
“Sergeant.”
“What?”
She pointed toward the credential.
“Can I see that?”
Reyes looked annoyed.
“Why?”
“I've seen federal credentials before.”
“So have I.”
Priya's eyes remained on the wallet.
“Then you should check the holographic seal.”