"Understood," I replied.
I turned, placing my palms against the ribbed rubberized wall of the jet bridge. Steel ratcheted shut around my left wrist, followed immediately by my right. The cuffs were cold, tight enough to press the brushed-titanium bezel of my watch deep into the tendons of my lower arm.
Through the cabin door behind us, I heard the sound of passengers being held back, followed by the firm, rhythmic footsteps of Arthur Vance ignoring crew instructions and stepping onto the gangway.
"Officer," Arthur’s voice boomed down the corridor. "Note on your record that I am demanding to be listed as the primary reporting witness. And demand that she produce the junior attendant."
The station supervisor hurried out behind them, waving his clipboard. "Mr. Vance, please return to the cabin until deplaning begins. You're delaying the turn-around."
"I don't give a damn about your turn-around," Arthur snapped. "Where is the other girl? Where is Ashley?"
Inside the galley, Ashley Brown had not moved.
I turned my head slightly, catching sight of her through the open aircraft door. She was standing beside the forward lavatory, holding the electronic tablet Brittany had handed her earlier. Her face was ashen, her fingers dug into the rubberized bumper of the case so hard her knuckles were chalk-white. She had signed the secondary witness line. She had committed her employee number to a felony false report under Brittany's direct coercion, and now she was watching an innocent man stand in handcuffs against the corrugated wall of a jet bridge.
"Ashley," I said.
My voice wasn't loud, but in the echoing tunnel of the jet bridge, it carried clearly into the galley.
Trooper Walsh pulled my shoulder back. "Don't address the crew, sir."
"Ashley," I repeated calmly, looking past Walsh's shoulder directly into her eyes. "Federal Aviation Act, Title 49, Section 46308. Filing a fraudulent safety declaration with knowledge of its falsity carries up to five years in federal custody. But under Section 46311, an employee who reports administrative coercion to the Department of Transportation before the aircraft log is locked receives full statutory protection. You have about ten minutes before that captain signs off the arrival packet."
Brittany lunged forward from the galley, her face flushed crimson. "Shut up! You hear him, Officer? He's threatening my crew! He's intimidating a witness!"
"I am informing her of federal reporting statutes," I replied evenly.
Trooper Walsh frowned, looking between me, the furious lead attendant, and the trembling girl who was now backing away toward the cockpit door with tears welling in her eyes. Walsh was not a stupid man; he had worked airport transit long enough to know when a scenario didn't smell right. Handcuffing a belligerent drunk was messy, loud, and physical. Handcuffing a man who recited specific titles of the United States Code while maintaining a pulse under seventy was something entirely different.
"Supervisor," Walsh said, turning to the man with the yellow clipboard. "Where is the captain?"
"He's running shutdown checklists," the supervisor said, visibly sweating now. "Look, we just need to get this passenger down to the field office so we can clear the inbound passengers. We're already seven minutes behind schedule."
"Nobody moves down the ramp just yet," Walsh said. He looked down at my jacket. "You have ID on you?"
"Left inside pocket," I said. "Two wallets. One is personal. One contains federal credentials. Take them out yourself, please."
Brittany let out a short, mocking laugh. "Oh, please. Now he's a federal agent? He's a consultant in coach who tried to strong-arm an upgrade!"
Trooper Walsh reached into my breast pocket. His fingers slid past my boarding pass stub and extracted the two leather folios. He opened the personal billfold first: Massachusetts driver’s license, credit cards, standard corporate insurance.
Then he flipped open the second folio.
A heavy gold-and-silver shield caught the fluorescent light of the jet bridge. Beneath the eagle emblem, the laminated credential identified Anthony J. Davis, Senior Special Agent, Office of the Inspector General, United States Department of Transportation, Civil Rights Enforcement Division.