Two of the agents stepped forward immediately. One knelt in the gravel, picked up my credential case with gloved hands, drew an evidence sleeve from his vest, and sealed the leather and brass inside without wiping away the dust. The second agent drew a universal cuff key from his pocket, stepped behind me, and slotted the pin into the double-lock mechanism of Miller’s cuffs.
The click of the release ratchets sounded abnormally loud in the quiet lot.
My wrists were deep, angry rings of purple and crushed white skin where the steel had pinched against the bone. I brought my arms slowly around to the front, rubbing the tingling nerve cluster at the base of my thumbs. I did not shake them out. I did not curse. I looked at the rubber floor mat of my open sedan, where Miller had thrown my travel binder.
"My fuel receipts and bridge structural vouchers are scattered across the vehicle deck, Director," I told Vance. "The deputy conducted a warrantless visual and physical search of an encrypted regional audit terminal inside the glove compartment."
Vance’s gaze shifted to the open sedan door, noting the dangling latch and the loose inspection logs fluttered by the hot breeze. "Did he access the hard drive?"
"He attempted to pry the casing latch before realizing it required a bi-factor key," I said. "The chain of custody on the bridge concrete core samples from the Altamaha River crossing is currently unsealed."
Miller took two steps backward, his boot heels striking the front tire of his own squad car. His hand fluttered near his sidearm, not drawing, but trembling with the instinctive panic of a man who has lived twenty years inside an absolute local kingdom and suddenly finds the walls made of cardboard.
"You boys are making a massive mistake," Miller said, though the brassy arrogance in his throat had cracked down the middle. "We got reports of an unauthorized vehicle scouting the county supply yards. I acted on probable cause."
"You acted on a call from County Commissioner Douglas," Vance said, opening the manila folder and holding up a single printed sheet bearing a timestamp from forty minutes prior. "A call made directly to your personal cellular device, warning you that an unannounced federal audit team was pulling structural logs on the Interstate 16 resurfacing project. The same resurfacing project your brother-in-law's haulage firm billed thirty-four thousand tons of sub-base gravel for last month."
Miller went completely pale. His sunglasses slid down the bridge of his sweaty nose, revealing wide, bloodshot eyes that flicked toward the young woman with the cell phone, then toward the unmarked Suburbans, and finally down at the empty gravel where my badge had been kicked.
"Step away from the patrol vehicle, Deputy," Vance said. "Federal agents are impounding your dash recorder, your mobile terminal, and your personal communications device under a preservation order issued by the Southern District of Georgia."
Miller didn't move. He stood pinned against the quarter panel of his squad car, the midday sun beating down on his synthetic uniform until the sweat soaked clean through his chest badge. The three shoppers across the lane remained frozen, their phone screens reflecting the silent, unyielding perimeter of the black trucks that had turned the Oakridge plaza into a closed federal arena.
I walked over to the open door of my sedan, reached down, and picked up the first inspection sheet from the rubber floor mat. It was a core-sample density report for the Route 9 overpass, dated two days ago, showing a thirty percent void ratio in the structural piers.
"Director," I said, looking back at Vance. "We need to pull the contractor's dispatch logs before the county depot closes at five."