"Sir, she wouldn't show ID," Gentry pleaded, desperate to cling to standard operating procedure, hoping the bureaucratic shield would save him.
Nadine stepped out from behind Agent Collins, her dark eyes flashing with a dangerous intelligence. "I told you my ID was inside the house, Officer Gentry. The house you were trying to prevent me from entering. The house I own."
Whitmore turned his gaze to Nadine, his expression softening instantly. "Nadine, are you hurt?"
"I am fine, Charles," she said smoothly, though the adrenaline was still coursing through her veins. "But I believe we are going to have to add a new addendum to our contract. It appears the rot in the local precincts is far deeper than the initial data suggested."
Gentry looked between the two of them, a fresh wave of nausea washing over him. Contract?
This was the twist that Officer Travis Gentry could never have seen coming. Nadine Brooks was not just a successful tech CEO. Her company, Brooks Holdings, had just secured a massive, highly classified contract with the governor's office to overhaul the state's law enforcement cybersecurity infrastructure. For the past six months, Nadine's team had been quietly auditing the data of local police departments, tracking everything from misappropriated funds to racially biased stop-and-frisk patterns. They had been looking at digital communications, dispatch logs, and body camera metadata. And Gentry's precinct, the prestigious 44th District of Windsor Hills, was the worst offender in the entire state.
"Officer," Nadine said, her voice dripping with absolute authority, "do you know what the governor and I were reviewing on my monitors right before you decided to assault me?"
Gentry swallowed hard, shaking his head. He looked like a cornered animal.
"We were looking at you," Nadine said softly. The words hit Gentry like a physical blow. "Not you specifically, though your name is all over the reports. We were looking at the 44th District. We were tracking the GPS metadata of your cruisers. We were analyzing the staggering discrepancy in your traffic stops and detainments."
She took a step closer, leaving the safety of Agent Collins's shadow. She wanted Gentry to look her in the eye.
"We were looking at how your precinct creates a hostile environment for minorities in affluent neighborhoods, using vague complaints from HOA board members like Arthur Penhaligon to justify civil rights violations. You didn't just assault a citizen today, Officer Gentry. You assaulted the very woman who was hired to audit your department's corruption."