Oh, I will, Cynthia thought as he shoved her into the back of the cruiser. I'm going to remain silent until you've dug a hole so deep you can never climb out.
The ride to the 42nd District Precinct was suffocating. The plastic partition separating the back seat from the front was scratched and yellowed. Up front, O'Grady had been joined by his partner, Officer Kevin Doyle, who had arrived on the scene in a secondary unit just to tow Cynthia's rental.
"Good catch, Tommy," Doyle grunted from the passenger seat, not bothering to look back at Cynthia. "Captain Miller's been riding us all month about narcotics numbers. This ought to get him off our backs."
"Easy money, Kev," O'Grady said, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel to the rhythm of the windshield wipers. "She practically handed it to me. Pulled her over for a swerve, saw the baggy sitting right in plain sight on the passenger seat. Didn't even try to hide it."
In the back, Cynthia committed every word to memory. First lie: he claimed it was under the driver's seat on the highway; now it was on the passenger seat in plain sight.
"She give you any trouble?" Doyle asked.
"A little lip," O'Grady scoffed. "Tried to pull the 'do you know who I am' routine. Just another mule in a rented suit. Miller is going to put me up for that detective shield after this one. I can feel it."
They pulled into the precinct's underground garage. Cynthia was hauled out of the car, her shoulders aching from the unnatural angle of the tight handcuffs. She was marched through the double doors into the chaotic, fluorescent-lit bullpen of the 42nd District. Phones were ringing off the hook, uniforms were shouting over the din, and the smell of floor wax mixed with despair hung heavy in the air.
O'Grady shoved her toward the booking desk. "Got a live one, Sergeant," he told the desk officer. "Possession with intent. Two ounces of rock."
The desk sergeant, an older man with tired eyes, glanced at Cynthia. "Name?"
"Cynthia Holloway," she said calmly.
"Empty your pockets."
Cynthia had already been searched, but she went through the motions as O'Grady uncuffed her just long enough to process her. They took her civilian ID, her keys, her belt, and her shoelaces. They did not find the small, encrypted Bureau-issued panic fob woven into the lining of her blazer, nor did they realize who she was. The name Cynthia Holloway was common enough, and the booking system at the local precinct wouldn't flag her high-level federal aliases unless a specific federal database was queried.
O'Grady stood by the desk filling out his initial arrest report on a clipboard. Cynthia watched his pen move. She knew he was documenting his fabricated probable cause, falsifying the chain of evidence, and cementing his perjury.
A tall man with silver hair and captain's bars on his collar emerged from a glass-walled office: Captain Richard Miller.
"O'Grady," Miller called out, looking at the plastic evidence bag sitting on the booking counter. "Is this the collar from I-55?"
"Yes, sir, Captain," O'Grady said, standing a little straighter. "Spotted her weaving, conducted a routine stop. Subject was visibly nervous, sweating, refused eye contact. I spotted the narcotics in plain view on the passenger seat. Seized the evidence, made the arrest without incident."
"Good work," Captain Miller said, not even looking at Cynthia. "Type it up tight. The DA is throwing out half our drug cases because you guys get sloppy with the paperwork. I want no holes in this one."