They pulled into the precinct's underground garage, the cruiser's tires squealing slightly on the smooth concrete, the sound echoing off the low ceiling. The garage was lit by harsh fluorescent tubes, and the air smelled of exhaust and damp concrete. O'Grady parked, killed the engine, and got out, slamming his door with the same casual force he had used on the highway. Doyle got out on the other side, stretching his back, already moving toward the elevators as if the arrest were finished business.
Cynthia was hauled out of the car, her shoulders aching from the unnatural angle of the tight handcuffs, her legs stiff from sitting in the cold and the wet. O'Grady's hand was on her elbow again, guiding her, or rather propelling her, toward the double doors that led into the precinct. She walked steadily, head up, blazer damp and wrinkled, shoes clicking on the concrete, and she did not look down. She had been in precincts all over the country, in every condition imaginable, and she knew how to walk into one without letting it diminish her. The doors swung open, and the noise and light of the 42nd District hit her all at once, a chaotic fluorescent-lit bullpen where phones rang off the hook and uniforms shouted 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, his hand pressing into her back. “Got a live one, Sergeant?” he called out to the desk officer, his voice loud and performative now that he had an audience. “Possession with intent. Two ounces of rock.”
The desk sergeant, an older man with tired eyes, glanced at Cynthia over the counter. He did not look surprised. He did not look curious. He looked like a man who had processed a hundred people that week and would process a hundred more before the week was over.
“Name?” he asked.
“Cynthia Holloway,” she said calmly, her voice clear despite the rain still dripping from her hair.
“Empty your pockets,” the sergeant said, and Cynthia went through the motions as O'Grady uncuffed her just long enough to process her, the cuffs coming off with a click that left red marks around her wrists. They took her civilian identification, her keys, her belt, and her shoelaces, placing each item in a plastic bin with the practiced efficiency of people who had done this many times before. They did not find the small encrypted bureau-issued panic fob woven into the lining of her blazer, because they did not search the lining, and they did not realize who she was, because the name Cynthia Holloway was common enough on its own, and the booking system at the local precinct would not flag her high-level federal aliases unless a specific federal database was queried, which no one here had any reason to query.