There was a brief pause.
"The information provided is being checked against the appropriate records. I cannot give you a final determination until the required step has been completed."
Vanessa looked toward Daniel.
He remained still.
She turned back to the telephone.
"All right. What do you need from me?"
The representative gave her the next instruction.
Vanessa listened carefully, repeated the details, and wrote down a reference number on a sheet of paper.
When the call ended, she placed the receiver back in its cradle.
The room remained silent.
Ethan looked at her.
"What did they say?"
Vanessa stared at the reference number.
"They're checking the information."
"Did they say it was fake?" Renee asked.
"No."
"Did they say it was genuine?"
"They haven't completed the verification."
Daniel nodded once.
"Then we wait for the result."
Vanessa looked at him sharply.
"Don't start."
"I'm not starting anything."
"You look as though you've already decided what the answer will be."
"I have decided that the answer should come from the verification process."
Vanessa picked up the paper and folded it once.
"Suppose the result doesn't support your story?"
"Then we will have an answer."
"And if it does?"
"Then we will have an answer."
She stared at him.
"You really don't understand how this looks from my side."
Daniel paused.
"Then explain it to me."
Vanessa appeared surprised by the invitation.
She had expected him to argue, not to ask her to describe her reasoning.
She pulled a chair away from the table but did not sit.
"From my side, I have a man in my precinct whom I don't know. He presents a badge I cannot immediately recognize. He insists that I accept his explanation, and every time I question him, he tells me to make a phone call."
Daniel listened without interrupting.
Vanessa continued.
"I have a responsibility to protect this station. People impersonate officials. People use fake identification to gain access to places where they don't belong. If I accept every claim without question, I am not doing my job."
Daniel nodded.
"That is a reasonable concern."
Vanessa looked at him suspiciously.
"Then why have you spent the last hour arguing with me?"
"Because I agree that you should question the badge. I disagree with your refusal to verify it."
She folded her arms.
"You make that sound like a minor distinction."
"It is the distinction between investigating a claim and deciding the claim is false before you investigate it."
Vanessa looked toward the window.
For several seconds, she said nothing.
Daniel continued.
"You are right that you don't know me. You are right that people can lie about their identities. You are right that your job requires you to take suspicious situations seriously."
Vanessa turned back toward him.
"Then what exactly do you think I did wrong?"
Daniel met her eyes.
"You treated your suspicion as a conclusion."
The words settled over the room.
Vanessa looked toward Ethan and Renee, but neither officer spoke.
Daniel continued, his voice calm.
"You had a question about my badge. That was the moment to verify it. Instead, you treated my request for verification as proof that I was challenging you. You became more concerned with making me accept your judgment than with finding out whether your judgment was correct."
Vanessa's jaw tightened.
"You don't know what I was concerned about."
"You're right. I don't know everything you were thinking. I can only describe what happened."
"And what happened, according to you, is that I'm wrong."
"What happened is that the question remains unresolved because the check was delayed."
Vanessa looked down at the paper in her hand.
For the first time, she seemed unable to dismiss his explanation without confronting the sequence of events.
Ethan spoke quietly.
"Lieutenant, I think that's the point we've all been trying to make."
Vanessa looked at him.
"Not you again."
"I'm not trying to argue with you."
"Then stop joining his argument."
"I'm saying the verification is the right way to settle this."
Renee added, "Once we have the result, we can determine the next step based on the facts."
Vanessa looked from one officer to the other.
"Do either of you believe I should simply trust him?"
Ethan shook his head.
"No."
Renee answered at the same time.
"No, ma'am."
Vanessa looked briefly satisfied.
Then Ethan continued.
"I believe we should verify him."
Renee nodded.
"So do I."
Vanessa's expression hardened again, but the distinction had been made clearly enough that she could no longer pretend her officers were simply taking Daniel's word for everything.