Webb nodded. "Don't discuss the merits beyond your statement. You're involved in the incident. Someone independent will take the investigative lead."
"Understood."
Webb asked Toby to step back with a medical officer while he contacted the local command team. He did not give Toby a speech about what the officer deserved or congratulate him for restraint. Toby was grateful for that. The attention he wanted was not admiration but a correct, complete record.
Kirby watched Webb approach and tried to recover something resembling his usual posture. He lowered his hands only after the nearest agent indicated he could, then straightened the front of his uniform as if wrinkles had become the day's most pressing problem. When Webb stopped in front of him, Kirby forced himself to meet his eyes.
"Officer Nicholas Kirby?" Webb asked.
"Yes. Who are you?"
"Marcus Webb. Special Agent in Charge, federal protective detail assigned to an active presidential movement in this city."
Kirby opened his mouth, then closed it. He had heard people claim federal authority before, and until that moment he had made a habit of treating such claims as performances designed to fool him. He could not make that explanation fit the response surrounding them. The badges had been verified by people outside his department, the vehicle had triggered an emergency notification, and a man with a federal command team was now asking him questions that would not disappear when he stopped talking.
"I need to establish a few basic facts," Webb said. "Did you run the license plate on the Suburban?"
"Yes. It came back strange."
"Did it return a federal exemption indicator?"
Kirby hesitated. "It returned something like that."
"Did dispatch offer an interagency verification inquiry?"
"I was conducting an active investigation."
"That's not the question, Officer."
The tone did not change. Kirby felt, with a creeping sense of dread, that this man was not interested in winning an argument. Webb was interested in placing statements beside records and seeing which ones survived. The quietness of the process gave Kirby nowhere to hide his irritation.
"They offered to check it," he admitted.
"And you declined?"
"I had reason to believe it was fake."
"What was that reason?"
Kirby looked toward the SUV, the damaged tow truck, and the small crowd behind the safety boundary. He had expected to explain that the vehicle was large, dark, expensive, and out of place. Now those words sounded thin even inside his own head. He settled on the only answer that preserved the idea that he had meant well.
"My training and experience," he said.
Webb studied him for a moment. "Training and experience can tell you when to check something. They cannot turn a federal database return into a forgery merely because you dislike it."
"I didn't know he was with you."
"You were offered a way to find out. More than once."
Kirby's jaw worked. He wanted to argue that the driver's attitude had been suspicious, but he could hear how the answer would sound after the facts already established. Toby had been calm, had given instructions for independent verification, and had submitted to being searched and handcuffed. The behavior Kirby had described as defiance had become, in other people's records, a series of efforts to avoid escalation.