Then Derek said, “I need your badge number, your supervisor’s name, and the process for obtaining body-camera footage and filing a formal complaint.”
McMillan’s face hardened again.
“You’ve got my name.”
“I want your badge number.”
“You’re making this bigger than it needs to be.”
Derek looked directly at him.
“No. You made it exactly as big as it is.”
“I stopped you for a traffic violation.”
“Which one?”
McMillan said nothing.
Derek continued.
“You commented on the kind of car I drive. You referenced my neighborhood. You called me ‘boy.’ You accused me of possessing narcotics. You threatened arrest. You dismissed federal identification before verifying it.”
“I never said anything about race.”
“You didn’t need to announce what was happening for me to recognize it.”
McMillan shook his head.
“You people always—”
He stopped.
Too late.
Derek’s expression changed.
McMillan knew it too.
The body camera had captured the unfinished sentence.
The officer’s radio suddenly crackled.
“Unit 108, status?”
McMillan pressed the microphone.
“Everything’s fine.”
Derek’s eyes remained on him.
Everything was not fine.
McMillan released the radio.
“Badge number,” Derek said.
This time McMillan gave it.
Derek repeated it back.
McMillan provided his supervisor’s name: Sergeant Leonard Price.
Precinct information.
Complaint number.
Then he turned and walked toward his cruiser.
No apology.
No explanation.
The traffic stop ended at approximately 9:34 p.m.
Fifteen minutes.
That was all.
Fifteen minutes was enough.
Derek remained parked for another six.
Not because he was afraid to drive.
Because his hands had started shaking after McMillan walked away.
Adrenaline had finally found room to surface.
He placed both hands flat on his thighs.
Breathed slowly.
In.
Out.
He had been inside armed search operations.
He had sat across tables from men suspected of ordering murders.
He had spent weeks undercover around traffickers who would have killed him if they discovered who he was.
Yet something about being accused of criminality during an ordinary drive home left him feeling exposed in a completely different way.
His phone showed five missed messages from Renee.
He called.
She answered immediately.
“Where are you?”
“Gas station.”
“What happened?”
Derek stared at the patrol car disappearing onto the highway.
“I got stopped.”
There was a pause.
“What kind of stopped?”
Renee knew him too well.
Derek told her.
Not everything.
Not yet.
Enough.
When he reached the part about “boy,” Renee stopped asking questions.
When he described the marijuana allegation, she became completely silent.
When he finished, she said one thing.
“Come home before you start writing anything.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re angry.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re furious.”
Derek looked down at his shaking hands.
“Yes.”
“Come home. Then we document it.”