“Then check.”
Silence.
“Dispatch can verify the registered owner in less time than you’ve spent wrenching a seventy-four-year-old man’s arms behind him.”
Nolan’s expression changed.
Not because he suddenly understood.
Because somebody had begun speaking his procedural language.
He hated that.
“Are you an attorney?”
Daniel held his eyes.
“Yes.”
Nolan looked away first.
The second patrol car arrived ninety seconds later.
Officer Karen Wells stepped out.
She saw George on the ground.
Martha beside him.
Daniel several feet away.
Nolan holding the handcuffs.
“What happened?”
Nolan answered immediately.
“Possible burglary suspect. Became resistant. Wife interfered. Male subject approached aggressively.”
Daniel almost laughed.
Instead he said:
“Your camera is recording that statement, correct?”
Nolan shot him a look.
Wells looked toward George.
“How old is he?”
“Seventy-four,” Martha said.
“My arm…”
George’s voice had become weak.
Wells crouched.
“Sir, where does it hurt?”
“Right wrist. Shoulder.”
She looked at Nolan.
“Why is he still cuffed?”
“He's detained.”
“For what?”
Nolan’s irritation returned.
“I just told you.”
Wells glanced at the house.
“Does he live here?”
“Claims he does.”
Martha stood.
“I have property tax records inside. His wallet. Our marriage certificate if you’d like our entire life history.”
Wells looked uncomfortable.
Then keyed her radio.
“Dispatch, verify registered occupants for 214 Ashford Lane.”
Nolan frowned.
“That’s not necessary.”
Daniel looked at him.
“It wasn't?”
Nobody answered.
Dispatch returned moments later.
“Property registered to George A. Harris and Martha L. Harris.”
Wells looked at Nolan.
Then at George.
Then at the cuffs.
“Take them off.”
Nolan hesitated.
That hesitation would appear later in the investigation.
“Blake.”
Wells’s voice hardened.
“Take them off.”
The moment the cuff came away from George’s right wrist, he pulled the arm against his chest.
Martha knelt beside him.
“Can you move your fingers?”
George tried.
His face tightened.
“Some.”
Daniel crouched.
“Dad, don’t move it.”
George looked at his son.
“You came fast.”
Daniel almost laughed from disbelief.
“Yeah.”
“Mailbox still broken.”
Martha stared at him.
“George.”
“What?”
Even hurt, he could not help himself.
The ambulance arrived seven minutes later.
X-rays at St. Matthew’s Hospital showed a small fracture near George’s wrist, severe bruising, and a shoulder sprain aggravated by an old rotator-cuff injury.
No surgery.
That was the good news.
The bad news was that at seventy-four, “no surgery” did not mean “nothing happened.”
George slept in a recliner for nearly three weeks because lying flat hurt too much.
Martha had to button his shirts.
He could not drive for a month.
His right hand trembled when he tried holding a coffee cup for the first several days.
And every time a car door slammed outside, Martha looked toward the window.
Daniel did something his father did not expect.
He refused to represent him personally.
George frowned from the hospital bed.
“You’re a lawyer.”
“I am also your son.”
“So?”
“So I’m currently angry enough to make bad decisions.”
Martha nodded.
“Finally, somebody in this family knows himself.”
George looked betrayed.
Daniel smiled for the first time that day.
“I'll help preserve evidence. Then another attorney handles the case.”
“Why?”
“Because this should be about what happened.”
Daniel looked at his father’s wrapped wrist.
“Not about me getting revenge.”
George studied him.
Then nodded.
“Good.”