By eleven-forty, she was traveling north through Bramwell County. Traffic had thinned after a line of trucks passed, and the road ahead was clear for a considerable distance. Then two red lights and two blue lights appeared in her mirror. Audrey signaled, slowed, and pulled onto the shoulder near mile marker seventy-four, leaving as much room as she could between her door and the interstate traffic.
She put both hands on the steering wheel and waited. The cruiser stopped behind her at a slight angle, and a bald deputy in a pressed uniform walked up with one hand resting near his belt. His badge read Kincaid. He looked through the window at the leather seats and then at her face.
"License and registration," he said. "You were following too close."
"Following whom, Deputy?" Audrey asked. "There's no car in front of me, and I haven't been near one for half a mile."
"There was one," he said. "Now there isn't. Stay in the car."
She supplied her license and registration without argument, noting the time on the dashboard clock. The deputy did not explain the alleged distance, the vehicle involved, or how he had made his observation. Audrey waited until he had the papers in hand before asking, "May I have your name and badge number for my notes?"
"Kincaid. It's on my shirt. You can read, can't you?"
"I can," she said. "I prefer to hear it said out loud."
He stared at her for a beat. Behind him, the second deputy climbed from patrol car seven. This man was broader and wore a gold shield on his chest, and he moved toward the sedan as though his colleague had already explained something to him that Audrey had not been allowed to hear. His name tag read Lyman.
"Out of the car," Derek Lyman said. "Hands where I can see them."
"Is there a problem with my documents?" Audrey asked. "I have complied with the request so far."
"The problem is whatever I say it is. Let's go."
The shoulder was hot enough for waves of heat to lift from the gravel. Audrey stepped out slowly, her hands visible, and asked whether she was being cited or detained. Instead of answering, Lyman walked around the sedan and asked who owned such a nice car. She told him the registration in Kincaid's hand answered that question. Lyman asked whether she had paid for it herself, an inquiry he made sound less like a financial question than an accusation about where a Black woman belonged.
"I make the payments every month," she said. "On time."
"Depends who's paying," he muttered, then asked where she was going.
"Greater Hope Church in Port Ellis. My mother's congregation."
Lyman laughed and glanced toward Kincaid. "They all have somewhere respectable to be. Grandma's house, church, a job interview. You hear that one, Bobby?"