He opened the leather wallet and stared.
A gold shield occupied one side. On the other, beneath a clear protective window, were a federal identification card, Dominic's photograph, his name, and his position. The materials carried security features Maddox did not recognize but instinctively understood were difficult to reproduce. A slight change in angle brought a patterned holographic detail into view.
He blinked and turned the wallet over. He had expected cheap metal, bad printing, or the comic-book boldness of an impostor's credentials. What he held felt official in the way he had always wanted his own authority to feel.
Walsh leaned close. "That looks real."
"Looks are the point," Maddox replied.
But his voice had changed. He no longer sounded triumphant. He sounded as though an unexpected witness had walked into a room where he had been speaking too freely.
Dominic held still beside the car. "Call the published number. Ask for the Atlanta field office duty supervisor. Tell them you have detained Dominic Brooks. You will receive verification."
Maddox opened his mouth, then closed it. He was thinking about other things: Hargrove's envelopes, a ledger with his initials, rumors of federal investigators asking questions near the courthouse. He had dismissed the rumors as political theater. Now a federal badge had appeared in the hands of someone he had just threatened to shoot.
Nyla watched his expression. "My own identification is in my purse. Please don't search it without documenting what you're doing. You can ask me to identify it."
Maddox ignored the warning. He reached into the SUV, took her purse from the passenger seat, and searched its inner pocket. Her government identification was inside a slim case with her name and Department of Justice affiliation.
Ellis saw it and took one involuntary step back.
"Rhett," Walsh said, "we need the chief."
Maddox glanced toward the church, then at the two cruisers recording everything. If he released them now, he would have to explain why he had detained them in the first place. If he continued, perhaps he could make the paperwork support his story. It was the calculation that had saved him so many times in Willow Grove, where records could be adjusted and witnesses intimidated.
"They're counterfeit," he said. "Expensive counterfeits. High-level criminal operation. We take them to the station and get prints."
"Sir, that seems unnecessary," Ellis said, surprising himself.
Maddox swung toward him. "You want to explain to the chief why you let armed suspects walk?"
The rookie fell quiet.
Dominic felt the cuffs press against his wrists. He had survived dangerous assignments in which he was less certain what an armed person would do next. This situation unsettled him for a different reason. The evidence needed to stop it was sitting in an officer's hand. The officer was choosing not to use it.