"You have a problem with authority?" Hask asked. "No," Adrien replied. "I have a question about yours." Nolan looked toward the ceiling and then the floor, as though the room might offer a place to stand that did not require choosing a side. He had heard Hask use that same question during traffic stops just before things turned ugly.
The sheriff smiled. Nolan recognized the expression and felt his stomach tighten. "You could've made this easy," Hask told Adrien, and his hand crossed the table without warning. He grabbed Adrien's wrist, squeezing the watchband into his skin. The fork struck the plate, and sweet tea spilled across the legal brief in a dark, spreading stain.
Adrien's instincts told him to pull away. He did not. He looked down at Hask's fingers, then back at the man's face. "Take your hand off me," he said, each word separate and clear. The sheriff ordered him to stand without explaining why.
"I haven't been told what I've done," Adrien answered. Hask released his wrist only to seize the edge of the table and shove it hard toward him. Adrien raised his forearm before the table struck his ribs, but the impact drove air from his chest and made his plate slide into the wall. A glass rolled along the seat and fell against the floor with a dull crack.
Estelle took two steps toward the kitchen. She wanted to tell the sheriff to leave and knew he might respond by shutting down the diner for some invented violation. Then she thought of the old footage stored in her office, recordings of arguments, thefts, and customers who forgot their wallets. None had mattered the way this one might. She continued walking at an even pace so Hask would not notice her hurry.
In the cramped office closet, she pulled the monitor toward her and found the recording controls. Her niece had shown her how to mark an event and save a separate copy without interrupting the camera. Estelle selected the minutes before the sheriff entered, then the footage continuing now, and copied it onto an external drive she used for bookkeeping backups. She watched the confirmation appear on the small screen, labeled the file with the date and time, and returned to the dining room, leaving the camera recording.
Nolan stepped closer to the booth. "Sheriff, maybe we should step back," he said. "He hasn't threatened anyone." Hask turned his head just enough to silence him. "I said step back, Beck." Nolan obeyed, and the obedience made him feel smaller than the rebuke.
Hask pointed toward the door. "Outside. Hands on my vehicle. We're going to find out who you really are."
Adrien pushed his chair back slowly, careful not to make a movement that might be described as sudden. "I'll comply," he said. "I'm not resisting." As he turned, Hask grabbed his shoulder and jerked him backward into the booth, sending a sharp pain through his side.
"You don't give instructions here," Hask said. Adrien waited until he could breathe normally before answering. "I wasn't giving you instructions. I was telling you what I was doing." He looked directly at Nolan, not with an appeal for rescue but to establish that someone else had heard those words. Nolan met his gaze for a second and looked away.