Medio came out of the store with his manager and a small stack of printed sheets. The manager said the forklift belonged to the pickup center and Mercer had taken it after telling a warehouse worker there was an urgent police seizure. Matio held up a parking lot camera still. It showed Crownland's dispatcher speaking with Ellis near the loading bay that morning, nearly an hour before Naomi arrived. Mercer reached for the sheet.
Price stepped between them. A second police cruiser entered the lot. Ellis straightened relieved until the woman who got out introduced herself as Lieutenant Harris from the department's professional standards unit. Price had called her while walking across the parking lot. Harris had been investigating complaints about Crownland for 6 weeks.
She had struggled to find anyone willing to describe an actual seizure from start to finish. Now there were shoppers videos, the store's cameras, a tow dispatch, two officers, and a forklift sitting beneath a damaged Lamborghini. She separated Ellis and Mercer for interviews and asked for their body cameras. "Mine malfunctioned," Mercer said immediately. "Before or after you got on the forklift," asked Harris.
Mdio spoke up again. Two weeks earlier, he said Mercer had asked him to text whenever a high-v valueue car parked near the entrance. Maido had refused. Yesterday, someone else at the center had been asked the same thing. His manager checked the staff schedule.
One employee was missing from the floor apart time loader named Devon Shaw. Harris found Devon sitting in his car behind the building. He looked terrified. Crownland had paid him to report valuable vehicles. He admitted when he saw Naomi's Lamborghini that morning, he sent the plate and parking space to a Crownland number.
He had no idea whose car it was. He thought the company would claim it was illegally parked and tow it. Why today? Naomi asked. Devon shook his head.
I don't know. They called twice asking if you'd come back out. Ellis had spent the next hour pretending a stolen car report existed. Mercer had tried to get the vehicle into Crownland's truck. The arrest had kept Naomi away while they worked, but one piece still bothered her.
Crownland could have targeted any expensive car. Her name appeared on the registration Ellis had held. If he had read it, he knew exactly whom he was arresting. Price received a call and walked a few steps away to answer. When he returned, his expression had changed.
Crownland's records were due to be discussed in court that afternoon. An attorney for one of the drivers had received an anonymous message that morning warning him the hearing might not happen. Naomi understood then someone believed that if she were arrested and the Lamborghini disappeared, she would be pulled into the case as a witness and unable to preside over it. Crownland would gain time to deal with its records. They had dressed their plan as another routine seizure.
Mercer had laughed because he thought she was simply an owner he could humiliate. Ellis, who had checked her name, had reason to know better. Naomi told Price and Harris about the hearing, then called the court clerk herself. Another judge would need to take the matter. Harris asked whether Naomi was all right.