He straightened his suit jacket, completely ignoring the fact that Briggs was hovering inches away, his hand gripping the butt of his sidearm. "Turn around and face the vehicle." Briggs ordered, pulling a pair of heavy steel handcuffs from his belt. "I am not under arrest, Sheriff." Aaron stated firmly, not moving an inch.
"And I will not be cuffed. You asked me to step out. I have complied. If you wish to search my vehicle based on your fabricated olfactory evidence, proceed. But know that you will be held accountable for every action you take from this second forward."
Briggs hesitated for a fraction of a second. There was something deeply unnerving about this man. A normal person, especially a minority, stopped by a notorious sheriff on a deserted road, would be panicking. They would be pleading, angry, or terrified. Aaron Fletcher was none of these things.
He was observing Briggs the way a scientist observes a volatile chemical reaction in a controlled laboratory. "Watch him, Kyle." Briggs barked, stepping away from Aaron and moving toward the rear of the SUV. "If he twitches, tase him." Harrison swallowed hard, raising his taser, though his hands were shaking.
"Yes, sir." Briggs walked to the back of the Suburban. He reached for the handle of the rear tailgate. He expected to find duffel bags full of cartel cash. He expected to find illicit narcotics.
He expected to find the justification he needed to seize the hundred thousand dollar vehicle and ruin the life of the man in the suit. "Last chance, Aaron." Briggs called out over his shoulder, a cruel smile playing on his lips. "Anything in here I should know about?" "Oh, there is quite a lot in there you should know about, Sheriff."
Aaron replied, his voice echoing slightly over the quiet hum of the highway. But, I think it is best you see it for yourself. Briggs yanked the handle. The heavy hydraulic liftgate hissed as it swung upward, revealing the cavernous rear compartment of the customized SUV. The blinding Georgia sunlight flooded the interior.
And for a moment, Sheriff Thomas Briggs's brain simply stopped processing information. There were no duffel bags. There were no drugs. Instead, the back of the vehicle had been completely gutted and retrofitted. It was a state-of-the-art mobile command center.
Four massive high-definition monitors lined the reinforced walls. And on those monitors was a live multi-angle video feed of the traffic stop. There was a camera on the dashboard, a camera hidden in the driver's side mirror, and one on the rear bumper. Audio waveforms danced on a laptop screen, indicating that every single word Briggs had just spoken, every lie, every threat, every fabricated claim of smelling marijuana, had been recorded in crystal-clear, high-fidelity audio. But, the screens weren't what made the blood freeze in Briggs's veins.