“In fact,” Carver continued, pulling at the sharp crease in his uniform trousers, “they went on to say that you two were both abusive and belligerent. That at one point you—”

“Now hold on a minute,” said Annie. “It was one of your men who grabbed me by the elbow and pulled his baton. Not us.”

“Because he was provoked.”

“Provoked, bollocks,” said Annie. “He did it because he’s a bully.”

“The officer said you were reaching into your bag. He thought you could have been reaching for a knife or even a gun. It’s a dodgy area. Drugs and stuff. They have to be careful. Every night they go out on patrol they could face some serious threat to life and limb. That’s why they might seem a bit more aggressive than some.”

“And I thought it was just in their nature,” said Annie. Gerry shifted uncomfortably in the chair beside hers.

“Again, I’d like to know why you didn’t simply identify yourselves as police officers from the start,” said Banks. “That would no doubt have prevented all these problems from arising, including the parking.”

“I didn’t see why we should have had to,” protested Annie. “We weren’t asking for special treatment. As far as I was concerned, we had broken no laws. We were simply two women parking a car—legally, as far as we were concerned—and walking down the street minding our own business when those two brutes came over and started hassling us for no good reason. The fact that we didn’t introduce ourselves as fellow officers only means they thought we were members of the public. And members of the public deserve to be better treated than we were. I’m sorry if you don’t like to hear it, but those two officers set out to bully and humiliate us from the start. Anything we did, whether you call it ‘intimidation’ or whatever, was by way of defending ourselves.”

“Including insinuating that one of my men was ‘bent’?” asked Carver.

“I said he reminded me of a bent sheriff in a bad Western. He did. I don’t think that constitutes calling him bent.”

“Semantics,” said Banks, again suppressing the laughter. “Let’s put the incident with the officers aside for the moment. As if that wasn’t bad enough, I understand the two of you then went on to inflame the local Asian community.”