Home Invasion - J. A. Johnstone [80]
“It won’t make me sad to leave, either.” For the first time, Alex sensed a slight chink in the man’s armor. “I haven’t enjoyed cracking down on my fellow citizens like this. But I signed on to faithfully carry out the orders of the President, and I have done so. There are no longer any illegal firearms to be found in Home, or in the surrounding area.”
Technically, that was true, Alex supposed. Any firearms still here hadn’t been found.
Not that there were very many of them. She didn’t know for sure, of course, but she guessed there probably weren’t much more than a dozen guns left in town, including the ones she and her full-time officers had been allowed to retain. The reserve officers had had to turn their guns in like everybody else. There might be a few more in the area outside the city limits within that ten-mile cordon, but not many. The FPS had been remarkably thorough with their searches, sweeping through the area like locusts.
“What happens now?” Alex asked.
Grady smiled thinly. “We’ll be setting up permanent checkpoints on the main roads leading in and out of town. Anyone attempting to bring in a gun or guns will be subject to immediate arrest.”
“What’s happened to the people you’ve already arrested?”
“That’s none of your concern. They’re being held in a secure location.”
“What about their rights?”
“Under martial law, they have none.”
“But Home isn’t staying under martial law, right? Isn’t that what you meant when you said the FPS was leaving?”
“That’s true. But those suspects were arrested under martial law, so they will remain under our jurisdiction.”
One more twisting and perverting of the Constitution, Alex thought. After everything they had done so far, what did one more outrage really amount to?
“Did you call me in here just to tell me this, Colonel?”
“I thought you’d want to know.”
“Oh, I do, don’t get me wrong. I just wish it had never come to this.”
Grady leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers. “You know, Chief Bonner, you’re a very intelligent woman. To protect your people, you’ve kept this situation from escalating until someone got hurt. If you’re ever interested in moving up in law enforcement, say on a federal level …”
Alex stared at him in amazement. “You’re offering me a job? Working for this … this modern-day Gestapo?”
Grady’s features hardened. “It was just a thought,” he said. “Obviously, not a good one. Forget I said anything.”
“I’ll try, you can count on that.”
The colonel stood up. “All right, I believe we’re done here. Best of luck to you, Chief.” He gave her a curt nod but didn’t offer to shake hands. That was fine with Alex.
She left the giant mobile command post and found Delgado leaning against the fender of his police car that was parked next to hers.
“I heard that the colonel sent for you,” he said. “What’s going on?”
Alex told him. Delgado looked surprised, too.
“I figured we’d be stuck with them from now on,” he said when Alex finished explaining the situation.
“So did I. But I suppose they have other things to do. Other constitutional rights to violate somewhere else.”
“It wouldn’t surprise me a bit.”
Alex debated briefly with herself whether to tell him the rest of it, but it was so outrageous she had to share it. “You know, J. P., he offered me a job.”
Delgado’s eyebrows went up. “The colonel?”
“Yeah. He said that I’d done a good job of controlling the situation so that my people didn’t get hurt.”
“Like the Vichy government in France during World War II.”
Alex grimaced. “You had to be a history major. I feel a little dirty, though, like I have been collaborating with the Nazis.”
“It’s a funny thing,” Delgado mused. “The liberals have always accused anyone who didn’t agree with them of being fascists. They’d even play the Nazi card from time to time. And yet, less than fifteen years after they took over everything in Washington, they’re the ones who come marching in dressed like storm troopers and occupy an American town. They wiretap ten times more than conservative administrations ever