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  'Good. I want you and Mo to get over there right away. DAC Bridges has just been on the phone to the Essex chief constable and they're sending ARVs, surveillance units and a hostage negotiation team over there now. We've advised them that we want the area secure, but we don't want them making any kind of move until we've ascertained whether or not it's the right place. And we definitely don't want the local plod stamping all over the place and advertising their presence, so we've cleared it that you and Mo, as experienced SOCA surveillance operatives, will check the place out, then advise us what the situation is.'

  'I want to be part of the team going in,' Bolt told him.

  Big Barry laughed, but it was a sound entirely without humour. 'I admire your devotion to duty, old mate, but this is way out of our league. If anyone goes in, it'll be the SAS.'

  'Jesus,' said Mo, exchanging glances with Bolt. Mere mention of the SAS gave events an almost surreal quality.

  'Now put your foot down. I want you there in five.'

  'We're on our way,' said Bolt, feeling the familiar surge of adrenalin as he pulled out and overtook the car in front of him.

  Mo switched on the flashing blue light and shoved it on the dashboard, and a minute and a half later they'd hit the right-hand turning for the B1057.

  Bolt's phone bleeped to let him know he'd received a text, but he was too busy watching the road to check it. Mo took a look, and for a couple of seconds he didn't say anything.

  'Who is it?' Bolt asked without looking round.

  'It's Tina,' he answered. 'She's still alive.'

  Sixty-five

  Eamon Donald watched as the lorry drove down the driveway of Willow End Farm, knowing that in about an hour's time the revellers enjoying one of the last evenings of summer in London's world famous West End would be choking up their own insides. He felt a twinge of guilt but quickly forced it down. The Brits had never shown him or his family any compassion. Why should he care about them?

  A light drizzle began to fall, and for several minutes he stared into the rapidly descending darkness as the gas lorry rounded the corner and disappeared from view. Rain was bad for the gas, and he hoped it was dry in London, otherwise all their work might count for very little.

  Still, it was no longer his problem. The job was over for him now and he was looking forward to watching the carnage on TV in a quiet hotel room with a bottle of Jameson's.

  He shut the barn doors, turned round and saw Hook standing a few yards behind him. The expression on his face was cold. 'Where's the woman copper, Eamon?'

  'The other hostage? I don't know. Didn't you kill her?'

  'No, I didn't. But I did shoot her in the foot and left her handcuffed in a locked room, and now she doesn't seem to be there any more.'

  'Well, we were here all day, and she never came past us.'

  'You're sure about that? You didn't go and have a little dabble?'

  'No, I fucking didn't. I'm not like you, Michael. I just do my job. And I've done it now. I made the bomb live before they left, and it's fixed so it'll blow the second O'Toole leaves his seat. So, I want the rest of my money and then I'm out of here.' He took a drag on his cigarette, not liking the way this conversation was going.

  Hook's lips curled up at the edges in an unpleasant smile. 'You know, Eamon,' he said, 'you're good at what you do, but I don't respect you.'

  Donald frowned. 'What the hell do you mean?'

  'You're happy to kill people—'

  'And you're not? That's rich, Michael.'

  'You misunderstand me. The reason I don't respect you is not because you kill them, but because you kill them from afar. With the flick of a switch. Anyone can do that with a bit of technical know-how, but only someone with real backbone can do it face to face, looking into the other man's eyes.' He pulled a gun from somewhere behind his back and pointed it at Donald's chest.

  The bombmaker's eyes widened, and he took a step back, genuinely shocked by this sudden turn of events, even though a part of him had been expecting it. 'What the hell are you doing, Michael?' he asked uncertainly.

  'You know, Eamon, I think it was you who told me that each and every bombmaker has his own signature.'

  'I don't think I did—'

  'And there aren't many good ones around, are there? So I'm thinking that it's only a matter of time before the authorities come knocking at your door.'

  'Shit, Michael. You know me. I'm no tout. I've never informed on anyone in my life. I'd never tell the Brits a thing, and they're not going to find me anyway.'

  'You said yourself, Eamon, there'll be hundreds, possibly thousands, dead. The pressure for a result's going to be enormous. They'll find you, and when they do, they'll be looking for me.'

  There was a pause of several seconds and then, working hard to keep his nerves in check, Donald smiled grimly. 'I thought you might try something like this, Michael. So, I got myself a little insurance.' He raised his hand to reveal a mobile phone in the palm. 'If I press Send, this phone will transmit an electronic signal to the battery pack in the lorry, and it'll detonate the bomb immediately.' He stroked the button with his forefinger. 'Even if you put a bullet in me, it'll make no difference. My reflexes will set it off anyway, and your whole op will have fucked up.'

  Hook's expression darkened. 'You're bluffing.'

  Donald shook his head, relieved to see he'd caught the other man out. 'No, Michael, I'm not. Now, what I'm going to do is back out of this building, make my way to my car, and drive away. If nothing happens to me en route, I'll chuck this mobile and the bomb will go off as planned. But I'll be keeping my hand on this Send button the whole time, and if you try anything – anything at all – then, kaboom: the only casualties of this whole job are going to be a few sheep, and maybe an unlucky farmer.' He backed away slowly towards the barn doors, keeping his eyes fixed on the other man. 'You understand what I'm saying?'

  'All right, go,' said Hook, his eyes cold. 'No hard feelings, eh? It's just business.'

  'Sure,' said Donald, ignoring the hammering in his chest and the sweat running down his face. His free hand found the door handle and he squeezed it tightly, knowing he was only a few seconds away from safety, feeling confident enough to say, 'I still want the balance of my money, though, Michael. I did my job. You owe me.'

  Hook opened his mouth to reply, but any words he might have spoken were drowned out by the voice that came through loud and clear from a megaphone outside, accompanied by the heavy beams of mounted flashlights as they were simultaneously switched on, illuminating the barn's interior.

  'Armed police. You are surrounded. Come out with your hands up.'

  'Jesus!' Terrified, Donald swung round. And in doing so he made a single, fatal mistake because he took his eye off Hook, and as he turned back round, the pistol kicked in the other man's hand.

  Donald felt a searing pain in his wrist, and the mobile he was holding clattered uselessly to the floor. He tottered unsteadily on his feet, before leaning back against the door for support, clutching the wound with his good hand.

  Hook watched him calmly, his unnatural face almost serene in the fixed glow of the police flashlights and Donald was amazed that he seemed so unperturbed. You had to hand it to the bastard. He knew how to stay cool under pressure. Donald could almost have admired his poise if it wasn't for the fact that his one-time colleague was about to kill him.

  Their eyes met, and Donald's expression hardened as he accepted the inevitable. 'You treacherous fucking freak,' he hissed through gritted teeth, determined not to show his fear in these last moments.

  'Perhaps,' said Hook evenly, and pulled the trigger.

  Sixty-six

  It was hard to believe she was still alive, but then, thought Mike Bolt with a burst of exhilaration, Tina Boyd had always been a survivor. It was one of the things that made her so attractive.

  But although Mo was already on the phone to HQ organizing a trace on the mobile she'd called from, which given modern technology and the resources involved shoul
d take only a matter of minutes, they still didn't know exactly where she was. Bolt was sure she'd still be at Willow End Farm, although why Hook was keeping her alive was anyone's guess. The GPS on the dashboard gave an ETA of four minutes, but with the speeds Bolt was doing he was certain he could make it in three. It was raining now, and getting harder to see, and he had to use all his concentration to keep the car from losing control on the winding country roads. He'd already had one crash this week. Another one and he'd probably be suspended from driving on duty for months.

  He slowed down as he came to a blind bend.

  'They should have a trace on the phone in the next five minutes,' said Mo, steadying himself against the dashboard, 'and Essex police have just arrived on site and are securing the area, so no one's going out.'

  'Shit!' yelled Bolt, slamming on the brakes as he came round the bend, almost blinded by a set of approaching headlights on full beam that had suddenly appeared in the gloom.

  The lorry was weaving all over the place as it came towards him far too fast and Bolt had to swerve violently to avoid it, skidding through the wet and only just managing to stay on the road. He screeched to a halt and, looking in his rearview mirror, saw the driver do a poor job of manoeuvring his vehicle round the final curve of the bend. He noticed that it was white and large.

  Unusual for a vehicle that size to be out on a road as quiet as this.

  'It looks like our lorry,' said Bolt, doing a rapid three-point turn. 'I thought they were meant to have secured the area.'

  'Surely we're not going to follow it?' asked Mo as Bolt accelerated off in pursuit. 'We don't know who's driving that thing, boss. It could be some kind of suicide bomber.'

  'I want to get close enough to show it we're police. If the driver's one of the bad guys he's not going to want to stop, so we'll call for back-up.' Mo looked scared, and Bolt was too, but he was also excited. 'I'll stay well enough back so that if he tries anything we can abort without getting blown to pieces.' He glanced at Mo's stricken face. 'I won't do anything stupid, I promise.'

  Within the space of a few seconds they'd closed in on the lorry, and with the car ten yards back from it Bolt pulled into the middle of the road. Just in case the driver had somehow missed the flashing blue light in his wing mirror, he began flashing the car headlights in rapid succession.

  If he was innocent, the driver would stop.

  He didn't. Instead he accelerated, weaving down the road, taking the next corner too fast, the wet road slicking beneath his wheels.

  'Get on to HQ now,' Bolt said, gritting his teeth, pulling back a little as the full enormity of what he was doing came home to him. 'That's our gas.'

  Mo was back on the line in seconds, putting the phone on loudspeaker and shouting out their location and current direction, using the GPS for guidance.

  A few seconds later the voice of DAC Bridges came down the line, strained with the tension he must have been feeling. 'We're sending in back-up and helicopters. Keep well back but do not lose it. I repeat: do not lose it.'

  The lorry braked suddenly. Bolt braked too, harder, going into a skid, suddenly only five yards from the back of the vehicle, and the gas.

  The lorry accelerated again, now on a straight stretch of tree-lined road.

  Bolt fought the skid, managed to straighten up, and put his foot down. The Jag's speedometer showed fifty, and the lorry was beginning to pull away from him.

  'Jesus,' hissed Bolt. 'He's going way too fast.'

  'We have local police setting up a roadblock at the junction of the B1057 and the 184,' said Bridges.

  'Then they've got about a minute to do it,' Bolt told him, glancing at the GPS, 'because we're less than a mile short of it and this guy's driving like a maniac.'

  'We're blocking the B184 north and south so if he makes this he won't make the next one. The helicopter will also be in situ within three minutes.'

  Bolt remembered him saying something similar only a few hours earlier with disastrous results, so he wasn't exactly filled with optimism.

  Another sharp corner appeared up ahead, and the lorry driver screeched round it, hitting the bank on one side but still managing to keep going.

  And then, as Bolt followed him round, thirty yards distant now, he saw the junction up ahead. A single police squad car was parked sideways on in the middle of the road, its lights flashing, blocking the path of traffic both ways. He caught the vaguest glimpse of two figures standing on the other side of it, one with a torch. And then the lorry moved into the middle of the road, blocking his view, and making no attempt to brake as it bore down on the squad car.

  'Oh fuck,' said Bolt, tightening his grip on the steering wheel as the two cops with the car dived into the bank, the torch flying into a bush. The lorry hit the patrol car with a huge bang, shunting it into the side of the road, before swerving dangerously to the left as it swung round on to the B184 southbound.

  Bolt had to make a split-second decision. Stop and see if the officers were OK, or continue the pursuit. He chose pursuit, knowing there was no way he could let the lorry get away. He braked hard to avoid the stricken squad car, changed down into second gear, drove through the gap between it and the bank on the other side, then slammed his foot to the floor on the accelerator.

  The force of the impact had slowed the lorry down and Bolt was rapidly back within twenty yards of it, but soon the road straightened and the lorry quickly picked up speed again.

  Then a strange thing happened. The lorry suddenly began to weave wildly on the wet tarmac, and, as Bolt watched, it slewed off the road, knocking over a speed limit sign as it hit the bank and careered along it at a precarious angle, tearing up mud and foliage, until it finally came to a halt, barely twenty yards away. Immediately its reversing lights came on. Bolt knew he only had a few seconds at most to stop it from taking off again. Up ahead he could hear the wail of sirens getting closer, but they were some distance away and there was still no sign of the promised air cover.

  Bolt pulled the standard-issue pepper spray from the inside pocket of his jacket and, ignoring Mo's warning shout, leapt from the car and made a dash for the driver's cab, just as the lorry bounced back on to the tarmac.

  Sixty-seven

  As soon as she realized that the lorry was being chased by the police, Tina knew she had to do something. She hadn't expected them to trace the mobile that fast, and now that they had it was clear to her that the two men in the cab weren't going to come quietly. Their voices were panicked, angry.

  'I can't get rid of this fucker!' the driver shouted in frustration.

  'There's a fucking cop car in the road!' the other one yelled. 'How the fuck did they find us?'

  There was a loud crash as the lorry struck it.

  'That'll teach youse!' the driver cried out, laughing. 'Now we sort the other and we're home free!'

  That was when Tina summoned up every ounce of strength she had left. Rising up in the back of the cab, she threw the duvet cover over the driver's head, leaning over to hold it in place.

  Taken utterly by surprise, he immediately lost control of the vehicle, his cries muffled by the duvet. He lashed out with an elbow, catching Tina in the ribs, but she clung on to him for dear life as the lorry mounted the verge at the side of the road and he swung the wheel wildly, desperately trying to wrest back control.

  The passenger, the big shaven-headed guy, turned in his seat with an angry snarl and threw a punch at Tina. She dodged the worst of the blow but the fist still connected with her shoulder and neck, knocking her backwards into the metal grille separating the cab from the rear of the lorry. She twisted her bad foot in the process and screamed out in pain, releasing her grip on the duvet.

  The driver yanked it off and braked hard, bringing the lorry to a juddering halt while his passenger leaned over his seat to throw more punches at Tina, who kicked out wildly with her good foot, catching him in the face, adrenalin overcoming the agony the action caused her.

  The driver crunched the lorry i
nto reverse gear, and as he accelerated backwards the shaven-headed thug managed to land a blow on Tina, who felt herself growing faint.

  Don't pass out now! One last effort!

  There was a bang as the wheels landed on the road. The driver turned the steering wheel and struggled to put the lorry into first while his colleague continued to punch Tina, savagely squeezing her bad leg as well. But he was too far away for his punches to tell and she managed to twist round, stick a hand through the gap in the seat, and grab the gearstick.

  'Sort the fucking bitch out, Stone!' yelled the driver, tearing her hand away. 'Get in there and sort her out!'

  Stone's face darkened with a killing rage that Tina had seen on criminals only a handful of times before. He clambered over the seat as the lorry lurched forward, his body filling her whole field of vision.

  She lashed out with her good leg again but there was no strength in the movement and he swatted it aside easily, drawing his fist back to throw the final punch that would surely finish her.

  And then, as the lorry began to move down the road, the passenger door was yanked open and a figure jumped inside. He threw an arm around Stone's neck, pulled him backwards and gave him a generous shot of pepper spray in the eyes in the process. Stone fell on to the driver, and it was only then that Tina recognized her rescuer. It was Mike Bolt – the first time she'd clapped eyes on him in a year. She experienced a feeling of complete elation as Bolt leaned over Stone and let the driver have it with the pepper spray too.

  But the passenger door was still hanging open, and Stone was still able to lash out. He struck Bolt in the face and knocked him backwards.

  Bolt dropped the spray and grabbed the door frame with both hands, but his grip was precarious, and when Stone kicked out again he almost lost it.

  'Mike!' yelled Tina.

  Sensing that he was about to fall into the road, she scrambled over the seat and launched herself at Stone with teeth and nails. She bit him on the ear and felt, but didn't see, Bolt grab him too. And then she was shoved hard from behind by the driver, and all three were flying through space before smacking on to the tarmac.