by Nick Oldham
Henry drew himself up to his full height and stumbled towards her, waving with his hands, hoping to prevent her leaving.
Danny flicked the gear lever back into neutral and yanked on the handbrake.
Henry fell against the car, leaning against the edge of the roof with both hands. He squatted down on to his haunches and looked at Danny through the window, which she slowly opened.
The face she saw was one wrecked by grief, torn apart by something dreadful inside. She was deeply shocked.
‘ Henry!’ she cried. ‘What’s wrong? What’s going on?’
‘ Get ready, get ready,’ Smith uttered into his radio. ‘He’s here, he’s here. Security van just pulling on to the slip road. He’ll be with you very shortly. Get ready.’
‘ Crane received.’
‘ Hawker and Price received.’
‘ Drozdov and Thompson received.’
At that exact moment a bomb threat was received in the Communications Room at Lancaster police station, the Divisional Headquarters for Northern Division in which Lancaster motorway services was situated.
Once again the call was taken seriously.
Evacuation procedures were put immediately into place.
‘ Danny, I’m sorry,’ Henry babbled through his tears, but before he could say anything further, everything was cut short by a huge blast less than seventy yards away when the Force helicopter exploded in a massive fireball of blue and orange flame and black smoke.
Henry was battered flat on to his back by the shockwaves. A huge, dangerous slab of rotor-blade sliced through the air with a whistling sound and skidded across the bonnet of Danny’s car, thudding into the ground like a red-hot sabre only a matter of inches from Henry’s head. Other pieces of sharp, deadly flying metal smacked into the ground like strafe from a fighter plane, sizzling and burning. One crashed against the windscreen of Danny’s car, making her cower in abject terror. The windows of buildings nearby were smashed by the mini-hurricane effect of the explosion, sending shards of glass scything into offices.
Henry rolled up on to his hands and knees, shaking his head incomprehensibly, but with one wary eye on the axe-shaped piece of rotor-blade in the ground which had nearly decapitated him. His whole word imploded and then came rushing back in a tidal wave of consciousness.
Danny threw her door open, leapt out of the car, went to Henry’s side, placing an arm around his shoulders. They stood up together, both unsteady, and turned.
The flames were now only a flicker, but plumes of thick black smoke circled up from the helicopter wreckage — a tangled, charred array of metal and glass.
People swarmed out of buildings to look.
For a moment, Henry was too stunned to say anything coherent. Then his mind cleared of all debris and the instinct of a cop came back into gear. He said urgently, ‘Get into the car, quick, Danny — let me drive.’
He jumped in through the open driver’s door and Danny, without question, ran around and got into the passenger seat.
‘ I saw someone cross to the helicopter only seconds before it blew,’ Henry said hurriedly. ‘Could’ve been one of ours, I suppose, but he didn’t really seem to fit in. Unless he blew himself up, my commonsense tells me he’ll be running away from the place, not towards it.’
Henry accelerated away, the surge of engine power equal to the rush of adrenaline in his body. ‘Gotcha,’ she said.
On reaching the service area south of Lancaster, Colin Hodge slowed right down and scanned for the parking space he had been instructed to pull into. He had argued that it didn’t actually matter a toss where he put the van — after all, this was just a quick RV, a situation report — and then he would be on his way within minutes. But Smith had insisted he park specifically between the two HGVs. It would mean that fewer people would see and remember the security van on the service area; it was also an indication to the team that all was going well. If he didn’t park there, it would mean that the job would have to be put off. Hodge accepted the reasoning.
He spotted the two HGVs, having been told there would be a Sherpa van already parked between them, flashing hazard warning lights. As he lined up to park between the HGVs, the Sherpa drew away. Hodge drove into the tight vacant slot and stopped.
‘ Fucking long way to the bogs from here,’ one of his mates observed, ‘especially if you’ve got the shits.’
‘ I know. It’ll be all right. Just don’t like leaving the van out in the open — don’t want to become a target for a passing opportunist, do we? Out of sight, out of mind.’
It was sound logic, easily accepted by his two rather dim mates upfront with him and the one in the armoured hold behind, the one surrounded by millions of pounds.
‘ Won’t be a minute.’ Hodge opened his door, briefly catching the reflection of the Sherpa in his wing mirror, reversing up behind. The reason why it might be doing so escaped him. He dropped to the ground only to meet the masked figure of Billy Crane appearing from underneath the rear wheels of the ERF Curtainside. He was holding a big black pistol in his hand.
Crane stepped smartly up to Hodge before he could react and rammed the muzzle of the gun under the chin strap of his helmet and pulled the trigger twice in quick succession. The soft-nosed bullets destroyed Hodge’s brain and he died instantly. Crane hurled him to one side before he fell, into the waiting arms of Hawker and Price who immediately began to haul him up on to the ERF trailer, behind the side curtain.
Crane climbed swiftly up the van steps and pointed his gun at the man in the passenger seat who was already reaching for the red emergency button on the dashboard radio.
‘ Don’t,’ Crane warned him with a snarl, ‘or I’ll kill you where you sit.’
The man froze, his finger an inch away from the button. He eyed Crane’s weapon and the hooded figure.
Crane saw the man’s dilemma. ‘The choice is yours,’ Crane said slowly, ‘but if you do, I promise you’ll be dead before you pull your finger off the button.’
The guard’s mouth twisted. He made his decision and lurched for the button.
‘ Wanker!’ screamed Crane and shot him three times on the side. One slug slammed into his neck, the second his biceps and third spiralled between two ribs and tumbled through the lungs, the force of the rounds smashing him up against the door.
Unfazed, still supremely confident, Crane turned his attention to the third terrified guard sitting behind. ‘You too?’
The man shook his head. Definitely not.
Crane beckoned him. ‘Get out this side. Slowly. Don’t try any crap, or I’ll fucking do you.’ Crane backed off, giving him space to climb down.
The guard held up his hands and slithered across the bench seat, contorting his way out of the cab. He was just in time to see Hodge’s feet disappearing under the curtain flap of the vehicle trailer. ‘Oh shit, I’m next, aren’t I?’
‘ Not necessarily,’ Crane said.
Hawker and Price reappeared from underneath the curtain and dropped to the ground. Crane pushed the security guard towards them. ‘Look after him.’ He himself climbed back into the cab, reached across and unlocked the opposite door against which the wounded security guard was slumped. He was not yet dead and watched Crane through glassy, half-closed eyes, bubbles of blood on his lips as he laboured to breathe with severely damaged lungs. Crane winked at him through the eye-hole in his mask.
Drozdov and Thompson had drawn their car across the front of the security van and they were now standing at the nearside door of the van. ‘Get this fucker out of here,’ Crane yelled to them. Drozdov reached up and opened the door, stepping back as the guard flopped backwards and dropped out, smashing heavily down to the ground. He squirmed and groaned for a few moments, then died.
Drozdov picked up his feet, Thompson his arms and they dragged him around the rear of the van.
‘ Can you hear me back there?’ Crane called to the last remaining guard, the one in the back of the van. Crane’s voice was very calm, very assured.
He was feeling good, alive and kicking, his senses switched on, buzzing. He had missed this since coming out of jail and was blissfully conscious that he had a semi hard-on and that his cock was still growing, beginning to throb. Coordinating a highly successful drugs operation was good, but nothing compared to the rush of this. He did realise, however, even while the adrenaline pumped through him there and then, that this was it now, the last big job he would ever contemplate pulling — probably the biggest ever cash-only heist on the British mainland. One for the history books. He was going to enjoy it to the full.
‘ Yeah,’ came a quivering response through the speaker.
‘ Two of your mates are down already,’ Crane said. ‘Don’t know if they’re dead or not. Don’t give a shit,’ he shrugged. ‘But now the choice is yours. You can go the same way or you can open up nice and easy, get out, keep cool, be tied up for a while and live. See your family and friends again.’
‘ You can’t get in here,’ the guard said defiantly.
‘ In order to kill you, I don’t need to. I’ve got two canisters of gas here, one of which will kill you in seconds if I push it through the vent. The other is CS which will make you want to get out anyway — but I warn you, if I have to use the CS, I’ll kill you as soon as you open the door.’
There was silence.
Drozdov opened the driver’s door. Crane ‘shushed’ him with a gesture before he could speak.
‘ I’m coming out,’ the guard said weakly.
Both Crane and Drozdov raced round to the back of the van as the door opened a quarter of an inch.
The guard peered out through the crack. Crane motioned him out.
Hesitantly he stepped down. Hawker grabbed him and flung him against the ERF trailer on to which the body of the security guard had been dumped alongside Colin Hodge. He stood next to his mate. They exchanged glances of abject terror. They were ordered to put their hands on their helmets and face the trailer.
‘ What do we do with these two?’ Drozdov hissed to Crane.
Crane eyed him. ‘I’ve shown my balls — now it’s down to you.’
Drozdov walked up behind the guards. Quickly, without any degree of remorse, he shot them in the back of their necks with clinical precision, angling the muzzle of his pistol upwards, killing them instantly.
He spun and bowed graciously to Crane.
Henry Christie was thinking hard as he powered Danny’s MX-5 down Hutton Hall Avenue towards the exit. Yes, he had seen a guy walking towards the helicopter, but his mind and emotions had been elsewhere. Now he was trying desperately to recall some facts. What was he wearing? What did he look like?
He put his foot down and screamed the engine in first out of the gate, over the speed ramps — and up to the junction with the dual carriageway, the A59, which ran by Police Headquarters, left to Liverpool, right to Preston. He could not actually cross the carriageway at this point because the gap in the central reservation had long since been sealed to traffic: too many accidents caused by too many drunken cops was the reason Henry had been given.
That meant he had to turn left, no matter what.
Which was a problem because as his sharp eyes skimmed the immediate vicinity he spotted a man on the other side of the road running down a narrow path which led on to a quiet lane backing on to the A59.
It was only a fleeting glimpse, but enough for Henry, from years of culminated experience, to say, ‘That’s him — shit!’ He struck the steering wheel in frustration.
Then he peered at the gap in the central reservation which had been closed to cars and other motor vehicles by use of concrete bollards. It was still possible to get across on a push bike or on foot.
Henry’s mouth sagged open as he examined the width of the gap between the posts. Surely a car as petite as a Mazda MX-5 could fit through?
Danny — there was no need for telepathy because she could read his face like a book — suddenly realised what he was going to do.
‘ No,’ she warned him.
He revved the engine, gave her an evil ‘sideways’, released the clutch and almost stood upright on the gas pedal. The wheels screeched and the car lurched towards the impossible gap. Henry held on tight to the steering wheel. Danny whimpered, cowered and covered her eyes in horror. ‘My car, my car,’ she cried.
At the very last moment, the driver suffered the gravest doubts as to whether the little sports car would be narrow enough to squeeze through and come out the other side in a fit state to keep working.
By then it was too late to brake.
‘ Breathe in,’ Henry suggested.
Danny clamped her eyes tight shut.
Many years before, as a young, bright and often very stupid and immature uniformed PC, Henry had become somewhat of an expert in getting police cars, vans, Land Rovers and the like, through unlikely gaps between fence posts, bollards and all other manner of very narrow places. There had been occasional scrapes, but generally his reckoning had been perfect. All it took, he boasted to his colleagues, was nerve, skill and the innate ability to line up the vehicle at the correct angle.
But now, the older man, whose self-judgement was muddied by the passage of time, was horrified to see the fast-approaching gap between the bollards getting tighter and tighter and tighter — and then suddenly he had no choice because the car was in there and he had to keep going — or get stuck.
Snap! Snap!
The wing mirrors were shorn off with clinical precision.
And that was it. He was through. He whinnied an almost hysterical roar of triumph.
‘ Jesus Christ!’ Danny yelled. ‘My car!’ Henry careered on to the opposite side of the road, wrestling with the tiny steering wheel, causing a car which was hurtling down the road to brake, swerve and pass with an enraged blast of the horn from a driver who had been certain his number was up.
‘ We haven’t finished yet,’ Henry said grimly.
‘ You’d better be sure this is the right guy,’ Danny warned him.
Underneath, however, she was secretly exhilarated both by the chase and the change in Henry Christie as the cop in him had slicked back into place. Even if it was a cop suffering from the ‘red mist syndrome’.
A hundred yards down the A59, he slammed on sharply, lifting the rear end of the car, yanked the steering wheel down to the left and mounted the kerb with a crash of front bumper and a sickening scrape of sump.
He drove across the pavement and on to a short footpath which led through to a cul-de-sac abutting the dual carriageway. As the MX-5 bounced down, a car in front of them tore away from the side of the road, slithering. It was a white Ford Escort XR3i. Though now a few years old it had been lovingly maintained by a careful owner who, at the moment, beavering away in her office in Preston, was blissfully unaware the car had been stolen. It could still pick up its skirts. The driver looked back over his shoulder and saw the MX-5 behind. He jumped to the right conclusion.
The cops were on his tail.
He cursed with a violent tongue and rammed the accelerator to the floor. At the same time he leaned across into the passenger footwell with his left hand and picked up the revolver lying there. He slotted it, barrel down, between his thighs.
In the MX-5 Henry asked Danny if she had a personal radio with her.
She shook her head.
‘ Looks like we’re on our own,’ he breathed philosophically.
The MX-5 was right up the rear end of the Escort. Henry was determined this was going to be a victory.
As the driver of the Escort sped towards the junction with what used to be the main road between Preston and Liverpool before the dual carriageway had been built, he was faced with a major decision.
To go right would mean travelling in the direction of Preston. Busy roads, built-up areas, slow-moving traffic, lots of cops. But also lots of rat runs, possibilities to ditch the motor and leg it over the fences, gardens and down back alleys.
Turning left would take him towards more rural areas. Fast-windi
ng roads, fields, cows, fewer cops. And also the chance to outpace and out-manoeuvre the bastard behind.
Both ways had good and bad selling points.
The only reason, in the end, the driver chose to go left was for practical driving purposes only. It was easier to negotiate the left-hand turn at speed. So without any noticeable reduction in mph, he skidded out of the side road, slewing sideways across the tarmac. He wrestled with the wheel, almost losing the car in the gardens opposite. Then he regained control and gunned it away.
Ahead of him was a tractor, pulling an empty, flat trailer, trundling merrily along. Easy to pass.
Behind, Henry edged out of the side road with more prudence than his prey. From bitter experience, he knew that fully liveried cop cars are far less likely to get hit than plain ones.
Intending to shoot by the agricultural combination, the driver of the Escort veered out on to the wrong side of the road, desperate to put the farm vehicles between himself and the pursuing Mazda.
And then the tractor driver did something that happens far too regularly on country roads.
He fucked-up the townie driver.
Without a signal, without a warning, not even a backward glance, he turned right across the path of the overtaking car.
The Escort driver had nowhere to go. Braking was useless, quick manoeuvring was out of the question. He screamed.
The front end of the Escort smashed into the coupling between the rear of the tractor and the front of the trailer. The roof of the car was effectively sliced off, but the rest of the car did not continue to go underneath the trailer and come out of the other side to continue a comic pursuit. It became a tangled, mangled, twisted mess.
The driver was killed instantly. His head was severed from his body with the efficiency of a guillotine.
Henry Christie found it a hundred yards back down the road where it had rolled face down into a grate.
Chapter Seventeen
It took longer than anticipated to carry out the transfer. There were fifty money-containers constructed of Kevlar-steel, all about the dimension of a medium-sized suitcase. They were all very heavy indeed and must have been tightly packed inside. Even allowing for a prearranged systematic transfer, there was a very edgy ten minutes during which everyone of the team felt vulnerable and exposed as they passed the containers from the back of the security van, down the line, into the back of the Sherpa.