by Iain Cameron
‘Right sir, I will.’
‘Good man. C’mon,’ he said to Walters, ‘let’s get after Petrescu.’
They bolted down the fire escape. At the bottom, they found a large dry patch on the ground where Petrescu’s car had been. They ran into the wine depot’s main car park, looking for the patrol car but aside from the empty one belonging to the officers upstairs, it was nowhere to be seen.
‘I’ll call them,’ Walters said.
‘We’re in pursuit of suspect’s vehicle,’ he heard the crackling voice of PC Dunn in the patrol car say, ‘westbound on the A270. He’s a fair distance in front and jumping red lights. Will keep you posted.’
Henderson ran over to his car and got in. Walters climbed inside and before the passenger door closed, they roared off.
‘The patrol car was blocking the Regency Wines car park,’ Walters said, ‘but he nipped through the place next door.’
‘He’s had that escape route planned for a long time.’
Driving through back roads they soon hit the westbound A270.
Walters called the patrol car once again.
‘We were close to him at the junction for the Shoreham Bypass but we lost him. We took the bypass but we can’t see him.’
‘Put his car on ANPR,’ she said. ‘It’s a Porsche Panamera registration number, CON 15.’
‘CON 15, got it. Will do.’
‘What now?’ Walters asked.
‘I’m thinking. What if he didn’t take the bypass and stayed on the A270. Where does it lead?’
‘Shoreham Harbour and the Airport.’
‘If he was heading for the harbour, he would have come off the A270 earlier. He must be heading for the airport.’
‘Your guess is as good as any.’
A few minutes later Shoreham Airport, or Brighton City Airport as it was called now, came into view. It didn’t compete in the same league as Gatwick, thirty-odd miles further north, as no commercial flights flew from there. Instead, it catered for private owners of planes and helicopters, local businessmen and those who used a plane to transport clients or their family on a day trip to France or Holland.
They left the car in the airport’s car park and ran into the terminal building. He spotted an official-looking man and approached him, holding up his ID. ‘We’re looking for Constantin Petrescu, a tall, slim guy with curly jet-black hair. Have you seen him?’
‘I know Constantin. He’s a regular around here. I saw him not ten minutes ago. He said he’d left his briefcase on his plane and needed to fetch it.’
‘Where does he keep it?’
‘Come and I’ll show you.’
They walked outside and strode past a number of hangers.
He pointed. ‘There’s his plane over there. Can you see it?’
‘The one with the blue tail?’
‘Yes, the Hawker 400XP. It’s a beautiful aircraft but it wouldn’t give you much change from two mill.’
Not for a rich man like Petrescu, something as simple and straightforward as a Cessna 172, a small plane with a single propeller. His was a twin-engined executive jet. If Henderson knew Petrescu owned such an asset as this when he believed him nothing more than a local businessman, it would have raised his suspicions about the sources of such cash.
He was about to run over to the plane when their helper said. ‘Hold on a sec, I think it’s moving. This is highly irregular because as far as I know, he isn’t scheduled for take-off today and hasn’t filed a flight plan.’ He lifted the radio in his hand. ‘Wait and I’ll check.’
Henderson didn’t hear the rest as he was now running. Instead of heading towards the aircraft as he first intended, he ran across the grass towards the runway. At this moment, another plane was landing.
Henderson had no idea how busy Shoreham Airport could be, if one plane took off every five minutes or five took off every day. If it was busy and a number of planes were circling above his head waiting to land, or several on the ground were ready to take-off, Petrescu forcing his plane onto the runway could cause a serious accident. Knowing the luck that seemed to follow the man, in the chaos, he would make his escape.
He would find out soon enough for as soon as the landed plane coasted past the Hawker, Petrescu moved his plane forward and moved into position at the start of the runaway. Henderson’s lungs were bursting when he reached the edge of the runway. He withdrew the weapon he’d taken into Regency Wines and bent over double for a moment or two to catch his breath and to steady his hand.
He heard a roar as Petrescu gunned the engines and the sleek jet raced towards him. Henderson raised the gun and aimed at the windshield but realised it was designed to withstand strong air pressure and would be difficult to penetrate with only a handgun.
The plane sped towards him, getting larger, its acceleration getting faster, the noise louder and louder. He could see Petrescu at the controls, his face fixed in a determined stare. Henderson took aim. He counted 1-2-3 before firing – bang, bang, bang. He leapt to the side.
The port side tyre blew apart in spectacular fashion, firing large lumps of rubber at speed in all directions. Seconds before, Henderson had flattened himself on the grass to avoid being pulled over by the jet wash and now felt large pieces of rubber whizzing over his head. He turned to see the jet sway drunkenly across the runway, as if its fuel tanks were filled with alcohol and not jet fuel, before bumping over the rough ground at the side of the runway.
It was traveling at perhaps thirty or forty miles an hour when it hit something uneven, maybe a ditch, causing the plane to keel over and its nose to crash into the ground, making a loud crunching noise. It rocked from side to side for several seconds before tilting over but was prevented from turning over completely when a wing tip banged on the grass.
Henderson ran over. Getting closer, he inhaled a strong whiff of fuel. Perhaps the crash had ruptured fuel lines. He jumped on the wing and scrambled up to the cockpit. He hauled the cockpit door open. Petrescu was slumped forward, unconscious. The headphones were askew on his head, blood dripping down his face and his body hanging limp in the taut seat belt like a rag doll at a seafront show.
Henderson yanked the headphones off the pilot’s head and undid the seat belt. Petrescu fell towards him, the dead weight of the big guy nearly knocking him over. He tugged and tugged, gradually pulling him away from the cockpit seat, the smell of fuel stronger than before.
He slid him down the wing and they both collapsed on the grass. In spite of the noise from Henderson’s own heavy breathing, he heard sirens as a fire crew and ambulance came speeding towards them. He got up, hoping for a second wind, and dragged Petrescu by the shoulders, pulling him further away from the plane.
Twenty metres away he slumped on the grass, exhausted, but he knew he had to get up and drag him some more. Before he could summon the energy to do so, he heard a loud whoosh, the sort of noise a big firework makes as it takes-off. He threw himself face-down in the grass as the fuel ignited and the plane erupted in a giant fireball. The heat was intense, searing his body through his clothes and sucking all the air out of his lungs.
The scorching temperatures vanished as rapidly as they’d erupted and when he dared look up, Petrescu’s two-million-pound plane, bought through the suffering of countless young women, was engulfed in flames. A better metaphor for the collapse of his odious business he couldn’t think of.
FORTY-SEVEN
Henderson walked into DCI Edwards’s office and closed the door. He took a seat in the visitor’s chair, facing her across the desk.
‘I assume because you’re in here today you’re feeling better?’ she asked.
‘A little singed around the edges, but otherwise fine.’
‘I have to say, you were a little cavalier out there at Shoreham Airport, Angus. One slip the wrong way and we would be having a different sort of conversation, that is, if you could still speak.’
‘I acted on pure instinct. I knew I had to stop him as not only did he finance
and manage the trafficking of those women, but he shot a cop.’
‘How is Officer Carr doing? Do you know?’
‘I went to see him this morning before I came in. Surgery was a success, although he might lose some mobility in his arm. He’ll be off work for three, maybe four months and when he comes back, it will need to be in some administrative capacity, at least at first. He was lucky in a way that Petrescu shot him in his right shoulder, he’s left-handed.’
‘Petrescu is a ruthless man right enough, but what you did could have killed him and yourself.’
‘Don’t I know it. Any one of those bits from the exploding tyre could have knocked my head off.’
‘Aye, and if Petrescu hadn’t been in such a big rush to get away, he might have filled the plane up with fuel before setting off, then where would you be?’
‘Burnt toast, I think.’
‘How’s the man in question? Don’t think I’m asking after his health, rather his ability to be questioned.’
‘He’ll live. He received a nasty bash on the head when the plane crashed, and broke two ribs. Before you ask, there are two armed guards outside his hospital room. I’m taking no chances. We’ll see him in an interview room in a few days, pain or no pain.’
‘Good, because I want this guy up in court. I want all the newspapers to report what he did to those poor women as a warning to others and I want the women you freed to see him in handcuffs.’
‘I’m afraid it won’t be good enough to deter others coming up behind as there’s so much money to be made.’
‘Talking of money, how are you getting on following it and uncovering his assets?’
‘We’ve just about got our heads around his organisation. Most of them are shell companies with few assets, but bundles of cash, and a lot of the work is in trying to find its source. The real businesses, the wine warehouses for example, we’ve got the accountants looking over the financials to see if they were being funded by any of his prostitution money.’
‘I’m sure they are as he expanded so rapidly, but you know me, I’ll use any excuse to nab it. Stories involving large sums of cash recovered always go down well with the mandarins at the Home Office. It not only reminds them that what we do is important, and it also goes to prove that we don’t cost as much as people think.’
‘I’m glad to hear something pleases them.’
‘The only outstanding issue is for me to offer you my congratulations at the successful closure of such a difficult case and give you a glass of the good stuff.’
Henderson glanced at the clock on the wall: two-thirty. It was a little early for him, but what the hell.
She reached into a drawer and pulled out a bottle of whisky and two glasses. She poured generous measures into each glass and passed one to him.
‘Well done Angus,’ Edwards said. ‘Earlier comments aside, you did an excellent job. At least forty women have got you to thank for their freedom. This is for them.’
The End
About the Author
Iain Cameron was born in Glasgow and moved to Brighton in the early eighties. He has worked as a management accountant, business consultant and a nursery goods retailer. He is now a full-time writer and lives in a village outside Horsham in West Sussex with his wife, two daughters and a lively Collie dog.
Girls on Film is the seventh book to feature DI Angus Henderson, the Scottish cop at Sussex Police.
For more information about books and the author:
Visit the website at: www.iain-cameron.com
Follow him on Twitter: @IainsBooks
Follow him on Facebook @IaincameronAuthor
Also by Iain Cameron
DI Henderson Crime Novels
One Last Lesson
Driving into Darkness
Fear the Silence
Hunting for Crows
Red Red Wine
Night of Fire
Girls on Film
Matt Flynn Thrillers
The Pulsar Files
All books are available from Amazon
In the UK: here
In the US: here
In Australia: here
In Canada: here
A Small Request
If you have read any of my books, I would be grateful if you could leave a review on Amazon or Goodreads. All reviews are read and any comments noted. My thanks to every reader for your continued support.