Chet put his head down, and continued walking to the car. He was coming towards it at a different angle to the police, and was slightly closer. But he didn’t want to speed up yet, because that would alert them to his presence.
Ten metres to go. He tried to catch Suze’s eye, but she was staring vacantly into space and clearly hadn’t noticed either Chet or the officers.
Five metres.
Chet could hear the crackle of the police radio. He pressed his key to unlock the doors, and the lights flashed twice.
‘Excuse me, sir.
Sir!
’
Chet opened the door and climbed in. He was turning the key even before the door was shut. The two officers were right in front of him, one of them holding up his hand, palm outwards, while the other was hurrying round to Chet’s side.
‘Oh my God,’ Suze wailed.
Chet said nothing. He centrally locked the doors, then put his foot on the accelerator and drove slowly towards the policeman blocking his way. At first it looked like the cop was going to stand his ground, but he jumped to one side when he realised Chet wasn’t going to stop. The second policeman managed to rap his knuckles on the driver’s window, but Chet had the space to accelerate now, and that’s what he did, ignoring the alarmed looks from the other customers at the petrol station.
The Mondeo’s tyres squealed as he raced towards the exit. In his mirrors he saw the two police officers running back towards their car.
‘What’s . . . what’s happening?’ Suze stammered. ‘How did they know where we were?’
Chet swung round the perimeter road of the service station and back on to the northbound M25, pushing the car through its revs until it was touching ninety.
‘Number-plate recognition,’ he murmured, his jaw clenched with determination. ‘Police cameras at all the main motorway junctions. They use them to track stolen vehicles. Gets fed through to the Police National Computer.’
‘Bastards!’
He checked his mirrors. No sign of the police tailing him yet. ‘Someone’s instructed them to bring us in.’
‘But . . . but if you
knew
all this, why did you . . . ?’
‘I want them to think we’re heading east out of London, OK?’ Chet explained himself more to keep her quiet than anything else. ‘At least that was the idea.’
‘Well, the idea’s not working . . .’
‘Thanks. Next time I need someone to state the fucking obvious, I’ll know where to come.’
‘We need another car,’ Suze continued as if he hadn’t said anything. ‘We could hire one, maybe . . .’
Chet shook his head. ‘Too easy to trace.’
‘So what are we going to
do
?’
Chet checked his mirror. No sign of the patrol car. He took the exit on to the A13. He knew he was on the money – that to beg, borrow or steal another vehicle would be a beacon to anyone trying to locate them. But they
could
do the next best thing . . .
As he drove along the A13, he looked left and right. He knew what he was searching for. It wouldn’t be too long before he found one.
Ten minutes later he saw it: a retail park just off the main road, with all the usual shops and a monstrous concrete car park, six or seven storeys high. A minute later he was pulling a ticket from the automated entry gate and slowly crawling along the parking bays of the ground floor.
‘What are we doing?’ Suze asked.
‘Looking for something.’
‘What?’
But Chet didn’t answer. He was too busy concentrating on the other cars in the multi-storey. Nothing on the ground floor, so he climbed the ramp to the first. Still nothing. He cursed under his breath and headed higher.
They were four floors up before he found what he was looking for: another Ford Mondeo, black. Two years newer than his, but it would do. He selected a parking spot in a corner of the car park, boxed in by a bulky Range Rover, then rummaged in his rucksack and pulled out the screwdriver from his debugging kit. Seconds later he was bending down in front of the car, prising off the plastic screw covers of his number plate and removing it. In under a minute he had both plates off.
‘Get out of the car,’ he told Suze.
‘Why?’
‘Just get out and come with me.’
Suze looked wary as she followed him across the deserted car park towards the other black Mondeo. ‘You see anyone coming, distract them,’ he said under his breath. ‘I’m going to switch the plates.’
‘How?’
‘You’re a clever girl. You’ll think of something.’
‘I can’t . . . I mean, I . . .’
One look from Chet, though, and she fell silent.
They approached the car together. Chet crouched down and removed the front number plate quickly enough, but he was just preparing to swap it for his when the banging of a door echoed around the car park.
He gave Suze a sudden, urgent look.
‘Right . . .’ she said. ‘OK.’ She dug the remains of her fingernails into her palms and started walking towards the stairwell. ‘Um . . . excuse me . . . ex
cuse
me . . . could you tell me where the nearest . . . ?’
Chet blotted out the sound and concentrated on the plates. A couple of minutes later they were swapped, and he was striding back to his own car, with Suze trotting along behind him. Elsewhere they heard an engine start and a vehicle move away. Then silence again. Chet fixed the new plates to his vehicle, and moments later they were driving out of the car park.
‘This’ll buy us a bit of time,’ he said. ‘Until the owner of the other car realises what’s happened. Or the police catch up with them.’ He paused. ‘Or anyone else does. But we still have to be careful.’
‘Careful how?’
‘We stay off the motorways until we get where we’re headed. The cameras tend to be on the main arteries. It’ll keep us under the radar. Hopefully.’
Suze stared at him. ‘And where
are
we headed?’ She stared some more, then clutched her red hair in her hands. ‘Christ, you haven’t even told me your
name
. . . and how do you . . . how do you
know
all this stuff?’
He glanced at her as he drove. She looked exhausted. Terrified. He didn’t blame her. He felt the same. The only difference was that Suze was physically shaking. Chet wasn’t.
‘You did well back there,’ he said, and he meant it.
Suze didn’t reply.
‘My name’s Chet Freeman,’ he said quietly. ‘I know all this stuff because it’s my job to. At least, it used to be. We’re going somewhere out of the way that I know pretty well. And when we get there, you and me are going to have a little talk. You’re going to tell me everything you know, and you’re not going to leave out a single fucking thing. Right?’
Suze looked straight ahead and returned her thumbnail to her teeth.
It took her a moment to reply, and when she did, her voice was quiet. Not meek-quiet, but determined-quiet.
‘Right,’ she said.
ELEVEN
‘Zero, this is Tango 17.’
The red Toyota had its boot up and Luke and Finn were sheltering behind it. That way they wouldn’t stick out on the horizon as the sun rose to the east, and they could operate the patrol radio stashed in the back with the rest of their kit. Their hostages were still in the car, Abu Famir in the front and the second man, now unconscious, in the back.
A couple of miles to the south was the main road that ran from the Jordanian border all the way to Baghdad. Everywhere else was desert. When they’d stopped it had been light enough for them to see the traffic on the road with the naked eye. Busier than last night. Plenty of small cars, indistinguishable at this distance from their own, but plenty of military vehicles too. Luke couldn’t tell from up here if they were moving men, munitions or other supplies. But he could tell there were enough of them for that road to be a very dangerous place for two members of the British Army and two dissident Iraqi hostages, one of them with blood pissing from a gun wound.
The radio crackled, and then was silent.
‘Zero, this is Tango 17.’
A pause.
‘
Tango 17, this is Zero. Send.
’
‘We have the target, but we got into contact. Two men down, one wounded. We have the casualty in tow. Target claims he’s a fellow dissident. Request further instructions.’
‘
Tango 17, wait out, figures 5.
’
The line went quiet. Luke looked around. A desert falcon was circling up above. Apart from that, no movement in the immediate vicinity.
After five minutes that felt like a lot longer, the radio came to life again.
‘
Tango 17, this is Zero. Proceed to RV with both captives.
’
Luke glanced at Finn. He was shaking his head.
‘Zero, we’re in a bad spot here. We need medical assistance. Request pick-up.’
A brief pause, then: ‘
Tango 17, pick-up cancelled. No heli assets.
’
He heard Finn cursing under his breath. ‘What about Fozzie and the others?’
A pause.
‘
Back-up unit compromised. Enemy aircraft in border area airspace. Return via vehicle or foot. Repeat, return via vehicle or foot.
’
Luke nodded grimly. ‘Roger that, Zero.’ He replaced the handset of the patrol radio.
‘Fuck’s sake.’ Finn looked towards the main road. ‘I’m telling you, with that guy in the car it’s fucking suicide down there. We should just nail him now, say he died of his wounds.’
For a moment Luke didn’t reply. He walked round and glanced into the vehicle. The wounded man was pale and sweating, despite Finn’s on-the-hoof medical attention. He had a large swab bandaged to his wound, but it was already saturated with blood. He needed serious attention and this wasn’t the place to go looking for it. Maybe Finn was right. Maybe they should just ditch him.
‘You given him a shot?’ Luke asked.
‘Not the kind I’d like to.’
‘
Have you given him a shot?
’
‘Of course I’ve given him a fucking shot. But he needs more than morphine.’
Luke continued to weigh things up. He didn’t like the sound of the situation at the border. With Fozzie and the others compromised, getting over into Jordan was going to be tough. Maybe they should ditch the car and head across the desert on foot. But it was 100 miles to the border, and that was a big ask even for the two Regiment men. For an old boy like Abu Famir it was an impossibility. And as for the wounded man . . .
In any case, they had their orders. Luke looked over at Finn. ‘We need to get him into the burka,’ he said. If nothing else it would cover up the guy’s wounds.
‘We need to waste the fucker.’
Luke gave Finn a dangerous look before opening up the front passenger door to talk to Abu Famir.
‘What’s his name?’ he demanded.
The Iraqi academic avoided his gaze.
‘What’s his fucking name?’
‘He needs a doctor,’ Abu Famir mumbled. It was clear he was avoiding the question.
‘Fuck’s sake,’ Luke sighed, before opening the rear door and moving his attention to the casualty. Their companion stank of sweat and was shaking. ‘Hey, buddy,’ Luke said – speaking English because he didn’t know what else to speak. ‘How you doing?’
The wounded man opened his eyes, but there didn’t seem to be much understanding behind them.
‘You got a name, buddy?’
When the man answered, it was in a hoarse almost-whisper. ‘Amit,’ he said.
That didn’t sound like an Iraqi name to Luke. He glanced in Abu Famir’s direction, then turned back to the wounded man.
‘OK, Amit, you need to stand up by the car so we can put something over you. Stop anyone paying us too much atten . . .’
‘Where’s Abu Famir?’ Amit asked. His accent had a strange tinge to it. ‘I need to get Abu Famir out . . .’ A moment of breathlessness. ‘I need to get him out of . . .’
‘Abu Famir’s here. We’re taking care of it.’ Luke felt a moment of respect for Amit, if that was really his name. ‘Now come on, buddy. I’m going to help you out . . .’
Luke could do nothing other than place two strong hands under Amit’s armpits to lug him from the vehicle. The wounded man gasped in pain, but he didn’t resist and moments later he was leaning against the car, his body crooked but his face a little more alert than it had been – even though the dressing of his wound was like a sodden sponge.
‘Your friend wants to kill me?’ he whispered.
Luke gave him a long look. ‘You want to give him a reason not to?’
Amit closed his eyes. ‘What do I need to wear?’ he whispered.
All of a sudden Finn pulled his Sig from under his robe and held the barrel of the gun hard against the man’s forehead. ‘Answer the fucking question,’ he instructed. But as soon as Finn had spoken, Luke knocked his gun away from Amit, and the two Regiment men found themselves staring each other down.