officer has been a part of.
“We’ll just have to wait.”
McAvoy wishes he were in the van with Pharaoh; able to give her the kind of encouraging smile that tells her he believes in her and that this will come good.
“Steady now,” comes Pharaoh’s voice.
The Land Rover still has not moved. It remains at a stop, diagonally opposite where McAvoy and Daniells sit. If they are lucky, two burly men will get out and walk across the five hundred yards of wasteland between here and the disused warehouse. Once they are inside, Pharaoh will give the signal, and her team will move in to arrest everybody inside. McAvoy is here in case anybody slips the net: ready to block off the road if someone flees in a vehicle. DCI Ray and DI Shaz Archer are hopefully shivering as they keep watch on top of the giant furniture store that marks the end of the retail park that the road winds through on its way down to this washed-out, run-down location. At the far side of the warehouse, two patrol cars from the Operational Support Unit are parked up behind a wall of containers, ready to block off the escape of anybody who makes it into the storage area of the still-working dock.
Pharaoh’s voice: “Keep it together, children . . .”
Seconds tick by.
Minutes.
“Hell of a place, isn’t it?” says Daniells broodingly, staring through the glass at the brick building opposite. “All those fishermen . . .”
“Trawlermen,” McAvoy mutters under his breath. “Fishermen stand on a bank with a rod. Trawlermen risk their lives in seas harder than you can imagine.”
“I’m just saying . . .”
Daniells does not get a chance to say anything more. In a shriek of rubber, the Land Rover roars out of the parking space.
DCI Ray’s voice on the radio . . .
“Fucking hell . . .”
The vehicle tears out of the car park, but instead of turning left back onto the road through, it spins right, barreling across the area of wasteland and rubble between Pang’s and the nearest tumbledown warehouse.
“. . . what’s he doing?”
McAvoy feels a fist close around his esophagus. He grabs the radio, but in his haste it slips from his hand and into the footwell. He grabs for it, papers falling from his lap, scrabbling desperately until his fingers close around its bulk.
“Guv, get out of there, it’s a setup . . .”
McAvoy doesn’t know why, but he is flinging open the car door. He could have instructed Daniells to drive. He will never know why he did not.
He has run only a half-dozen steps when he sees the light. Sees the flame emerge from the dark glass of the Land Rover. Sees it flicker and bounce as the vehicle smashes its way over the ragged landscape. Sees a figure climb halfway out the window of the moving vehicle and draw back its hand . . .
The Land Rover spins 180 degrees and barely slows as it approaches the small outbuilding where McAvoy had seen the telltale smudge of a police van’s back tire.
His shout of warning dies in his throat. The light is momentarily airborne, arcing upward, bright against the dark sky, before it tumbles down, down . . . and smashes against the double doors at the back of the police van, stuffed to the gills with police officers: sudden prisoners in a vehicle clothed in flames.
HOME. The back end of the Kingswood estate, a twenty-minute drive from the center of Hull and near enough to the East Riding villages on one side to compensate for the nearness of Europe’s biggest council estate on the other.
It’s a computer simulation, this place: a sprawl of Identikit houses and lawns the size of bath towels; of used cars bought on finance; and square living rooms costumed with hand-me-down sideboards and January-sale sofas and first-day-at-school photos.
Here, on the curve of one nondescript cul-de-sac, all white paint and bare brick, a rusty blue Peugeot with two wheels on the curb, tasteful ivory curtains and the slightest scent of baking . . .
Roisin McAvoy,
“We’ll just have to wait.”
McAvoy wishes he were in the van with Pharaoh; able to give her the kind of encouraging smile that tells her he believes in her and that this will come good.
“Steady now,” comes Pharaoh’s voice.
The Land Rover still has not moved. It remains at a stop, diagonally opposite where McAvoy and Daniells sit. If they are lucky, two burly men will get out and walk across the five hundred yards of wasteland between here and the disused warehouse. Once they are inside, Pharaoh will give the signal, and her team will move in to arrest everybody inside. McAvoy is here in case anybody slips the net: ready to block off the road if someone flees in a vehicle. DCI Ray and DI Shaz Archer are hopefully shivering as they keep watch on top of the giant furniture store that marks the end of the retail park that the road winds through on its way down to this washed-out, run-down location. At the far side of the warehouse, two patrol cars from the Operational Support Unit are parked up behind a wall of containers, ready to block off the escape of anybody who makes it into the storage area of the still-working dock.
Pharaoh’s voice: “Keep it together, children . . .”
Seconds tick by.
Minutes.
“Hell of a place, isn’t it?” says Daniells broodingly, staring through the glass at the brick building opposite. “All those fishermen . . .”
“Trawlermen,” McAvoy mutters under his breath. “Fishermen stand on a bank with a rod. Trawlermen risk their lives in seas harder than you can imagine.”
“I’m just saying . . .”
Daniells does not get a chance to say anything more. In a shriek of rubber, the Land Rover roars out of the parking space.
DCI Ray’s voice on the radio . . .
“Fucking hell . . .”
The vehicle tears out of the car park, but instead of turning left back onto the road through, it spins right, barreling across the area of wasteland and rubble between Pang’s and the nearest tumbledown warehouse.
“. . . what’s he doing?”
McAvoy feels a fist close around his esophagus. He grabs the radio, but in his haste it slips from his hand and into the footwell. He grabs for it, papers falling from his lap, scrabbling desperately until his fingers close around its bulk.
“Guv, get out of there, it’s a setup . . .”
McAvoy doesn’t know why, but he is flinging open the car door. He could have instructed Daniells to drive. He will never know why he did not.
He has run only a half-dozen steps when he sees the light. Sees the flame emerge from the dark glass of the Land Rover. Sees it flicker and bounce as the vehicle smashes its way over the ragged landscape. Sees a figure climb halfway out the window of the moving vehicle and draw back its hand . . .
The Land Rover spins 180 degrees and barely slows as it approaches the small outbuilding where McAvoy had seen the telltale smudge of a police van’s back tire.
His shout of warning dies in his throat. The light is momentarily airborne, arcing upward, bright against the dark sky, before it tumbles down, down . . . and smashes against the double doors at the back of the police van, stuffed to the gills with police officers: sudden prisoners in a vehicle clothed in flames.
HOME. The back end of the Kingswood estate, a twenty-minute drive from the center of Hull and near enough to the East Riding villages on one side to compensate for the nearness of Europe’s biggest council estate on the other.
It’s a computer simulation, this place: a sprawl of Identikit houses and lawns the size of bath towels; of used cars bought on finance; and square living rooms costumed with hand-me-down sideboards and January-sale sofas and first-day-at-school photos.
Here, on the curve of one nondescript cul-de-sac, all white paint and bare brick, a rusty blue Peugeot with two wheels on the curb, tasteful ivory curtains and the slightest scent of baking . . .
Roisin McAvoy,
Similar Books
