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
