Donovan glanced over at PM and Bunny. The two black men looked back at him impassively. Donovan grinned and gave them an exaggerated thumbs-up. PM's face broke into a smile but Bunny continued to stare at Donovan, stony faced.
The landing lights came on, two bright white stripes down either side of the runway.
Jordan and Macfadyen strolled over. They were wearing heavy jackets with designer labels.
'Are we on?' asked Jordan.
'Looks like it,' said Donovan.
Fullerton scanned the skies.
'Which way is east?' he asked.
Donovan pointed off to their right.
'Over there.' He narrowed his eyes.
'I think I see it.'
'God, my heart's pounding,' said Fullerton.
'Like I've run ten k.'
One of Donovan's phones buzzed, and he pulled it out of his pocket. He'd been sent a text message.
'Adrenalin,' said Donovan.
'Nothing like it.'
'Yeah, you're right. Better than a coke rush.'
'Better than anything, because this rush comes with tens of millions of pounds of readies attached,' said Donovan. He grinned.
'That's it. See it?' Donovan looked down at his mobile phone and scrolled through the text message.
'DEN IT'S A TRAP. RUN. LOUISE.' He smiled to himself and deleted it.
Fullerton nodded.
'Yeah. Bloody hell, it's happening, it's actually happening.'
Donovan put the phone back in his pocket. He shouted over to PM and Bunny and gestured at the sky.
'Here we go,' he yelled at them.
'That's us.'
Everybody was now staring up at the sky and pointing. The plane was at about five thousand feet, flying below an impenetrable layer of grey cloud. The engine noise was louder now, and the plane seemed to be descending quickly, as if in a hurry to get on the ground. The undercarriage and nose-heel dropped down and the flaps lowered. The plane was coming in straight to land. It had a large T-shaped tail unit with a high-set swept back wing on which were mounted four turbofan engines.
'Can you imagined if it crashed and burned?' said Fullerton.
'The whole of the south of England would be on a heroin buzz for weeks.'
Donovan didn't reply. He just watched the approaching plane with a half smile on his lips.
'Come on,' Donovan whispered to himself.
'Come to Daddy.'
The flaps were lowered and the plane visibly slowed, then the nose came up and the wheels hit the concrete with a squeal and puffs of black smoke and then the plane was rolling by them. Donovan caught a glimpse of a grinning pilot through the windshield as the plane went by, but he couldn't tell if it was Gregov or Peter.
Fullerton began to jump up and down.
'We did it. We fucking we did it!' He punched the air, then turned and hugged Donovan.
'Fucking hell, Den, we did it.'
Donovan patted Fullerton on the shoulder.
'Yeah,' he said quietly.
'We did, didn't we?'
The giant transport plane turned off on to a taxiway and then turned again so that it rolled back towards them. Bunny and PM walked over, their hoods up on their black Puffa jackets.
'Okay, guys?' asked Donovan.
'Will be once I see the stuff,' said PM.
'You okay, Bunny?' asked Donovan.
'Don't see you smiling.'
'Like the man said, all we see now is a plane.'
The plane slowed and then stopped, about a hundred yards away from where they were standing. The engines shut down one by one.
'Right, let's get the vans over there,' said Donovan.
The engines of the Transit vans burst into life and Bunny motioned for his drivers to get into the laundry trucks. That was when all hell broke loose.
Three helicopters came in low from the west, swooping over the wire perimeter face and then breaking away from each other to land at different parts of the field. One hovered close to the tower building, and six men clothed in black, holding automatic weapons, jumped out. A second helicopter disgorged more armed men on the far side of the plane and they ran to surround it. The third helicopter landed at the end of the line of storage sheds. Another six armed men piled out and started running towards Donovan and his crew, guns at the ready, their boots pounding against the concrete.
'What the fuck's this?' hissed Fullerton.
Donovan said nothing. He didn't try to run and he didn't show any emotion other than a slight smile as he slowly raised his hands in the air.
An armoured Land-rover crashed through the gate in the perimeter fence and then turned sharply to the left, allowing a dozen faster vehicles to speed by. Half were police cars, blue lights flashing but sirens off, and half were dark saloons filled with big men in black jackets.
Two of the Transit vans roared off, but a burst of automatic fire ripped out the tyres of one, and the other was rammed against the wall of one of the sheds by a police car. Police officers surrounded the van and dragged out the stunned driver. Jordan and Macfadyen made a run for it, but both were rugby-tackled to the ground by police officers.
PM was about to run, but Bunny dropped a hand on his shoulder.
'Don't bother, bro. These are heavy people. Don't give them no excuse to get heavier.'
PM nodded grimly, then slowly followed Donovan's example and raised his arms above his head. Bunny did the same.
The armed men in black surrounded Donovan and his men, swinging their weapons from side to side, their faces hidden behind respirators. They wore heavy black body armour over black uniforms.
'Fuck me, it's the SAS,' whispered Fullerton.
'Just stay calm, Jamie,' said Donovan.
'Hands in the air.'
Men in black jackets with 'CUSTOMS' written on the back in bright yellow piled out of the saloon cars and walked towards the plane.
SAS troopers were waving at the pilots to open the door at the front of the fuselage. To make sure they got the message, they fired a quick burst of gunfire over the top of the plane.
The door opened and one of the SAS troopers shouted clipped instructions to the pilots.
Hands started patting down Donovan. He looked to his left. It was a burly, unsmiling police sergeant.
'It's okay, I'm not armed,' said Donovan.
'None of us is.'
'Pity,' said one of the SAS troopers, his voice muffled by the respirator.
'Fuck you,' said PM.
'You wanna try something without all that hi-tech crap? Huh, probably isn't even a man inside that Robocop suit.'
'Easy, PM,' said Bunny.
The ramp at the back of the plane began to open.
'Open Sesame,' whispered Donovan.
The sergeant finished searching Donovan and moved on to Fullerton. Donovan slowly lowered his hands. No
