Nick Oldham - Dead Heat

‘This is a bloody farce,’ Jo simpered, keeping her face firmly forward-facing.

‘Where’s everybody else?’ O’Brien demanded.

Jo spoke into her radio again. It was dead. So was O’Brien’s.

She reverted to her mobile phone again, not having completed the call she had started earlier to one of her other colleagues. She saw that her battery charge indicator was low.

‘Right, right, right, if he can do it, so can I.’ stated O’Brien. This time he was ruthless. He swung the car into a gap that wasn’t there and completed a spectacular U-turn so he was now heading in the same direction as their target. ‘If I see the bastard going back the other way again, I’ll bloody cry.’

‘Can’t get through,’ Jo said, pulling the mobile away from her ear. She pressed redial.

O’Brien squeezed in a double overtake, not recommended in such busy circumstances, but he pulled it off without damage or injury and stood on the accelerator, tail-gating the car ahead.

‘Nothing!’ Jo spat contemptuously at her phone. ‘Aaargh!’ she screamed angrily, then screamed again, this time in fear, as O’Brien executed another daring overtake followed by a wicked swerve into a space which he alone created.

‘How the hell did you get in here?’

‘I’m good at getting big things into tight places,’ he boasted.

Jo chuckled, the tension released for a moment. Then she shook her phone, still unable to get through. She tried the number of another team member. This time she connected. ‘Ken. . it’s Jo. . we’ve eyeballed the target. . he’s headed towards. .’ Click. Whirr. The line went dead as the signal broke. ‘Shit. I do not effin’ believe this. Technology, I’ve shit it.’ She watched the signal-strength bars reappear on the mobile-phone display. She redialled again.

As they hit a set of traffic lights on red, they found themselves stuck in a long queue of traffic.

‘Can you see him, or have we lost him?’ Jo asked.

O’Brien opened his window and stuck his head out, craning to see. ‘Dunno.’

With the mobile to her ear, Jo opened the door and, holding the door pillar, swung herself up to get an elevated view across the roofs of the cars in front of her.

O’Brien heard her slam a hand down on the roof. He ducked instinctively. She dropped back into her seat. ‘About eight cars ahead,’ she said, her phone still stuck to her ear. She pulled it away and glared crossly at it. ‘Blooming thing,’ she said and threw it down in the footwell. ‘Gimme yours,’ she demanded of O’Brien and held out her hand.

The traffic began moving slowly.

‘You’re very cautious,’ Andy Turner commented, following the numerous U-turns.

The man in the driving seat said nothing, concentrated on driving and checking his mirrors.

‘I like that,’ Turner said.

‘Don’t get to like anything about me,’ the man warned.

The cars moved so slowly that by the time they reached the traffic lights, they were turning back to red, Turner’s vehicle having gone through towards the city. Jo looked aghast as the amber light appeared. O’Brien swore, then took a chance.

He pulled out and accelerated past the car in front and shot the red light. He made it over the junction before the cross-traffic began to move.

‘Well done,’ Jo breathed.

O’Brien held on tight to the wheel, but made no reply.

‘I just hope he hasn’t seen us carrying out death manoeuvres and basically doing everything we can to draw attention to ourselves, y’know? Us being undercover, highly trained surveillance operatives and all? So far we’ve done everything we shouldn’t have.’

‘What’s new? It’s usually a wing and a prayer at the best of times. At least we’re still in touch with him.’

‘But not with the rest of the team,’ Jo said miserably. She tried to call Ken on O’Brien’s mobile, but could not make a connection despite there being a charge in his battery and a strong signal. ‘Somebody up there doesn’t like us tonight,’ she said. She tried another team member and this time got through.

The 4x4 weaved through the centre of Manchester, emerging on the other side of the city on the A56, which led out past Manchester Prison, towards Prestwich and Bury.

O’Brien hung in behind him, keeping as far back as he dared without actually losing sight. It was not ideal. A one-car follow was always tough, but it was all he had. There was no doubt that, just at that moment, the team was in disarray and there seemed little hope of pulling it back together. Jo had contacted some of the others and they were doing their best to play catch-up, but she was beginning to despair a little because the battery on O’Brien’s mobile was losing strength and the radios still did not work, even with a change of channel. She used the phone sparingly, but knew it would not last for long and she also knew that the further Turner travelled, the more stretched and ineffective the team would be.

Not a comforting scenario.

The only good side of it was that the 4x4 was such a big vehicle it was fairly easy to keep tabs on, particularly with its cluster of high-level brakes across the rear window, which shone like Blackpool illuminations every time the brake pedal got pressed.

Turner and his driver took them past the entrance to Sedgley Park, Greater Manchester Police’s training school, then into Prestwich, staying on the main road all the way.

Jo speculated where they could be headed.

‘Motorway junction’s up ahead,’ she mumbled. ‘Straight across to Bury, or left on to the M60 ring road towards south Manchester, or east out towards Rochdale, or beyond to Leeds. If he goes on to the motorway either direction and puts his foot down, I think we’re snookered.’

‘Let’s not give up yet,’ said O’Brien grimly.

They followed through Prestwich and approached the motorway junction. On the left, just before the roundabout was a petrol station which the 4x4 drew into. O’Brien sailed past on to the roundabout. This gave Jo the opportunity to scribble down the registered number of the car and to have a glimpse of the driver again as he climbed out and went to a pump. She saw he was looking around warily and that he actually watched her drive past.

O’Brien went on to the roundabout, circled it twice, covered by fairly heavy traffic. Turner’s vehicle rolled off the forecourt and accelerated straight down on to the M60 southbound as O’Brien was three-quarters of the way through his third circle.

‘Motorway,’ Jo said unnecessarily. She quickly relayed the message to another team member who was still trying to get through heavy theatre traffic on Deansgate in Manchester City centre, which was a long way away now. They might as well be on the moon. She and O’Brien were effectively on their own.

O’Brien tore down the motorway slip road and hit the main carriageway at 70mph, cutting ruthlessly into the first lane, out into the middle, then into the fast. He was expecting not to come into close contact with the 4x4, but suddenly there it was ahead of them in the middle lane, travelling sedately. Another tactic for the surveillance-conscious criminal — and O’Brien almost fell for it. Instinctively he took his foot off the gas and drifted into the centre lane, dropping about half a dozen cars behind the target.

‘That was a bit close for comfort. I hope he hasn’t made us,’ said Jo. If they had passed the 4x4 she knew they would definitely have been blown out of the water and that would have been the end of the night’s operation. As it was, they were clinging to the remnants.

Then, just to make matters worse, the big car lurched out into the fast lane and surged forwards.

‘Bugger!’ O’Brien cursed.

They were lucky to see the back end of the 4x4 leaving the motorway on the exit which looped round on to the M61. They were only just able to cut sharply across the traffic themselves and throw up road dust as their car angled across the chevron markings on the exit. By the time they reached the point where the M60 joined the M61, and there was also the choice of going onto the A666 towards Bolton, the 4x4 had beaten them. It was nowhere to be seen.