Simon Kernick - Target

Hook had allowed himself a small smile as he picked up speed, checking his location on the GPS. It wouldn't be long before they realized their mistake, but by then it would be too late.

Once again, it would be like he'd never existed. A shadow disappearing into the night, leaving only terror and destruction behind him.

Seventy-three

The helicopter rose swiftly above the smoking ruin of the barn before turning south towards London. Below him, Bolt could see the wide cordon of flashing blue lights stretching out in the darkness across the countryside, with the crashed phosgene lorry in the centre, illuminated by the search beams of a circling police helicopter.

It was now half an hour since he'd discovered that the body he'd assumed was Hook was actually female, and therefore almost certainly the kidnap victim, Jenny Brakspear. Ominously, the ambulance taking the person they'd thought was Jenny to hospital had not arrived. Nor had the crew responded to radio contact or calls to their mobile phones. The assumption was that they'd been carrying a disguised Hook, and that he'd managed to overpower them and escape. Only someone with his ruthlessness and nerve could have carried something like this off, and Bolt almost felt a grudging admiration for him.

He sat back in the cramped seat, frustrated at the way events had once again twisted out of his control, fighting the exhaustion that was now taking hold as the adrenalin-fuelled tension of the past twenty-four hours subsided. He knew he'd achieved a lot. He'd helped to avoid what would have been a disaster for London and the UK, and he'd rescued Tina from certain death. He'd just spoken to the hospital again, and the doctor had told him she was expected to make a full recovery, although it would be some months before she regained full use of her foot. So, in the end, he had a lot to be proud of.

Except it wasn't enough. Hook remained free, and Bolt knew he'd probably murdered the paramedics as well. Portman remained free too. As did Paul Wise. Justice, then, had not been served on those who deserved it. Bolt felt like sleeping for a week, but he knew he wouldn't be able to until matters had been brought to a close.

In the cramped helicopter cab with him were Mo Khan and Big Barry Freud. Mo was dozing, while Big Barry, who still had a long night ahead of him, sat in the seat next to Bolt, staring into space. He was on his way to Scotland Yard where he would help coordinate the capture of all outstanding suspects involved in the plot.

Bolt turned to him now. 'I want my team on the Henry Portman surveillance,' he said firmly. 'I think we deserve that.'

'Get some sleep, old mate. And don't worry about Sir Henry. He's not going anywhere.'

'I don't care. I still want to be a part of it.'

Big Barry looked reluctant, but he was also pragmatic enough to know when to give ground. 'All right, I'll speak to DAC Bridges and see what we can do. There's a new team taking over at two a.m., and they're on until ten tomorrow. I'll try and get your people to take over then.'

Bolt looked across at Mo, who'd opened one eye and was listening to the exchange. 'Does that give you enough time to sleep?'

'If I have all the sleep I need,' he answered, yawning, 'then I won't be awake until Saturday. But I don't want to miss out on this either. Someone's going to have to pay for this, and I'd love to see the look on that pompous sod's face when we nick him for conspiracy to murder.'

Bolt cracked a half-smile. 'My feelings exactly.'

Mo closed his eye and went back to dozing while Bolt stared out of the window at the sweeping curtain of lights that signalled their approach into London. Somewhere down there was Hook. Hiding among the city's ten million citizens. The immense apparatus of the state would be hunting him down, using all the latest technology, but Bolt knew that it wasn't going to be enough. Their quarry was too good for that, and right now the slippery bastard was winning on points.

But it wasn't over yet.

And anyone, even a cunning pro like Hook, could make a mistake.

Sir Henry Portman rose at seven a.m. on Thursday and, after showering and dressing, ate breakfast with his wife, Amelia, during which they discussed the dinner party they were hosting at the weekend, as well as the news being reported on Radio 4's Today programme that a terrorist plot to release poison gas in central London had been foiled the previous night. According to the surveillance operatives listening in, Sir Henry sounded perfectly normal, even feigning outrage at the callousness of the terrorists. 'What on earth is the world coming to?' they heard him saying.

After breakfast, he checked his business email account, answering a query regarding the terrorist attack from a private Jersey-based client, who wondered how it was going to effect HPP's positions. Sir Henry replied that it was too early to say, but a short-term fall in the market seemed likely, and thanks to HPP's recent bearish approach to blue-chip UK stocks, the fund would make some modest short-term gains.

At 8.30, Sir Henry's driver arrived at the five-storey Chelsea townhouse and he left for a prearranged 9.30 meeting with a London-based private client at the Landmark Hotel on the Marylebone Road, just west of Baker Street. He arrived twenty minutes early and took a seat in the open-plan dining area on the hotel's mezzanine floor, where he ordered a cappuccino and read the Financial Times until his client, a Mr Raif Mohammed, arrived at 9.25.

Their meeting, which was filmed covertly by surveillance officers sitting at a nearby table so that lip readers back at Scotland Yard could describe what was being said in real time, was polite yet tense. It seemed Mr Mohammed was less than impressed with HPP's current investments and it took all of Sir Henry's powers of persuasion to keep him from withdrawing his money from the fund.

While all this was going on, Bolt's team of twelve took up their positions. Two joined their colleagues in the Landmark dining area; a third took a seat in the foyer with a copy of the Sun ; the remainder gathered near the hotel's main entrance. One of them, Kris Obanje, was on a motorbike; the others split themselves between four cars.

Bolt had had to give up the Jaguar he'd used on surveillance ops ever since his days in the NCS. It was undergoing a full steam clean to get rid of any traces of phosgene before being delivered to Thames Valley CID so that they could carry out an inspection and attempt to ascertain whether or not Bolt had been driving recklessly when he'd hit Rob Fallon. He didn't like his new car. It was an immense Mitsubishi Shogun 44, totally unsuited to London streets. Worse still, it was an automatic.

'They take all the pleasure out of driving,' he said, leaning against the car door, trying to get comfortable. 'I don't know what philistine invented them.'

Mo smiled. He was in a better mood now that he'd had a sleep and the danger from the gas had passed. 'You sound like Jeremy Clarkson, boss.'

'Jesus. Really? Well, he's got a point.'

'I don't like the way that prick Portman isn't feeling scared,' said a voice from the back seat.

Tina Boyd looked pale and she was sporting a black eye and a bandage across her nose, but even so, she'd made a pretty remarkable recovery. The hospital, having operated on her foot and put it in plaster, had wanted to keep her in for observation, but Tina was the kind of person who liked to make her own decisions, and she'd discharged herself at seven that morning and immediately phoned Bolt for an update.

As soon as she found out that his team was going to be following Sir Henry, she'd insisted on being involved. It had taken Bolt a lot of effort to persuade Big Barry to let Tina come along, and he'd swung it by explaining that she was better placed than anyone to ID Hook should he turn up, but he wasn't at all sure now that it was such a good idea. Tina had been quieter than he could remember in the hour the three of them had been in the car together, as if she was weighed down by an unseen burden. He couldn't help wondering what suffering she'd undergone at Hook's hands, indeed whether she would ever fully recover. He wanted to talk to her, offer words of comfort and support, but knew that now was not a good time.