Paul Finch - Hunted

He assessed the motorbike through the entrance, and despite the darkness was able to identify it as a new model Suzuki GSX; an expensive make for this neck of the woods.

‘DS Heckenburg to Charlie Six,’ he said into his radio. ‘PNC check, please?’

‘ DS Heckenburg? ’ came the crackly response.

‘Anything on a black Suzuki GSX motorcycle, index Juliet-Zulu-seven-three-Bravo-Foxtrot-Alpha, over?’

‘Stand by.’

Heck moved to the side of the garage and glanced up the steps. The monolithic structure overhead was wreathed in vapour, but lights still burned inside it and the argument raged on; in fact it sounded as if it had intensified. Glass shattered, which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing – it might grant him the right to force entry.

‘ DS Heckenburg from PNC? ’

‘Go ahead.’

‘ Black Suzuki GSX motorcycle, index Juliet-Zulu-seven-three-Bravo-Foxtrot-Alpha, reported stolen from Hucknall late last night, over. ’

‘Received, thanks for that. What were the circumstances of the theft, over?’

‘ Fairly serious, Sarge. It’s being treated as robbery. A motorcycle courier got a bottle broken over his head outside a newsagent, and then had his helmet stolen as well as his ride. He’s currently in IC. No description of the offender as yet. ’

Heck pondered. This sounded more like Jimmy Hood by the minute. On the basis that he was now looking to make an arrest for a serious offence, Heck had the power to enter the garage – which he duly did, finding masses of junk littered in its oily shadows: boxes crammed with bric-a-brac; broken, dirty household appliances; even a pile of chains, several of which were wrapped round an upright steel girder supporting the garage roof.

‘ DS Heckenburg … are you saying you’ve found this vehicle, over? ’

‘That’s affirmative,’ Heck replied, pulling his gloves on as he mooched around. ‘In an open garage at the rear of eighteen, Mountjoy Height, Bulwell. The suspect, who I believe to be inside the address, is Jimmy Hood. White male, early thirties, six foot three inches and built like a brick shithouse. Hood, who has form for extreme violence, is also a suspect in the Lady Killer murders. So I need backup ASAP. Silent approach, over.’

‘ Received Sarge … support units en route. ETA five. ’

Heck shoved his radio back into his jacket and worked his way through the garage to a rear door, which swung open at his touch. He followed a paved side path along the base of a steep, muddy slope, eventually joining with the flight of steps leading up to the maisonette. When he ascended, he did so warily. Realistically, all he needed to do now was wait until the cavalry arrived – but then something else happened.

And it was a game-changer.

The shouting and screaming indoors had risen to a crescendo. Household items exploded as they were flung around. This was just about tolerable, given that it probably wasn’t an uncommon occurrence in this neighbourhood. Heck reasoned that he could still wait it out – until he got close to the rear of the building, and heard a baby crying.

Not just crying.

Howling.

Hysterical with pain or fear.

‘DS Heckenburg to Charlie Six, urgent message!’ He dashed up the remaining steps, and took an entry leading to the front of the maisonette. ‘Please expedite that support – I can hear violence inside the property and a child in distress, over!’

He halted under the stoop. Light shafted through the frosted panel in the front door, yet little was visible on the other side – except for brief flurries of indistinct movement. Angry shouts still echoed from within.

Heck zipped his jacket and knocked loudly. ‘Police officer! Can you open up please?’

There was instantaneous silence – apart from the baby, whose sobbing had diminished to a low, feeble keening.

Heck knocked again. ‘This is the police – I need you to open up!’ He glimpsed further hurried motion behind the distorted glass.

When he next struck the door, he led with his shoulder.

It required three heavy buffets to crash the woodwork inwards, splinters flying, bolts and hinges catapulting loose. As the door fell in front of him Heck saw a narrow, wreckage-strewn corridor leading into a small kitchen, where a tall male in a duffel coat was in the process of exiting the property via a back door. Heck charged down the corridor. As he did, a woman emerged from a side room, bruised and tear-stained, hair disorderly, mascara streaking her cheeks. She wore a ragged orange dressing gown and clutched a baby to her breast, its face a livid, blotchy red.

‘What do you want?’ she screeched, blocking Heck’s passage. ‘You can’t barge in here!’

Heck stepped around her. ‘Out the way please, miss!’

‘But he’s not done nothing!’ She grabbed Heck’s collar, her sharp fingernails raking the skin on his neck. ‘ Can’t you bastards stop harassing him! ’

Heck had to pull hard to extricate himself. ‘Hasn’t he just beaten you up?’

‘That’s cos I didn’t want him to leave …’

‘He’s a bloody nutter, love!’

‘It’s nothing … I don’t mind it.’

‘Others do!’ Heck yanked himself free – to renewed wailing from the woman and child – and continued into the kitchen and out through the back door, emerging onto a toy-strewn patio just as a burly outline loped down the steps towards the garage, only a few yards in front of him. The guy had something in his hand, which Heck at first took for a bag; then he realised that it was a motorbike helmet. ‘Jimmy Hood!’ he shouted, scrambling down the steps in pursuit. ‘Police officer – stay where you are!’

Hood’s response was to leap the remaining three or four steps, pulling the helmet on and battering his way through the garage’s rear door. Heck jumped the last steps as well, sliding and tumbling on the earthen slope, but reaching the garage doorway only seconds behind his quarry. He shouldered it open to find Hood seated on the Suzuki, kicking it to life. Its glaring headlight sprang across the alley. The roars of its engine filled the gutted structure.

‘Don’t be a bloody fool!’ Heck bellowed.

Hood glanced round – just long enough to flip Heck the finger and hit the gas, the Suzuki bucking forward, almost pulling a wheelie it accelerated with such speed.

But the fugitive only made it ten yards, at which point, with a terrific BANG, the bike’s rear wheel was jerked back beneath him. He somersaulted over the handlebars, slamming upside down against another garage door before flopping onto the cobblestones, where he lay twisted and groaning. The bike came to rest a few yards away, chugging loudly, smoke pouring from its shattered exhaust.

‘Bit remiss of you, Jimmy,’ Heck said, emerging into the alley, toeing at the length of chain still pulled taut between the buckled rear wheel and the upright girder inside the garage. ‘Not checking that something hadn’t got mysteriously wrapped round your rear axle.’

Flickering blue lights appeared as local patrol cars turned into view at either end of the alley, slowly wending their way forward. Hood managed to roll over onto his back, but could do nothing except lie there, glaring with glassy, soulless eyes through the aperture where his visor had been smashed away.

Heck dug handcuffs from his back pocket and suspended them in full view. ‘Either way, pal, you don’t have to say anything. But it may harm your defence …’

It took a near-death experience to make Harold Lansing realise that he needed to start enjoying life more. Of course, those who didn’t know him would have been startled to learn that he wasn’t leading a very full and pleasurable existence in the first place.