The convoy made its way at speed along the hard shoulder, travelling at a pace that was both rapid and safe.
French had been an advanced driver for ten years – he had developed a sixth-sense for trouble and normally this served him well. Like most of his colleagues he had had a few ‘bumps’ – one at a hundred miles an hour. But he knew instinctively when something wasn’t ‘right’.
He glanced in his door mirror, everyone was still with him. Looking ahead, he could make out a slowing sea of tail lights, braking and further ahead, stationary. This was the regular consequence of Operation Stack. It happened so often that they had got used to it. Three lanes of one of Britain’s busiest motorways brought to a standstill every time the ‘bloody French’ decided to head out on strike again.
He felt sorry for the lorry drivers, some of whom were lucky and had cabs in their trucks, with basic kitchen facilities and a bed. The others weren’t so lucky and had to find comfort in whatever way they could. There were hundreds of them, from as far afield as Greece. Many of the drivers had left their cabs and were tracking down their compatriots; a chat, sharing a story, a hand or two of cards or better still a meal.
At the end of the extensive sound deadening barrier, one of them, a twenty-seven-year-old Greek from Patras had taken the opportunity to walk across the emergency lane and had climbed over the crash barrier, seeking refuge with a group of countrymen on the grassy verge. They smoked, told jokes and generally waited for the signal that the nearby tunnel and seas ports were opening up again.
Sometimes it took days.
They paced around, dancing from foot to foot to avoid the cold, some thinking they would be better off in their cabs. Sephos Christakos had heard enough of the age-old jokes and decided to call it a night. He clambered over the single metal crash barrier and looked back up the carriageway. He saw a set of headlights but knew they would be in the lane next to the hard shoulder and besides they would have to slow down soon.
He turned back towards his peers and wished them a pleasant and hopefully warmer night. He was a metre away from the barrier when he realised that the vehicle had illuminated its distinctive blue lights. It would be the last thing that he would remember and the first that he recalled when he woke with a start three days later in Ashford Hospital.
Despite the narrowing of the roadway and the relative speed of the convoy, French was able to have a reasonably engaged conversation with his partner Shaun Douglas. They did this every day and often at speeds twice as fast.
French was concentrating on the road ahead, as he had been taught. It curved slightly to the left and about a mile ahead of them he swore he could make out an outline but wrote it off as being the overhead gantry that was displaying ironic traffic data – ‘Expect delays’.
“No kidding. Bloody French. Oh well, think of the cash Shaun.”
French noted a few stray drops of rain on his windscreen and began to reduce his speed, bringing the average pace of the convoy down to a level that was both manageable and safe.
He leaned across and turned on his heated seat, looked back up and then immediately managed to gain some clarity on what had earlier caused him to question his vision and whether all was well in the world.
He saw the rear of truck ahead, the right-hand edge illuminated by the xenon headlamps on his Volvo. The blue strobes flickered and ricocheted off the surrounding traffic, hypnotic but essential.
And then, it happened.
Training, muscle memory and pure adrenaline-fuelled skill took over, his right boot scrubbing off the miles per hour in feet, per second. The tyres were grappling onto the rough surface of the emergency lane but fighting a losing battle. The lane surface was of the same standard as its nearby main carriageway but sustained periods of rubber, oil and motoring debris made it far more hazardous than the average driver could ever anticipate.
Neither officer uttered a word. Neither were average. It had happened before, all part of the job. What they hadn’t anticipated was a pedestrian, standing, staring straight back at them and stood petrified, perfectly in the middle of their lane.
At a little under sixty miles an hour, the front passenger wing of the Volvo struck Christakos. The collision was instant. French had not even seen the driver until he turned to face him, a pitiful owl in the blistering-white headlights.
French braked, hard. With limited means of escape he had no choice but to hit the Greek father of two, who catapulted up and over the bonnet, his right shoulder striking the familiar federal light bar, partially dislodging it from the roof and in turn tearing the rotator cuff to shreds.
With already life-threatening injuries, the long distance driver hit the surface of the carriageway with a sickening thump and then rolled fortuitously into the gutter.
The driver of the first French police van was not so swift to react, seeing the pedestrian at the last moment. He too braked hard but began to lose control. Christakos instinctively rolled himself into the foetal position and prayed to whoever might be listening.
The van missed him but swerved into the inside lane, continuing with the second following close behind as they had been instructed to do.
‘Do not stop for anything.’
Ahead and unaware of the developing and unexpectedly chaotic windfall, Stefanescu turned to Hewett.
“The money we paid our countryman to park his truck in the emergency lane was well spent, no?”
It had been a simple aspect of the broader plan. Plan B – if Plan A – a well-timed swap nearer to the tunnel or in it had not come to fruition.
Plan B was always the riskier option. Cause a block on an already busy motorway and pray that in among the chaos his team could respond as envisioned, over the countless hours in their anonymous industrial warehouse using their own vehicles as props. Again and again, written up on a whiteboard, until just like the jewellery operation in Hatton Garden they could do it in their sleep.
Stefan considered it his finest hour. Not without risk, in fact, his greatest rewards had always followed his most reckless risks. Unlike his brother, he always had a Plan C too. Better to live and tell the tale than die with a story untold. He was convinced that his sibling would do just that one day soon and love and admire him as he outwardly did he also despised him in equal measures.
Either way, he considered his future to be alone – and in no way connected to his big brother. He brought him fortune, but he did not crave the fame.
A fifty year old long distance driver had been offered a day’s wages to pull his articulated vehicle off the main motorway and tell the world that he had broken down. ‘Of course. As long as no one will be harmed,’ he said, ‘It would be a pleasure’. And the cash would be rather nice.
“With any luck, the police vehicle will run into the back of the truck and then we can move. The gap we have left will enable us to do what we need to do.”
He checked his wristwatch. “Any time now.”
French brought his car to a standstill, rammed on the handbrake and ensured that the emergency lights on his car were on for all to see. He grabbed the Maglite from the door pocket and ran back along the hard shoulder.
Douglas was calling the Force Control Room advising them of the road traffic accident.
“Mike One-Four, we have had an RTA. Repeat RTA. We’ve hit a pedestrian. Ambulance to the scene please, alongside marker post…” He strained his eyes in the now pouring rain. “6993.”
“Received, ambulance en route, do you need any other units?”
“Yes over. And get a supervisor down here please so we can deal with the accident. God only knows where our French colleagues are heading, they haven’t stopped. Can you try and make contact? Mike One-Five has put in a rolling block behind us if you can get us on camera please.”
Blissfully unaware of the situation on the motorway and bored beyond six games of ‘I-Spy’ Cade and Daniel were now playing a new round of ‘Would You Rather?’
“Neither!” said Daniel indignantly.
“You can’t answer like that. You have to respond with an option.”
“OK, OK. I’d nibble a cherry from a nun’s arse.”
“Interesting choice. I’d have bashed the bishop. Hang on – standby.”
He answered the phone, shoving it under his right shoulder and propping it against his ear.
“Yes. Yep. Aha. Yes. Understood.”
Daniel looked at Cade, still disappointed in his heavily imposed choice of clerical-sex options.
“Well?”
“Suffolk Police have stopped a van en route to Felixstowe. Four Eastern European nationals on board and a whole pile of jewellery fresh from Hatton Garden. All hidden away. They had a cracking cover story but the local cops saw right through it.”
“Excellent stuff. Hewett or Stefanescu with them?”
“No. Sadly not.”
“So now what?”
“I guess we wait. They will come, they have to and meanwhile…”
“No! I am not choosing between intimate acts of lust with a frolicsome walrus or the blowhole on a dolphin. I am just not. OK?”
“Fair enough, JD. But at least if we’re caught you could always say you didn’t do it on porpoise!”
It was characteristic of the black humour that accompanied police officers the world over.
“Get out Cade and go and fetch me a strong coffee.”
“Mike One-Four ambulance ETA is about seven minutes. Sitrep please.”
“Received, thank you. One male pedestrian, struck by our vehicle. Has extensive leg and upper body injuries. He’s conscious and breathing. Our vehicle is still in situ. One-Five has the traffic stopped now. You had better inform the media, this is just going to make a bad situation worse.”
“Received. Any news on the French vehicles?”
“Your guess is as good as mine.”
About three quarters of a mile ahead, the French vans had come to a standstill. Their radios were as good as useless and following the briefing to the letter they remained in their vehicles, now penned in on both sides by other traffic. The driver of the first van switched the blue lights off, shrugged Gallically and cracked the window down a notch as he lit up a stereotypical Gitanes cigarette.
He leant out of the window and looked back at his counterpart, who followed his lead. They too were on overtime and were happy to ride out the storm. The fact that their armed guard was now nowhere to be seen appeared not to bother them.
Their instructions were clear. Proceed without the UK Police team only when you have lost communication, you are informed that the plan has changed, or you sense that you are under immediate threat.
“They would be here by now.” Stefanescu looked back up the motorway for the British police vehicles, then turned and spoke forcefully into the rear cargo area of his own van. “Go and see what has happened. Come on, quickly!”
Dragos Saban seized the moment. Pulling his collar up and around his neck he left the rear of the van, noticing how cold it had become. He also noticed how many people were milling around what was normally one of the business motorways in the world.
Ahead of him he could make out the two French vans. The officers inside didn’t bat an eyelid at the sight of ‘one of their own’ running along the carriageway and away from them, they were at best disinterested.
He ran back up the road, towards the blue lights that stood like sentinels on the British patrol cars. Shielding his eyes, he stared up the major arterial route and could make out some activity on the ground. A man had been hit. Poor devil.
Saban looked for a spare police officer, but they all appeared to be busy. He knew that this may be his only chance to alert the authorities, but he also knew he was being watched. No one in the group trusted anyone else. It was incestuous, deceitful and greed-laden and possibly the worst combination in a group that already had few friends, and plenty of enemies.
And despite his uncle’s advice, he needed the money too, just like the other disparate members of his team.
He walked back, then jogged to avoid the rain. As he ran he made the decision that the financial rewards outweighed the risks. His uncle would despise him, but needs must. And his needs were greater.
He reached the van, pounded on the back door and was let in.
Stefanescu called out to him from the front.
“Well? What can you tell me?”
“It is terrible. A man was run over by a police vehicle.”
“Most fortunate. And the vans that were with them?”
“I could not see them. I think they are somewhere ahead in the traffic.”
“Then get someone and go back out there and find them. Now!”
Daniel looked down at the foot well and flicked a small stone around with his foot.
“I’m not happy, Jack. There’s bugger all happening and like you I’m an active rester. I need the thrill of the chase one last time. Like all good murder mysteries, this one has some clues – and we are missing them. Agatha Christie would have cracked this bloody case weeks ago, the dirty little minx.”
Cade did not respond. His mind was focused on other places. Carrie’s calm hospital bedside, the chaos that revolved around the Stefanescu family and the reason for that chaos – a wave of greed. He felt like he was the only one pursuing them. And it was getting tiring. His head nodded and soon he was in that hideously indistinct state somewhere between consciousness and deep sleep where the words of his partner could be heard but he was unable to answer them without appearing drunk, his words slurred, punch-drunk and concussed from the preceding weeks.
Daniel turned to Cade, who was now in a deep sleep.
“I said Agatha Christie…”
Cade grabbed Daniel’s hand and gripped it tight. “I heard what you bloody said John. If you are that bothered, give her a bloody ring – I’m sure you’ve got her on speed dial.”
Hewett was unsettled. Physically exhausted, he knew that within twenty four hours he could be in a new country, alone and yet potentially free of the shackles of debt and dishonour. He persisted in giving the outward impression that he just needed to put up with the group for a few weeks, then he could escape and flee – anywhere. If his reputation remained intact within European government circles he could start again. If.
‘Then you will be a man, my son…’ His father’s words echoed with the classic Kipling poem.
Dragos returned, shattering the silence, somewhat breathless.
“Up ahead. About a kilometre. The driver of the van is asleep! We should go now!”
Stefanescu broke the silence. “Need I remind anyone who is in charge here? No? Exactly. We go when I am ready. Not you, or you.” He pointed around the van. No one returned his critical stare. “Good. So, are we ready?”
It was Hewett who spoke first.
“I am.”
He wasn’t – he never really would be, and might never be able to live down the deep sense of current betrayal, but the British government owed him so much more than the apparently lucrative salary they paid him. His historical negotiations and those of his parents before had benefited the nation to the tune of millions in grants and trade deals. His father had worked himself into a potential early grave, his mother had become what could best be described as an upmarket whore – a prostitute of the British government.
And between them in order to live up to the hedonistic lifestyle they had overspent, over-stretched and borrowed way beyond their means. And, as their loving son, he had gambled in secret to try to alleviate their financial misery.
At first it was a means to an end, a logical method of using his classical education, a way of allowing his razor-sharp mind to read the cards and work out the odds – stacked against him though they were.
In the beginning it was also a necessary evil, but he soon found that he left the overt and less apparent casinos with more than he arrived with. And no casino owner ever enjoyed losing.
Above all he wanted a reward, more than anything, more than a sharp suit a
nd a European car. More than a Thames-side flat and a place on the starting grid of the social circuit. And betrayal worked both ways. Those men in sharper suits, scarlet ties and cufflinks, filling their vaulted-ceilinged offices with decadent, bitter cigar smoke. There, in their ivory towers they had hung his parents out to dry all those years ago.
His delightful mother, the doyen of those blissful, semi-tropical, colonial days now spent her days staring out of a window in her French home almost permanently reminiscing about the past, dementia slowly gnawing away at her, piece by painless piece. And he hated that more than anything else.
“Retribution is apparently a dish best served cold Stefan. I am ready.”
Stefan made the call. Time to see if the Englishman was as good as his word.
He hung up thirty seconds later.
“OK. Let’s go. Remember your roles. Do not take any risks and above all try to avoid attracting too much attention.
The first van edged its way out of the main carriageway and onto the emergency lane that hugged the edge of the motorway. The driver illuminated the front emergency lights and was soon followed, after some skilful negotiation by the second white van its own mesmerising blue strobes flooding the area with cobalt lightning, sporadically rebounding off the stationary traffic and illuminating the miserable, jaded faces of the less fortunate drivers around them.
The abandoned articulated wagon had created the perfect, fortuitous shield which in conjunction with the rain had allowed them to proceed without alerting the British police – who were now hastily reprioritising.
Everyone had changed their plans now. For the Eastern European team, things had become so much easier.
The rain that emptied from the night sky added to the equation. In the back of the lead van Dragos found a sense of well-being in listening to it ricocheting off the metalwork, it was a noise that had settled him since childhood and now as he fought to find a comfortable position he stared down at the van floor – empty, sterile, not a match or cigarette stub. Not even a hair. They all wore gloves, as far as a DNA traces were concerned it was a vacuum.
Seven Degress (The Seventh Wave Trilogy Book 2) Page 45
