He slowed down as he came to a blind bend.
'They should have a trace on the phone in the next five minutes,' said Mo, steadying himself against the dashboard, 'and Essex police have just arrived on site and are securing the area, so no one's going out.'
'Shit!' yelled Bolt, slamming on the brakes as he came round the bend, almost blinded by a set of approaching headlights on full beam that had suddenly appeared in the gloom.
The lorry was weaving all over the place as it came towards him far too fast and Bolt had to swerve violently to avoid it, skidding through the wet and only just managing to stay on the road. He screeched to a halt and, looking in his rearview mirror, saw the driver do a poor job of manoeuvring his vehicle round the final curve of the bend. He noticed that it was white and large.
Unusual for a vehicle that size to be out on a road as quiet as this.
'It looks like our lorry,' said Bolt, doing a rapid three-point turn. 'I thought they were meant to have secured the area.'
'Surely we're not going to follow it?' asked Mo as Bolt accelerated off in pursuit. 'We don't know who's driving that thing, boss. It could be some kind of suicide bomber.'
'I want to get close enough to show it we're police. If the driver's one of the bad guys he's not going to want to stop, so we'll call for back-up.' Mo looked scared, and Bolt was too, but he was also excited. 'I'll stay well enough back so that if he tries anything we can abort without getting blown to pieces.' He glanced at Mo's stricken face. 'I won't do anything stupid, I promise.'
Within the space of a few seconds they'd closed in on the lorry, and with the car ten yards back from it Bolt pulled into the middle of the road. Just in case the driver had somehow missed the flashing blue light in his wing mirror, he began flashing the car headlights in rapid succession.
If he was innocent, the driver would stop.
He didn't. Instead he accelerated, weaving down the road, taking the next corner too fast, the wet road slicking beneath his wheels.
'Get on to HQ now,' Bolt said, gritting his teeth, pulling back a little as the full enormity of what he was doing came home to him. 'That's our gas.'
Mo was back on the line in seconds, putting the phone on loudspeaker and shouting out their location and current direction, using the GPS for guidance.
A few seconds later the voice of DAC Bridges came down the line, strained with the tension he must have been feeling. 'We're sending in back-up and helicopters. Keep well back but do not lose it. I repeat: do not lose it.'
The lorry braked suddenly. Bolt braked too, harder, going into a skid, suddenly only five yards from the back of the vehicle, and the gas.
The lorry accelerated again, now on a straight stretch of tree-lined road.
Bolt fought the skid, managed to straighten up, and put his foot down. The Jag's speedometer showed fifty, and the lorry was beginning to pull away from him.
'Jesus,' hissed Bolt. 'He's going way too fast.'
'We have local police setting up a roadblock at the junction of the B1057 and the 184,' said Bridges.
'Then they've got about a minute to do it,' Bolt told him, glancing at the GPS, 'because we're less than a mile short of it and this guy's driving like a maniac.'
'We're blocking the B184 north and south so if he makes this he won't make the next one. The helicopter will also be in situ within three minutes.'
Bolt remembered him saying something similar only a few hours earlier with disastrous results, so he wasn't exactly filled with optimism.
Another sharp corner appeared up ahead, and the lorry driver screeched round it, hitting the bank on one side but still managing to keep going.
And then, as Bolt followed him round, thirty yards distant now, he saw the junction up ahead. A single police squad car was parked sideways on in the middle of the road, its lights flashing, blocking the path of traffic both ways. He caught the vaguest glimpse of two figures standing on the other side of it, one with a torch. And then the lorry moved into the middle of the road, blocking his view, and making no attempt to brake as it bore down on the squad car.
'Oh fuck,' said Bolt, tightening his grip on the steering wheel as the two cops with the car dived into the bank, the torch flying into a bush. The lorry hit the patrol car with a huge bang, shunting it into the side of the road, before swerving dangerously to the left as it swung round on to the B184 southbound.
Bolt had to make a split-second decision. Stop and see if the officers were OK, or continue the pursuit. He chose pursuit, knowing there was no way he could let the lorry get away. He braked hard to avoid the stricken squad car, changed down into second gear, drove through the gap between it and the bank on the other side, then slammed his foot to the floor on the accelerator.
The force of the impact had slowed the lorry down and Bolt was rapidly back within twenty yards of it, but soon the road straightened and the lorry quickly picked up speed again.
Then a strange thing happened. The lorry suddenly began to weave wildly on the wet tarmac, and, as Bolt watched, it slewed off the road, knocking over a speed limit sign as it hit the bank and careered along it at a precarious angle, tearing up mud and foliage, until it finally came to a halt, barely twenty yards away. Immediately its reversing lights came on. Bolt knew he only had a few seconds at most to stop it from taking off again. Up ahead he could hear the wail of sirens getting closer, but they were some distance away and there was still no sign of the promised air cover.
Bolt pulled the standard-issue pepper spray from the inside pocket of his jacket and, ignoring Mo's warning shout, leapt from the car and made a dash for the driver's cab, just as the lorry bounced back on to the tarmac.
Sixty-seven
As soon as she realized that the lorry was being chased by the police, Tina knew she had to do something. She hadn't expected them to trace the mobile that fast, and now that they had it was clear to her that the two men in the cab weren't going to come quietly. Their voices were panicked, angry.
'I can't get rid of this fucker!' the driver shouted in frustration.
'There's a fucking cop car in the road!' the other one yelled. 'How the fuck did they find us?'
There was a loud crash as the lorry struck it.
'That'll teach youse!' the driver cried out, laughing. 'Now we sort the other and we're home free!'
That was when Tina summoned up every ounce of strength she had left. Rising up in the back of the cab, she threw the duvet cover over the driver's head, leaning over to hold it in place.
Taken utterly by surprise, he immediately lost control of the vehicle, his cries muffled by the duvet. He lashed out with an elbow, catching Tina in the ribs, but she clung on to him for dear life as the lorry mounted the verge at the side of the road and he swung the wheel wildly, desperately trying to wrest back control.
The passenger, the big shaven-headed guy, turned in his seat with an angry snarl and threw a punch at Tina. She dodged the worst of the blow but the fist still connected with her shoulder and neck, knocking her backwards into the metal grille separating the cab from the rear of the lorry. She twisted her bad foot in the process and screamed out in pain, releasing her grip on the duvet.
The driver yanked it off and braked hard, bringing the lorry to a juddering halt while his passenger leaned over his seat to throw more punches at Tina, who kicked out wildly with her good foot, catching him in the face, adrenalin overcoming the agony the action caused her.