‘Keys!’ he yelled at the shocked man, who threw the keys at Dan and raised his hands in the air in one fluid motion.
Dan pushed Sarah into the car, and then ran round to the driver’s side. Starting the engine, he gunned it, grinned at Sarah and reversed out of the parking bay. Changing gear and hauling the steering wheel round at the same time, he spun the car so it pointed towards the car park exit and floored the accelerator.
There was an audible crash from the back seat as vegetables and tin cans of food tumbled to the floor of the car.
Sarah’s hands shook as she tried to fasten her seatbelt. Dan glanced over at her, a confused look on his face.
She shrugged. ‘I believe David about your driving.’
Dan braked hard and Sarah was thrown forward into her seatbelt. ‘Jeez,’ she gasped, as she reached down to ease the tension against her chest and stomach. ‘That’s going to leave a dent.’
‘Missed him though,’ Dan pointed, then put his foot down on the accelerator again. Sarah looked back over her shoulder as they took off, a security guard madly waving his arms in their wake.
He wrenched the wheel round hard and stomped on the brake. The gearbox whined in protest as he crashed through the gears, downshifted, then guided the car round the corner and accelerated hard down the street.
Sarah hung onto her seat, knuckles white as she slid across the car. ‘We’re losing him!’ she yelled.
‘Do you want to drive?’ Dan yelled back, as he swerved to miss an oncoming truck, the driver gesticulating furiously at them as they tore past.
Dan wrenched the wheel around hard to his left. The tyres shrieked in protest as the car slid across the wet bitumen. He feathered the throttle to bring the vehicle back under control, and then slammed his foot on the accelerator. The car bucked forwards and he straightened it out, blasting past a bewildered cyclist.
‘Can you see him?’ he screamed to Sarah.
She pointed to a car’s tail-lights at the end of the street.
‘There. Going round that corner. Quickly, Dan – we’ll lose him!’
Dan floored the pedal and swung the car round the junction. Turning right, he slid the car forty-five degrees and overtook a white panel van, braking hard as the road turned sharply left and then ran parallel with the Thames.
The black sedan’s tail-lights glinted a few hundred metres in front of them. Dan eased off the accelerator and followed at a distance.
‘Dan?’
Sarah glanced over at him, confused.
‘Aren’t you going to stop him?’
Dan shook his head.
‘I can’t – I don’t know how that bomb is designed to detonate. I need him to get it to its destination in one piece.’
He broke off as his mobile began to ring. He rummaged in his jacket pocket and handed the phone to Sarah.
‘Get that.’
She flipped open the phone.
‘Hello?’ She turned to Dan and mouthed, it’s David.
‘David? We’re following him – he just turned on to the Embankment… no, he wants to wait until the car stops – he says it’s too dangerous… okay.’
She hung up and held the phone tight in her hand.
‘David’s got a team about two minutes behind us. They’ll follow at a distance. He’s got a visual on us from the helicopter.’
Dan risked a look out his window and glimpsed the tell-tale lights of a helicopter at low altitude. ‘Good – as long as they keep their distance. I don’t want this guy to get spooked…’
He broke off as the black sedan slewed to the left-hand side of the road. Its brake lights flashed once, then again as it drew to a stop.
‘Shit!’ Dan sped up and overtook the car. ‘Don’t look at it, for Christ’s sake! Let’s just hope he doesn’t know we were following behind him!’ He continued driving along the street until he saw a left-hand turn and steered around the corner. ‘Phone David back – they’re going to have to tell us where Terry is heading now so we can try to get there first – hopefully we can hide before he shows up.’
Sarah opened the phone and began to dial, her hands shaking. She relayed the message and fell silent.
Dan kept the car at a slow speed until Sarah finished the call.
‘David says the car’s heading for a wharf off of Wapping High Street – Philippa’s tracking us and says we can pass him further along here.’ She pointed ahead of him.
‘Okay, just yell out the instructions as we go – and keep your fingers crossed we can beat him to it.’
Chapter 48
Brisbane, Australia
Delaney burst through the door to his office, slammed it shut and locked it. His eyes darted around the room. Sweating and out of breath, he forced himself to breathe slowly. It was all falling apart.
Delaney pulled his mobile phone from his jacket pocket and hit redial. He put the phone to his ear, closed his eyes and leaned back against the door. He listened as the same tone-flat recorded message informed him Uli Petrov’s mobile number was no longer available.
He disconnected the call, and then looked up sharply as his desk phone began to ring. He strode across the office and snatched it from its cradle. ‘What?’
He closed his eyes and rubbed his hand over his face as he listened and processed the information. ‘When?’
He leaned against the desk. His heart raced. This couldn’t be happening. ‘Send the report to my private fax line.’
He put the phone down and walked around the desk. Pulling out a drawer, he felt around until he found a small plastic bottle. Pulling it out, he twisted open the lid and shook it until two small white pills fell into his hand. He shoved them in his mouth, swallowed them and threw the bottle back in the drawer. He slammed it shut and turned as the fax machine began to print.