Instinct by Nick Oldham Page B

it didn’t concern Rik too much when Mark saw his chance and fled.
    The two detectives raced to Henry’s car and jumped in. Henry reversed out of the space and screeched on to the road, turning up to the traffic lights on Preston New Road. From there, a left turn would take them towards Blackpool, right to the motorway roundabout at Marton Circle, the M55. The lights were on red.
    â€˜What’s the situation?’ Henry demanded.
    â€˜Not entirely sure,’ Rik admitted, looking at his PR which was alive with traffic and some pretty panicked voices.
    â€˜Find out,’ Henry said.
    Rik hesitated slightly, waiting for an appropriate gap in transmissions into which he could dive. Impatient, Henry snatched the PR and said, ‘Superintendent Christie interrupting.’ From what little he had heard he could tell it was very confusing and, for a short time, no one seemed to be taking proper control. Part of the problem was that patrols were on radio talk-thru, meaning everyone could hear everything being said and could interrupt without permission. On big incidents, this wasn’t always a good thing and sometimes the radio operator needed to take a firm grip, switch off talk-thru and assume total control. Which is exactly what Henry ordered the comms operator, who sounded out of his depth, to do. Maybe it was a new guy. At Henry’s instigation the man took a deep breath, became more authoritative, and cancelled talk-thru. Henry asked him then to recirculate brief details of the incident, offender and vehicle.
    The lights changed to green.
    Henry stuffed the PR back into Rik’s hands, considered his position, zipped across a lane, cutting up another driver, and headed towards the motorway junction. His feeling was that enough people were already at the scene, so he thought that a few minutes sat at the motorway junction could be fruitful. Maybe. A traffic car was en route to do just that, but was ten minutes away at least, so Henry decided to plug that gap for a while. Patrols covering checkpoints such as motorway junctions was pretty standard procedure anyway, basic coppering that sometimes got overlooked in the heat of an exciting incident. Escape routes had to be covered and sometimes it paid off.
    All this was in Henry’s mind when Rik said, ‘We’re not going to the scene, then?’
    Henry gunned the Mercedes, feeling the smooth surge of power at his light touch. God, it felt good. ‘No.’
    â€˜But  . . .?’
    â€˜I know there’s no guarantee, but a Ford Fiesta with a cracked windscreen might just come sailing past.’
    â€˜And pigs might fly.’
    Henry grunted like one. But he knew that being a lucky cop was often about diligence and doing routine things  . . . and patience. He said, ‘Sometimes it happens, especially if an offender is panicking leaving a scene because they haven’t worked out an escape route properly, one that avoids main roads. Sounds like the guy in the Ford was surprised and maybe he didn’t even think he’d need an escape plan.’
    â€˜Mm, whatever.’ Rik would most definitely have preferred to be charging to the scene. Those emotive words ‘ Officer down ’ drew in cops automatically. They always felt the need to be there, even if they ended up acting like headless chickens. Henry, too, felt the urge to be at the scene, but he knew a wider perspective was needed – which is why he was a superintendent. That was his argument, anyway.
    His mobile phone rang and he answered it by pressing a button on the dash which linked to the handset via Bluetooth and also switched the call to speakerphone. Henry grinned, amazed at how he had embraced the technology.
    â€˜Henry Christie.’
    â€˜Henry – it’s Karl. I heard your voice on the radio, barking orders like some sort of mini Hitler.’
    â€˜Karl – you at the scene?’ Henry asked, ignoring the