Rough Justice Read Online Free PDF Page B

Rawstorne looked over at her daughter and held out a hand. ‘Amy, come on! Come with us!’
    ‘He’s going to be all right,’ said one of the paramedics, as Amy climbed in after them.
    Mrs Rawstorne put a protective arm around her daughter. ‘Just bloody drive,’ she snapped. ‘Get him to a real doctor – now!’
    Two cops pulled Maloney out of the house. He was struggling and two more rushed over to grab a leg each. They lifted Maloney up and carried him to the van. He bucked and kicked but the four officers were big men and used to dealing with uncooperative prisoners. Maloney cursed and spat at them, but his struggling intensified when he saw Simpson in the back of one of the ambulances. ‘This is all your bloody fault, Simpson!’ he roared. ‘I’ll bloody well have you for this.’
    The detective looked up when she heard Maloney verbally abusing Simpson and went over to the four officers who were restraining him. ‘Put him in with the other one,’ she said, gesturing at the van that contained Grimshaw. ‘Cuff him first and, judging by the way he’s kicking, I’d restrain his legs too.’ The four armed officers had never met the detective before and didn’t know her rank but her tone was enough to convince them to do as she said.
    ‘You’re bloody dead, Simpson,’ screamed Maloney. ‘When I get my hands on you, you’re dead meat.’
    ‘A gag wouldn’t go amiss either,’ said the woman, as she walked over to the ambulance where the paramedic was attending to Simpson. She pointed at the injured man. ‘Keep them apart,’ she said, to the two armed officers guarding him. ‘Put him in the van over there.’ A third vehicle was parked next to one of the armed-response vehicles.
    The paramedic finished applying a plaster to the graze. ‘He’s good to go,’ he said. ‘It’s just a scratch.’
    The two armed officers frogmarched Simpson to the back of the police van. The rear doors were already open and they shoved him inside. The uniforms were just about to slam the mesh door on him when the detective told them to wait. ‘I’ll ride with him,’ she said, and climbed in.
    ‘Are you sure, ma’am?’ said one of the uniforms.
    ‘Don’t worry, boys, I can take care of myself,’ she said.
    The officers closed and locked the mesh door, then closed the two outer doors.
    The detective looked at Simpson and smiled. ‘Well, Spider, that didn’t go as well as we hoped, did it?’
    Dan ‘Spider’ Shepherd, undercover operative with the Serious Organised Crime Agency, scowled at her. He wanted to shout and swear but Charlotte Button was a lady and his boss so he just smiled thinly. ‘I’ve had better days, Charlie,’ he said. He put his hand up to touch the plaster and winced. ‘I’ve got one hell of a headache.’
    ‘Would you like some paracetamol?’
    ‘I nearly bloody well died, Charlie. I’m supposed to be one of the good guys and the cops came this close to putting a bullet in my head.’
    ‘Moan, moan, moan,’ said the van’s driver, as he twisted around in his seat. Shepherd grinned: it was his dour Scottish colleague, Jimmy Sharpe. ‘Where to, m’lady?’ he asked.
    ‘Take us back to the safe-house in Bristol,’ said Button.
    ‘Can I use the siren?’
    ‘No, you can’t,’ said Button. ‘Any more backchat and I’ll drive and you can walk.’
    The safe-house was an office above an estate agent’s in north Bristol. There were two designated parking spaces in the yard behind it and Sharpe parked the police van next to his Lexus. He got out, walked around to the rear and opened the doors, then the cage.
    Button stepped out, unlocked a green door that was covered by a CCTV camera and led Shepherd and Sharpe up a flight of stairs where she unlocked a second door. They went into a large, open-plan office with two sash windows overlooking the street below and a small kitchenette off to the right. One wall was lined with surveillance photographs of Alex Grimshaw and his gang.