Page 85 of Her Last Breath

‘That’s the main entrance,’ he said, indicating a rusting door. ‘That’s where most people tend to congregate, do whatever they need to. Then there’s offices on the sides, smaller rooms. He’s hiding in one of those.’

‘Is he armed?’ Jane asked.

‘No way of telling, ma’am.’

Jane looked out again at the warehouse, surrounded by shrubbery and trees further along.

‘What about the other warehouses behind this one?’ she asked.

‘My informant said that they haven’t been able to access any of the other buildings. The one they use had a broken door where the locks had become useless.’

‘Could the locks have degraded on any of the other premises?’ asked Jane.

‘The other main building on site is a death trap. It’s only the scaffolding inside that is holding it up, so they never venture in there.’

Jane checked her watch. Time was passing and her main suspect was right under her nose. They needed to act. She radioed DI Coghill, who was leading the Tactical Aid Unit to get their ETA.

‘Fifteen minutes,’ he said gruffly, after she’d demanded a precise time.

Jane was about to respond when a piercing shriek rent the air, making her jump. Spinning, she saw the blue lights flashing on a nearby patrol car as the siren screamed.

‘Jesus Christ,’ she hissed, as she sprinted to the car that was now lighting up the walls of the warehouse.

‘Switch that bloody thing off!’ she shouted over the noise, her heart hammering in her ears as the siren finally died.

‘Sorry, ma’am, it was accidental,’ one of the uniforms inside confessed sheepishly.

Jane breathed hard, rushing towards the warehouse. There was no way Colin wouldn’t have heard that. They had just alerted the prime suspect to their presence.

Chapter 58

Adrenaline coursed through her as Jane tore through the warehouse. DI Coghill was still ten minutes away and she couldn’t risk losing Wilson again. Inside the warehouse, panicked men and women melted away as she ran through the shadowy interior, DS Johnson just behind her.

Jane saw him first, a scuttling figure darting away into the darkness. For a moment, he looked back and locked eyes with her. It was Colin Wilson, no question.

Jane raised her pace, her lungs bursting as she crashed through cardboard boxes used as makeshift beds, her eyes fixed on the retreating suspect. The stench of the collected rubbish filled her nose; the unmistakable scent of human faeces, blood, rotting food all mixed with the heavy odour of weed and despair.

Against the back wall of the warehouse, Jane spotted an upturned wooden crate. She watched as Colin slammed it against the concrete bricks, hoping to clamber up it to a smashed window, an impromptu means of escape. She sprinted towards him, knowing her job would be much harder if he fled the building. She saw him slip, but then gain purchase on the wooden frame. His fingers dug into the ledge in front of the shattered window as he hauled his body up. A lithe, muscular man, he slithered through the broken window and out into the open, just as Jane grabbed hold of the wooden crate.

Her first attempt to follow him ended in her foot falling through the crate, scraping her shins and knees and studding her palms with splinters. Swallowing down the pain, Jane tried again and this time she managed to get a foothold, only to crash to the ground as yet another wooden slat gave way. Frantically, she looked around, aware that with each second Colin was putting more distance between himself and his pursuers. She spotted an old metal chair, flipped over on the ground. It was rusted and damaged, but it would serve its purpose. Jane pushed it up against the wall, testing it first with one foot before clambering up onto the window ledge.

For a moment, she felt as if she was about to lose her grip and fall, but using her elbows, she pushed herself further forwards onto the ledge, until she was through the window gap; her body falling through open air.

The overgrowth behind the warehouse cushioned her fall and she was on her feet in seconds, in time to see Colin disappear into the second warehouse, tugging aside the corrugated iron door that concealed the entrance. DS Johnson was just behind her as she sprinted over to the now-exposed entrance.

‘Stay here!’ she barked at DS Johnson as he joined her at the entrance. There was no way she was risking another member of her team, given what he had already told her about the structural instability of the second building.

Checking her baton was securely fastened under her suit jacket, Jane switched her radio on so her team and TAU could hear everything, before hurrying into the darkness. Trying to adjust her eyes, she searched for any sign of her suspect.

The building was gutted, only a huge, cavernous space remaining. A complex lattice of scaffolding had been erected within the warehouse, pinned against the damaged walls. A tower of scaffold stood in the centre, broken up by three levels of wooden planking, providing access walkways. No wonder it was empty; who would want to risk their life in here, just to get high? Jane walked slowly towards the central scaffolding, noticing the structure reached the ceiling, holding up parts of the damaged roof.

She spotted Colin, clawing his way to the top, the scaffolding reverberating below him. Was there another way out that she hadn’t spotted?

Grasping the rust-covered poles, her hands already splintered and sore, Jane tried to gain a solid grip to help her climb. She was exhausted, spent from her chase through the first warehouse, but she pushed herself on. The structure started to shake as she grasped one rail after another, propelling herself upwards. Each layer of the scaffolding was hard won, her raw hands protesting as she hauled herself ever higher.

She was drenched in sweat, her lungs burning from the effort of climbing. There were wooden walkways threaded through the scaffolding at intervals; she needed to climb high enough to get onto one of those, so she could rest for a moment. All the while she could feel the thuds and bangs reverberating through the metal poles, as Colin climbed towards the damaged roof.

Pole by pole, Jane scrambled upwards, pulling with strength she didn’t know she possessed, until she reached the first platform. Crashing onto the wood, she lay on her back, panting for breath, looking up to see there were at least two more platformed levels above her. She couldn’t see Colin, but she could hear him. Her heart leapt into her mouth as she heard him fall and cry out; then the grunting as he grasped some support and started climbing again. Jane scrambled to her feet and resumed the painful ascent. Each pole seemed harder to climb, her body weight heavier than it had been earlier, but still she refused to give up, determined that Colin Wilson would not beat her today.