Dead Watch: a fast-paced thriller you don't want to miss Read online

  ‘Not bad, now that we’ve finally woken up Silly-Bollocks.’

  After beating on the door for five minutes with his hammer fists, Lenny had managed to wake the drunken flat owner. They had heard his footsteps pounding down the hallway as he shouted and swore at whoever was on the other side of the door. It was only when he opened it and saw Lenny staring back at him that he quietened down and stepped aside. That was the thing about Lenny; he might have been an arsehole most of the time, but he was Red Watch’s arsehole, and on occasions like this, he was exactly the sort of person you needed on the crew.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ the owner said, now that fight had gone out of him. ‘I must have fallen asleep again.’

  ‘No shit,’ Lenny said, then added, ‘Who the fuck has a bath when they come back from the pub anyway?’

  As he interrogated the man, Wonder Woman took off her tunic and plunged her hand into the bathtub to remove the plug.

  ‘If this happens again,’ she said, ‘we’ll be charging you for wasting our time. Understand?’

  Even though she was an incredibly good-looking woman, she could be just as scary as Lenny when she wanted to be, sometimes even more-so. Wonder Woman was the final piece in the jigsaw that made up Red Watch. Her real name was Joanne, or Jo as she preferred, and her nickname was well-earned.

  When she wasn’t being a firefighter, WW was a dedicated Triathlete. So dedicated, in fact, that she had recently qualified as a member of the Great British Squad for her age group. At thirty-nine, she was one of the fittest people in the brigade. There were few guys who could keep up with her in the sporting arena, and she was equally as focused at work as she was with her training. The phrase “doesn’t suffer fools gladly” could have been invented for her.

  ‘I promise it won’t happen again,’ the owner pleaded. ‘To be honest, I never even thought the fire service came to things like this.’

  That’s how it was with most people; they had no real idea what the job entailed. Fighting fires was only a small slice of the pie; there were plenty of other things they had to deal with too. First, there were the car crashes, or “road traffic collisions” as the service now referred to them, and that tended to be where they saw the really nasty stuff, the things you didn’t forget about in a hurry. Then, there were the lift rescues, floodings, lockins, lock-outs, chemical incidents and other hazardous substances, environmental protection and dangerous structures to name but a few.

  On top of that, there were the animal rescues. Seagull impaled on a television aerial, dog down a hole, cow in a ditch or the good ol’ cat up a tree; you got the fire service out. Then, there were the not-so-normal incidents. A stag gets handcuffed to railings by his pissed-up mates who lose the keys; you call the fire service. A guy can’t remove his cock ring, and it needs cutting off (this had happened to Red Watch); you get the fire brigade. Someone threatens to jump off the roof, falls down a cliff or gets their leg stuck down a drain, then, to quote the Ghostbusters, “Who ya gonna call?” The basic rule of thumb was, if you couldn’t think who else to hold of, then you got the firefighters.

  After they had helped the flat owner clean up the water from his bathroom floor (it was for the old dear downstairs’ benefit, not his), and Dylan and Wesley had done the same for her, they all headed back to the lorry.

  So, this is probably a good time to talk about fire service terminology. A fire engine has almost as many names as the equipment it carries – appliance, pump, truck, lorry, rescue vehicle, water tender, shit cart, along with numerous others depending where in the country you worked. They all represent the same thing, though; the big red shiny thing that sits in the fire station bays, waiting to deal with whatever is thrown at it.

  Just to confuse matters further, you may have noticed the words crew and Watch being thrown around. The Watch is comprised of all the people on a particular station who work together on the same shift pattern, and each of these is named after a colour – red, green, white and blue. The crew refers to the Watch members that were riding the fire engine on that specific day. If you have two appliances at your station, then you would have two crews. And one more thing, even though they work for Sussex Fire and Rescue Service, most firefighters still refer to it as the Brigade, just like it was known in the good old days.

  When they got back on the truck, Harrison was sitting in the driver’s seat waiting for them.

  ‘Anything happening out there?’ Wesley asked him.

  He was referring to the main-scheme radio system. By listening to the messages being passed over the airwaves between various fire engines and mobilising staff at headquarters, it was possible to get an insight into what was going on throughout the service.

  ‘Central and Hove have just been sent to a make-pumps-four in Portslade,’ Harrison answered. ‘Looks like we’re the only ones available in the city.’

  ‘Shit,’ Dylan said. ‘How come we always miss the big ones?’

  Like anyone with only a few years in the service, Dylan was desperate to get some good fires under his belt, and in this case, good meant bad. It wasn’t like he was wishing ill on people, it was just that if there were going to be fires, he would prefer it if they happened when he was on duty. While the older guys were happy to have a quiet night and get a few hours’ sleep, the young pups wanted nothing more than to be in the thick of it, putting out the flames.

  Not that Red Watch had exactly had a quiet night. Things had kicked off a couple of hours earlier with a car fire near the racecourse. Some scrotes had nicked a Volkswagen Golf and, after having their fun, taken it onto the South Downs and torched it. By the time the crew got there, it was, to use a fire service expression, going like a bastard, with ignited petrol pissing out of the cracked tank. When this happened, unlike in the Hollywood films, cars didn’t explode and shoot twenty feet into the air; it just meant the crews had to use a different approach to put it out as water didn’t work so well when it came to fuel fires. As Dylan and Jo had hosed down the car, Lenny, who had hoped to escape doing any work, grumbled to himself as he dragged the foam reel off the appliance to tackle the burning petrol.

  They were only back at the station for five minutes when they were called out to a lift rescue. An old boy in a high-rise was on the way to taking his dog for a late-night walk when the lift had stopped working. When they opened the doors, they were greeted by the smell of freshly laid Corgi shit that almost made Dylan puke. The appliance hadn’t even made it back to the station when they got called to the flooding.

  ‘Seeing as everyone else is out,’ Wesley said, turning to look at the crew, ‘we might as well head into town before mobilising send us there.’

  East Brighton, as the name suggested, was located to the east of the city, with Hove situated to the west. Central, the largest of the three Brighton stations, was in the middle of town. It made sense that if there was only one pump available, then it should be located on Central’s ground, where all parts of the city could be reached in roughly the same amount of time.

  ‘You know what that means,’ Lenny said. ‘It’s one o’clock in the morning on Saturday night, and we’ve got to go into town. Looks like we’ve got ourselves a West Street run.’

  The fire engine came to a stop at the traffic lights, allowing the gaggle of cowgirls from the hen party they had just passed to catch up with them.

  Harrison glanced back at them in his mirror. ‘Brace yourselves. We’ve got company.’

  Dylan leant forward so he could see past Lenny’s bulk and talk to Wonder Woman. ‘Watch the disappointment on their faces when they see what real firefighters looks like.’

  ‘Speak for yourself, shit-pot,’ Lenny said, then pointed both thumbs towards his chest. ‘This is what they want. One hundred percent prime British beef.’

  Jo looked at him in disgust. ‘Pork, more like it.’

  The hen party reached the lorry, and while the others stared into the back, the leader banged on Wesley’s window until he felt obliged to lower it. She hid the l
ook that Dylan had described as well as she possibly could.

  ‘Come on then, Mr Fireman!’ she shouted, tilting back her cowboy hat. ‘Let’s have a look at your hose.’

  Wesley just about managed to smile through his grimace of embarrassment. ‘Having a nice time, ladies?’

  ‘Magic,’ the woman responded. Wesley thought he detected a Bristol accent although it might have been Welsh. ‘But it would be even better if the bride-to-be got a kiss from one of you lovely fellas.’

  It was definitely Bristol.

  Wesley faked a smile. ‘We’d love to, but unfortunately, we’re not allowed.’

  The woman looked genuinely disappointed.

  ‘Bollocks to that,’ Lenny said as he pushed Dylan’s face to the side and stuck his massive head out of the window. ‘Where’s the lucky girl?’

  A shy-looking woman with red hair, sporting the biggest of all the hats, stepped up to the window.

  ‘Good luck, darling,’ Lenny said, leaning forward to plant a smacker on her cheek as he crushed the life out of Dylan.

  The traffic lights changed as the rest of the party gave out a massive cheer. Lenny blew them a kiss before dragging himself back inside the appliance.

  As they drove up the street, Wesley nodded at the two police officers standing in the central reservation. The man gave him a friendly enough smile, but the female officer was clearly not impressed.

  Wesley turned to face the back. ‘I wish you hadn’t done that, Len. It really doesn’t help our professional image.’

  Lenny laughed. ‘Come on, Wes, it was just a bit of fun. We just made their evening.’

  ‘Maybe so, but I certainly don’t think that police officer would agree with you.’

  ‘Which one, the Doris?’

  He turned to Jo. ‘No offence.’

  ‘None taken.’

  ‘She can get fucked,’ he said, ‘I mean, what the fuck is she even doing standing on West Street on a Saturday night? She’s about five foot one, if she’s lucky, and weighs less than my right nut. What’s she going to do if it all kicks off? No offence.’

  ‘Actually, dumb-ass,’ Jo said, ‘I do take offence at that. Perhaps she’s not here to be part of the muscle. Perhaps she’s here to help avoid confrontation. As a bouncer, I thought you’d understand that. Or just maybe, if some young girl’s been sexually assaulted by some scumbag prick, she’d feel more comfortable talking about it to another woman than some meathead like you.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ Lenny said, conceding the argument. ‘You’ve made me feel like a proper nasty bastard now.’

  And to be fair, despite his attempts to suggest otherwise, that was something he wasn’t. If you asked him, Lenny would tell you his nickname came from his likeness to Lenny MacLaine, the hulking bareknuckle boxing champion, who, before his death, had found fame playing East-End tough guys in Guy Ritchie flicks. In reality, the name was given to him by his first watch in reference to Lennie, the mouse-squashing man-child in Of Mice and Men. You definitely wouldn’t call him a gentle giant, he’d break your arm for suggesting it, but usually, his heart was more-or-less in the right place.

  ‘Then, don’t act like one,’ Jo said, the tone of her voice easing.

  As the engine neared the top of the street and slowed for the next set of lights, a group of lads ran alongside the vehicle, banging the lockers. As they came to a stop, the boys turned and held up their middle fingers before quickly taking off.

  ‘This place is a shithole,’ Dylan said. ‘Don’t these kids know there are plenty of better places to go out in Brighton?’

  Lenny shook his head in disgust. ‘Where would you rather be, knobhead? Drinking craft beer in the North Laine, telling the hipster cunts how great their beards are?’

  ‘Why do you keep trying to associate me with the hipsters? I hate them as much as you do.’

  ‘Yeah right. If we were allowed to, and you were capable of growing one, you’d definitely have a beard.’

  ‘No, I wouldn’t.’

  ‘Yeah, you would, and one of those little twirly moustaches. Hipster lover.’

  ‘If you say so,’ Dylan said, slightly agitated.

  Lenny looked out of the window and waved at the two massive bouncers standing outside The Heist. If he weren’t working nights, he would have been there, accompanying them.

  ‘You better get used to this place,’ he said. ‘Because if you get that transfer you want, you’ll be here every weekend. The city boys love it.’

  Dylan shrugged. ‘If I’m ever going to rescue a baby from a burning building, then I’m more likely to do it at Central.’

  He’d had a transfer request in for almost eighteen months, but no positions had become available. It was an understandable move for him. Central was a three-pump station, if you included the aerial appliance. It was also busier, what with it being in the heart of the city. East Brighton was quieter, and a place where many firefighters went to serve out the last few years of their careers. With the exception of him and Jo, the entire Watch had served their time at Central before ending up at East. That’s not to say they didn’t get their fair share of jobs, because they did, and being a one-pump station, when they did get an incident, the lack of manpower meant that things could get pretty hairy before backup arrived.

  ‘Anyway, I don’t know why you’re being such a snob,’ Lenny said. ‘When Jo’s not here, it’s all “Check out the tits on that” and “Look at the arse on her.”’

  ‘No, I don’t,’ Dylan said as his face turned crimson.

  Jo shook her head in mock disgust. ‘And there I was thinking you were a nice boy.’

  They were interrupted by the mobile phone going off in the front of the cab. Wesley picked it up and, after a few brief words, returned the phone to its housing and spoke to the crew. ‘That was mobilising. Barcombe will be here any minute, so we can get back on our own ground ASAP.’

  He actually said ASAP as a word and not separate letters. The others had heard it so many times, they didn’t bother to make fun of him for it any longer.

  ‘Thank god for our retained brothers,’ Lenny said.

  Jo gave him the look. ‘You’ve changed your tune.’

  ‘I like anyone who lets me get my head down for a bit of kip.’

  The computer screen in the front of the appliance flashed as a miniature wailer went off notifying them they had a shout.

  Wesley turned and smiled at them. ‘Looks like your bed’s going to have to wait.’

  RTC: Persons Trapped

  ‘I’ll tell you something for nothing,’ Harrison said as he squinted at the road ahead. ‘I’d rather be dead than in that place. When I can’t wipe my own arse anymore, just give me a nice cocktail of painkillers and send me on my way.’

  ‘What do you mean when?’ Lenny said. ‘I’ll put out of your misery now, if you want, you old bastard.’

  Harrison laughed. ‘Cheeky sod. I’ve still got a few years left in me yet.’

  The fire call had taken them out to Rottingdean, a pretty little village to the east of Brighton. They had been sent to an automatic fire alarm activating in a care home for the elderly and dementia sufferers. As usual, it had turned out to be a false alarm. There was an ongoing system fault, meaning the alarm kept activating, despite there being no obvious reason. In such places, they had a stay-in-place policy, otherwise it would have been chaos as the scared and confused residents, many with mobility issues, tried their best to get outside into conditions that would probably give them hypothermia.

  The drive back to the station along the seafront road was a beautiful one in the daytime. To the left, the land dropped away to chalky, white cliffs giving an unadulterated view of the horizon. On the other side were grassy fields that sloped up towards a row of large detached houses owned by Brighton’s finest. Some were classy, some not so much. In the nineties, the Spanish villa look had become fashionable on the strip, with people trading their dull roof tiles for ones with garish blue or red glazes. But none of them
could stand up to the one house that eclipsed them all.

  ‘Look at that fucking eyesore,’ Dylan said to no one listening.

  Jo was still strapped into her BA set and had fallen asleep with her head hanging so far forward, it looked like it was about to fall off. Wesley was staring wide-eyed out of his window, and Harrison was focusing on getting them back to base before his eyes closed.

  ‘It just goes to show,’ he said, oblivious to the fact that it was a one-person conversation, ‘money can’t buy you class.’

  ‘Stop being such a snob,’ Lenny said, ‘I think the place looks class. Now, shut the fuck up. It’s too late for your bullshit.’

  The house in question was huge. It was actually three houses that had been knocked down and been reborn as a neo-classical mansion complete with giant pillars, murals and fountains that were home to bow and arrow-toting cherubs. It was owned by the notorious businessman, property magnate and all round bad egg, Jonathan Bogarde. The man was one of Brighton’s most powerful, not to mention infamous, residents. Not a week went by when he wasn’t in the local rag for evicting dozens of families from one of his slum buildings, or making shady business deals with dictators in countries with dreadful human rights records. All in all, the man was an out-and-out bastard, and he didn’t give a shit who knew it. The house had been more than five years in the making and had cost him a fortune. At least two construction companies had quit the job in rows over unpaid bills, and after years of legal battles, it was finally close to completion.

  ‘Did you see that?’ Wesley said.

  Harrison looked out of his window. ‘What?’

  ‘Back there,’ Wesley craned his neck to see whatever it was they had just passed. ‘I saw some lights down the bank. I think a car may have gone over.’

  ‘You sure?’ Harrison said.

  Wesley shrugged. ‘I think so.’

  ‘Then, we better go and check it out.’

  While Harrison slowed the truck so he could find a spot to turn around, Wesley turned to the guys in the back.

  ‘Look lively!’ he shouted to them. ‘We could have an RTC here.’