Page 2 of No Safe Place

Wednesday | Early hours

Field

In seconds, the night went from dull routine to life and death.

They’d just got back in the car after a call to assist during kicking-out time at a pub, when the radio crackled into life.

‘Circulation of an I-Grade. Ambulance Service requesting assistance for a male found with multiple stab wounds on Ancona Road, Plumstead. Is anyone available to respond?’

The easy atmosphere, their chat about swapping back to day shifts after a run of nights – it was forgotten.

Field put her coffee into the cupholder and pulled the radio from the dash. ‘Control – Hotel Charlie Six-Four, we’re round the corner. Show us en route.’

She punched the street name into the car’s satnav, but Riley was already pulling away – his superior sense of direction the reason he was often behind the wheel.

Blue lights. Siren.

The radio crackled again. ‘Hotel Charlie Six-Four received. Update from LAS: subject is unresponsive. Sending further LAS and locals.’

Adrenaline was already pumping, making the tips of her fingers tingle and her heart beat harder in her chest.

Riley took a corner at speed and Field threw out a hand to stop herself smacking into the passenger window. The radio went off constantly with patrol cars responding.

‘Show Two-One.’

‘Eight-Zero-One.’

Riley glanced at the satnav. ‘I’ll have us there in two minutes, boss.’

‘Six-Four, any update, Control? Are suspects on scene?’ Field said into the radio.

An Audi in front of them chose to speed up instead of pulling over. The pedestrian crossing to their right meant they couldn’t overtake – and Field smacked her hand against the dashboard.

‘Say that again, Hotel Charlie Six-Four?’ Control said, finally.

‘Are suspects on scene?’ Field shouted.

She shot a look at the speedometer. Riley was doing fifty down Plumstead Common road, the dark street oddly lit as they flew down it.

‘Unknown at this stage. We’ve passed to Metro Alpha for review.’

Metro Alpha – serious enough to need firearms on standby, then.

Riley put his foot down. ‘One minute.’

She wiped her hands on her black trousers, smoothed her hair. Pulled an extra set of handcuffs from the glove box and secured them to her belt.

Heading up a Major Investigation Team didn’t involve as many sirens and active scenes as Field’s civilian friends assumed. She couldn’t deny the thrill of a boring on-call night shift interrupted.

‘We’re here, boss,’ Riley said, indicating and swinging onto Ancona Road, and braking hard.

An Ambulance Response car was parked across the other end of the street, doors still open.

Control spoke over the radio. ‘Two cars on their way to you, Hotel Charlie Six-Four. Five minutes out.’

Field threw her door open, and the heat hit her, like the first step off a plane abroad. She popped the boot, grabbed her stab vest and pulled it on.

She didn’t wait for Riley before running towards the scene, clipping the radio to the left panel of the vest.

A huddle of people in pyjamas and dressing robes blocked the victim from view.

‘Police—’ Field pushed through the gathered crowd. She could hear the victim wheezing before she could see him. ‘Police – stand back.’

They parted, stumbling.

Two paramedics were already working on the victim. One was by his head, a young girl with dark hair back in a bun, listening to his chest through a stethoscope.

The older paramedic was cutting through the man’s shirt like it was made of tissue paper. ‘He’s unresponsive. Collapsed airway – at least five stab wounds.’ He looked up at Field, pink scissors frozen by the man’s collar. ‘This is nasty.’

Field grabbed her baton and flicked her wrist to extend it. A woman next to her jumped and clung to her husband.

There wasn’t as much blood as she’d been expecting. A pool of blood meant arterial, death in minutes.

‘Any sign of the attacker?’ Field barked at the paramedics. Neither spoke, but both gave one shake of the head.

Riley appeared on the victim’s other side, baton out, and nodded at Field.

Protect the medics. Always the first duty of the police on an active scene.

Field held her radio to her mouth. ‘TOA Hotel Charlie Six-Four. We’ve got an IC1 male, approx. fifty years old. Not conscious, trouble breathing. Male appears to have multiple entry wounds, including one to the neck.’

Field turned so she was facing outwards, scanning up the street towards the ambulance, while Riley faced their unmarked car.

It was impossible to see much beyond the pool of light cast by the headlights.

‘Chase firearms, Control. We might need a chopper so get HEMs on standby, and identify a suitable landing location.’

‘Is he going to be okay?’ asked one of the neighbours, the husband of the scared woman.

Field glanced down. The female paramedic was talking soothingly to the patient, while unwrapping a large needle, which Field suspected would be going straight into his chest.

Her stomach flipped.

She turned and the small crowd were still standing there, gawping. Unable to look away.

‘I need everyone to get back inside,’ Field shouted. ‘We don’t know it’s safe out here.’

No one moved.

‘I’ve got a major internal bleed here, Lea,’ the male paramedic said. ‘Coag bandage.’

People were craning round her, trying to see, and Field snapped. ‘Get back in your houses, now .’

They jumped – scurried away.

‘You—’ Field pointed at two men with bloodstained arms and T-shirts, who must have tried to help before the paramedics arrived. ‘Go inside, but don’t touch anything. Don’t take those T-shirts off.’

She scanned the street again, gripping the baton tighter. The front gardens were small, tiny patches of grass and some window boxes – not big enough for someone to hide.

She hoped.

More front doors were opening.

Field turned the volume up on the radio and spoke into it, eyes still ahead. ‘Control, I need that backup, now .’

She didn’t hear the response.

‘Detective, I’m going to need you to give us a hand here,’ the male paramedic said. He kicked a box of gloves towards her.

Field gritted her teeth, passed the radio to Riley.

As she kneeled, Riley moved closer to them, baton up.

She looked at the victim properly, for the first time, as she pulled the gloves on. His skin was grey, and his breathing was erratic, rattling. He was hooked up to a portable monitor and his BP was low – the red numbers glowing.

The fingers of his left hand were twitching. He was wearing a wedding ring.

He had collapsed below a silver birch tree, bark glowing in the gloom. Its leaves were casting dappled shadows across his bare chest.

The paramedic snapped her back to the present. ‘Right, I need to deal with the neck wound while Lea intubates, so I need you—’ he handed Field a thick wad of gauze ‘—to apply pressure here.’

The top of the man’s jeans had been cut away too, and Field saw a deep gash in his thigh, blood oozing down into the space between his legs.

How many times had this guy been stabbed?

She pushed down firmly on the wound and watched the man’s face, hoping to see him flinch or groan.

No response.

‘I’m Lea,’ the female paramedic at the man’s head said. ‘This is Mike.’

‘Field,’ she said with a nod, glad to have names for them. ‘That’s Riley.’

The exposed skin of the victim’s chest was patchy with bright blood, smeared by the medics. It was hard to see the wounds, but Field could count at least five.

The blood on the pavement looked darker, congealed. Field’s knee was an inch from the slowly growing pool.

‘Right—’ Lea spoke loudly but with a soothing tone. ‘This is going to hurt but we need to get this needle in, okay? It’s going to help with your breathing.’

She might as well have been talking to the tree.

Field focused her gaze on her own hands as the needle pierced the man’s chest plate.

‘Cars are arriving, boss,’ Riley said, somewhere above her. ‘At least one ambulance too.’

And then they were surrounded by uniforms – officers with batons out, forming a proper ring around them.

Two more paramedics joined, unfazed by the gasping, dying man, unzipping bags and pulling out dressings.

‘Keep that pressure on, Detective,’ Mike ordered. ‘Don’t ease up until someone’s ready.’

Field’s arms were starting to shake with the effort, sweat running down her face.

She pressed harder and looked up at Riley. ‘Firearms?’

He looked pale in the moonlight. ‘On the way from Lewisham. Three minutes out.’

Then blue-gloved hands were taking over from hers, and Field sat back on her ankles, panting. She had an iron taste at the back of her throat, like she’d breathed the blood in.

There were five medics around the victim, now, and a sixth unpacking a defibrillator.

Her gloves were sticky with blood, hands sweaty inside them. A young PC materialised – evidence bag already outstretched.

When the gloves were off and bagged, Field felt her sense of control return. She could concentrate on being a police officer, leave the lifesaving to the professionals.

Where is the knife?

Which direction was he attacked from?

Which route is the attacker most likely to have taken?

Mike’s voice: ‘He’s going into shock.’

Field turned back to watch them. Lea was still speaking in a low, soothing voice, right by the man’s ear.

This is going to end up a murder investigation.

The thought had popped into Field’s head before she could stop it.

Upstairs windows were opening all along the street, shocked figures leaning out, holding up phones.

Riley strode towards her, thumbs tucked into his vest. ‘We’ve got six PCs and a skipper. Told four to stay with our victim, got one at each end of the road. Cordon going up now.’

‘Good. The blokes who found him – bag their clothes.’ Field pointed at one of the houses – door still wide open, like there wasn’t a madman with a knife on the loose. ‘Take a quick statement – timings, whether they know the victim – anything that’s going to be helpful now .’

Forensics was going to be tricky with the paramedic intervention. She pulled a torch from her belt and shone it at the ground.

There was more blood than she’d realised, stretching down the street, towards their car. Their attacker must be covered in it.

A different pitch of siren in the distance, the wide headlights of a black van and then firearms officers were pouring onto the road.

It was progress: they had the bodies – and gunpower – to keep the scene safe.

‘Detective?’

Field jogged back to the paramedics.

Mike stood, breathing hard. He had dark stains on his uniform. ‘We’ve got five minutes to get him stable enough to get into the van or—’ He gave a grim shrug and returned to crouching.

As a rule, if a stabbing victim wasn’t in the back of the ambulance or a chopper within twenty minutes, chances of survival were slim to none.

The scene was a mess. Boot marks in the blood, bandage wrappers littering the street.

The victim had tubes in his throat, the needle in his chest rising and falling rhythmically, now – the paramedics breathing for him. One medic had his hand inside the slice to the thigh.

Field retrieved evidence bags and gloves from the car. She needed to ID the victim.

Time was elastic, and in seconds she was back by the paramedics.

Trying not to get in the way, Field dived into the man’s pockets – the job made easier by the fact his jeans were in ribbons. Her hand closed around a wallet, and she teased it out between the green jump-suited bodies.

Field sat back and flicked it open, squinting to read the name on the driving licence.

David Moore.

There were three ￡20 notes inside.

Not a mugging.

Heart racing, Field bagged the wallet.

‘His name is David,’ she called, and Lea looked up, flashed her a grateful smile.

‘David?’ Lea said, over the low urgent chatter of her colleagues – passing each other equipment and negotiating for space. ‘David – my name is Lea, okay? I’m right here with you.’

The medic next to Field stood up. He had been kneeling on a sheet of paper. It seemed so out of place, a piece of bloodstained A4 tangled in the detritus and ruins of his clothes. It wasn’t Field’s, and it wasn’t something the paramedics had used.

She caught the page by one of the corners.

The Disordered Approach to Diagnosis: a pilot study of—

Field was distracted from the sheet by the raised voices of the paramedics.

‘He’s coding. I’ve got no pulse – I need epi and fluids now; get ready to charge—’

Field twisted, seeking out Riley. Ancona Road was now swarming with people. Police tape was going up, more paramedics were on standby to support. There was a slight whine as the defibrillator charged.

‘Clear.’

Riley was a few metres away, looking sombre. She was glad. She wanted him here to witness this, to understand the magnitude of what they were dealing with.

‘You’re okay, sweetheart,’ Lea intoned, stroking David Moore’s hair while her colleagues alternated chest compressions. ‘You’re okay.’

Field looked away from the bloody mess of David Moore’s chest, and went to bag the items she was holding.