Dead Man's Grip

at everyone he passed, ‘Please, if you witnessed the incident come over to my car and give me your names and phone numbers.’
    He opened the tailgate and dragged out a folding POLICE ROAD CLOSED sign, which he erected a short distance behind his car. At
the same time he shouted into his radio that there was a potential hit and run and he needed the fire brigade, the Collision Investigation Unit, the inspector and backup PCSOs and uniformed officers.
    Then he grabbed a roll of blue and white POLICE LINE DO NOT CROSS tape, tied one end around a lamp post and ran across the road, securing the other end around a parking sign on the pavement. As he was finishing he saw two more officers from his unit running towards him. He instructed them to tape off the road on the far side of the lorry and grab names and phone numbers from anyone else who might be witnesses.
    Then, inside the taped cordon, he pulled off his reflective jacket and threw it over the severed leg, wanting both to spare people the horror of it and to stop one particular ghoul in a raincoat taking any more photographs of it.
    ‘Get the other side of the tape!’ he shouted at him. ‘If you’re a witness, go to my car. If not, move along please!’
    More emergency vehicles were arriving. He saw a second ambulance and a paramedic car which would be bringing a specialist trauma doctor. But his main focus now was on identifying the drivers of the lorry and the Audi from the mass of rubberneckers and potential witnesses.
    He saw a smartly dressed woman with rain-bedraggled hair standing near the open driver’s door of the Audi. She was staring, transfixed, at the lorry.
    Hurrying over to her, he asked, panting, ‘Are you the driver of this car?’
    She nodded, eyes vacant, still staring over his shoulder.
    ‘Are you injured? Do you need medical assistance?’
    ‘He just came out of nowhere, came out of that side street, straight at me. I had to swerve, otherwise I’d have hit him.’
    ‘Who?’ Surreptitiously he leaned forward, close enough to smell her breath. There was a faint reek of stale alcohol.
    ‘The cyclist,’ she said numbly.
    ‘Were there any other vehicles involved?’
    ‘A white van was right behind me, tailgating me.’
    He had a quick look at the Audi. Although the bonnet was
crumpled and the airbags had deployed, the interior of the car looked intact.
    ‘OK, madam, would you mind getting back into your car for a few minutes?’
    He gently took her shoulders and turned her round, away from the lorry. He knew that if drivers of vehicles involved in an accident stared at a serious casualty for too long, they would become traumatized. This woman was already partway there. He steered her over to the Audi and waited as she climbed in, then with some difficulty pushed the door, which seemed to have a bent hinge, closed.
    As he did so, he saw a PCSO running over towards him. ‘Any more of you around?’ Pattenden asked him.
    ‘Yes, sir.’ The man pointed at two more Police Community Support Officers approaching, a short distance away along the pavement.
    ‘OK, good. I want you to stay here and make sure this lady does not leave her vehicle.’
    Then he ran towards the two PCSOs, delegating each of them to scene-guard at either end of the crash site and to log anyone crossing the police line.
    At this point, to his relief, he saw the reassuring sight of his inspector, James Biggs, accompanied by his duty sergeant, Paul Wood, coming, grim-faced, through the rain towards him, both men holding a reel of police tape and a police traffic cone under each arm.
    At least now the buck no longer stopped with him.

13
    Carly sat numbly in her car, grateful for the rain which coated the windscreen and the side windows like frosted glass, at least making her invisible and giving her some privacy. She was aware of the dark figure of the PCSO standing like a sentry outside. Her chest was pounding. The radio was on, tuned as it always was to the local news and chat station, BBC Radio Sussex. She could hear the lively voice of Neil Pringle, but wasn’t taking in anything he said.
    The image of what was going on underneath the lorry behind her was going round and round inside her head. Suddenly Pringle’s voice was interrupted by a traffic announcement that Portland Road in Hove was closed due to a serious accident.
    Her accident.
    The car clock said 9.21.
    Shit. She dialled her office and spoke to her cheery secretary, Suzanne. Halfway through