CHERUB: Brigands M.C. - Robert Muchamore Page 0,99
the brakes, but found his tyres jolting violently over tree roots. He thought he was going head first into a trunk, but he managed to swing past with his jeans scraping bark.
Back on the road the coach driver completed his turn and aligned his front tyres so that his vehicle passed cleanly over the stone slab and the writhing Bitch Slapper. James took a long breath and stuffed the chain into his hoodie pocket before driving in a tight circle and pulling back on to the road.
After a few hundred metres the road broke away from Outlaw Hill and he overtook the coach. Some of the women inside gave him thumbs-up and the Cardiff Brigand in the open doorway waved his machete appreciatively.
James sped on across a taxiway, between the frames of two rusting hangars that hadn’t housed an aircraft in thirty years. The moonlit fields on either side were dotted with couples making out and families enjoying a late picnic. But while some corners of the Tea Party remained calm, James saw an air of panic on the main strip, with vanloads of police parked in the middle of the tarmac and ordinary bikers and their families surging towards the exit gates.
James cruised an access road that ran parallel with the strip and gulped when he saw the tatty stall with Cardinas Spanish Paella – Famous across Europe written across the back. He felt slightly sad as he imagined Reina standing inside with her hair tied back.
The gate James had entered through with the Brigands was manned by one of the bikers in fluorescent security jackets.
‘You want a hand stamp for re-entry?’ he asked. ‘What’s it like up there on the Hill?’
‘Mental,’ James said. ‘Looks like the police are getting ready to go in and I’ve got no intention of going back.’
The coach closed back up behind James as he pulled through the gate and turned right. The traffic was heavy, but the snarl-ups were all in the public car park behind him. Most of the traffic was coming out of the festival, but the headlamps of the few cars coming the other way reflected horribly off the crack in his visor and blinded him.
James had lost count of the beers he’d drunk and as his adrenaline rush wore off he realised he was in no state to make the three-hundred-mile ride back to Devon. He stuck close to the kerb, let cars overtake and hummed an Arctic Monkeys song to stop himself from falling asleep.
When he reached an out-of-town shopping area he pulled the bike up outside a McDonald’s, then checked the area out to make sure that there were no other refugees from the Tea Party around. There weren’t, but it was probably only a matter of time and he didn’t want to be here on his own when a chapter of riled-up outlaws arrived.
James slid out his mobile and dialled the campus emergency number. A man with a brummy accent answered: ‘Unicorn Tyre Repair.’
‘Hey, Ranjit,’ James said, relieved to hear a familiar voice. ‘It’s James, agent twelve-o-three. I’m about fifteen miles from Cambridge with a motorbike. I need you to reserve me a hotel room somewhere nearby. Then arrange for a van to come and pick me and the motorbike up early tomorrow morning and take me back to Devon.’
James waited a few seconds while the emergency mission controller tapped away at his keyboard.
‘OK,’ Ranjit said. ‘I can book you into a three-star or a five-star. Those are both within four miles of your present co-ordinates. Which would you prefer?’
‘Oh let me think,’ James said. ‘The five-star, maybe?’
Ranjit laughed. ‘Why ask, eh? I’ve e-mailed driving directions to your hotel to your handset. Is there anything else you need? Would you like me to contact Chloe Blake?’
‘Yeah, give her a call and tell her I’ll speak to her once I’ve checked in and taken a shower.’
‘You don’t sound so great.’
‘Just knackered,’ James explained. ‘It’s been a bloody long day.’
35. COUSINS
Dante tried not to think about his past as alcohol took hold and the party at the Führer’s house came to life. By quarter to ten you couldn’t get across the conservatory without stepping over teenagers making out. The stereo speakers were out on the lawn and a dozen girls danced barefoot in the grass. The atmosphere in the back lounge was darker, as lads who’d either been blown out or were scared to speak to girls drank hard and bickered over the pool table and dart board.