The Surrogate’s Gift

by Davis, L. G.

  As soon as he found out what happened, he had rushed to the hospital. When I was transferred to a larger, better equipped one in Tallahassee, he took the short drive up from Wellice every day to see me.

  My eyes well up as I look at my friend. “I can’t believe Agnes saved my life,” I say to him.

  That night, Agnes had stayed with me as I drifted in and out of consciousness, and rode with me in the ambulance. She looked down at me with worried eyes as I was wheeled into surgery for the emergency C-section.

  The woman I thought hated me and wanted me gone called the cops on her own daughter, and she put out the fire that was threatening to burn me alive.

  When I came out of surgery, she was gone. I never got to talk to her, to ask why she did it, or how she happened to be there at the right time.

  A nurse enters and smiles down at me. “How’s the pain?”

  “It comes and goes,” I murmur.

  My eyes travel down the length of my body, taking in the bandages on my hands, legs, and feet. I can’t see the one around my head, but I feel it resting against my sore scalp.

  “You’re so brave, but I’ll give you another dose of painkillers to make you comfortable. You’ll be up and running before you know it.”

  Doctors told me I’m lucky to have only suffered second-degree burns. A full recovery is expected, and the hair-producing follicles on my scalp should heal and allow for hair regrowth.

  The burns on my body are the last thing on my mind.

  “How’s the baby?” I ask Clayton.

  He waits until the nurse leaves and shifts closer to the bed. “The baby is perfect,” he says. “Have you thought yet about what you want to do?”

  “I’m keeping her,” I say without hesitation.

  I didn’t come into this process thinking I would end up with a child, but the idea of giving the baby to someone else, especially after everything we’ve been through, terrifies me.

  I’m the only one she has. Marcia is probably going to prison for the rest of her life, and Travis, her biological father, doesn’t get to have a say. I may have been lucky, but he didn’t survive the night of horrors. The paramedics were able to revive him on the scene, but he died at the hospital. The cause of death wasn’t the large amount of blood he had lost. He suffered a cardiac arrest during surgery.

  That leaves only me. The surrogate. The mother.

  I’m alive because of the child I was carrying. I tried killing myself before, and I failed. If that surrogacy ad had not popped up on my screen, giving me something to live for, I’d probably have tried again.

  Three days ago, the baby gave me the courage to run through fire in order to save us both. She went through so much and still lived. We both did.

  “Are you sure?” Clayton grins. “If that’s what you really want to do, I think it’s great.”

  “I’ve never been surer about anything in my life. She’s my baby.” Tears well up in my eyes and Clayton pulls a tissue from his pocket and dabs them away.

  “You’ll be one hell of a great mom,” he says, his own eyes moist.

  “Thank you.” I pause. “I’ll try my best.”

  Becoming a surrogate was a chance for me to wipe the slate clean. At the end of the journey, I had hoped for a fresh start. That’s what I got, just not in the way I thought.

  They brought the baby to me an hour ago, and when I looked into her face, for the first time in years, I felt a flicker of joy. They promised to bring her again before lunch. I don’t have a name for her yet. I want to take my time to make sure it feels right.

  “Have you heard anything about Marcia?” I ask Clayton. “Has she said anything yet?”

  “According to the papers and the gossip in town, no. Apparently, she stares into space all day.” He pushes a hand through his hair. “But enough evidence was found among the remains of her art studio, and in the basement of their house, to prove she committed the three murders.”

  “She really killed those women?”

  “Looks like it. She killed Daisy herself, but she hired someone to kill the others. The hitman was also her private investigator. He turned himself in yesterday morning.”

  I close my eyes, thinking about the woman I thought I knew. “I almost feel sorry for her. She was hurting.”

  “I do too. Folks around town are saying that she was a very jealous woman, and she accused most women in Wellice of sleeping with her husband, especially the female employees at MereLux, Inc. That’s why she was on an extended leave.”

  Marcia said she took a step back from the family business to be present during the pregnancy. She lied.

  “Could she have made up the affairs?”

  “Maybe, maybe not. But to tell you the truth, I don’t much care at this point. I’m just happy you and the baby are safe.” Clayton puts his hand on mine. Even with a bandage between us, an electric current flows from him to me.

  We don’t speak, just sit in silence until a neonatal nurse walks in with the baby in her arms. My baby.

  The moment she places her in the bassinet next to my bed, I smile and say her name for the first time.

  Rachel.

  Epilogue

  I spin the cake around, making sure the white icing is covering every inch.

  Satisfied, I pick up the candle, shaped like the number two, and press it into the center of the chocolate sponge cake. I’m about to put sprinkles and butterflies on the edges and sides when the doorbell rings.

  I rush out of the kitchen to the living room, where Clayton is sitting on the floor, building Lego towers with Rachel and Heidi. The room is decorated with a birthday banner, streamers, pom-poms, and gray and pastel pink balloons.

  “Isn’t the party starting in two hours?” Clayton asks.

  “It’s supposed to,” I say. “Sydney has a habit of coming early. Let me see if it’s her.”

  Three months ago, Sydney did make her dream of visiting Africa come true, and she and Jeff renewed their vows in the Namib desert of Namibia. The two of us are heading on our girls’ trip to Austria in four months.

  On my way to the front door, I rub my hands up and down the flour-covered kitchen apron.

  When I open the door, I gasp.

  “Agnes?” I whisper.

  She’s standing in front of me, holding a box draped with a white cloth.

  I haven’t seen her since Marcia’s trial, when I sat on the witness stand, recounting the events of the night she tried to murder me and the days that led up to it.

  “I’m sorry to come unannounced,” she says. Her voice is different, deflated. “I thought you might not want to see me.”

  I stare at her, my tongue too thick to let any words out at first. Finally, I say, “Do you want to come in?”

  “No,” she says. “You’re probably busy with your daughter’s birthday. I don’t want to get in the way.”

  “You came all the way to Miami. You might as well come in for a few minutes.”

  She hesitates before stepping over the threshold.

  We stand opposite each other as if no time has passed, but a lot has changed. She certainly has.

  She’s wearing a plain beige T-shirt and jeans, and her graying hair is tied back in a ponytail. With no makeup on, I’m able to see the marks left behind by the past.

  Instead of hate, I’m overwhelmed with sympathy.

  “I’m sorry,” she says. “That’s what I came to tell you.”

  She’s waited this long to come and speak to me. Even in court, she avoided me. But I no longer hold anything against her, especially since she was not behind the crimes I accused her of.

  “Thank you,” I say. “Thank you for saving my life that night.”

  She blinks several times. “It’s the least I could do.” Her voice is shaking. “I didn’t hate you, Grace. I just didn’t understand the situation. Maybe I didn’t want to.”

  “Most people didn’t,” I reply.

  From the corner of my eye, I notice a movement. I can sense it’s C
layton, but I don’t turn to look at him.

  Unfazed, Agnes continues, “I apologize for the things I said to you, and most of all, I’m sorry for what Marcia put you through. She was not herself, not as long as she was in that marriage. I always knew that Travis was not good for her.” Her gaze leaves mine and drifts to the box in her arms. “It wasn’t his fault. I know now that she was the problem. She had an unhealthy obsession with him. But I had no idea it was, well, deadly.”

  She looks up again. “Your hair is nice. The short cut suits you.”

  “Thank you.” I run a hand through my hair, my fingers passing over the coin-sized scar at the back of my head, leftover from my burns. “Agnes, you don’t have to apologize,” I say. “Time heals not all, but most wounds.”

  She gives me a sad smile. “How’s your daughter?”

  “Rachel,” I say. “Her name is Rachel. She’s fine.”

  “You named her after your sister?” she says and I nod.

  I never wanted my story to come out to the public, but during Marcia’s trial, the press was able to uncover the reason why I became a surrogate in the first place.

  “Marcia spoke to me last week,” she says, lowering her eyes to the box in her hands.

  I raise an eyebrow. “She did?”

  Marcia, who’s serving her prison sentence in a prison in downtown Tallahassee, hasn’t said one word to anyone since the night she tried to murder me. No one was able to make her speak, not the police, not the press, not her own mother.

  “What did she say?”

  “She told me to give you this.” She puts the covered box in my arms.

  “What is it?”

  Agnes slides the cloth off to reveal what’s inside.

  Meow.

  Marigold’s sound causes tears to spring to my eyes.

  “She wants you to have her,” Agnes says. “You and the cat must have formed quite the bond.”

  “We did,” I whisper.

  I guess Agnes is not the only one apologizing. In her own way, Marcia is too.

  When I put a hand on the pet carrier box, Agnes touches my hand. “You’re engaged,” she says.

  I turn to look at my fiancé, then back at her. “We’re getting married next year.”

  “Congratulations,” she says to me and Clayton.

  “Thank you,” we both say.

  We grew closer while I was in the hospital. When I got discharged, our relationship progressed at a speed that took both of us by surprise. A year after I left Wellice, Clayton moved to Miami, landing a job with one of the most prestigious law firms in the city.

  As for me, I started a nonprofit magazine that features articles of real, raw stories from real women who want to be heard. No glamor, no cosmetics. I run the magazine part-time with a small team while working as a senior editor for a publishing company.

  All in all, life is good, and my daughter has everything to do with it.

  It’s an hour after Agnes leaves that I find the envelope taped to the underside of the carrier box. With Marigold in my lap, I read the letter inside.

  * * *

  Dear Grace,

  I hope you’ll take a moment to read this letter.

  Let me start by saying I’m sorry. I’ve had enough time to think, and I realize that I punished you for a crime you did not commit.

  If you think I’ll try to talk myself out of the other crimes I committed, I won’t. Yes, I was involved in the murders of Lorie Dawn, Julia Williams, and Daisy Lane. I’m guilty as charged, and I belong behind bars for murder.

  Do I regret what I did? I wish I could say no, but I’d be lying. You will be shocked to hear that those women did not sleep with my husband. The affairs did not happen. But my mother always told me that prevention is better than cure.

  What my mother also taught me was that if I want something, I should be willing to do everything it takes not only to get it but also to keep it.

  That’s what I did. The moment I laid eyes on Travis, I knew he was the one I wanted to keep. Most people don’t really mean it when they say “I do,” but I did.

  My husband appreciated beautiful women, and he loved to photograph them. That must be the reason why he took all those photos of you. I knew about his appreciation for beautiful women long before I married him. After the wedding, I wanted to be the only woman he looked at.

  My jealousy almost destroyed our marriage. In the end, he quit photographing other women. It was his gift to me. I thought that would be the end of it. But as we both know, women are everywhere, not only in the modeling industry.

  Lorie, Julia, and Daisy all had their eyes on my man. I killed them, and I do not regret it. If I had not done it, my husband would have left me for one of them. I knew he was capable of it. When we met, he was in a serious relationship with someone else. I was the other woman… until I wasn’t.

  I thought you were one of the women who lusted after my husband, that you were out to betray me, but after hearing about your sister and watching you on the stand, I knew you were innocent.

  You were my friend, and you genuinely wanted to help me, while also helping yourself heal in the process. Maybe Travis had his eye on you, but you didn’t encourage him.

  I’m sorry for misjudging you. I’m sorry for making your life hell. I’m sorry for pushing you to the brink of death. Maybe one day, you’ll forgive me. Maybe you won’t. I don’t know if I care at this point… about anything.

  You probably don’t care how I’m doing, but I’m glad to say that I’ve never been more at peace. The day they told me that Travis was dead, I had the best sleep I had in years. His death means that I got what I want. Our marriage lasted “till death do us part”. I was the last woman he loved.

  Now that he’s gone, so is the fear and constant anxiety of losing him. The war is over, and I can rest in my little cell and wait until we meet again on the other side.

  Grace, this letter is not an invitation asking you to visit me. I never want to see you again. It will be too hard for both of us. Seeing you will remind me that I almost killed an innocent woman and baby.

  It’s hard to live with the knowledge that you’re the mother of my husband’s child, but some stories don’t end the way we want them to. They end with a twist we don’t see coming. Mine did. You got the better end of the deal and I don’t begrudge you for it. You were my only real friend, Grace, and after what fate and I have put you through, you deserve a break.

  I’ve asked my mother to bring Marigold to you because, in the end, she liked you more than me. Now you get to keep her and the baby.

  In this envelope, you should also find a check of fifty thousand dollars. Please take the money. I owe you more than that for the pain I caused you and your baby.

  Have a good life, Grace, and continue to protect that baby from people like me.

  Goodbye forever,

  Marcia

  * * *

  Someone coughs. I wipe my eyes and look up to find Nina standing in the bedroom doorway.

  Still reeling from what I just read, I go and hug my future mother-in-law. “I had no idea you were coming.”

  “I wanted to surprise you. I didn’t want to miss my new granddaughter’s second birthday.”

  “Thank you,” I say. That’s all that’s left to say. Thank you.

  I’m grateful for the things that happened. I’m grateful for the things that didn’t.

  For two years, I tried to understand why Marcia did the things she did. Even though I’m shocked that she killed innocent people with no remorse, her letter is the key I need to lock the door to the past forever and start again on a clean slate.

  I’ll donate some of the money to the recycled goods shop in Wellice, where I’d bought Sydney’s handbag, and the rest will go toward Rachel’s education fund.

  “No,” Nina says. “I’m the one who’s thankful. You gave my son a brand-new life.”

  She takes my hand and together we stand on the landing, watching Clayton tickling the girls on the shaggy
living room carpet.

  He pauses to gaze up at us and winks.

  If I had the power to go back and change anything in my life, I’m not sure I’d want to. If what happened didn’t happen, I wouldn’t be here, where I belong. Sometimes happiness can only be found at the end of a dark tunnel.

  Thank you for reading The Surrogate’s Gift. If you enjoyed the book, please take time to review.

  To be notified when L.G. Davis releases a new book, please visit www.author-lgdavis.com to sign up for her newsletter.

  * * *

  THE END

  Connect with L.G. Davis

  Connect with L.G. Davis:

  www.author-lgdavis.com

  Email: Liz@lizgdavis.com

  Also by L.G. Davis

  Don’t Blink

  The Janitor’s Wife

  The Midnight Wife

  The Stolen Breath

  The Widow’s Cabin