The Surrogate

by Tania Carver

  She had stabbed him in the stomach. Hard, fast. His shirt front was covered in blood. No longer required to make its way to his heart, it was pumping out of him in gushing torrents.

  ‘No, no…’

  He put his hands on his stomach, tried in desperation to catch the blood in his fingers. Couldn’t. It just ran straight through.

  ‘Oh God, oh God…’

  He stumbled round, not knowing what to do, his panic increasing the rate his blood pumped out at. He looked to Sophie for help. But she had put on her coat, grabbed her holdall, which had been at the side of the armchair. She wasn’t even looking at him.

  ‘Help… help me…’

  His voice, like the rest of him, was becoming weaker.

  She ignored him, walked towards the door.

  Something clicked inside him. He mustn’t let her get away. He had to stop her. Call an ambulance, call for assistance. He fumbled inside his jacket for his mobile, his fingers slippery with blood. Eventually he got it out, punched in 999. No use. He had turned it off on the way to the flat.

  ‘Oh God…’

  He tried to thumb it on. Waited for it to power up, to find his network.

  ‘Come on, please… come on…’

  Dancing black stars were moving into the edges of his vision. He tried to blink them away. But every time he blinked, they just seemed to increase in number. He looked round the room, tried to focus. He was aware of Sophie reaching the door.

  ‘No…’

  The phone had eventually found a signal. He managed to dial 999, held it to his ear. It was ringing. His legs were weak. He felt like he wanted to sit down. He fought it, remained on his feet. Waited for the phone to be answered.

  It was. He was asked which emergency service he wanted.

  ‘Ambulance. I’ve been… stabbed…’

  Sophie heard his words, turned. She crossed the room, took the phone from his hand, threw it as far away from him as she could. It hit the wall. Broke. She nodded, pleased with her action, turned, walked back to the door.

  ‘No…’

  His legs were ready to give way. With one last surge he managed to lurch across the room, blood following him, keeping pace as he went. He reached her by the door, put his hands on her. She turned, ready to swat him away.

  Clayton knew he was fighting for his life. He knew his last breath wasn’t far off and he had to do something. He grabbed her, tried to remember his training. Hung on to her as hard as he could.

  They were fighting by the door when the entryphone buzzer went.

  65

  ‘ This the place?’ said Phil.

  Anni nodded. ‘Yeah.’

  They shared a grim look. She pressed the button, waited.

  Clayton and Sophie stopped struggling, looked at the buzzer in surprise. They both had an idea of who it would be.

  Clayton reached for the receiver, ready to press the release button. But Sophie got there before him. Stopped him from pressing it.

  The black stars were increasing. He knew he didn’t have long left.With all his remaining strength he knocked her hand away, pressed the release button. Shouted down the receiver.

  ‘Help… help me… somebody fuckin’ help me…’

  Phil and Anni looked at each other. They didn’t need to hear any more.

  ‘Which floor?’ asked Phil.

  ‘Second.’

  They ran inside and up the stairs.

  Clayton’s strength was gone. His legs would no longer support him. The black stars were almost obscuring everything else before him. He crumpled in a heap in front of the door. Before his eyes closed, he felt a pang of guilt in amongst the pain. His mother. How he had failed in the dreams she had for him.

  Then his eyes closed. For the final time.

  He didn’t feel Sophie drag him by the legs, try to move him out of the way.

  ‘This one,’ said Anni, outside Clayton’s flat.

  Phil pushed the door. It was locked. ‘Fuck.’

  Then, to his surprise, it began to open.

  He gave a quick glance at Anni. She was prepared too.

  The door opened. There stood Sophie Gale. She stopped moving, surprise on her face. She was hurrying, clearly expecting someone to arrive, but not expecting them to be there waiting for her.

  Phil began to read her her rights.

  ‘Sophie Gale, I-’

  He didn’t get any further. She dropped her holdall, gave him a swift kick between the legs with her booted foot. He crumpled over as pain flooded through him. He thought he was going to throw up; he thought he would never feel the same again.

  Sophie Gale tried to step round him.

  But Anni was waiting for her.

  Although small, Anni was a fierce fighter. She had studied martial arts, picked up a few moves to give her the advantage against someone bigger or stronger than her. Before Sophie could try anything, she curled the fingers of her right hand inwards and flattened the palm of her hand. Then, with as much speed and strength behind the movement as she could manage, she hit Sophie just between her nostrils and her upper lip.

  It was, as Anni knew, a part of the body with plenty of nerve endings. It didn’t take much to have an effect. And Anni had hit hard.

  Sophie Gale’s hands flew up to her face. She screamed in pain. Anni pressed forward.

  ‘Sophie.’

  The other woman’s hands dropped. There was real anger in her eyes. She was readying herself to fly at Anni.

  Anni did the same again, even faster and stronger this time.

  Sophie went over backwards. Anni moved over her, knelt beside her. Punched her in the nose this time. Hard. Blood flowed even faster.

  Then she took a pair of PlastiCuffs from the back pocket of her jeans, grabbed Sophie’s wrists, pulled them behind her back and secured them as tightly as she could.

  She looked at Phil. ‘You okay, boss?’

  He was getting to his knees. ‘Yeah…’ He pointed at the open doorway. ‘Get Clayton…’

  Anni jumped over Sophie’s prone body, saw what was waiting for them in the flat.

  ‘Oh my God…’

  ‘I’ll… I’ll call an ambulance,’ said Phil, getting out his phone.

  Anni moved sadly to the door, stood there, head down.

  ‘Too late for that, boss. He’s dead.’

  Part Three

  66

  Hester looked down at the baby as it lay sleeping in its cot. It was pinker, bigger, healthier than the last one. It was just like she’d seen on TV and in the books. It was everything a baby was supposed to be. And as she looked at it, she expected to feel an overwhelming outpouring of love for it, like the books said. But she didn’t. In fact, she didn’t know what she was feeling.

  No, it wasn’t love. Or at least she didn’t think it was. Because love didn’t make comparisons. Love didn’t judge one against the other. She kept thinking of the last baby. She knew this was a different baby from the last one, with different needs and everything, but even though that one had been sick all the time, she still thought it was better than this one. There didn’t seem to be anything wrong with this one. It was big and strong, like a baby was supposed to be. But Hester felt nothing for it. Why was that?

  She had read somewhere that this happened sometimes, mothers not bonding, rejecting their babies. They got depressed and wouldn’t do anything for them. Maybe that was it. Maybe she was rejecting it. Maybe she was wrong about not looking back and it was too soon after the last one. Maybe. Or maybe she just wasn’t interested any more. Bored with babies, time to do something else.

  She was thinking all this while she was staring at the TV. The news was on. Hester was watching again to see if they said anything. Something seemed to be happening, because the reporter looked even more serious and the smooth policeman, the one she liked, was talking to the camera again. She couldn’t understand the words, though.

  The phone was ringing in the background. Hester didn’t like answering the phone, so she closed her
eyes, called for her husband. Asked him to answer it. He didn’t reply and it was still ringing. She would have to do it herself.

  Reluctantly she crossed the room, picked up the receiver. Listened.

  It was for her. And it wasn’t good news.

  Call finished, she replaced the receiver and stood there. It was like she had been physically hit. Punched in the face. And that punch had more than hurt her; it had rocked her world on its axis. She closed her eyes, absorbing the impact. Opened them again. And in that instant her world changed.

  Her head was spinning, mind reeling. She looked at the TV, still spitting out news. It didn’t seem important now, not as real as what was happening here. She felt like crying. She felt like screaming. So she did both. It woke the baby but it also made her husband appear.

  Shut it, woman.What’s that fuckin’ noise for?

  ‘They’ve got her.’

  Who?

  ‘They, they’ve got her. They know about the babies. And that means they’ll be comin’ for us…’

  Tell me.

  She told him. Everything. Where the list came from, who had supplied it. He listened, silent. Not a good sign.

  I knew, he said eventually. Where the list came from.You really think I didn’t?You thought you were bein’ clever, keepin’ it from me, but I knew.

  ‘But… why didn’t you say somethin’?’

  Why should I? Was what you wanted.What I wanted.

  ‘But it was…’

  Didn’t matter.

  She was relieved that he wasn’t angry. But that wasn’t important now. She could feel panic overwhelming her. ‘So… we’ve got to do somethin’.’

  He didn’t reply.

  ‘I said we have to do somethin’!’

  The baby started crying. Hester ignored it. This was more important.

  ‘We could run,’ she said. ‘Yeah. Go somewhere where they wouldn’t find us. Take the baby. Be a family.’

  No reply.

  ‘Talk to me! Tell me what to do!’

  The TV was still on. He stared at it, tried to concentrate, decided what his next move should be.The news.The smooth detective was still talking.Then the image changed and it was the woman from last night, the one he had seen outside the leisure centre.The pretty one.The pregnant one. He thought she was saying the same things again until he realised it was just a recording of the previous night. He watched her mouth move. Smiled. A plan was forming.

  All hunters needed a strategy. Especially an exit strategy.

  He put on his overcoat and went outside.

  Work to do.

  67

  Phil parked the Audi in the car park, got out, closed and locked the door. Then leaned against it, sighed. Eyes closed. Clayton Thompson. His DS. Dead.

  He shook his head, whether in disbelief or to clear it of the images from Clayton’s flat he didn’t know. Probably both. His DS, the one who had irritated him no end but who somehow he had still found likeable, lying twisted and broken on the floor of his flat. The walls and floors covered in his blood, thrashed out of his body as he fought against death, struggled to live. All in vain.

  There was a moment in every murder investigation in which Phil had taken part that made him contemplate, usually after a couple of drinks on his own, the big issues. Life and death. The human condition. Why we were here, alive in this universe. God and a divine purpose versus blind evolutionary chance. He would look into the faces of the family left behind as they struggled to fill the void that the death of their loved one had created and know they were thinking the same things. If the victim was one of the lost souls he saw all too often, with no one to love them in life or grieve for them after it ended, his questioning was just intensified.

  It was a regular process he went through. And he never found any answers, formulated any convictions or reached any conclusions. But during those alcohol-fuelled dark nights of the soul, he often imagined the dead were calling to him. Asking him to be their champion, to avenge their deaths, bring peace to their families. He would usually sober up the next day; carry on with his life, his job. Rationalise the night before as merely bottle-induced dark fantasies. And then, more often than not, he caught the murderer. Solved the crime. And the ghosts would disappear.

  But he was never completely sure they were truly gone. Because when the next murder occurred, they returned, another added to their number. And now, on top of all the pregnant women, Clayton would be joining them. Joining the three a.m. line-up, imploring Phil to help them, avenge them. He knew it.

  He shook his head once more, opened his eyes. The station was directly in front of him. He played the events of the inquiry over and over again in his mind. Re-examined Clayton’s every word, every look. Tried to find something, some clue or indicator that might have told him what was going on. He found nothing. His heart felt as if it had been attached to a rock by bonds of guilt and regret and thrown into the River Colne. Sinking fast, on a one-way, bottom-bound journey. As that happened, he felt the familiar bands begin to constrict his chest, like an invisible boa constrictor he carried with him always that had to remind him of its presence every so often.

  His breathing quickened, pulse speeded up. He couldn’t take it any more. He needed rest. He needed escape. He needed…

  Marina.

  The thought hit him like lightning cracking a tree trunk. Marina. It was so simple. It was so complicated. Marina.

  Taking strength from that thought, he crossed the car park, went into the building. All the way to the bar. As he entered, he felt all eyes on him. Unspoken questions, condolences, affirmations of solidarity. He knew they wanted to step forward and speak, all of them, but he also knew that none of them would dare. Eventually they stopped looking, went back to their work. They needed something. They needed him to say it.

  ‘Listen up,’ he said, standing still. ‘Everyone.’ He waited until he had the whole team’s attention. Took a deep breath, ignored the tightening in his chest. ‘Right. You all know what’s happened. And it’s a blow. One of the biggest we’ve ever had. But we’ve got the person who did this. So that’s something. And we’re going to make sure that the rest of this case is wrapped up as tightly and securely as possible. Clayton was a good copper. He was a friend to a lot of you. He was my friend too. And I’m going to miss him.’ He took a deep breath. Continued. ‘But we’ve got a job to do. So let’s get on with it. Thanks.’

  He sat down.

  Silence.

  One person clapped. Then another. And another. Until the whole team were applauding. Phil smiled, blinked wet eyes. ‘Get back to work,’ he said.

  Refocused and re-energised, they did as they were told.

  Phil put his head down, looked at the work in front of him, the reports. Knowing they weren’t going to write themselves, he got on with it.

  Eventually he became aware of someone standing before him. He looked up. There was Marina. Coat on, bag over her shoulder.

  ‘Hey,’ she said.

  ‘Hey yourself.’

  ‘Good speech.’

  ‘Thanks,’ he replied. ‘They needed something.’

  She nodded.

  ‘You heard.’

  ‘Whole place has heard. Everyone wants to get her in an interview room, have a crack at her.’ She glanced round the office. ‘They’re taking this one personally.’

  ‘How could they not?’

  ‘What about you?’ she said. ‘You still on the case? Personal interest and all that.’

  He rubbed his eyes with the backs of his hands. Thought of the questioning he had undergone at Clayton’s flat. They were his own people, they had been sympathetic. He and Anni had brought in Sophie Gale and there was no question she had killed him. But, like him, they had their jobs to do.

  ‘Well I suppose I shouldn’t be. But the Super at Chelmsford wants me to do the interview. So…’ He shrugged.

  She smiled, nodded. But her eyes were downcast. ‘Good.’

  ‘I want you working with me again
. We’ve got to get this one right.’

  ‘Well…’ She glanced about, at anything and anyone but him. ‘Sorry. I can’t.’

  He frowned, looked at her. ‘What d’you mean?’

  She lowered her voice, as if she was almost embarrassed by what she was about to say. ‘I… can’t stay. I have to go.’

  ‘What? But I need you.’ He closed his mouth quickly, wondered how that statement had been received. Wondered how he had really intended it.

  ‘Sorry. I can’t.’

  ‘Why not? Is it money? I know we can stretch the budget, get some cash from the Home Office-’

  ‘It’s not money. I want to stay. Believe me.’ Their eyes locked. Honesty passed between them. He believed her. She sighed.

  His voice dropped. ‘What then?’

  ‘I need… I have to go to the doctor.’

  ‘A doctor’s appointment?’ Phil almost laughed. ‘Well that’s okay.You can get it rearranged.’

  ‘No. I can’t.’

  ‘Yes you can, just-’

  ‘No.’ Her voice louder, sharper than she had intended. She looked round quickly to check no one had heard. They hadn’t. ‘I’m pregnant.’

  Phil stood, unblinking, unbalanced, like he had been hit and was reeling, about to fall backwards.

  Marina put her head down, averted her eyes from his. ‘I’m sorry.You shouldn’t have found out like this.’

  Phil said nothing. He looked round, saw the office, felt the unreality of the situation.

  ‘I’ve got to go.’ She made to move away. He put his hand on her arm, stopped her.

  ‘Is it… mine? Ours?’

  She looked away once more. ‘I’ll talk to you later.’

  ‘Is it?’

  As he spoke, her hand went involuntarily to her stomach, massaged the bump that her baby made. Phil saw the action, looked up. Caught her eye to eye. A sheer, nakedly emotional connection. Neither could look away.

  In that moment he knew. And she knew it too.