Tania Carver: The Surrogate

Phil gave a grim smile. ‘Clayton, I think you’ve just discovered a metaphor for policing in the twenty-first century,’ he said.

He looked out of the window. They were on an industrial estate in Braintree, a few miles south of Colchester, just off the A12. Low-level metal and brick buildings surrounded them, stretching all the way from the main road to the railway line running from London to East Anglia. Directly ahead of them was a double set of metal mesh gates bearing the name B & F METALS. Behind the gates was another low-level metal and brick building with a forecourt on which stood a pair of huge cranes and several trucks and lorries. Cars were parked at the side. Metal canisters were piled all around: old gas bottles, fire extinguishers. Further on were huge square bays made out of old railway sleepers in which sat various kinds of scrap metal, piping, wire and old electrical appliances. One of the cranes was moving, a grabbing claw on the end of it. As they watched, it lifted a massive handful of metal from a bay, swung it round and deposited it into the back of a waiting high-sided lorry.

Phil shared a look with Clayton, turned off the engine.

‘Come on,’ said Clayton, getting out of the car, ‘let’s do it.’

‘Yeah,’ said Phil. ‘Clock’s ticking.’

Clayton stopped to give him a look. ‘Nothin’ to do with the clock. Just a relief to get away from that awful music you keep playin’. Glasvegas? You listen to some shit.’

Phil stared at him, said nothing.

‘With all due respect, boss,’ mumbled Clayton, his eyes dropping.

Clayton had an attitude on him. Phil knew that. Most of the time he tolerated it because his junior was a damned good copper, but sometimes he overstepped the mark. Phil often wanted to hit him. But just as often wanted to praise him.

‘Well at least it’s better than that stuff you listen to,’ said Phil. ‘Just how many songs do we need by black ex-gang members boasting about their genitals and their bank accounts?’

Clayton didn’t answer, just looked sullenly at the ground, a naughty schoolboy facing detention.

‘Now get your head straight,’ said Phil. ‘We’re going in.’ He started off, Clayton trudging behind him.

They knew this wasn’t going to be an ordinary death-message delivery. In running a routine check on Claire Fielding’s boyfriend Ryan Brotherton before coming to his place of work, they had found something interesting. He had done time in HMP Chelmsford for assault. The reports were over five years old, but from what they could gather it had been a previous girlfriend he had assaulted. This had made them all the more interested in talking to him.

Phil and Clayton walked into the yard. Men, barrelchested and shaven-headed for the most part, dressed in dirty work clothes, went about their business. Phil knew immediately that they had been clocked. He also guessed that most of the men who worked here had had run-ins with the police before so weren’t inclined to help them or ask what they were doing here. They would assume it was bad news and hope it didn’t concern them.

They found an office at the corner of the main building, the glass streaked with grease and dirt. They knocked on the door. It was answered by a woman; blonde and middle-aged, but fighting it hard. Petite but pneumatic, her breasts, lips and expressionless forehead screaming surgery, she was dressed like a secretary in an eighties porn film. As the smile she gave them faded once she worked out who they were, Phil reckoned she might have had a run-in with the law too. For something entirely different.

He held out his warrant card, Clayton doing likewise, and introduced themselves. ‘DI Brennan and DS Thompson. Could we come in?’

‘What’s this about?’ Her voice had a hardness that no amount of surgery could soften.

‘Better we talk inside, I think.’

Looking round warily, she reluctantly led them into the office. Inside was bare-walled and functional. Not a place for interior designers or feng shui consultants. Two desks, two computers, two phones. A charity calendar on the wall. Metal filing cabinets.

‘What’s this about?’ she said, not offering them a seat.

‘We’re looking for Ryan Brotherton,’ said Clayton, trying to move his eyeline away from her breasts and, Phil noticed, not entirely succeeding.

Knowing she had his DS, she turned to Phil, stuck them out further.

‘What’s it concerning?’

‘It’s a private matter.’

No one moved. The phone rang. She ignored it.

‘Shouldn’t you get that?’ Phil said. ‘Might be work.’

She still didn’t move.

‘Want me to?’ said Phil, moving towards the desk.

She beat him to it, grabbing the receiver and saying, ‘B and F Metals,’ then listening. ‘Right, Gary, can I call you back in a minute?’ She put the phone down, turned back to them.

‘Ryan Brotherton?’ said Phil, reminding her.

‘And I want to know why you need to see him.’

‘Look,’ said Phil, trying to keep a lid on his irritation, ‘he’s not in any trouble, he’s not done anything wrong. We just need to have a few words with him.’

He looked at her, didn’t break eye contact. She wavered, looked away. ‘I’ll go and get him.’

She left the office, walked across the yard. Clayton watched her go.

‘You okay?’ said Phil.

Clayton shook his head as if coming out of a trance. His face was unreadable. ‘Yeah, uh… not your average scrap-metal dealer,’ he said.

‘This is Essex, remember,’ said Phil, trying not to look, but unable to stop his eyes tracking her swinging hips like a spectator at Wimbledon. ‘Wonder why she wants to work here? Surrounded by all those men?’

‘Maybe that’s your answer,’ said Clayton, not bothering to disguise his leer. ‘Might consider a change of career…’

‘Focus, sonny. Think with your brain, remember. Look around. See anything that might help us?’

Clayton scanned the office, giving it close scrutiny. He shook his head.

‘Me neither.’ Phil returned his attention to outside the window.

As they watched, the pneumatic secretary walked to the bottom of the grabber and gestured to the man in the cockpit. He swung the arm over a bin and left it dangling there as he put the brakes on and opened the cab door, leaned out. Phil got a good look at him. He was big, and not unattractive, fine-featured. His hair was close-cropped, his upper torso very well muscled. He listened to what the woman said, his eyes going to the office, following her pointing arm. He didn’t look pleased.

‘Look at those guns,’ said Clayton. ‘Whoever he hit didn’t stand a chance.’

Ryan Brotherton got out of the cab and made his way across the yard to the office. Not in a good mood. He reached the cabin, opened the door, stepped inside. The space was small enough; with his large frame as well as the two of them, he seemed to suck all the air from the room.

‘Yeah?’ he said.

Phil held out his warrant card again. ‘DI Brennan and DS Thompson,’ he said.

‘So?’

‘Can we have a word, please?’

Brotherton shrugged.

Phil noticed the pneumatic secretary trying to enter the office. ‘In private.’

Brotherton noticed her entering too, didn’t try to stop her. ‘This is Sophie. Anything you have to say to me can be said in front of her.’ His face twisted into an expression that on someone else could have been a smile. ‘And I’ve found, Mr Brennan, that when your lot are around it’s better to have a witness.’

Phil weighed his options. Reassure Brotherton that he had done nothing wrong, insist on privacy. Or just say what he had to say to this unpleasant man, no matter how painful, and get out. He decided on the latter.