Tania Carver - The Surrogate

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.’

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.

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.