Tania Carver: The Surrogate

He knew what he should do. Call the others. Get a team over here, get that trapdoor open. See what was in there. But he couldn’t leave it to them. He had made a promise to Marina. If she was here, then it didn’t matter. He would have found her, one way or the other.

Taking a deep breath, he opened the trapdoor.

It wasn’t what he had been expecting. It wasn’t a crawl space or a shallow grave. It was a tunnel leading downwards. A wooden ladder was clamped to the side, a thick black cable fastened to the opposite side of the shaft. Electricity, Phil thought. Whatever – whoever – was down there, they had rigged up power.

He shone his torch along the floor, found a ridge in the carpet where the cable snaked in. Must be a hidden generator somewhere, he thought.

He looked down the hole again. It was dark down there, pitch black.

He should call the others over, let them lead the way.

He looked down again.

And swung his legs over, began climbing down.

‘ Shut up! Fuckin’ shut up! If there’s one thing I can’t stand it’s a whingein’ bitch!’

Marina’s kidnapper was standing over her, anger blazing in his eyes. He had walked towards her, exuding an almost primal energy, bent down and smacked her across the face.

It stopped her crying immediately. It also hurt like hell. The blow had been so fierce she had felt like her head was coming off.

She had no doubt that he was more than capable of killing her. And she realised that, even with everything that had happened to her – Martin Fletcher, finding Tony on the floor of their house – until now she had never truly experienced fear.

He bent down again. She tried to get to her feet, but couldn’t. Still sitting, she scuttled away from him.

He reached her quickly. She pushed herself back into the wall. He stood over her, bearing down. She began to whimper.

Then remembered the screwdriver, held it out in front of her with both hands, point towards him. Hoped he wouldn’t notice how much her hands were shaking.

‘Don’t… don’t…’ Her voice was failing her.

He looked down at her. ‘You gonna use that? Eh?’

She kept pointing the screwdriver at him, her hands still shaking.

‘You gonna use that on me?’ He laughed. It wasn’t pleasant. ‘You’d better. You do that again, pick up somethin’ and point it at me, you’d better be ready to use it. ’Cause baby or no baby, I’ll stop you.’

He moved in towards her, his hand outstretched again.

Marina started to cry once more.

Then the lights went out.

‘Bastard…’

The darkness was all-enveloping. Phil was trying to use the torch as he went down, hoping to see how far he had to go, but he was finding it difficult to hold on to it and the ladder at the same time. He missed his footing and the torch fell from his grasp. The light bounced and swung as it dropped down to the bottom of the shaft.

He put his arm out, tried to grab it, and lost his balance, almost following it. Desperately he cast around for something to grip on to and found the black cable attached to the other side of the shaft. He grabbed at it, hoping it would steady him, but when he pulled, transferring all his body weight to it, it came away in his hand.

He flailed around in the dark, trying not to fall. Luckily, his other hand managed to get a grip on the ladder once more. He clung to it, steadying himself. Took a few deep breaths, continued his descent.

As he neared the bottom, he noticed a dim light shining upwards. His torch. Thank God it was still working, because he was sure he had pulled out the power cable. He stepped off the ladder, picked up the torch. Looked round.

He quickly worked out that he was in the cellar of the house that had once stood above him. A quick examination of the walls bore that out. Bare brick with overhead rafters and a hard-packed dirt floor. He swung the torch’s light into every corner. No sign of Marina.

He looked round again, saw a door set into the wall. Heavy and old, made of solid timber. He almost ran to it, trying the handle. Locked. He tried pulling it. Too thick to budge.

‘Shit…’

Then something caught his eye. Against one wall was an alcove. He assumed it must have been a fireplace at one time, with a chimney leading up to the rest of the building. Someone had customised it. Bricks were piled at one side of the opening and it looked as if a tunnel had been hollowed out through the fireplace.

He examined the hole with his torch, making mental measurements. There was no other opening in the room, no door in or out, so this must be the only way through. Phil hated confined spaces. Tried to avoid lifts, even, whenever possible.

But he got down on his hands and knees, the torch clenched in his teeth. He really should go back, tell the others, get them down here. Send them into the tunnel. He tried to look along it, see if there was any light, hear if there was any sound.

Then came a scream.

‘Marina!’

And he was on his knees and into the tunnel, his fear of enclosed spaces on hold.

In the sudden darkness, Marina could feel her assailant in front of her. She didn’t think something like this would stop him getting hold of her. Stop him hurting her. Using the wall behind her as a brace, she pulled herself up to a standing position. Adrenalin kicked in. It was either do something or submit. And she wouldn’t give in without a fight.

‘Bloody generator,’ he mumbled. ‘Bloody power cuts…’

It was now or never. She gripped the screwdriver tightly in both hands and thrust it forward as hard as she could.

It connected. She could feel it hit something solid. She kept pushing, hard. Harder.

He screamed. In anger or pain, she couldn’t tell.

She put all her weight behind the screwdriver, drove it in as far as she could, letting it take her body with it. Then, when she could push no further, she let go of the handle.

‘Bitch…’

She closed her eyes, tried to remember the layout. Turned right, away from where he had been building the cage, and, keeping as low as she could, moved quickly away from him.

‘Fuckin’ bitch…’

She could hear him thrashing about behind her, coming for her.

Her heart felt like it was about to burst as she felt her way along the wall. Her fingers came to a corner. She followed it round. It was some kind of alcove, a recess. An old fireplace, perhaps? Something like that. She didn’t care. It was somewhere she could pull herself into, curl up and hope he wouldn’t find her.

She squeezed inside, aware that the baby was stopping her from getting any further in. She hoped the baby was still all right. There was nothing she could do if it wasn’t. She had to save her own life first.

She made herself as small as she possibly could, held her breath.

Prayed to a God she had long since ceased to believe in, that he wouldn’t find her.

Prayed that she would just survive.

Phil crawled.

Using his elbows to propel him, he worked his way through the tunnel. The torch was heavy in his mouth, his teeth gripping it as hard as he could, his jaw cramping up. He wanted to let it drop, take a rest, but he knew if he did that he would never get it back between his teeth again. There wasn’t room in the tunnel to move his arms, get his hands to place it back there. So he kept moving.

He was committed now. He couldn’t go backwards. There was just enough space for him to keep moving forward. The walls and ceiling of the tunnel were right in on him. Brick, stone and dirt all around, with what looked like prop shafts keeping the ceiling up. It didn’t look too sturdy. If he disturbed it in any way, pushed too hard, it could all come down on top of him at any second.