‘Have you been following that awful story on the news?’ Mark asks. I see him force down a swallow, wondering if he’s overstepped the line. ‘That poor pregnant woman?’
‘Which pregnant woman?’ I say, making him squirm on purpose. I smile a little, to let him know I’m kidding, that of course I’ve heard about it.
‘It’s just dreadful. How could anyone . . . ?’ He doesn’t know how far to go. Does he think I’ll fall apart if we talk about it?
‘Is that the murdered pregnant woman story?’ Diane, ears pricked, comes in from the kitchen carrying a tray of coffee mugs. ‘I couldn’t believe it. And guess what? My mum actually knows the dead girl’s mother. They went to school together years ago and keep in touch. When the photo of the dead woman came on telly, her mum was in the background and my mum recognised her. And the surname was a giveaway. Frith’s not that common, is it?’ Diane passes round the mugs – mine says ‘Give me a gherkin NOW!’ on it. No one really knows what to say about the murder. We see enough tragedy in the department without adding to it.
‘You don’t have to keep quiet about it for my benefit,’ I tell them. ‘It’s no more awful for me to hear about it than for you. Just because I’m pregnant doesn’t mean I can’t hack real life.’ I shrug and try not to think about what that woman must have gone through before she died. Two lives unnecessarily lost.
‘Have the police arrested anyone yet?’ Mark says, slurping coffee and returning to his computer.
‘Don’t think so,’ Diane says. She tucks a strand of dark hair behind one ear and crunches into a biscuit. She swivels to face her desk. ‘My mum’s going to go round later. See if she can help.’ She’s tapping at her keyboard.
The first call of the day comes in. A local GP is worried about a young patient. There’s a teenager in crisis and it’s up to me to sort her out.
*
Christine Lowe hasn’t changed much over the years. Despite multiple pregnancies, various abusive partners, having all her kids taken off her, and a drug habit that would impress even the hardest of addicts, these days she’s a quiet, almost well-mannered woman who’s resigned to her lot in life.
‘Come in,’ she says. A cigarette bobs between her lips as she speaks. Her house doesn’t smell as bad as it usually does, and it looks as if she’s even made an effort to tidy. Two German Shepherds are slumped in front of a gas fire. Beside them on the floor lies the baby in a very well-used Moses basket. Christine doesn’t kick up much of a fuss when we come any more.
‘Who have we got here?’ I ask.
‘Nathan,’ she says resignedly. ‘Any chance his grandma can see him before you take him? She’s been in hospital.’ She yanks a dog away by its collar as it moves lazily to sniff the baby’s face. More a maternal action on the dog’s part, I feel, and I doubt Christine would have intervened if we’d not been there.
‘That depends,’ Mark says. He gives me a glance.
‘On what?’ she snaps. She’s never got on with the men in the department.
‘On whether you manage to stick to the care plan we set out.’ Mark is taking notes.
‘How long is your mother going to be in hospital?’ I ask, trying to rouse the baby. I don’t like what I see. I want this baby out of here.
Christine puts a hand to her forehead and wobbles. She’s very pale. ‘Sit down,’ I tell her. She dissolves into the sofa and a dog rests its chin on her knee. If only the dogs were in charge. ‘Have you eaten today?’ I ask. She shakes her head. ‘Where’s your partner?’ Immediately I remember Mark telling me he’s back in prison again. It’s a wonder Christine gets pregnant at all.
‘The nick,’ she confirms.
‘Is Nathan feeding properly?’ He hasn’t made a noise or moved since we arrived. I know the health visitor will visit every day but, until the paperwork is finalised, our hands are tied.
‘Yeah,’ she says. I can see she’s thinking hard, trying to remember. Christine has learning difficulties. Part of me wonders if she even knows that it’s not normal to have your baby taken away as soon as it’s born. She stares at her son. ‘He likes milk,’ she adds, as if the notion’s a revelation.
‘When did he last have some?’ I ask. Mark is stroking the baby’s head now, trying to wake him. Slowly, he stirs. ‘Turn off the fire,’ I say, suddenly noticing how stifling the room is. There’s no air.
‘He had some in the night,’ Christine replies, pleased with herself. She’s very skinny for a woman who’s recently had a baby. I’ve piled on the weight since being pregnant.
‘You’re having one too,’ Christine says, beaming at me. She gets up and steps towards me, hands outstretched. She rests them on my belly. I’m so shocked that she’s done this, I can’t move. ‘It’s a boy,’ she says, beaming.
You’re wrong, I think, already knowing I’m having a girl.
I lean over and whisper in Mark’s ear, ‘We need to get him out soon.’ Mark nods. We both know that unless Christine agrees, we’ll need an emergency court order.
‘Would you like to have a break from looking after baby Nathan?’ I ask. Even though I want nothing more than to scoop up the little mite, take him home, feed him, bathe him, cuddle him, things have to be done the right way. There are papers to be signed, and I know she could change her mind at any moment.
Eventually, Christine gives me the vaguest of nods and I say a silent prayer of thanks before we all leave for the office. I phone ahead to alert the team. I already have a nice foster home in mind.
8
‘I’M OFF THEN,’ Lorraine said, ducking into Adam’s office on the way out. He looked up from his desk. ‘To interview Sally-Ann’s parents, remember?’ She rolled her eyes. Adam raised a hand in a half-hearted wave as she left. He was immersed in something.
Lorraine took DC Patrick Ainsley with her, her favourite of the new blood that was flowing around CID. Between the pair of them, the GP who had just stopped by to administer more sedatives to the mother, as well as a rather traumatised family liaison officer, they managed to get Mrs Frith to string some coherent sentences together. Just a hunch, Lorraine thought as the woman gradually and painfully opened up, but she reckoned it would be the mother who would be the most help, rather than the stern, somewhat aloof father who had yet to react to the fact that his only daughter was dead.
‘I just can’t believe it,’ Mrs Frith kept repeating over and over. Her voice was brittle, barely there. ‘Pinch me, pinch me for God in heaven’s sake. Make me wake up from this nightmare.’ She rocked, clutching a bunch of tissues.
‘I’m so sorry about your loss, Mrs Frith. It’s incom-prehensible how someone could do this. Please be assured we are doing everything in our power to find whoever’s responsible.’
Responsible, Lorraine thought sourly. Whoever did this didn’t have an ounce of responsibility in them. She’d only said that word to avoid using the word ‘murderer’.
‘Can you tell me when you last saw your daughter?’ Lorraine was ready to take notes. DC Ainsley was in charge of the recording. They’d agreed to it this way – nothing formal, but important that they could listen to the Friths’ comments later. It never ceased to amaze Lorraine what could be missed first time round. ‘Mrs Frith?’
‘Last Saturday,’ Mr Frith interjected coldly. He’d hardly said a word. ‘Daphne went round to see her, didn’t you?’ He stared at his wife. Lorraine supposed he was still in shock, grieving in his own way, even though his words were emotionless, as if it was all a bit of a nuisance.
Mrs Frith nodded in agreement.
‘What time on Saturday would that have been?’ Lorraine asked her. She leant close in the hope she would answer for herself this time.
‘In the morning,’ she replied quietly. She was shaking uncontrollably.
‘Late morning,’ Mr Frith added.
‘And how did Sally-Ann seem to you?’ Lorraine glanced at DC Ainsley.
‘Fine. She was excited but nervous about having the baby.’
‘She was hav
ing a planned Caesarean section, I understand.’
‘Yes.’
There was no need to ask why. The hospital had already confirmed that Sally-Ann had a placenta praevia – a condition where the placenta had grown to block the baby’s natural exit route. The obstetrician had explained to Lorraine how a C-section was imperative, but then halted when she’d interrupted, explaining that both her daughters had been born this way for exactly the same reason. ‘Unlucky,’ was all he’d said, and Lorraine had to agree.
‘So it was very important that Sally-Ann didn’t go into natural labour,’ Lorraine stated. Mrs Frith nodded. Lorraine remembered her obstetrician telling her all those years ago that if she did go into labour, she’d suffer life-threatening internal bleeding and the baby would be deprived of oxygen once the placenta detached. It wasn’t exactly a win-win for either party and a pre-planned surgical delivery was the best option. Timing was everything.
‘So awful,’ Mrs Frith managed to say. ‘That she died anyway.’ She snatched a look at her husband as if she knew what was coming. Her eyes filled with tears.
‘God wanted to take her and her bastard baby one way or another,’ Mr Frith said. He crossed himself.
‘I understand that’s your grief talking, Mr Frith,’ Lorraine said, trying to loosen the chill that had taken them all by the throats.
‘No, it’s not,’ Mrs Frith said pitifully. ‘He hated that Sally-Ann was going to have a baby.’
‘Why was that?’ It was for this very reason that Lorraine had decided to tape their meeting.
‘She wasn’t married,’ Mrs Frith whispered, as if even saying the words was a sin.
‘And no grandchild of mine was going to be born out of wedlock. It was shock enough knowing that Russell Goodall was the father.’ Mr Frith’s face was bursting red with hatred and anger. Blue-black veins wiggled across his cheeks and his strawberry-like nose, indicating a lifestyle that was most ungodly.
‘Are you certain Russell Goodall was the baby’s biological father?’ DNA testing would soon tell them but she wanted their opinion.
‘Sally-Ann told us he was,’ Mr Frith said. He let out a half growl, half sigh.
‘No, Sally-Ann wasn’t sure, Bill,’ Mrs Frith continued. ‘She was a . . . a popular girl.’
‘Slut, you mean.’
‘Carry on,’ Lorraine said to Mrs Frith.
‘She had two boyfriends. She couldn’t decide between them. When Liam found out about the baby, he didn’t want anything more to do with her. He said it couldn’t possibly be his,’ Mrs Frith explained meekly.
‘Fucking whore, that’s what she was.’
‘Bill!’ Mrs Frith said as loudly as she could. ‘Our daughter was not . . . she was not like that.’
‘What’s Liam’s surname, Mrs Frith?’
‘Rider. Liam Rider.’
‘And married with a family of his own, I might add.’ Mr Frith’s hands were balled into tight fists. He sucked air in and out as if there was no oxygen left in the room. ‘No wonder the dirty bastard went running when Sally-Ann got pregnant.’
‘So you can’t be sure who the baby’s real father was?’ What mattered more, Lorraine knew, was who each of the two men believed the father was.
‘Sally-Ann got herself in a state over it. When Liam wanted nothing more to do with her, she tried to forget him,’ Mrs Frith said. ‘She wanted to scribble him out of her life, but it was hard. She loved him.’
Literally, thought Lorraine as she remembered the scratched-out name in the pregnancy file.
‘Russell stepped up to the mark. He’s a kind-hearted boy,’ the mother continued.
‘He’s a loser, that’s what.’ Mr Frith’s turn again.
‘Where did Sally-Ann meet Liam Rider?’ Lorraine asked. ‘Who did she know first?’
‘She’s known Russ since she was at primary school. Liam, though, she didn’t meet him until she enrolled on that college course. He was teaching her bookkeeping. Everything changed when she met Liam.’
‘Teaching her how to be immoral, more like,’ Mr Frith said. His face appeared to balloon at the cheeks and turn a deep shade of beetroot, then he broke down into dry, rasping sobs. He covered his face and dropped his head. The top of his scalp was swept across with strands of grey, greasy hair.
Lorraine glanced at Patrick. They gave the man a moment.
‘Let it out, love,’ Mrs Frith said, but he shrugged her hand off his back. He was going to have to do this his own way.
‘One more question.’ Lorraine drew in breath but then stopped. She’d been going to ask why they thought Sally-Ann had put Russ Goodall as her next of kin on the pregnancy file and not either of them. But staring at them in turn, she kind of guessed.
*
Liam Rider wasn’t home. A bemused woman of about thirty-five answered the door with a couple of kids peering on from down the hallway. It was a pleasant house, a Fifties semi with a neat front garden and a pot of pansies beside the front door. A waft of cooking food – baked potatoes or chips – spilled out as the woman stared at her ID. Lorraine felt her stomach rumble.
‘Is everything OK?’ the woman asked, paling a little. ‘Is Liam all right?’ She took hold of the doorframe as Lorraine convinced her that everything was fine, there were no accidents. She couldn’t bring herself to say that no one was dead.
‘It’s Mr Rider I’d like to speak to,’ Lorraine said. ‘Do you know where I can find him?’
‘At the college, I think,’ she replied. Her eyes were flashing everywhere from beneath a neat blonde fringe. She didn’t look like the kind of wife to be cheated on. Then again, Lorraine hadn’t thought she was the type either until Adam, drunk on guilt, had decided to tell her that he’d had a brief – oh so brief – affair. Lorraine swallowed it away. Now wasn’t the time.
‘Craven Road Campus?’ Lorraine asked.
The woman nodded. It was the place where her husband both worked and played away, except she didn’t know it. We have something in common, you and me, Lorraine wanted to say, but didn’t.
Brief . . . meaningless . . . over . . . Adam had gone on to tell her he’d been stupid, drunk, that he was having a crisis, that she’d pursued him and it wasn’t his fault. What advice would she give the younger woman, Lorraine wondered? Get out while you can? Do the same back? Take him to the cleaners? While the house looked pleasant enough, it was clear Liam Rider wasn’t exactly cleaning-out material. Neither was Adam, though that hadn’t stopped her fantasising about it.
‘If he comes home before I’ve spoken to him, will you ask him to call me?’ Lorraine handed the woman a card. ‘It’s urgent.’
‘He’s not in any trouble, is he?’ She shooed the children back as they approached the door.
‘No. I just need him to help with some enquiries.’ Lorraine smiled tersely before leaving for the college.
*
‘You know the first thing he said?’ Lorraine was perched on a bar stool in the kitchen. Once the girls were sorted for the evening, she was back to the office.
Adam shook his head.
‘You won’t tell my wife, will you?’
Adam pulled a face. He hadn’t been present at the interview. ‘Natural.’
He’d just come in from his run and was dripping with sweat even though a frost had begun to creep across the pavements and railings. He wiped his face on the tea towel. Lorraine snatched it and tossed it through the door to the utility room. ‘That’s a disgusting thing to do,’ she said. ‘On both counts.’
She couldn’t help the occasional comment. It hadn’t quite been a year. Mostly, she was able to cope, to put it behind her, get on with life. Then there were the times she couldn’t and all she wanted to do was make the rest of Adam’s life as unbearable as possible.
‘What else did Rider have to say?’ Adam bit into an apple. ‘Did he agree to a DNA test?’
‘He’d heard about Sally-Ann on the news so he’d had a couple of days to absorb the shock. He was still very upset though. It
wasn’t a great way to find out. He said she was a promising student, trying to make something of herself by taking a course, blah blah.’ She took a breath. Now wasn’t the time. ‘And yes, he agreed to give a swab straight away.’
Adam pulled off his luminous running top and tossed that onto the utility-room floor with the tea towel. ‘Has the time of death come through yet?’ he asked.
‘I spoke to the pathologist. Best guess is she’d been dead a minimum of thirty-eight hours and a maximum of forty-one. Rider told me without being asked that he could prove his exact whereabouts for the last week. That’s when he virtually begged me not to tell his wife. “It would kill her” I think were his words.’
Lorraine bit her cheek. Adam didn’t look in the least bit uncomfortable.
‘Rider had ended it with Sally-Ann several months ago, when she insisted the baby was his. She wanted money from him and he didn’t have it to give. And of course he didn’t want his wife to know about the affair or the baby. He took a risk, if you ask me, by dumping her, said that if it all came out, he was just going to deny it.’ Lorraine stood up and leant against the worktop. She felt her heart kick up. ‘Do you know what else he told me?’ She paused. ‘He told me that unless you actually get caught in the act, no one can prove a thing.’ Lorraine had wanted to slap him at that point.
‘I’ll remember that then,’ Adam said sourly, and went upstairs for a shower.
9
THE WORST THING about not being pregnant is that everything in life seems to suddenly involve babies. And the worst thing about having to make up so many stories, literally living in the centre of an ever-changing lie, is that the stories get deeper and deeper, more twisted and untrue, so that eventually I have trouble remembering who I really am.
But, all things considered, I decide that for the moment being someone else isn’t so bad; that being the real me would be dangerous and unhelpful in my current predicament. I am here for one reason only and my time will soon come. The wait itself is a gestation.
Until You're Mine Page 6
