Chapter 46 #2
“Twenty-eight years ago, I was working the night shift, or the graveyard shift, as I liked to call it. A heavily pregnant woman walked in. Well... I say woman, she couldn’t have been older than eighteen.
She was in active labour, and as luck would have it, I spotted her before she had the chance to go to the reception desk and check in.
I told her I was a doctor, that I’d take care of her, and I ushered her down the corridor and into a side room.
“A young nurse called Fiona Tapp, was working that night. She was on my payroll and knew how to be discrete. She helped me deliver the baby. The mother did well, coping on gas and air. It’s a big thing for a young girl to go through, without family around her or strong drugs to numb the pain she was clearly in, but she was adamant she wanted to deliver the baby the best way she could.
All she cared about was making sure her baby was all right.
When he was born, he didn’t cry right away.
A build-up of mucus had blocked his airways, and I gave Nurse Tapp the nod. She knew what was expected of her.
“Nurse Tapp took the baby away, and I told Tia, the mother, that it was all perfectly normal. The baby’s airways needed to be cleared, and we had to take him to another part of the hospital to do that with specialised equipment. She trusted me. I was the doctor. I was in complete and total control.
“I cleaned the girl up, gained her trust, and when Nurse Tapp came back in and delivered the devastating news that her baby had died, I held her as she wailed.
“She asked to see the baby. She wanted to hold him in her arms just once, so she could kiss him and say goodbye. I agreed, left the room and made my way to the morgue. There was a mortuary technician on duty that night. I paid him a sum of money to leave the mortuary for a while, making sure he knew that if anyone ever found out about it, his family would receive a visit from some men they wouldn’t want to meet.
He knew me. He knew my threats carried weight, and he agreed to the deal.
“I took a baby boy from the morgue, cradled him in my arms and carried him back to Tia Bailey as she lay on the bed in the side room.
She cried, kissed his head and said goodnight to her sweet angel, telling me she wanted to call him Enzo.
We sat with her for a while, then I took the baby back to the mortuary.
When I returned, I told Tia it was best to leave the funeral preparations to the hospital.
The cost of a private funeral would be astronomical.
More than a single mother in her position could afford.
She agreed, and we managed to take her out of the side room so she could exit through the back doors of the hospital.
“I paid for a taxi to take her home. I never thought I’d see Tia Bailey again, but that girl was a persistent bitch.
A week later, she came back in, saying she wanted to see her baby boy again.
Said she wanted to give him a proper burial.
The receptionists had no idea what she was on about, there was no record of her on the system, and there was no baby listed in the records under the name Enzo Bailey.
“She saw me walk past and called out to me, telling the staff that I’d delivered the baby, and I knew all about it.
I told them I’d take care of it and took her to my office.
I later told the reception staff that she had mental health issues and was convinced she’d had a baby at the hospital, and that it’d died.
I told them I’d referred her to the mental health team, and they were relieved that it’d been taken care of.
“And I did take care of her. She was a loose end I couldn’t afford to have, storming into the hospital and throwing a light on me when I was happy to work quietly in the shadows.
I couldn’t risk her coming into the hospital again, asking questions and causing trouble.
So, I took care of Tia Bailey. I silenced her forever.
She was a fighter though, a bit like your girl.
Strangling her was heavy work, it took three of us to hold her down.
“There’s nothing left of Tia Bailey now.
Her remains were incinerated at the hospital.
And the baby she delivered, the little boy she called Enzo Bailey, was sold for five thousand pounds to a man I knew through my other line of work.
Phil Dalton would do anything for his wife, Ruth.
She was desperate for a baby, but it just wasn’t happening for them.
” In a hushed tone, he said, “Low sperm count, you see.
“I think they got a bargain when they bought you, Isaiah. But after a few weeks, Phil became irritated with how much you cried, and what a drain you were on their finances. Not to mention the attention Ruth gave you that Phil was jealous of. I think he regretted getting you. But that wasn’t my problem.
You were a business transaction. Not the most fruitful.
The kids in Halliwell House and Clivesdon made me far more money.
You’d be surprised how much a young girl and boy can go for on the black market. ”
I didn’t want the tears brimming in my eyes to fall. I didn’t want to feel a fucking thing after what he’d just told me.
They weren’t my parents.
That’s why I had no papers.
My mother had crossed paths with Satan that night, and she didn’t stand a chance.
But Satan had met his match today. I would make him pay a million times over for what he’d done to my mother, Abigail, her friend Stacey, and every single person he’d destroyed through his sick, pitiful, cruel life.
As players went, he was the ultimate. The one I’d happily drag to hell, my claws sunk deep into his fucked-up flesh, as I sacrificed us both to the demons that reined in hellfire.
I’d serve up his soul myself, just to make sure he got there, and was never free to harm another human.
And I’d sit in hell watching him relive his torture, revelling in his screams for mercy.
I didn’t care if I screamed too. It’d be worth it.
“Now you know why there’s no records for you, Isaiah. Unless you want me to call you Enzo now?”
“The only thing you’ll do is beg me for mercy when I kill you,” I hissed, spitting and struggling against my restraints, and he laughed.
“A fighter to the end. I admire you.” He pointed his finger at me. “It’s just a shame all you can do is fight with words. And we both know how useless they are.”
“You fucked with the wrong guy,” I snarled, teeth bared as I imagined every fucked-up way I was going to torture him.
“I’m going to enjoy this.” He stood up and walked over to the table of weapons and tools.
“Shall we play a game? I know you love games, Isaiah.” He lifted a scalpel.
“How about, guess which part of you I’m gonna cut off next.
” He gripped the scalpel, scanning my body before proclaiming, “I’ll give you a clue, it starts with p, and you won’t have any need for it ever again.
” He laughed at his own shitty joke. “You think I mean penis, don’t you?
Do you think I’d go for the obvious right out of the gate?
I meant phalanx. You know, your finger.” He wriggled his own as if I needed reminding.
“But which finger first?” He tapped his chin in thought as he walked towards me. “Decisions, decisions.”