The Bad Things: A gripping crime thriller full of twists and turns. Mary-Jane Riley

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      Detective Inspector Kate Todd was sitting in the doctor’s waiting room idly flicking through a glossy magazine. She’d stabbed at the blasted machine on the wall that asked her personal questions in big letters, and confirmed it really was her for the appointment, before sitting down to wait; no doubt, in danger of catching some vile disease while she did so. The television murmured in the corner. She tried to focus on the magazine in her hands. Babies. Food for babies. Getting your baby to sleep. Bloody babies everywhere. She flung it down on the wooden table in front, eliciting a frown from the woman next to her.

      ‘Sorry,’ said Kate.

      The woman gave her a small smile then shrugged. ‘They’re usually dead boring, those magazines. Years out of date, some of them. I’m reading about summer holidays three years ago.’

      ‘Hmm. Yes.’ Kate was being polite. Didn’t want to get into conversation. Just wanted to get this over and done with and back to the station. Not that there was much excitement there, either. No major incidents to speak of, unless you counted the work that was going into planning raids in some godforsaken town in the Fens to try and combat the trade in poor sods being brought over to work and live in filthy conditions. Cannabis factories upstairs, three or four families downstairs. Trouble was, planning involved more than one force: the National Crime Agency and Uncle Tom Cobley and all. Had the potential to be a right cock-up.

      Kate looked around the waiting room. No one she recognized. No one who looked as though they recognized her. That was the beauty of working in Ipswich but living in a small town some miles away – she was far less likely to come across any of her colleagues here.

      ‘This little one…’ The woman was talking again and Kate dragged herself back to the present. She noticed the woman was holding a bundle in her arms. A baby. How could she not have noticed? The woman carried on talking. ‘She was born with a hole in her heart. Had to have an operation when she was so tiny. Didn’t know if she would survive.’

      Kate felt a sudden but familiar twist of fear in her chest.

      ‘So we have to come for check-ups quite often, don’t we sweetheart?’ The woman cooed at the baby and smiled that smile that cut the pair of them off from the world.

      The fear was now coiling around her heart. Whoever said the heart was just an organ didn’t know anything. She took a deep breath and managed to put a pleasant look on her face.

      ‘You got any?’ asked the woman, who was now stroking her baby’s cheek with the side of her finger.

      ‘No,’ she said. She must have sounded abrupt because the woman blushed.

      ‘Sorry.’

      ‘It’s okay.’ Kate picked up another magazine. This time it was Designing Interiors. Safer, she hoped.

      She tried to concentrate on how to organize her living space better, what colour palette to use for a south-facing conservatory, and the ‘beautiful home’ created by some D-list celebrity. She tried not to think of the row she’d had with Chris last night. It was the same row they’d been having off and on with varying degrees of severity for the past ten years. This time, she had been about to turn the light off when Chris said, ‘I wish you’d see someone.’

      Her hand froze on the light switch. She was tired, had been doing paperwork for much of the day, and all she wanted to do was sleep. Now Chris had brought up the one subject guaranteed to make her tense and therefore lie awake for ages.

      She gritted her teeth and looked over at her husband, who was lying in the bed, head on the pillow, hands crossed over his chest, his breath even. Eyes closed. Eyes bloody well closed. He always did that, so preventing her from having a damn good argument with him. She noticed lines around his mouth that hadn’t been there before, and wanted to trace them with her fingers. Her irritation drained away. Chris loved her without any strings attached, and she loved him for that. He was calm, made her feel peaceful. She adored watching him work, how his hands, rough and calloused, fashioned the most beautiful objects out of wood. She loved him. But she had strings.

      ‘Chris,’ she said, propping herself up on her elbow, knowing it was going to have to be her making the first move, knowing that this time she had to give him some hope.

      He opened one eye, reached out for her, pulled her down into his arms. ‘Honey, I know how you feel, but…’

      No, he didn’t know how she felt, not really. He couldn’t know the way her mouth went dry and her heart beat hard and fast whenever she thought about becoming pregnant, giving birth, having to look after another person who would totally depend on her. The emotional attachment scared her; the knowledge that, at some point, the child would leave and tear her heart out. Or worse, something – anything – could happen to him or her that would not only tear her heart out but stamp on it and throw it away. She knew it could happen. She’d seen it before.

      ‘Can’t we just adopt?’ Even as she said the words, she knew she didn’t mean them, and she knew what his answer would be.

      ‘Surely we ought to find out first if there’s any reason why we can’t have our own?’ His voice was gentle, and she felt hot tears gather at the back of her throat.

      ‘Maybe it is all down to me. Maybe I’ll never be able to conceive. Maybe I’m too old.’ Or maybe she should just stop taking the pill.

      ‘No, you’re not. And if it doesn’t happen soon, there is so much we can do. I just think it’s a good idea to be checked.’

      ‘Aren’t we happy as we are?’ she asked, guilt heavy on her shoulders.

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘Aren’t I enough for you?’

      ‘Darling, it’s not about that.’

      ‘I know,’ she said into his neck. ‘I know.’

      He had gone by the time she woke in the morning – he often went for an early morning run, summer or winter, when he needed to clear his head, to give himself some thinking time.

      As soon as she could, Kate rang the doctor’s surgery.

      Which was why she was now sitting on a plastic chair, flicking through a magazine without seeing any words, and wishing she was at the station, drinking filthy coffee out of a flimsy cup and enjoying the banter between colleagues.

      The buzzer sounded and Kate saw her name on the electronic noticeboard. She got up, and the woman with the baby gave her an encouraging smile.

      She was nervous because she knew she was going to have to say something to the doctor, but she hadn’t worked out what yet.

      She knocked on the door and went in.

      The young woman GP, the appropriately named Dr Bones, looked up from her screen and smiled. ‘Take a seat, Kate. What can I do for you today?’

      Kate sat and blinked. What was she supposed to say?

      ‘Kate?’

      She cleared her throat.