The Wrong Surrogate

Chapter Four: The First Lead

POV: Ivy Carter

The number was unfamiliar. There was no name, nothing to tell me who had sent it or how they knew about my meeting with Julian.

I looked around the hotel entrance, looking at the faces of people passing by.

“Do you recognize anyone?” Elena asked.

“Recognize who?”

“Anyone who might be watching us”

I shook my head.

“Someone just sent you a message about a meeting you had less than five minutes ago, Ivy. I think it's reasonable to be suspicious”

She had a point.

I took a screenshot of the text and saved the number before locking my phone.

“Let's go home” I said.

Elena didn't argue.

We walked to the car park togethera nd I kept looking over my shoulder despite telling myself I was just being paranoid. Nothing happened. No one approached us and no unfamiliar car followed us out.

Still, the message stayed in my mind all the way home.

Someone knew I was asking questions about Clara.

The question was whether they were trying to protect her, silence her or keep me from discovering something they didn't want exposed.

By the time we reached my apartment, Elena had decided that neither of us was going to do anything else until we had eaten.

I wasn't hungry but arguing with her would have taken more energy than I had.

She placed a plate in front of me and sat opposite me at the dining table.

“Start from the beginning” she said.

I put down my fork.

“What?”

“Your meeting with Julian. Tell me everything he said, especially anything that seemed strange”

I gave her a detailed account of the conversation, from Julian's explanation of the surrogacy arrangement to his admission that Clara had disappeared around the time of the scheduled embryo transfer.

When I finished, Elena leaned back in her chair.

“So he hired Clara, she disappeared and then somehow you're the one who ended up pregnant”

“That's what we know”

“And his inheritance depends on him having a biological child before he turns thirty”

“Yes”

She shook her head.

“I don't like this”

“Neither do I”

“I'm serious, Ivy. What if someone deliberately arranged this because of his inheritance?”

I'd been trying not to think about that possibility.

Julian had insisted that he knew nothing about the transfer and I couldn't prove otherwise. But the circumstances were too strange to dismiss.

“That's possible” I admitted. “But we can't accuse him just yet”

“I'm not saying he did it. I'm saying we shouldn't assume he's innocent either”

I nodded.

Of course.

I opened my laptop and pulled up the email the clinic had sent me. I wanted to examine the information against without any pressure.

Elena moved her chair closer.

“What are we looking for?”

“Anything that doesn't make sense”

I showed her the treatment record, including the entry claiming that an embryo transfer had been completed under my name.

She read it slowly.

“Did you sign this?”

“No. I already told you that” I reply,annoyed at her question.

“Just making sure”

“Could they have mistaken your signature for someone else's?”

“Then why would the record contain my name and medical details? and why would they claim I consented to a procedure I never discussed with them?”

Elena had no answer.

I opened the other documents I had received from the clinic.

The embryo transfer had been planned for Clara but the clinic had told me that the embryo intended for her was transferred to me instead.

What I couldn't understand was how the clinic had allowed it to happen without anyone noticing.

“Can you find anything about Clara?” Elena asked.

“Not much. I know her name and I know she was supposed to be the surrogate”

“Did Julian give you her contact details?”

“No. He said they hadn't been able to reach her”

Elena picked up her phone.

“Then let's see what we can find ourselves”

We started with the information already available to us. I searched Clara's name alongside the fertility agency and the clinic, while Elena looked through publicly accessible profiles and business records.

Most of what we found was useless. There were too many people with the same name and none of the results gave us enough information to confirm which woman was connected to Julian's arrangement.

After nearly an hour, Elena rubbed her forehead.

“This is going nowhere”

“Not yet”

I returned to the clinic's email and looked at the documents again.

The name of the fertility agency appeared on the surrogacy paperwork. It was a separate organization from the clinic, which meant there were two places where the arrangement had been recorded.

If the clinic had made a mistake, the agency might have its own version of events.

And if someone had deliberately changed the records, comparing the two accounts might help us identify where the story stopped making sense.

“I need to contact the agency” I said.

Elena looked at me.

“Do you think they'll tell you anything?”

“Probably not if I just call and ask questions but I can request confirmation of the scheduled transfer and whether it actually took place”

“And if they refuse?”

“Then I'll have another reason to question them”

I found the agency's contact information in the documents and drafted an email requesting clarification about the transfer involving Clara Hayes. I kept it brief and factual, avoiding accusations I couldn't support.

Before sending it, I read it twice.

Then I clicked send.

It wasn't much but it was a start.

An hour later, my phone rang.

I glanced at the screen. Another unfamiliar number.

Elena noticed my expression.

“Is that the same number that sent the message?”

I checked.

“No. It's different”

“Be careful”

I answered.

“Hello?”

“Good afternoon. Am I speaking with Ivy Carter?”

“Yes. Who's calling?”

“My name is Marcus Reed. I'm Julian Mercer's business adviser”

I sat straighter.

“Is something wrong?”

“No. Mr Mercer asked me to ensure you received the documents relating to the surrogacy arrangement. He also asked me to pass along the contact details for the agency that handled it”

“I already have those details”

“Understood. I'll still send you the records we have, so you can review them directly”

“Does Julian have any idea what happened to Clara?”

There was a short pause.

“Not at this time. We've been trying to establish when she was last in contact with the agency”

“Did she withdraw from the arrangement?”

“We haven't received any formal confirmation that she did”

I exchanged a glance with Elena.

“So you don't know whether she left voluntarily or whether something happened to her?”

“That's correct”

It was the first answer I'd received from someone connected to Julian that didn't pretend to explain more than they knew.

“Please send me everything you can” I said.

“And I want to be clear that I haven't agreed to anything regarding the pregnancy. I'm only trying to find out what happened”

“I understand. I'll make sure that's clear to Mr Mercer”

After the call ended, Elena watched me.

“Marcus?”

I nodded.

“He's sending the records”

“Do you trust him?”

“No”

She gave me a small approving nod.

“Good”

I rolled my eyes but I couldn't help smiling.

Then an email notification appeared on my laptop.

The sender was the fertility agency.

I opened it immediately.

The message acknowledged my request but stated that the agency could not release confidential information concerning another client without the appropriate authorization.

I was about to close it when I noticed the final paragraph.

For clarification, the embryo transfer scheduled for Clara Hayes was postponed pending further instruction from an authorized representative.

I read the sentence again.

Then I turned the laptop towards Elena.

“Read that”

She leaned forward.

“Postponed pending further instruction?”

“Exactly”

I opened the clinic's record beside the email.

One document said the transfer had been postponed. The other said the procedure had been completed under my name.

Those two things could not both accurately describe what had happened.

Someone had to explain the difference.

And now we had a written statement from the agency confirming that Clara's original appointment had been postponed.

Elena looked at me.

“What are you going to do?”

I saved the email and backed up the documents.

“ I'm going to find out who gave that further instruction”

“And how are you going to do that?”

I looked at the agency's message again.

There was no name attached to the authorization. No explanation of what had changed or why.

But there was one part I couldn't ignore.

An authorized representative.

Someone had been allowed to make decisions about the arrangement on Julian's behalf.

I closed the laptop.

“I don't know yet” I admitted.

“But whoever gave that instruction is the first person I want answers from”

My phone buzzed again.

For a second there, I thought it might be another threat.

Instead, it was an email notification from Marcus.

The first document had arrived.

I opened the attachment and scrolled to the section containing the original surrogacy agreement.

Near the bottom of the page was a name I hadn't seen before.

Victor Mercer.

I stared at it.

Then I read the line above his name.

He had been listed as the family representative authorized to receive updates concerning the arrangement.

If someone had been involved in the decisions surrounding Clara's transfer,I had just found another name worth investigating.