The Hill - Carla’s Story (Book Two): A Paranormal Murder Mystery Thriller. (Book Two)

by Andrew M Stafford

  “Wow, that’s brilliant dad, where did you get it from?”

  Richard didn’t answer.

  “Who did it dad? It looks like one of my sketches, I didn’t draw it did I?”

  Richard remained silent. The look in his eyes was starting to make her feel anxious. He looked like someone who’d just received some awful news. News which was life changing, like he’d been told someone had died.

  “What’s the matter dad, you’re scaring me?”

  Richard didn’t know what to say. He’d been waiting for her to come home and dreading the moment when she did. And now she was here, standing in front of him, he didn’t know where to begin.

  “So you’re sure that’s a picture of you, are you?” said Richard when he eventually spoke.

  She looked at the sketch again, saw the dimples on her chin, the freckles on her cheeks and the way her fringe fell over her forehead. It was like she was seeing herself in a mirror.

  She wasn’t sure whether agreeing was a good or a bad thing. Her father seemed concerned by the picture, but she didn’t know why.

  He asked her again.

  “Is that you?”

  “I does look like me doesn’t it?” she nervously replied.

  “That’s because it is you,” he said gravely.

  Carla was now officially scared.

  “Please tell me what this is all about, you’re scaring me.”

  “I’m scaring you, am I? Well I think you’re going to be a little more scared when I show you this.”

  He passed her his laptop which was in standby mode.

  She took the computer, placed it on the table and pressed the enter key. The screen lit up as it displayed the story which everyone seemed to have been talking about, other than her.

  Carla took her time to read the report and as she did she began to feel clammy. Her mouth was dry as she read the brief story. Scrolling down, she came to the end of the report and saw the picture of the girl, the same picture she was holding in her hand. She looked at the paper again, almost as if to check whether it was different to the one on the computer. She turned back to the screen and read the story again. She was confused, very very confused. Markland Garraway was looking for her. But how did he know of her and why now, why all of a sudden now?

  Everyone else who had read the story had been completely amazed and awestruck that a dead man was communicating through a two year old boy. It had confirmed that there was life after death. A few readers thought the story was a hoax, a lie or perhaps some kind of cruel prank. But the majority of those who’d read it believed in it one hundred percent. But Carla wasn’t amazed or shocked by the story, it didn’t register as being strange. Because her mind was consumed, consumed by the fact that Garraway was looking for her. He clearly didn’t know her name, otherwise it would have been in the story, but he obviously knew what she looked like.

  “Now you’ve read the book, why don’t you watch the movie?” said her father in a flat tone of voice.

  She looked back at the screen and saw the video link. Her heart was in her mouth as she moved the cursor and hovered it over the link. She read the words which came before the video link.

  Click here to see a video of the boy whilst under hypnosis and speaking as Ben Walker.

  She swallowed hard and then clicked on the link.

  Just over eleven minutes later she muttered under her breath, “what the……...?”

  Her father looked at her with soulless eyes, almost like some dead thing. And then he spoke, “Would you like to tell me what all of this is about?”

  No matter how she dressed up what had happened, her father would never understand the full extent of what she had been through. Not only had she witnessed a murder, she had been affected by something supernatural. Since the murder she’d been plagued with visions and strange dreams. Like the night she dreamt about Garraway, a year to the day Ben had been killed, and the sketch she had made of him when she awoke. Carla stood up, and holding the picture she ran to her bedroom slamming the door behind her.

  Richard didn’t go after her. He didn’t have the strength to stand up. Carla left him waiting in the lounge for over an hour before she came back downstairs.

  He heard his daughter’s footsteps as she reluctantly made her way down the stairs and watched as the lounge door slowly opened. She was silhouetted by the light in the hall as she stood in the doorway. He turned his head and his eyes followed her into the room. She stood with her back resting against the table, cleared her throat and then spoke.

  She started at the very beginning. She described how she, Charlotte and the boys had climbed into the car which had been driven by Daniel Boyd. She told her father of how they ended up in the woods. Every few seconds she emphasized that she should never have been there and only went along because of Charlotte. She described what happened when Boyd saw Ben Walker kissing the girl and how Boyd had confronted him. Carla had never heard the conversation between Boyd and Walker so never knew why the fight had started.

  Her father was horrified when she told him how the boys began attacking Walker and that this was the point which she had tried to break things up.

  He listened without talking when she told him how the girl, Liz, had thrown her to the floor. Carla assumed that Liz thought that she had meant trouble, but she hadn’t, she wanted the whole thing to end there and then. But it hadn’t ended, things became worse, much worse. Richard winced when she told him in detail of John, the quiet and odd youth, and the way he relentlessly kicked the girl. She recalled how his large booted feet kicked her all over her body and her head.

  Tears rolled down her face as she told her father how she remembered the dull thud of the rock cracking Ben Walker’s skull, killing him instantly.

  Finally he heard the part where she shouted ‘police’ and how everyone ran into the woods.

  Ultimately she had saved Liz Mason’s life.

  “I know I should have told you, I know I should have gone straight to the police, but I was scared, I was so, so scared.”

  Her father looked at her in silence. Carla felt compelled to keep talking. It was like a deluge of emotions that had been pent up since the murder were allowed to overflow, like someone had opened the floodgates which had been holding back her emotions.

  She cried uncontrollably as she tried to explain the strange things that had happened since the attack, but by now she was making no sense.

  Richard had heard enough and raised his hand for her to stop talking.

  “Are you going to turn me in?” asked Carla as she looked at her father through swollen red eyes.

  Richard looked at his daughter, the girl he’d brought up, the girl who he’d tried his best to instil the essence of decent moral fibre. He couldn’t believe what he’d just heard.

  What had happened to the beautiful and innocent young girl she used to be?

  Now it was Richard’s turn to cry. The two of them cried together. At times they cried in unison, howling and wailing like banshees. They cried so loud, they could be heard by the neighbours in their houses across the road.

  By midnight their tears were subsiding. The emotion of sorrow had changed to that of fear. Carla was scared, scared for her future.

  “Tell me dad, what are you going to do? Are you going to turn me in?”

  Chapter one hundred and thirty three

  The Offices of the Bristol Post

  Temple Way

  7.58am

  Tuesday 19th June

  Ian Lester waltzed into the open plan office complex like the cat that had swallowed the canary. He had written what was probably the most talked about story in the history of the Bristol Post.

  Since the video had gone online, just under twenty four hours earlier, it had been viewed around the world over seven and a half million times. The Bristol Post had received over sixty messages from readers who either thought they knew the girl in the picture, or the killer based upon Ben’s description. But none of those who’d contacted the
newspaper had named either Carla Price or Daniel Boyd.

  Lester slung his jacket on the back of his chair and sat at his desk.

  Martha Ward, the journalist he sat closest to, popped her head over the partition which divided his work space from hers.

  “Forster’s gunning for you mate, she wants you in her office right away, and she’s not looking happy.”

  Lester couldn’t understand why Jennifer Forster, the managing director of West Media and News, the company which owned The Bristol Post, would be unhappy with him. The sales of the paper must have gone through the roof and as the story would unfold it would surely guarantee an increase in turnover. And what about the Post’s website? Businesses would be clambering over each other to advertise on it.

  He knocked on her office door which slowly swung open.

  Forster was a short, slim woman in her mid-forties. She wore her dark hair in a ponytail and always had a pair of glasses propped on the top of her head, which she never seemed to use for reading. Lester wondered if she wore them purely as a fashion accessory.

  As the door opened he could see she was on the phone. She glanced up at him, ended the telephone conversation and pointed to one of the seats in front of her desk. He entered her office, closed the door behind him and sat down.

  “What the fuck to you think you’re playing at?” said Forster in her East London accent.

  Lester decided not to answer, not just yet. He was sure she had more to say and he thought it best for her to get everything off her chest before he said anything.

  “I’ve just found out from Fin Saunders that we’ve been approached by Trinity Mirror, DMG Media, News UK to name a few, who all want to buy your story.”

  Lester was confused, surely this was a good thing.

  “When I asked Martin Fergusson, your Chief Editor, in case you’d forgotten who he is, he’d no idea the story had even been printed.”

  She paused as she stood up. Lester had never seen Forster turn such a shade of red. He must have really upset her.

  “You’ve taken it upon yourself to write a story and somehow sneak it in through the back door whilst not getting the authority of any of the editors. You may as well have written a story about aliens landing on College Green and snuck that one through as far as I’m concerned.”

  Lester opened his mouth to speak, but Forster got in first.

  “Whatever possessed you to write such a ridiculous story, about an ongoing unsolved murder case without consulting either the Editor in Chief, or the police?”

  Lester tried to speak again, but Forster raised her hand to stop him.

  “I understand Munroe from Avon and Somerset has been shouting at Fergusson, wanting to know what the fuck’s going on.”

  Lester attempted to talk again, and this time she let him.

  “It’s all true, everything I’ve written is true. None of it was fabricated. The video proves that.”

  “The video’s been pulled,” interrupted Forster.

  “You’ve pulled the video? No, you mustn’t.”

  “Whatever possessed you to print a story like this without consulting with anyone, not even the tea lady?”

  “Because……..because no one would have allowed it to be printed,” replied Lester confidently.

  She stared at him in silence and cocked her head to one side. She looked like a confused puppy dog.

  “You’re right, it wouldn’t have been printed……..for one of our top journalists you’ve just made a very serious mistake…….one which has cost you your job……….and unless he’s very lucky, you’ve probably cost Fergusson his job too.”

  Lester said nothing as he sat in front of Forster, looking like a boy who had been sent to the headmistress.

  “I’ve no option Ian, other than to relieve you of your position at this newspaper. And I won’t be surprised if the police will be next in line to talk to you.”

  Ian shifted uncomfortably in his chair.

  “Do I have the chance to explain myself?”

  “You do, I suppose, for what it’s worth……..but nothing’s going to change…….you no longer work for me.”

  Lester took the opportunity to explain why he had done what he’d done. He knew he had to choose his words carefully, as he would have just the one chance to convince his boss that he should keep his job.

  After he’d explained everything and told her of the importance of finding the girl whom Markland Garraway had dreamt about, the same girl who’d appeared in the back pages of the novel, Forster still hadn’t changed her mind.

  Lester accepted the fact that he was out of a job. He made one final plea to her, not that he was trying to get his job back, but because there was something he needed her to allow him to do.

  “OK, I understand the position I have put you and Fergusson in, and I appreciate that you don’t want me to work for you……but can I ask one thing……a favour?”

  Forster’s expression was one of anger.

  “Favours, you want favours?”

  “Not favours, just one, just the one favour.”

  Forster folded her arms and reluctantly let him continue.

  “Please can you let me stay at my desk, just until say……Friday, the end of the week?”

  “I told you that you’re fired.”

  “I know, I won’t be here to work and I won’t expect you to pay me…..I just need to be in the office, by my phone.”

  Forster looked puzzled.

  “I am certain that within the next few days, or maybe even by today, the girl in the picture will be identified and whoever it is that knows her will contact me at the Post. You see I need to be by my phone.”

  “And what happens if this dream girl turns up, what are you going to do then?”

  “Tell Garraway, he’s the first person who needs to know.”

  “But he’s off the case, and from what I’ve been told, he’s a mad man.”

  Lester ignored her comment.

  “After Garraway’s spoken with her, he will contact Colin Matthews, the detective whose case it is now, then Matthews will do what he has to do.”

  “Why wouldn’t you contact Matthews first, after all, like you say, it’s his case?”

  “Because Matthews wouldn’t understand, he’s not been as involved in the case as much as Garraway, even though Garraway’s been officially off the case for years.”

  “You really believe in all this hypnotism, reincarnation and all the other strange shit you say has been happening?” asked Forster with just a hint of empathy.

  Lester nodded.

  “OK, you can have access to your phone…..and your computer……and that’s it, nothing else, not even the coffee machine.”

  “Thank you,” said Lester after letting out a long sigh.

  “Can I ask you something else?”

  Forster looked at him with an expression of irritability.

  “What if everything works out, you know, I get the girl and she names the killer and the case is closed…….do I get my job back?”

  “Don’t push your luck,” replied Forster as she pointed to the door.

  “Now get out and do what it is you have to do.”

  Lester left her office and closed the door behind him.

  Jennifer Forster smiled as she sat alone in her office.

  Chapter one hundred and thirty four

  M32 motorway, approaching Bristol

  10.37am

  Tuesday 19th June

  Richard Price and his daughter set off from Darlington at six o’clock that morning and had driven without stopping.

  After last night’s emotional set to, Carla and her father eventually spoke until the early hours. Richard had convinced her that going to the police was the right thing to do. If what she’d told him was true, then she’d have nothing to worry about. She’d done nothing other than withholding information from the police. Richard was sure, considering the circumstances, that the police would overlook this.

  Eventually Carla
saw sense and agreed with her father, with one caveat. Instead of going to the police, she would go straight to the newspaper, straight to the person who wrote the story and demand to speak with Markland Garraway,

  Richard had agreed, although he didn’t think she was in much of a position to demand anything, considering the secret she’d been keeping for almost three years.

  The motorway ended and Richard was on Newfoundland Road, leading to the centre of Bristol. He took a left and headed towards the offices of The Bristol Post.

  Chapter one hundred and thirty five

  Bristol Bus Station

  10.40am

  Tuesday 19th June

  Daniel John Boyd had travelled to Bristol on the early coach. He’d hung around Truro bus station all night waiting for the five thirty to Bristol.

  During the marathon nonstop five hour journey he’d dozed in and out of sleep and in the few hours when he was awake he’d considered his options once he’d arrived in Bristol.

  His plan was to stop the girl from talking. He had to get to her before she got to the police.

  He wasn’t sure how to find her, he couldn’t remember her name and wasn’t sure whether he had even known it in the first place.

  He decided to head straight to Paul 'Greeny' Green’s place and assuming he still lived at the same address, he intended to find out where Greeny’s girlfriend Charlotte lived. The girl he was looking for had been Charlotte’s best friend and he would encourage her to tell him where he could find her. He had enough tools in his rucksack to convince her not to go to the police. A sharp kitchen knife, a screwdriver and a hammer were more than enough to silence her forever.