Beyond Evidence

by Emma L. Clapperton

  He wracked his brain, searched in his mind to unravel the words that she used to describe the culprit.

  "You mean I know him now, but haven't always? Is that it?" he asked but she was gone. The image of the car was also gone, but the colour of the car stuck in his memory.

  He rushed into the office and could see that a woman in a blue and red shirt was taking them through files of paperwork.

  "I've got more," Patrick called out as he approached the desk.

  The woman looked up a little shocked at his sudden presence. She then looked at Preston who assured the woman that Patrick was a colleague.

  "What do you have?" Lang asked.

  "The car was black and I know him, but I haven't always known him," Patrick was beginning to sound a little panicked.

  "Well, who do you know that you have only just met?" Lang asked him, almost sounding panicked himself.

  Patrick thought about all of the people that he met for the first time since Angela had been murdered.

  "Well, it could be anyone, I meet new people all of the time through the church," he paused. "And to be fair I have only known you two for a few weeks."

  Lang let out a laugh that he couldn't control. "Get serious Patrick, police officers remember?"

  Patrick didn't know who to trust, but he was certain that it must have been someone from the church as he didn't socialize that much out of work.

  Then, he suddenly felt his body freeze, almost as if his muscles and joints had locked simultaneously. Preston watched the colour drain from Patrick's face. "What is it?"

  He didn't want to believe it, but the situation would have been too much of a coincidence for it not to be true.

  "Patrick, who?" Lang urged.

  "Mark, it’s Mark."

  "What's the last name?"

  "He didn't give me one, when he started working the shift at the bar, we just started talking and, I don't know, I just never thought to ask. And clearly he wasn't willing to give."

  Lang shook his head. "Yeah and now we know why."

  Preston asked the woman to look for the name Mark under a black car that was hired out on the day that Patrick hired out his.

  "There is nobody under that name in any of the records sir," her voice was quivering.

  Patrick was beginning to lose hope after a further thirty minutes of the woman searching her computer for a single name when she spoke. "I have found a booking that seems to be the only one that matches your requirements. It is a black Ford Focus one point nine turbo diesel, the only black car that we hired out that day."

  "That's it, what's the name?" Patrick asked.

  "A Mr Ross Turner," she said.

  Patrick felt a wave on confusion was over him. "But how can that be?"

  "I'm sorry sir that is the name that I have here," she said.

  "It has to be correct, he would have had to produce a driving license to receive the car," Preston said.

  "Can you make a note of that address please Miss?" Lang asked.

  Patrick walked back outside, feeling defeated. He stood still, allowing the rain to soak him. Angela stood next to him once more, this time she smiled.

  "What?" he asked aloud.

  "You're nearly there, you have almost worked it out," she faded from his vision as she spoke. He took a deep breath, hoping and wishing that she was right.

  "Ok, let's go," Preston said as he appeared in front of Patrick.

  The three men got back into Preston's car and as he pulled out of the car park, Patrick felt the butterflies begin to swarm around the pit of his stomach as they began the journey to the address on the piece of paper.

  Forty Three

  The game

  They had sat in silence for a long time. Jodie hadn't known which words to use to begin her dangerous game, so she decided that since she wasn't going anywhere, she would sit in silence.

  Ross had paced the room in the time that no words were exchanged between the two, slow at times and quicker in others. She had been able to see his thoughts, some of them quite grim and sometimes she would only see little snippets. Michelle was allowing Jodie to see them but whenever Michelle got too angry her energy would rage and then flop and Jodie wouldn't see anything for a while.

  Ross mainly thought of his mother, who Jodie now felt like she knew. Ross had run through his childhood a few times, unconsciously showing her the terrible abuse that Maria had suffered at the hands of Billy. She could see that Ross was seriously damaged by what he had seen as a child and in a way she felt sorry for him.

  Grief can do terrible things to people, Rebecca said to Jodie.

  Looks like it. His mother would be spinning in her grave if she could see him now, Jodie replied.

  Trust me, she knows what he is doing. And deep down he knows that she would not be happy. But it's too late for him now, his time is up! Rebecca said in Jodie's mind.

  What do you mean?

  His grief has taken over his mind, it's going to kill him, Angela replied to Jodie's question.

  Jodie watched Ross as he continued to walk back and forth, and at one point he stopped and closed the bedroom door. He looked over at Jodie, who quickly averted her eyes.

  "You're quiet," he said.

  "I was thinking about how similar we are."

  There. She had said it, the game had begun.

  "Ha!" he laughed loudly. "How the hell are we similar?"

  "Well, I have never told anyone this but," she considered what she was going to say next before she said it, "my mum was abused too!"

  He knitted his eyebrows as she spoke, he tried to read her words. "No chance, you're just saying that to get on side."

  Jodie disregarded his words and continued. "It was awful, she was beaten on a daily basis by my Dad, her husband! I saw it, not every time, but I did hear it most times!" she spoke quietly, working from his own emotions inside his head. Although not exactly like his, she wasn't a raving lunatic!

  "What did you do?" he found himself asking.

  She felt the spirits willing her to go on, but carefully. "At first I used to try and stop it but then when he hit me, I would just to stay out of the way. I would put my headphones in or read."

  Ross was wary of her words. He stood back, as if she was an unexploded bomb and he watched her. Was she playing, or was she showing him that he wasn't alone?

  He smiled, which grew into a huge grin and then he laughed, "Ha, nice try Jodie but you are not fooling me. Good story teller, I'll give you that," he clapped again and returned to the wall.

  "I get it you know," she continued as though she hadn't heard him speak.

  "You don't get anything," he said quietly, irritation in his tone.

  "When my Gran told me that I had to go and live with her because my Mum was dead, I knew then that I would never see my Dad again!" she managed to squeeze out a tear.

  Ross did not reply, he kept his eyes on Patrick's photo.

  "I never did see him again."

  There was another bout of silence and Jodie was not sure what to do now. All of those words could either draw him in, make him lose his temper or simply do nothing.

  "Where is he now?" he suddenly asked.

  "Prison, he got twenty five years for murder," she felt her hands beginning to sweat from feeling so nervous.

  "So why didn't you go and see him?" he seemed genuinely curious.

  "Because my Gran wouldn't tell me what prison he was in and we moved away from where I was brought up. See, I am originally from Thurso, a small town up North..."

  "Yes, I know where it is I'm not thick," he said annoyingly.

  "Anyway, my Gran didn't want me growing up in a town where everyone would know me as the little girl whose Dad murdered her Mum, so she moved us down to Glasgow."

  More silence...

  "Doesn't it piss you off that you will never know what happened to your mum?" he asked.

  "To be honest when I think about it, it makes me feel numb."

  Ross sat down with his back a
gainst the wall. Now not only was he staring at her, but the faces of the spirits were too. She felt a lot of pressure building for her to pull through for everyone and she began to tremble.

  "What are you doing?" Ross asked.

  "I'm just cold. Sometimes this happens when I think about it," she was surprising herself. She was never one to tell lies, she just hoped that the lies would not trip her up later, if they worked at all.

  "Well, deal with it. You might have parents that were fucked up like mine, but you are not getting any of my sympathy," he said harshly.

  Jodie focused on calming down. She felt sleepy but tried to stay as alert as she could, she certainly did not want to fall asleep in the company of Ross.

  Keep it quiet for now, he is considering your story and if you push it he will suss you out, Michelle said.

  Jodie nodded inwardly and stayed quiet.

  He made Jodie's skin crawl as she watched him play the murders over in his head. She could feel herself becoming distressed when she saw how he killed each one of them. She could feel his hands around her own neck and she could feel the panic that they must have felt when he was killing them.

  What she saw in his mind next made her feel sick. She watched his imagination play out the scene of strangling her, in the very room in which they sat.

  She got up and ran for the small bin in the opposite corner to where she was. She was violently sick into it but due to an empty stomach, all that surfaced was bile which made her wretch even more.

  Before she had a chance to compose herself, she realised that Ross was standing over her holding a tall glass with water in it. "Here," he said as he handed it to her.

  She reluctantly took the glass from his hand and instinctively began to sniff the liquid.

  "It's pure H2O, no Chloroform for you now. Well, not right now anyway," he sat back down at the wall.

  "Is that what you used to get me here?" Jodie felt the rage begin to boil along with her bubbling stomach, but she had just enough energy left to cool it back down.

  "That and a car," he smirked. "Oh, I almost forgot. I switched your sleeping tablets for stronger ones. I hope you don't mind, it made getting you here a lot easier."

  Jodie gulped at the water until the glass was empty, desperately pushing his words out of her head. "Why did you take me?" she asked.

  "Because, he was ruining it!" he raised his voice.

  "Patrick?" she knew that was who he meant.

  He kept his head low, but raised his eyes when he looked at Jodie, "He was going to stop me from taking my girls. The ones who deserve to die, so I decided to take his from him."

  Forty Four

  The last piece of the puzzle

  The journey to the address felt like it was being taken in slow motion. Patrick clutched his knees with his hands as he looked out of the window and all that he could think of was what he would find on his arrival. He knew that Jodie could die tonight and he knew it well. What would happen to him then? He couldn't bare to answer that question.

  "So, why is it that you don't have the same name as the one that we were given back at the hire place?" Lang asked from the front seat.

  "I don't know but now that you mention it the name is really familiar," Patrick massaged his temples.

  "Oh?" Preston looked at Patrick in the rear mirror to see his face turn a shade of grey.

  "Oh my god," Patrick said quietly.

  "What?" Lang turned to him.

  Patrick pulled a letter from the inside pocket of his jacket and unfolded it. His eyes darted back and forth as he read and Lang watched him, wondering what was going to come from his mouth next.

  "Pull over, quick!" Patrick shouted.

  Preston pulled into the side of the road and Patrick threw the door open and began vomiting onto the pavement.

  "Urgh! What the hell!" Lang got out of the car and tried to compose himself. The sound of Patrick's stomach contents hitting the ground caused a stir in Lang's stomach.

  He finally emptied his stomach and got out of the car for some air. Preston met him on the pavement and asked, "What is it Patrick?"

  "I have something to tell you," Patrick said, "but not on the street, let's get back in the car and I will tell you on the way to the address, we need to get there right now."

  As they climbed back in the car Lang averted his eyes from the vomit on the ground and he closed the door.

  "Right, what is it?" Preston asked as he started the car again.

  Patrick took the deepest breath possible and began to speak. "Ok, there is one thing that I never told you both about me. I am adopted."

  "What the hell has that got to do with this?" Lang asked.

  "Just listen to me!" Patrick snapped.

  "Ok, before we go any further we all need to stay calm for Jodie's sake here," Preston added without taking his eyes off the road. "I will put my siren on so that..."

  "No," Patrick said. "He will know that we are on our way and doing that will only allow him time to get away."

  "Ok, ok I will keep it off."

  "As I said, I am adopted and up until last year I was happy not knowing where I had come from. Years ago I had put my name on a database allowing my biological parents to contact me if they wanted too but they never did." Patrick could feel tears building in his eyes with what he was about to say next.

  "Go on," Lang said with interest.

  "I received a letter from a place called Adoption Contact Scotland last year and it was from my biological brother. One that I did not know existed. It took me six months to reply and a lot of thought went into whether or not I wanted to meet him. But in the end I decided that I didn't have anything to lose and I agreed."

  Preston looked in the mirror at Patrick and saw that he had real fear in his eyes. "What happened? How is this connected to the case?"

  Patrick raised his hand to his mouth, the shock of the whole situation was beginning to hit him. "The name that the woman at the hire place gave us is the name of my biological brother."

  "Ross Turner? That's a very common name Patrick it could be a complete coincidence," Lang said.

  "No, it is not a coincidence. You may not believe in what I do Lang, but I am telling you now, this case was meant to come to me. I am the only person that can stop him."

  Preston stopped the car.

  "We're here," said Lang.

  "Now what?" Preston asked.

  ***

  He has figured it out, Angela said to the others.

  Good. It is about time we all put an end to this, Michelle growled.

  We still have a lot to get Jodie through, he is so unpredictable at this point that his plans could change before we see it. We all have to be very careful what we say to him through Jodie.

  Michelle and Rebecca swirled around Ross as he stood at the door of the bedroom watching Jodie. He did not believe in spirits and afterlife, which for the girls was a good thing. What they had planned would hopefully scare him enough into shock and give Jodie the chance to escape.

  Whatever happens in here tonight, we cannot let there be a fifth death, Rebecca said.

  Jodie had heard the whole conversation in her head as she watched Ross, watching her, planning his next move.

  Agreed, Jodie said, allowing only them to hear it. They put all of their energies together to protect her.

  Ross had been silent for a while and hadn't said anything to Jodie since he said that he was going to take Patricks girl. He had been thinking of the best way to tell Jodie about the adoption situation. He wanted to say it with perfection so that he could see the look on her face before he committed murder number five and then end his own life. He knew that his time was almost up before the police caught up with him and he wasn't going to prison to stare at four walls for the rest of his days. That would really drive him insane, being stuck inside a prison cell with his thoughts for years to come and no way of releasing the pain.

  "You know, I know something about your psychic man, something very personal,"
he said.

  Jodie looked up from the floor where she was sitting and saw a look on his face that said he had won. "And what is that?" she asked.

  "I know about Jeffrey," he sneered.

  Jodie felt her blood run cold at the sound of that name. "Jeffrey?" she tried to control the tremble in her voice. "How do you know about that?"

  Ross smiled and walked toward her, intensifying the pause before he sat down on the floor beside her. "Oh, I have been doing my research."

  Jodie tried to think of anything that would make her understand his knowledge of Jeffrey. "Did Patrick tell you about his adoption when you and he were working together? Or should I say Patrick and Mark?" she said sarcastically.

  "Ah, Mark. Quite a character don't you think? I am quite proud of him, he has created quite an ending scene for us," he smiled widely, rubbing his hands together.

  Jodie shivered at his creepiness as he continued to speak. "No he didn't tell me about Jeffrey, my Mum did actually." He looked at her, expecting confusion.

  "You're Mum? How did she know him?" Jodie searched her own mind for the answer but only heard Angela.

  Stay calm Jodie.

  "Because Jodie, we share the same blood. Turner blood," he said with a sneer.

  "What? I don't understand?"

  Ross jumped to his feet and said, "Brothers, Jodie. We are biological brothers. My Mum gave him up for adoption when she had him, my Dad made her do it. Good thing for him I suppose, he escaped the evil clutches my Dad."

  Jodie couldn't believe what she was hearing. "How do you know that Patrick is your biological brother? How long have you known?"

  "Now Jodie one question at a time," he patronisingly patted her on the head. He was jumping around like a hyperactive child on Christmas morning after revealing his information. "I know he is my biological brother because when my Mum died she left a box for me to find. In that box was a letter to me and a letter to Jeffrey. I read the one to Jeffrey first, I guess the reason was because she wanted me to read it first, you see it was the first letter at the top of the box. Underneath that one was the letter addressed to me. I was so confused at first, I mean how couldn't I have known about him? But she kept it from me to protect me," he spoke so passionately about his Mum that Jodie was beginning to see why her death had driven him insane, to the point of murder.