Perhaps the old me really is somewhere inside still.
Chapter Forty
It was Tuesday morning and having not seen her brother at all for two years after his incarceration, Dani was making her way to Long Lartin prison for the second time in less than a week. The weekend had passed by in something of a blur. Not a drunken or pill induced blur though. After her most recent bust-up with Jason, Dani had stayed strong for three nights in a row, had even tried her best to wean herself off the pills, like Scholz had advised. The blur was more because her mind was so muddled with thoughts as to how – whether – she could get her life properly back on track again, just like she’d had to after her injury, just like she’d had to after that seizure.
There’d been no word from McNair or Baxter on her disciplinary investigation. Numerous times she’d debated whether to call Fletcher to get an update on the murder cases, but had decided against it.
Easton, on the other hand, had said he’d be there for Dani. Hadn’t he? At least Dani had taken that as his meaning back at the crash scene. She’d called him several times, wanting to speak about the case, but he’d not taken or responded to her calls.
Unlike Jason, who was the one person who’d been trying to reach her. Despite what had happened in her apartment he’d called and texted. First to apologise to her, but later wanting to check on how she was. To lend an ear, support her however he could. No matter what happened, Jason was the one person who seemed willing to stick his neck out for her. She’d felt unable to answer or respond to his calls and texts, yet how much longer would he hang around if she kept pushing him away?
* * *
Half an hour later Cartwright was once again showing Dani into the interview room at the prison, where Ben was already sitting in wait. Dani took the seat as the door was closed and locked behind her.
‘I’m surprised you came back,’ Ben said, with what looked like a genuine smile.
‘I’m as surprised as you are.’
She could see quite clearly that Ben had a large bruise on his face, around and under his left eye.
‘What happened?’ Dani asked.
‘This isn’t a beach holiday, Dani.’
‘Someone attacked you?’
‘Does it matter to you if they did?’
It did. But she didn’t say it.
‘So what can I do for you this time?’
Dani didn’t answer that. She didn’t quite know herself.
‘I heard about what happened,’ Ben said after a few moments of silence.
‘Heard what exactly?’
‘It was on the news. You were chasing some chump who ran onto a busy dual carriageway.’
‘Nothing escapes the media’s eye, does it?’
‘So now you’ve killed someone too.’
Dani opened her mouth but managed to hold her tongue. She met Ben’s eye for a few seconds but she really didn’t like what she saw and had to break the contact first.
‘What does that mean for your job?’ Ben asked.
‘I don’t know yet.’
‘They’re firing you?’
‘Possibly.’
‘So you came to your little brother for comfort.’
Ben smirked. Dani didn’t.
‘The only comfort I get from you is knowing that you’re locked up in this place.’
Ben’s face fell into an angry frown but he didn’t bite back.
‘I saw the kids again at the weekend,’ Dani said and she noticed Ben’s features pick up. ‘It was great to spend some more time with them.’
‘How are they doing?’
‘Chloe’s a real natural at sports—’
‘Just like you used to be.’
‘She’s the star of her football team. I went to watch them play over at Wyndley. Harry’s not bad either, but he’s more into his PlayStation than anything else.’
Dani noticed there was a wide smile on her face as she talked. She’d come to realise that being around those kids was one of the few true bright spots in her life; they were just about the only two people that seemed to be able to bring a smile out of her. Yet even that part of her life she’d neglected.
Ben was beaming back at her and Dani quickly took her smile away.
‘I miss them so much, Dani,’ Ben said, and she saw cracks in his demeanour begin to take hold.
‘They’re good kids, Ben. Despite everything. They’re going to be fine.’
‘I just wish I could see them again.’
Dani didn’t say anything to that.
They sat through a few moments of silence, before Ben’s face again opened out into a wide grin.
‘What?’ Dani asked.
‘Remember when we were younger. You were always such a tomboy too, just like Chloe is.’
‘Yeah. I remember.’
‘There was this one time, we were ten, eleven maybe. The lads in school were giving you a hard time. I think you’d just beaten them at long jump or something. They were calling you all sorts, pushing and shoving you.’
‘It happened more than once, believe me.’
‘This one time, though, I was right behind you all. We were walking out of school and one of the lads grabbed your rucksack and pulled you backwards. You landed on your arse. I was about to rush forwards to confront the guy but you shot back up and clocked him one. A massive right hook onto his chin that sent him down. Pretty much knocked him unconscious. Everyone stood in awe.’
Dani sighed. ‘Mickey Farmer.’
‘Yeah, that was him.’
‘Was there a point to the story, Ben?’
Ben looked down at his hands and sighed. ‘I don’t know. Just that you always did know how to take care of yourself. And that I hope my Chloe is just like that too. I hope she’s just like you.’
Dani could see what he meant by that, though part of her also felt a little uncomfortable that one of Ben’s standout memories of her involved her being violent. How much different to Ben was she really? Part of his defence when he was on trial was that he’d acted with diminished responsibility, that he was schizophrenic. The jury hadn’t bought that. He’d not been diagnosed with a mental disorder, but surely there was something wrong with the functioning of his brain? Why else would he have flipped like he did?
That was the key aspect of what had happened that continued to worry Dani the most. It wasn’t as if her mind was in tip-top shape.
‘Can I ask you something?’ Dani said.
‘Fire away.’
‘Why did you do it?’
‘Seriously? That’s what you want to know? Haven’t we been through all this before?’
‘Yeah, yeah, sure. Alice wanted to leave you. You killed her in a rage because if you couldn’t have her, no one could. You quietly held a grudge against me for years after that, supposedly for poisoning her against you. Then one day you flipped and started killing everyone.’
‘You make me sound like some sort of nutter,’ Ben said with a wry smile.
‘You’ve not exactly helped yourself there. But why you, Ben? We’re twins. We’re virtually the same. We shared a womb. Our DNA is more or less identical. We had the same upbringing. How could you do what you did? Because I certainly never could.’
‘You really think that’s true?’
‘I know it is.’
‘Then you’re wrong, Dani. At one time I thought like you’re thinking now. I’d have said the exact same thing. But it’s plain wrong. All humans are the same. We’re all made of the same stuff, and deep down every single one of us is a potential killer.’
The way Ben said it chilled Dani to the core.
* * *
She stayed in the interview room for nearly forty-five minutes before their conversation fully dried up. She wouldn’t say it was nice, or even rewarding, to be there with him, but her mind did somehow feel more at ease by the time she left the prison. Maybe confronting Ben really was an important step to her moving on.
Having detoured and stopped off for lunch in
Warwick, it was mid-afternoon by the time Dani made it back home. She set herself down on the sofa in the lounge. She was all out of alcohol, and had deliberately not bought any more. Sitting on her own for hours on end, she knew how easy it was to turn to the bottle for comfort, but she was determined to break the habit.
After sitting in silence for a few minutes she grabbed her laptop and opened it up and navigated to West Midlands Police website. She headed into the portal to gain access to the intranet, typed in her details then held her breath as she hit return. Would they have suspended her access?
She sighed in relief moments later when the screen refreshed and she realised she was on the inside. Feeling her heart rate building, as though she were a hacker who’d just hit gold, she entered into the HOLMES 2 system which detailed all of the force’s cases. It took her a few moments to set up a simple search to look for any new murder cases. There had been two in the last couple of days, but neither seemed in any way related to the deaths of Reeve or Natalya.
Similarly, none of the new missing persons cases jumped out at her.
Nonetheless, Dani carried on her search, looking into various cases both familiar and otherwise, reading notes and interview transcripts and all manner of other information contained within.
By the time she had finished her fruitless search it was dark outside, and the only light in Dani’s apartment was coming from her laptop screen and the orange glow of streetlights outside.
Dani sat back and sighed. A shuffling noise from out in the hallway caught her ear. Dani frowned, set the laptop down and walked out of the lounge. In the hallway her eyes moved down to the bottom of the front door where the edge of a piece of paper was poking into her apartment. Dani rolled her eyes. Each of the apartments had letterboxes on the ground floor, but that didn’t stop canvassers from regularly sneaking into the building and pushing their junk straight into people’s homes.
Dani moved over to the door and bent down to pick the paper up, ready to go through the motions of tearing the leaflet in two without even looking at what was being offered this time.
But then she stopped, because she quickly realised this wasn't yet another leaflet offering house cleaning, or pizzas, or assistance with injury claims, but just a regular piece of plain paper, folded in half.
She unfolded the paper and stared down at the words, handwritten in blue.
‘What the…?’
RIP Dean Harland. Now you’re a killer too, DI Stephens. Just like your brother. And just like me.
Dani froze for a couple of seconds as the words sank in. Then she grabbed the door handle, threw open the door, and burst barefoot out into the corridor.
Chapter Forty-One
Dani sprinted along the corridor outside her apartment. All was quiet, not a soul in sight, but that note had been slipped under her door all of ten seconds before. Whoever had left it couldn’t have gone far. Dani had taken little time to properly digest the scribbled words on the piece of paper that she was still clutching in her hand, but she knew damn well she wanted to catch whoever had left it.
She skidded around the corner to the lift and looked up to see the red screen blinking four, then three. That had to be the person who’d left the note, still heading down.
Dani rushed to the stairwell and crashed open the door, bounding down the steps two at a time. Twice her socks on the slippery bare concrete almost caused her to fly head over heels but, gripping hold of the handrail, she managed to keep her footing, just.
On the ground floor, out of breath, she flung open the door and raced into the foyer. She looked over to the lift. The doors were open, the lift waiting. No one was in sight inside. She turned the other way. The outer security doors were closed. The place was entirely deserted.
She thought about heading outside, but her own wariness got the better of her. What if the person who’d left that note was still upstairs even? Feeling more vulnerable than she cared to admit, Dani quickly moved back up to her apartment, remaining on high alert as she went.
Back in the safety of her home, after a thorough search inside to check she was alone, and with the door locked and bolted, Dani went and sat on the sofa and stared at the handwritten note, unfolded on the coffee table in front of her.
For minutes she simply stared at the writing. Should she call the police? But who would she call? Easton? Jason? McNair? None of those options was appealing, for different reasons.
The more she considered the note, the more spooked she felt. But as Dani worked the swirling thoughts in her head over and over, she finally determined a plan.
There was, of course, the distinct possibility that the note was nothing more than a wind-up, someone goading Dani after seeing her in the press conference, and then reading about Dean Harland’s death. She’d received plenty of such taunting mail over the last couple of years. There really were some sick weirdos out there. Most of them were harmless.
Most, but not all of them…
Dani went into the desk in the spare bedroom and pulled out a plastic wallet from the drawer. She put the note inside. Yes she’d handled it already, but she hadn’t had any inkling what it was when she’d first picked it up. Her fingerprints on the note were easily explainable, but she had to do her best to preserve the note properly now. There could still be trace evidence on the paper that could prove vital in identifying who wrote it.
If she showed it to the police. The police. Like she wasn’t one of them anymore.
Dani heard a clank at the lounge window and jumped in shock. She stared over at the glass. The blackness outside was interspersed with the yellow and orange glow from apartments across the canal. There was nothing else she could see, nothing to hear. Was it a small bird flying into her window? A giant moth, lured by the lights in her apartment?
Dani moved over to the window and pressed her face up against the glass so she could see onto the balcony. She realised her heart was thudding in her chest.
What would she actually do if there was a person standing out there, staring right back at her?
She had no idea. Luckily, it was a moot point. There was nothing and no one outside.
Then Dani jumped again when she heard faint footsteps behind her. She whipped around and held her breath…
Nothing.
Perhaps the sound had come from outside the apartment?
She could see out into the dark hallway, and as she stared at the band of light seeping in under the front door it was suddenly distorted.
Someone was definitely out there.
Dani rushed forwards, through the lounge, into the hallway. She threw open the door and sprang out into the corridor. She looked up and down. She was panting with anticipation, fear too. But the corridor was quiet. Just like it had been before when the note had been slipped into her home.
No one was in sight. But someone had been there. Dani knew that for sure. And it certainly wasn’t the first time she’d felt a presence over the past few days.
Feeling anything but bold and courageous this time, Dani quickly retreated to the safety of her apartment and slammed the door shut, then locked and double-checked the door. She moved through the apartment in a frenzy, flipping every single light on, propping open all the doors, closing all the curtains. Then she went from room to room, once again satisfying herself that she was, in fact, alone.
When she’d finished her search, Dani grabbed a dining chair and lugged it out into the hallway where she propped it under the handle to the front door. Then she walked back into the lounge and curled up on the sofa.
Her eyes darted intermittently between the front door, and the note on the coffee table. Who’d left that note and why, she simply had no idea.
One thing was for sure, she wouldn’t be getting much sleep tonight.
Chapter Forty-Two
Steven Grant woke up on Thursday morning feeling tired and groggy. Even after his usual quiet catch-up Wednesday, he didn’t feel at all rested, and could scarcely believe there were still two full w
orking days before the weekend. He knew why he was feeling so wiped out though: Ethan. Grant and Mary had heard nothing from him for days. The police still wanted to speak to him in connection with the deaths of at least two of his friends – if friends was the right word.
Even if Grant knew where Ethan was, he wasn’t sure he’d tell the police. Ethan was still his son, and he would protect him if he could. He wanted to confront Ethan first and find out exactly what was happening, before he decided whether to let the police at him.
The whole situation was taking a toll on Mary too, though she’d been surprisingly relaxed the last couple of days. Perhaps she’d upped her meds again.
Grant got up from the bed and left Mary sleeping. After fixing himself a quick breakfast he was out of the house not long after eight. It was a cold, dark, foggy and drizzly autumn morning. The kind of morning that could suck any happiness out of even the most hardy and optimistic of people.
Out on the drive Grant headed to his car and pressed the unlock button on his key fob. He was intent on getting in and getting warm, until he heard a voice call out.
‘Morning, neighbour!’
The cheery voice riled Grant. He looked out across the street to see Francis standing at the edge of his driveway, his set of pristine golf clubs propped up by his side. Grant had his hand on the door handle as Francis stepped forwards and crossed the road.
‘Morning,’ Grant said, deciding it best to at least play along for a few seconds rather than blank the guy. ‘Another day, another game of golf, eh?’
Did the man never have anything else to do? Work, for example?
‘Got to get the practice in,’ Francis said, stopping at the edge of Grant’s driveway, much to Grant’s relief. ‘I know you didn’t enjoy yourself much last time, but you’re always welcome to join me again.’
‘Thanks. I’ll bear it in mind. You waiting for a lift or something?’
The Essence of Evil Page 24