Mystery: Quest for Justice: (Mystery, Suspense, Thriller, Suspense Thriller Mystery) (8 page)

"So, it was Laura who was pretending to be John's mother?" asked Monica.

"Yes. This fits in with everything. Such as when I went to John's house. I knocked on the door. I think that Laura was actually in the house at the time, waiting for a phone call. The knock on the door alerted her, so she sneaked out the back and came to talk to me. She was able to observe Monica going out every day, because she lived just round the corner from her, so she would be able to look from one bedroom window and watch her going out of the house. Whenever Monica left, Laura would dress up as the old woman and go to the house."

"This is extraordinary!" Patricia said.

"There is more," I said. "When I asked Laura if she knew that John was schizophrenic, or that he had any mental health disorder, she denied it, even though it was blatantly obvious. This was to convince me that she was not trying to manipulate John, or show that she was an easy target."

"What about our sons’ murders?" asked the mother of Daniel Gibson.

"Well, for the first murder, Laura was working in the club at the time of the party. I know this because before I left the building, I checked the records by telephoning the club. Anyway, since she was doing a job that night, Laura was easily able to slip a drug into everyone's drinks. This meant that nobody would be able to remember anything that happened the night before, except for minor details. Furthermore, nobody would suspect a thing because they were all drunk anyway. After the dance, Laura killed him and put his body into the back of her car. She then waited for people to leave, and drove his body to the forest."

"And the second murder?" said Steven's mother.

"The second murder helped me out a great deal," I said, "because of one thing. I now know that every day, Steven took a new route when he walked his dog, because there was a lot of the town to explore. If Steven took his dog out for a new walk every day, would the dog be able to remember everything?"

There were a few shakes of heads.

"A dog's brain is not adapted enough to be that clever, so it would not remember its exact route home. So, how did it get home? The answer is that somebody must have taken it home. Obviously, this person was Laura. After killing Steven, she noticed the dog, and since she cares for animals so much, she drove it home, where she left it to find its own way back."

"And the third?" said Daniel's mother.

"The third murder was quite puzzling, but the answer was very simple. There were no witnesses at the time, were there?"

"No," some people said.

"So, why did Laura take the risk and kill him in an open street? The answer is simple: because she knew that nobody was there. She knew that everyone in Jackson Street was out for a 100th birthday party or somebody's anniversary. This lasted for the whole night from the afternoon until late at night, because a 100-year old would prefer to have their party on an afternoon than at night time. Knowing this, Laura was able to kill Daniel without anyone seeing at all."

I then moved on to the fourth murder.

"The fourth murder was very puzzling indeed, but I now know that it was Laura who wrote the note to Richard, because she knew that Monica and Richard were dating, so Richard would naturally assume that it was Monica who wrote the note. That's all there is to it. I'm finished now, so does anybody have any questions?"

Nobody answered.

"I have one!" cried Laura.

"And what is that?" I said to her.

"How can you prove any of this?" she said with a fairly smug look on her face.

"Please, don't let her get away with it!" one of the parents begged.

"I won't," I replied, "and I do in fact, have evidence. I know that the love note that was written to Richard would have your fingerprints on it. If you are innocent, you would have no need to touch the piece of paper, so they would not be there."

Laura looked very vexed by now.

"Alright!" she cried, "I'm the Minot Hacker! Are you all happy now?!"

Monica looked at her. Everyone else looked at her. Patricia was the one who arrested her.

A couple of minutes later, everyone prepared to leave.

"Thank you so much!" cried the parents of the victims. "We've waited twenty years for this day!"

"I'm glad you've finally found justice," I said. "Laura will never get out of prison again. That is guaranteed."

"I never thought it would be a woman," said the father of Daniel Gibson. "I thought about who the killer might be a lot, and I prayed to God for that day. Without you, we would have never found true justice!"

The parents left. However, there were still two people I wanted to speak to. Monica slowly approached us.

"Thank you," she said, almost crying.

"What for?" I asked.

"For having faith in us."

Monica and John then held hands, and walked out of the police station and into the sunlight. I almost cried when I watched them give each other a hug.

"It's over now," said Monica. "It's all over."

And I'm glad it is!

June, 1974

The Green family were similar to any typical family living in a rough housing project in the town ofMinot, North Dakota. They were unemployed, had little money and overall, were experiencing a tough time during economic depression. During this time, many people turned to alcohol, and no-one cared about anyone else but themselves and their own families. Times were hard, and many did not see a way out of it. No-one knew if they were ever going to experience happiness again. The country was going through a terrible time, and that was that.

Ian Green was like any other child going through these times. He was eight years of age, and often had little to eat outside of school hours. He was an innocent child who was always making people laugh. He had no idea of the situation the country was in, as he was too young to understand, and was too occupied with his own childhood to even try to. He had grown up in one house in a housing project, as did his elder sister and elder brother. His brother, Evan, was six years of age, while his sister, Alison, was almost seventeen.

Evan was known as a geek, or a nerd. He wore square glasses and had two teeth at the front of his mouth that stuck out. Very few people talked to him in those days. He was always in the background, though a target for bullies, and Ian could not do anything but sit back and watch, as he was powerless against large groups of them. Evan did not fit in at all with the rest of the family – he was too intelligent, though none of the other members of the family seemed to notice.

Alison, on the other hand, was a typical teenage girl. She was the complete opposite of Evan in some ways, as she spent most of her time going out and dressing her hair.

One night, on an afternoon in 1984, was a completely typical night. It was quiet outside, and there was no-one around, no-one except the entire Green family, excluding the one who did not bother to speak to any of them.

"Bitch, I asked for a steak pie, not a pork one!" cried Thomas, the patriarch of the family.

"Do I care?" asked Iris, drinking a large glass of wine. Iris was the matriarch of the family, and most of the time she did not care about anything.

"You will in a moment if you don't keep your trap shut!" screamed an enraged Thomas.

The entire family was watching in the background of the living room, knowing what was about to happen next. Iris' parents, Margaret and Fred, who lived next door to the family, were watching, not caring much, while all three children were there. The two boys watched in fear, while Alison did not care at all. She was too busy putting on makeup for her night out. Iris' sister, Alison, was also there. Alison and Iris were nothing at all alike: Iris had short, brown hair and was a plump woman, while Alison was a skinny blonde.

"Here they go again!" laughed Margaret. Fred laughed with her.

"And if you don't shut up I'll ram your head into that door!" yelled Thomas, even more angry. Those threats were not at all empty, as the entire family knew the extent of his violent behavior.

"Don't talk to her like that!" Iris cried, getting up to attack Thomas. She stood up, but could barely walk. She was obviously drunk, as usual. The rest of the family had no idea where she got those amounts of alcohol from. Maybe there was a secret supplier, they thought. Iris half-limped over to Thomas and as she tried to hit him, Thomas jumped up and punched her repeatedly in the mouth. Two of her teeth fell out, and her face turned red. She screamed to stop but he didn't listen, and neither did anyone. Nobody cared anymore.

"You go, girl!" cried Iris' father, enjoying the action.

Iris then picked up a knife and cut into Thomas's hand. Thomas then screamed.

"I'm gonna kill you!" he cried.

Iris tried to run away, but he grabbed her hair and yanked it. She screamed for someone to help her.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, Ian got up heroically and tried to stop the fight. He could not bear to see his mother abused like this; it was becoming more and more frequent.

"Let go of her now!" Ian cried.

Everyone in the room was bewildered by this. Thomas let go of his wife.

"What did you just say?" he said, in complete shock.

"I hate you! I'm gonna tell the police!"

This made Thomas even more angry. He grabbed hold of little Ian and smacked his head against the wall. He forced him onto the wall, and then repeatedly punched Ian in the stomach. Poor little Evan was screaming in fear, but Alison was laughing, crying, "Go on, Dad! Kick the shit out of him!"

Thomas eventually finished beating his child. He collapsed to the floor, covered in bruises, bleeding in places. He almost coughed up blood.

"And don't you ever, ever stand up to me again!" he screamed, kicking the child a few more times.

Alison, who was still there in the background, stood next to her parents who were watching as if they were watching a television program. She decided enough was enough.

"Right, I'd best be off," she said, her voice trembling.

"See ya, love!" said Margaret, kissing her on the hand. Alison left, telling herself that she had not witnessed any of what she had just seen.

Alison then got up.

"Right, I'm ready," she said.

"And where are you going?" Thomas asked.

"I'm going to my friend's party," she replied. "Isn't it obvious? I'm wearing a pink dress!"

"Well, go on then," said Thomas.

Alison left, leaving the rest of the house in tatters. Evan was hiding under a table, while Ian was still in shock about the whole thing. He was still in agony. He had been hit a couple of times before, but this was the worst by far. Iris carried on drinking, and Thomas sat down to eat his pork pie.

It was a cold night, actually early hours in the morning, and there was a person out in the middle of a field, digging. The person dug a hole, and they placed something into that hole. That thing was a person. A woman. A young woman. A young woman wearing a pink dress.

It was one week after the Minot hacker murders case, and I was still receiving vast amounts of media attention, although there was now little attention left to receive. To me, it was done, in the past, and I focused all of my energy on the next murder case that I was assigned to, even if that was going back to the gang killings.

"Has everything settled down now?" asked Miranda, my colleague and somewhat friend.

I thought that Miranda was perhaps jealous of my amazing achievement, since I knew that she had not used that sort of deductive power in her life, and even if she was assigned to the Minot case, she would not solve it, and the true murderer would have gotten away with it, sending an innocent person to prison. Although I was very proud of what I had done to help those families I did not brag about it, nor did I mention it once to hint to the others that I was pleased with my huge success.

To my bewilderment, there was still a newspaper article about me pinned up on the boss's wall when I entered the room, even though seven days had gone by. I was very pleased that Clive Mitchell had thought so much of me – that was something else for Miranda to be jealous of.

"Well, to be honest, Miranda," I'm glad the whole thing is over with," I replied to her before I went into the boss's office, ready to be assigned to my next murder case. I assumed it was another gang killing, because that was what they generally were; the gang violence in North Dakota was at the highest ever rate in 2012, which made me tired sometimes. However, I knew I should never assume anything that I thought might not be true, and indeed I was about to be proven wrong, when Mitchell assigned me to the case.

"Williams," he begun, smiling slightly as I entered the room, "I have a new case for you, and I think you'll like it."

"Alright," I replied, waiting for more information and eager to discover what the man had in store for me. Inside, I was honest with myself that not much could be trickier than solving the Minot murders, but I knew I could be surprised.

"Well," said Mitchell, "this morning, we, or should I say, a dog, found a body of an unidentified victim. There is not much left but bones, and they appear to be a female. I'll let you look at this person and you'll see the rest. It's obvious that this person died decades ago. I've chosen you for this case because I trust you. I have faith that you will find the killer of this person, no matter how hard it will be. You have already demonstrated your amazing skills to me, so this should be no problem to you."

I was quite annoyed at Mitchell's assumption, because he should not have put that much pressure on me. Sometimes murders are unsolvable, especially cold cases, since there are no leads from the start. It's sad, but unfortunately, Mitchell did not see it like that. He saw me as the God of criminal catching, and I knew I wasn't. Although I was talented at what I did, I could not make any deductions about things if I did not have anything to deduce from, and this case seemed just like that. On the other hand, it was worth a shot, and it was better than working on all of the gang killings all the time, so I was ready for the challenge, leaving others to work on the gang killings for a second time. I predicted they would now be very annoying, but now I had more important things to focus on than whether I was right about that.