to think her squeamish, she stared at the screen. It didn’t look real in the photographs. The carnage and devastation didn’t hit home like it had in that cellar which smelt of damp and blood.
‘Saul Potter, and his youngest daughter Beatrix, were both dead on the scene, massive blunt-force injuries to their heads. Both faces were covered with white cloths. Bronte, the older sister, was found by Morgan barely alive and rushed to the RLI, where she is currently undergoing surgery to remove a clot from her brain. The safe word when speaking to staff for updates is “campervan”.’
Everyone scribbled it down onto their notepads, and Morgan did the same.
Ben continued talking and, listening to his soothing voice, her eyes began to feel heavy and she had to pinch her arm under the table to wake herself up. She’d never live it down if she fell asleep in her first murder investigation briefing. Ben would send her back down to response faster than she’d come up. But she was tired, beyond tired. Her dad’s late-night visit had disrupted her routine. The usual feeling of swallowing a lead ball settled in her stomach at the thought of him being in her apartment. She didn’t trust him; she was sure he wouldn’t have left like he’d promised and he’d have eaten what meagre food she had in her fridge.
She felt a sharp dig in the side of her stomach and glanced around to see Amy staring at her. With a start she realised her attention had drifted off and she mouthed ‘sorry’. She brought her attention back to Ben, who was staring at her, and she realised he’d asked her a question. Only she had no idea what.
‘Sorry, can you repeat that?’
‘I said that you were going to be responsible for CCTV enquiries at surrounding properties to Lake View. Is that okay?’
‘Yes, Sarge.’
‘Good, the houses along that stretch of Easdale Road are expensive. Which means they’re likely to have good security systems with a possibility of CCTV. At least that’s what I’m hoping for. It would be a bit of a miracle if they all worked or had cameras which covered the road.
‘Amy, you are in charge of background checks on the family. I’ve already asked Intel to do the more in-depth stuff. I want you to get me their Facebook accounts, friends list, et cetera.’
Morgan raised her hand.
‘Yes.’
‘Teenagers don’t really do Facebook any more. They tend to go for Snapchat or Instagram; TikTok is very popular at the moment.’
Ben repeated. ‘Tick tock, what the hell is that?’
She shrugged. ‘Not too sure, I just know a lot of them use it.’
Abigail nodded. ‘She’s right, studies show it’s more our age group that use Facebook.’
‘Well then, there’s a good chance Saul and Olivia are on Facebook. Just see what you can find. Wendy, can you give us an update on the evidence at the scene?’
Wendy began to talk them through what she’d found.
When she’d finished Claire asked, ‘What can you tell me about the cloths covering their faces?’
‘That’s a good question. When something of this calibre, using extreme violence, happens, it often leads to a family member or someone close to the family. Ashamed because of what they’ve done, they cover the faces. You said there are doubts surrounding Olivia Potter’s hanging; is there any chance this is a murder–suicide? Maybe she killed her family then killed herself. Or could the surviving daughter have done it then injured herself, but not severely enough to kill herself? What about Saul, is there any chance he could have done it?’
Ben shook his head. ‘All very real possibilities, but no, Saul, isn’t the perpetrator. I agree we need to look into Olivia a little more closely, and Bronte; we need to see if either of them had motive. I do agree it’s either one of them or someone close to the family. There were no signs of forced entry, so whoever it was had a key and knew them all well enough to get into the house without arousing their suspicion.’
Abigail asked, ‘Who found the first body?’
Morgan answered. ‘Bronte’s boyfriend. He rang it in when he found Olivia hanging in the front garden when he arrived to see Bronte.’
Claire and Abigail both said, ‘Bingo,’ in unison.
Ben looked at Amy.
‘Let’s bring him in: what’s his name?’
Morgan spoke before Amy had chance to look at the incident report on the laptop.
‘Harrison Wright. He’d been at work though; he had a bag of KFC with him when he arrived.’