Page 26 of One Left Alive
‘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.’
‘How do you know he’d been at work?’
‘He had a red shirt with KFC embroidered on the left side of it and he told me he had.’
Amy grinned at Ben. ‘Ah, well, it’s not him then, is it, if he clearly has an alibi like wearing a uniform.’
Ben frowned at her. ‘Bring him in for a friendly chat. I want to speak to him myself. Let him stew for a bit in interview room A. Claire, Abigail, should we go and take a look at the scene? I’d appreciate your advice as to whether we can get the bodies moved to the mortuary.’
Morgan realised Amy was being sarcastic and scolded herself for being so gullible. Ben ended the briefing; everyone had a set of tasks to complete. She was no longer sleepy: she was determined to show everyone how capable she was of carrying out the role she’d been given. She would scour the CCTV footage for any clues no matter how long it took her.
Eighteen
Ben pulled his vibrating phone out of his pocket; it had been going on and off the whole time during the briefing. It was Declan. ‘What’s up?’
‘I’m ready to continue with Olivia Potter’s post-mortem. I want to get hers out of the way before the rest of her family arrive. Are you free now?’
‘Can you give me an hour? I have two visitors from the Murder Investigation Team and was going to take them to the scene. I can show them then come to you.’
A loud crash in the background almost deafened Ben.
Declan shouted down his ear,‘For the love of God, can you just be careful with that, it’s evidence. If you smash my samples to smithereens you can go in front of the judge and explain what happened to them.’
He lowered his voice.‘I swear to God I have the clumsiest assistant you could find. Lovely, hardworking, but a bloody liability. One of these days she’s going to end up dropping someone’s brain all over the tiled floor. I’ll hold on for you then, come straight down.’
Another loud noise and more cursing from Declan filled the air then the line went dead.
Ben looked at Morgan, who was tugging on a coat.
‘Hey, you can come with me if you want. While I’m showing the bosses the crime scene you can go check for CCTV at the nearest properties.’
He didn’t tell her that once he was done, they were going to watch a post-mortem. She looked a bit overwhelmed and he didn’t want her running back down to Mads begging to go back on response after only being on his team for an hour. He did wonder if this was taking the whole throwing someone in at the deep end a touch too far. Then decided that if he was giving her a baptism of fire he may as well get the worst of it over within the first twenty-four hours. After everything she’d been through, she would relish the simplicity of tasks such as house to house or CCTV enquiries.
She didn’t answer but nodded her head. That would do for him. He’d go easy on her tomorrow if she was struggling.
He was heading out of the station with Claire, Abigail and Morgan when his phone vibrated again. It was a message from Amy this time.
Who knew you’d have an entourage of women at your disposal, never thought I’d see the day :)
Holding the door open, he waited for everyone to leave then turned and gave her the finger. As the door shut, he heard her loud laughter following them down the corridor and couldn’t help but smile.
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