‘Ben, I’m going to pretend you didn’t just insult both my intelligence and professionalism with that tasteless remark. I could tell because in perimortem injuries the haemorrhaging after losing a large amount of blood is associated with clotting. When you are breathing and hurt yourself enough to bleed the clots are laminated, firm and variegated. Wounds after death can cause a slight haemorrhage of the venous vessels, in which case clots are not present or if they are, they will be soft and non-laminated with a yellowish appearance. David had no clots in or around his injury, but Sally did and, to further back this up, her wound edges were gaped and swollen, while David’s had no swelling around them.’
Will was shaking his head. ‘It’s terrible, they killed David before his wife.’
Ben took another shot whilst he processed the information Declan had relayed to him.
‘What about the boy, Tim?’
‘I haven’t looked at him, I’m hoping for his sake that his were the same as David’s. I’ll be able to tell you more tomorrow, Ben.’
‘So, whoever did this, it’s likely that David and Tim were killed first, because Sally was the last one to arrive home. Then not long after the neighbour saw smoke coming from the front of the house. This is personal, whoever did this wanted Sally to see her family dead with their hands chopped off.’
‘Yes, it looks that way. Obviously I can’t give you a definite on Tim’s injuries until tomorrow, but I’m hoping to God that whoever this sick bastard is didn’t make a fourteen-year-old boy suffer any more than he had to. This is the kind of thing that gives me nightmares.’
Ben hadn’t thought today could get any worse, how wrong he’d been. Now Declan had confirmed Morgan’s theory and his own worst fears. He couldn’t comprehend the terror Sally must have felt walking into her home, the place she should be the safest, and seeing her husband and son dead. Then to have someone put a thick plastic bag over her head and chop off her hand whilst she was dying was just incomprehensible. Declan wasn’t the only one going to have nightmares tonight. He wasn’t sure if he’d be able to close his eyes without seeing those three bodies slumped at the table, bloodied stumps in front of them and their eyes bulging from their sockets as they gasped to try and take in oxygen that wasn’t there.
FIFTEEN
The ride into work was quiet. Morgan was worried about Ben. He’d been tossing and turning so that neither had slept much last night. She’d managed to grab a few hours at one point, but she’d then woken to find the bed empty and heard him downstairs in the kitchen. The next time he got in bed she got a faint whiff of whisky fumes that tainted his breath.
Amy was already in the atrium when they arrived, chatting to Mads. She looked a lot better than she had yesterday, funerals were hard. The dread and sadness leading up to them was magnified a hundred times, not that the grief ever left you. Morgan knew this all too well; she’d spent years battling with Stan, her dad, only to finally start to get along with him in the weeks before he’d been cruelly murdered. The grief ebbed and flowed in waves, she’d be okay and not even thinking about him and then out of nowhere something would remind her of him, and she’d want to curl up into a ball and cry buckets. She guessed guilt was what was eating away at Amy, but she had nothing to be guilty about. It was her, Morgan, who shouldered that particular guilt over Des: as she was the last person to be with him, she should have stopped it happening. Instead, she’d been relieved when he’d left her at that spring fete because he’d been getting on her nerves. The thing that upset Morgan over it all was that she’d never get to apologise to Des about what had happened. He had worn a protective shield whenever he had to work with her because he was scared she’d get him killed, and look what happened, she’d done just that.
Ben went up the stairs, but Morgan veered off to the downstairs toilets because she was afraid she was suddenly going to cry right here in the middle of the station. She never used to be this way, she used to be tough, feisty. But, she reflected, she also used to be lonely with no real friends since leaving school. She realised this was the price you paid for having people you cared about in your life: the more you liked someone, the bigger the impact from anything happening to them. Blotting her eyes with a piece of toilet paper so as not to smudge her eyeliner wings, Morgan asked herself would she rather be lonely so there was none of this and she realised the answer was no, she didn’t want to go back to the lonely girl she’d been before she joined this team.
When she came out of the toilet everyone had disappeared. Amy was now in the office along with Ben and Marc, who looked at her and smiled.
‘How are you all doing? It’s been a rough few days for everyone.’
Amy shrugged, Ben nodded, and Marc’s eyes fell on her.
‘Okay I guess,’ she answered him.
‘I wanted you to know that I’m going to be putting a post up on the intranet, asking for offers of interest to fill Des’s position.’ He held up his hand. ‘Before you rip my head off, Amy, I’m not trying to replace him, I wouldn’t want to. But what I see is a hard-working team who are overworked, underpaid and a team member down. Regardless of what you think of me, I can’t let you go on without an extra pair of hands. Even if we get someone in temporarily, that’s a big help.’
He was grimacing and Morgan found herself feeling a bit sorry for him, despite her past run-in with him.
Amy shrugged. ‘We need the help.’
Ben nodded. ‘We do need a hand, there’s a lot of investigating to do. Thanks, boss, that’s very much appreciated.’
‘Obviously I’ll run the likely candidates past you all, I’m not going to throw someone in who won’t get along with the rest of the team. That would be counterproductive, I want it to be someone you all think you can work with. Morgan, could I have a word with you in my office?’
Amy raised her eyebrows at Morgan, who nodded and followed him down to his office wondering what he was up to.
‘Come in, take a seat, this won’t take long.’
Reluctantly she did as he asked, noticing the picture frame of the family he’d had on his desk was gone.
‘I’m going to be honest with you because there is literally no point in not being; you seem to have a good handle on people, which is an excellent trait by the way.’
‘Honest about what?’ She had her hands tucked under her knees, hoping that he wasn’t going to say she was being moved again because she didn’t know if she’d be able to control herself.
Marc sighed heavily. ‘I have been a nightmare; I came in here guns blazing wanting to make the best impression, but I realise now that I have done nothing but mess things up and in a spectacular fashion too.’
She nodded, not sure if she was supposed to agree with him or not.
‘I’m sorry for causing you a lot of unnecessary stress. I shouldn’t have moved you to Barrow like that. I was angry, not with you but with myself. I thought that I was going to be working things out with my family and it didn’t happen. In Ben’s words I have been a complete arsehole and I want you to know that I’m going to really make this move work. Now that the investigation I was under in Manchester has been closed, and my name cleared, I can relax a little and see things for what they are, and I’ve realised that I needed to sort myself out.’
‘That’s good, I’m glad to hear it.’
