‘Not really, but I will be. You?’
He shrugged. ‘Currently on the world’s biggest guilt trip, but you’re right we will be okay eventually, and it’s not as if we were the ones who chased Lauren and killed her, is it?’
Morgan stopped herself from saying thatwe may as well have, all this wallowing in guilt wasn’t going to find whoever did this. ‘No, we didn’t.’
He patted her arm. ‘Have you seen the boss? Is he back yet?’
‘Not that I know of.’
‘Okay, I’ll go get the files and we can go over stuff together until everyone is back for a briefing.’
‘Where’s Lauren?’
‘Still in situ at the scene. Wendy didn’t want her moving until they’d processed both rooms and the hallway outside. She said we’d trampled enough of the scene, and it was CSI’s turn to do their job.’
‘She’s right. Though I know we had to get the hotel searched for everyone’s safety, it still means we could have comprised some forensics. God, I hope they find something that leads us right to the killer’s front door.’
Right on cue, thudding up the spiral stairs signalled Marc’s arrival. He nodded at the pair of them. ‘Briefing?’
Ben shook his head. ‘Nobody here to have one, boss. CSI are still processing the scene, body is still in situ, Task Force has finished for the day.’
‘Really? Part-timers.’
‘Nobody authorised any overtime for them, so they weren’t going to hang around. How did you get on?’
‘Montgomery is on holiday, staying at a friend’s château in the south of France.’
‘Who told you this?’
‘The housekeeper.’
Morgan couldn’t stop herself. ‘And you believed her?’
‘She FaceTimed him, and he answered from inside a casino where everyone was speaking French. As much as I’d have liked it to be him and this be over, it clearly wasn’t, sorry.’
Ben looked gutted at this news, and she felt bad for him. It would have been nice if it had been Stefan and they had him in custody.
‘We must figure out who hated Lauren and her sister Lydia enough to kill them both, and also, someone is going to have to speak to their estranged sister and break the news to her.’
‘Yeah, we do.’ Ben was nodding.
‘I’ll speak to Alison Reynolds from Lancs CID and see if she’s got the contact details for the sister, or maybe Scotty might know where she’s living.’
‘Do you want to try find Scotty and see if he does?’
‘He’s in the report writing room, saw him as I walked past.’
Amber had joined them; Morgan smiled at her. ‘Thanks.’
She left them to go find him.
She walked past the sergeant’s office where Madds was laughing at someone on the other end of the phone. He lifted a hand to wave at her, and she waved back. There was only Scotty sitting at a desk in the far corner, everyone else was at the scene or patrolling the area. When he looked up, his face was devoid of colour; he looked worse than she did.
‘Hey.’
He nodded. ‘Hey.’
‘Are you okay? That must have been quite a shock for you.’
