Page 62 of Her Lips Are Sealed

Lucy laughed. ‘Forgive us, Eric, this is huge and I can’t thank you enough for your cooperation.’

He nodded. ‘Is Lisa going to be okay?’

‘As far as we know, yes, she’s going to be sore and emotionally traumatised, but we have experts who will help her.’

‘Thank God, I hope so. Is there anything you need from me at this moment? I don’t want to be in your way.’ He passed Lucy a business card. ‘I’ll be ready to fix Lisa’s door the minute you ring me. I’m going to get brand new composite doors fitted and Lisa’s will be first.’

‘We don’t need anything else, thank you, Eric. You have been amazing and we appreciate this so much.’ Morgan smiled at him.

‘Good.’

Both women got out of his car letting him drive away.

Lucy was still clutching his business card, and she passed it to Morgan. ‘I’ll lose this. I’m hopeless. What a nice guy, he was so helpful.’

‘He was, he kind of restored my faith in landlords a little bit.’

‘And mine, he seemed to genuinely care and that’s a rare thing these days. Do you really recognise the guy, Morgan?’

‘I don’t know, probably not. I couldn’t place him, but he did remind me of someone I’ve come into contact with but not recently. It’s going to drive me mad now, trying to think where I may have seen him.’

‘Well, no pressure or anything but that would be extremely helpful if you did.’ Lucy winked at her.

‘Let’s tell Ben the good news. He’s going to pass out when he sees how clear the footage is.’

They walked back to where Ben was talking to Carl, and Morgan resisted the urge to shout the good news to him. The only question was why Lisa’s description differed so much from what Morgan had seen on the CCTV.

THIRTY-NINE

The blue room was buzzing with an electric current of mounting anticipation; news had got out about the clear image they had of the suspect. Every surface inside of the entrance to Lisa’s flat, the stairs and banister leading up to it and the front door were currently being covered in aluminium flake fingerprint powder. The front door and door frame that were uPVC were now stained with the black magnetic powder. There were lots of prints to lift, meaning a lot of work, but the hope was that some of them would belong to the suspect. It was painstakingly slow work, but in Ben and Lucy’s opinion totally worth it. If they could then match fingerprints from Lisa’s to some prints lifted from the scenes at Rachel’s and Ash’s flats, it would be all the evidence they needed to connect all three crimes.

An enlarged image of the suspect filled the Smart Board.

‘Anyone recognise him?’ Ben asked.

The room was silent. Morgan had already told Ben she thought he looked familiar.

‘This is our suspect for two murders and one attempt murder. What about the suit, anyone recognise where that might have come from?’

‘Next, looks like one Cain would wear,’ Amber piped up.

‘Shut up, Amber,’ Cain whispered, and she frowned at him.

‘His image doesn’t match that of his note-writing though, does it?’ Morgan said.

‘Actually, you have a point and I would appreciate it if anyone could tell me how he knows Morgan’s name and why he’s written that in it.’ Ben brought up a copy of the letter left under Lisa’s pillow. He stared at Morgan.

‘Christ on a bike,’ Cain muttered. ‘That’s not good, is she going into protective custody?’

‘She is not going anywhere, it doesn’t mean I’m on his hit list.’ Morgan couldn’t hide the annoyance in her voice.

‘I know this is judgemental of me and I’m sorry, but I was expecting someone a little less smart than this. Why is he dressed in a suit to go and commit murder?’ Amy said.

‘Because he looks trustworthy. If he knocked at your door, you’d probably open it. A lot of door-to-door sellers wear suits so they look more appealing.’ Lucy didn’t look up and instead was googling pinstripe suits.

‘If he put the note under Lisa’s pillow, he must have thought she was dead. That his job was done, yet he’s seen running out of the door, so what happened? Did she fake being dead and the minute he was out of sight phone me? She must have saved my number in her phone. I wish we could speak to her and find out what happened.’

‘We all do, Morgan. Have we got an update on her condition yet?’ Ben’s face was hopeful.