Chapter 22
TWENTY-TWO
Dawson’s family had left with Caroline. Morgan had been relieved she hadn’t had to deal with them.
She wasn’t going to be as lucky with Scarlett’s family, though, as Ben had asked her to be present for the identification, and she could hardly say no a second time.
They went to the small viewing room to await their arrival, while Declan and Susie did the preliminary examinations before preparing Scarlett’s body to be viewed.
A noise signalled the arrival of Scarlett’s family as a harried-looking officer led them into the room.
There was a man, woman and two teenagers following behind them.
Morgan glanced over at Ben whose face looked as stressed as the officer accompanying the family.
The guy who she assumed was Scarlett’s dad had burning red cheeks and his eyes were two swirling pools of darkness.
He looked to Morgan like he was ready to fight the world.
Scarlett’s mum, on the other hand, was barely holding herself together; the two teenagers looked as if they didn’t care less, one of them was staring down at her phone tapping away on the screen.
The boy, who looked the youngest out of them, was staring at his feet, as if he wanted to be anywhere but here.
‘What are we waiting for? Let’s get it over with,’ said Scarlett’s dad.
Morgan held out her hand. ‘I’m Detective Brookes, we’re just waiting for the staff to get everything ready.’
He didn’t take her hand but glared at her. ‘By “everything”, you mean our daughter?’
Morgan kept her voice calm. ‘The room, the paperwork. I’m very sorry you’re having to go through this.’
‘You’re not as sorry as we are. Stupid, selfish girl was grounded for arguing with her sister and she snuck out to go and get herself killed. It’s a good job that lad is already dead because if he wasn’t I’d have strangled him with my bare hands for taking her out in that weather last night.’
‘Don’t, Johnny.’
The guy looked at his wife and stopped talking; instead he took up pacing the small room, making it even more claustrophobic than it already was. After what seemed like forever Declan walked in.
‘Mr and Mrs Peters, I’m the forensic pathologist dealing with your daughter. I’m sorry for what you’re going through. When you’re ready, my colleague will open the curtain for you to take a look at the body on the other side. Please take your time, there is no rush.’
Mr Peters glared at Declan. ‘Take my time? How long do you think is appropriate for me to look at my dead daughter’s body?’
Ben moved in front of Mr Peters. ‘I understand how upset and angry you are, but please remember that we’re here to help you all, and Scarlett. We’re not here to make things worse for you.’
Mr Peters growled under his breath, ‘Do it.’
His wife was staring through the viewing window, and she fixed her gaze on the gurney bearing the body on the other side. She stepped forward, her nose touching the glass as she stared. Her husband did the same, then he stepped back and looked at his wife, confusion etched across his face.
‘Who the fuck is that?’
Morgan felt her heart drop. She looked across at Declan. By the worried look on his face he was trying to gauge the situation.
‘Can you confirm this is your daughter, Scarlett Peters?’
‘Are you having a laugh? That is not my daughter.’
‘She’s been in the water for quite a few hours. It can cause facial changes and disfiguration.’
‘She’d have to have been in there forever to cause those changes. Our daughter isn’t Asian.’
Whoever assumed it was Scarlett hadn’t actually paid much attention to her missing person’s report, and Morgan would not be surprised if it had been Marc or Amber.
Morgan turned to look closely at the body and realised in horror that he was right.
Mrs Peters sank to her knees and let out a soft wailing sound, while her husband looked at her then turned to Declan.
‘You have done this. Do you see what you’ve done to her? Bringing her, us, all here, thinking our daughter was dead and then you show us someone who isn’t even the same ethnic minority as us. How stupid are you all?’
Out of nowhere, he swung back his arm and threw a punch that landed in the middle of Declan’s face. Morgan heard the cartilage in his nose crack. Ben launched himself at Mr Peters, who was now swinging his fists as if he was in the ring with Tyson Fury.
Morgan tugged her radio out of her pocket and pressed the red emergency button, at the same time yelling, ‘Scotty, where are you? We need urgent assistance.’
Ben had taken a fist to the side of his jaw so hard he’d lost his balance and fell backwards on the floor, landing with a loud thump.
Morgan stepped in front of the distraught dad.
Not wanting to but having no choice, she thrust both hands at Mr Peters’s chest, so hard it winded him and knocked him off balance.
He stumbled backwards. His two teenagers seemed to be enjoying this; the girl had her phone in her hand filming the entire debacle; his wife was screaming full force.
He ran at Morgan both fists balled and ready to knock the living shit out of her, when Scotty ran in with his taser drawn.
‘Stop or I’m going to have to taser you.’
Mr Peters didn’t stop, and the words, ‘Taser, taser, taser,’ filled the small room as Scotty aimed and discharged the yellow taser gun he was holding with a loud pop, just seconds before Mr Peters smacked her in the face.
The barbs landed dead centre in the middle of the guy’s back and he dropped to the floor like a sack of potatoes, twitching.
Morgan ushered his wife and kids out of the room, snatching the phone off the girl who was recording and pocketing it.
‘Hey, give me my phone back. You can’t take that off me.’
She turned to her. ‘I’ll give it back in a minute. Recording what is not your dad’s finest moments isn’t going to help matters. Look after your mum, please.’
Susie took one look at the carnage inside the viewing room and began ushering the family minus their dad into Declan’s office.
‘Susie, the curtains, please.’ Declan’s voice sounded thick as if he was full of the cold.
Susie nodded at him, handing him a wad of tissues from her pocket. He held them to his nose.
Sirens stopped outside of the front doors and officers rushed in, followed by two paramedics. Ben, who was rubbing his jaw, looked at the mess and whispered, ‘What a shit show.’
Morgan couldn’t stop the smile that lifted the corners of her lips, despite the situation.
Scotty was standing over Mr Peters, watching the paramedics check him over before loading him onto a trolley and wheeling him down to the A&E department.
‘I leave you lot alone for less than five minutes. I mean I didn’t even get out of the car park,’ whispered Scotty.
‘Well, at least I took the daughter’s phone off her before she could do any damage.’
Amber walked into the room in time to catch what Morgan said, and she shook her head. ‘She was on TikTok and live-streamed part of it. My student officer was on it and saw the whole thing kicking off.’
Ben groaned. ‘Christ.’
Declan was sitting on one of the very bland, beige sofas with blood dripping down his scrubs. He began to laugh and everyone turned to look at him.
He shrugged. ‘Are we trending and now TikTok superstars? Well, I was pondering a nose job, so I guess now I have a good reason to book a consultation. That poor family. Is someone going to get in there and apologise, because as much as that punch in my nose hurt, I think we just traumatised an entire family for no good reason. That was really unprofessional. I have never, ever had anything so awful happen on my watch. I do not want to press charges against Mr Peters. We can never make up for the distress we just caused them all.’
Ben was heading towards the door. ‘But who would think another body would be in that lake when their daughter went missing there? Her friend was already pulled out of it. Who said it was Scarlett?’
Morgan spoke quietly into her radio. ‘Control, who ID’d the body from the lake?’
‘I’m just looking through the log now.’
After a minute Helen the call handler replied. ‘2821, student officer.’
Morgan knew it had to have been something to do with Amber. She had turned up with a student and she’d let him do it without monitoring the situation closely. The blame fell on Amber’s shoulders, not the students. ‘Okay, thanks.’
Ben was shaking his head. ‘I mean, you just couldn’t make that stuff up.’
Amber who didn’t look at all remorseful about the mess she’d made with her student pulled up a photo of the woman that Sandra had reported missing.
Morgan looked at it and nodded. ‘That looks an awful lot like the woman in the viewing room, who you let your student ID without making sure it was correct.’
This time Amber’s cheeks flared a deep, burning red and she at least had the decency to look like she was bothered. ‘I don’t know how it happened, I’m so sorry. I was so tired and the visibility was really poor.’
‘Double fuck, what the hell is going on? Why was she in that lake?’ Ben’s voice was barely audible he was talking so low.
Amber shook her head. ‘Not got the foggiest, but she had a friend, so that other girl might be missing too…’
Morgan looked at Amber. ‘There are two missing girls?’
‘Her friend is twenty-two, so not technically a girl, but yeah. It looks that way. We haven’t been able to get hold of her, and her family hasn’t heard from her for four days.’
Morgan wanted to scream in frustration, but she didn’t. Instead, she pulled up Google on her phone and typed in weather four days ago near Buttermere. A sinking feeling that it might have been damp and foggy that day too made her stomach churn so much she thought she might puke all over the floor.
The watcher might be very real, and he was on a killing spree. She needed to find him and stop it no matter what the cost.