A female officer at the back of the room stuck her hand up. ‘No real luck yet, ma’am. We found no ID at the address taken from Rebecca Hargreaves and Laura Finlay, and no correspondence for our vic, or anyone else for that matter. All utility bills were paid by the landlord who… well, he’s a bit dodgy. Took cash, no questions. He couldn’t give us anything useful on Natalya.’

‘No ID at all at her home? Any evidence that the place was deliberately cleared?’

‘No. Sorry.’

‘But he did acknowledge that someone by that name had been staying there?’

‘Kind of, but he really was pretty vague even about that.’

Dani thought about that for a moment. She didn’t like the sound of the situation at all. Was the guy just a dodgy landlord or was he a potential suspect?

‘Bring him in for formal questioning. Find something to caution him with if you need to. Firstly, I want to clear him off as a suspect.’

‘Yes, ma’am.’

‘And Mrs Staunton. Have we cleared up what happened to her?’

‘Still waiting for forensics results,’ Easton said. ‘Maybe we’ll have something today.’

Dani sighed. Other than her relaying to the team her own thoughts and findings, there really wasn’t much else to go on. She spent a couple of minutes dishing out further responsibilities. Largely casting the net of enquiries and CCTV searches a little further. Then she was done. She needed to go anyway.

‘Are there any further points before we wrap up?’ Dani asked.

‘So we really are looking for a serial killer now, do you think?’ piped up one of the young DCs. DC Grayling.

‘No,’ Dani said. ‘We are not toeing that line, either internally or externally. Not officially. But it’s becoming quite clear these two murder cases are closely linked, and we can’t rule out that possibility.’

There were a few murmurs from the room. Dani was aware that Fletcher was staring at her but she didn’t bother to look. Her answer this time certainly wasn’t as inflammatory as at the press conference, but would McNair still have disapproved?

‘Anything else?’

No one raised their hand this time, and Dani called the meeting to a close. After a quick and largely pointless further debrief with Fletcher and Easton, Dani was soon back in her car, whatever insecurities and aggravations she was feeling about her role in the force well and truly sidelined, and her anxiety levels peaked despite the tablets she’d taken before leaving the house earlier that morning.