She kept her phone’s light trained on the spot on the shelf, and I took a step closer.
It was a gold signet ring, chunky, with a star-shaped emblem set into it, with a small diamond at its centre. I picked it up and examined it.
‘I don’t believe it,’ I said.
‘You recognize it?’
‘It’s Samir’s. I spoke to the podcaster earlier. She told me it was missing from his body. The police never found it.’
‘What podcaster?’ Miranda asked.
I ignored her, holding the ring between finger and thumb.
‘I bet he hid it there,’ I said. ‘As evidence he’d been here.’
‘No, it’s more than that,’ Holly said. ‘It was designed to attract attention to this part of the bookcase. Reach under the shelf.’
I put my fingers beneath the spot where the ring had sat and immediately felt something, wedged into a spot in the wood. I pulled it out and found myself looking at a thin wallet. A card-holder.
Inside the wallet was Samir’s provisional driving licence. There was a bank card, too, and a membership card to a shop that exchanged video games and tech. I pulled out the licence to take a closer look at the photo– wide eyes, wispy moustache– and a piece of paper came out with it, fluttering to the floor.
I shone my flashlight at the floor but couldn’t see it. I crouched and was about to start swearing with frustration when Holly said, ‘There.’
I picked it up. It was a small sheet of lined notepaper, and it was folded several times so it would fit into the wallet. I unfolded it.
At the top of the page, he had drawn what looked like a logo, scratchy and crude, but the four letters clearly legible:
Fase. The name of the facial recognition app.
‘Let me see,’ Miranda said, pushing past Holly. ‘What the hell?’
This was it. Proof not only that Samir had been connected to the Grants, but that he was linked to Gravitas.
‘This is it,’ I said. This was it. I was going to be able to tell Miranda what her husband had done. ‘This is proof that Zack—’
Halfway through the sentence, I turned the paper over and saw something that stopped me dead. A phone number and a name.
Not Zack’s name.
Lewis.
36
I stared at the sheet of paper, with Holly and Miranda both looking over my shoulder, Holly shining her phone light to illuminate it. It had been folded numerous times and was almost falling apart. I assumed Samir must have had it in his pocket when he was brought to this place, that it wasn’t something he’d written while he was here. Surely if he’d had a pen he would have written something more direct. This was the best information he’d been able to leave behind.
Holly seemed even more shell-shocked and uncomprehending than I felt. ‘You don’t think Lewis brought him here, do you? Why would he do that? I don’t understand.’
‘Give that to me.’ Miranda snatched the sheet of paper from my hand, frown lines appearing on her forehead. She took a few steps away from us. Actually, it was more of a stagger. Seeing her brother’s name appeared to have stunned her.
I seized the opportunity, leading Holly to the other side of the room, into a dark corner, and dropping my voice to a whisper.
‘I was sure this would lead us to Zack. Not Lewis.’
‘Zack? Why?’
As succinctly as I could, I told her about going with Morag to the bothy, the shooting, Susan showing up, the crash… She listened to it all with her jaw hanging open.
‘Morag’s dead?’
