Page 64 of Glasshouses

“Good job someone is.”

Another chuckle.

I left him to whatever he was doing, itching to crack open my own laptop and see what was on the pen drive. It was where I’d left it, still full of secrets. My own laptop was rarely used. I made a point of turning it on every couple of weeks and checking for updates, occasionally using it for work if I was doing something that wasn’t advised, like this. Even looking at these files would get me into no end of trouble with professional standards.

How had Taz gotten them? I knew he was a skilled hacker, but these opened like they would’ve if I was in Holmes and had the right permissions. I paused that thought. It could wait.

I plugged it into the port and opened up the drive. There was only one folder.

Goodhew.

Well, that was obvious. I opened it up, revealing several other folders, each one containing files with names that looked like evidence numbers.

The first one I opened told me that was exactly what it was. Evidence. These were the files I couldn’t open, even with a password, they’d been redacted.

And here they were, accessible and enticing. If you liked that sort of thing.

I rearranged my pillows on my bed, settling into them while I started to go through each document, scanned in accountancy ledgers for The Holding in writing I knew to be Amanda’s.

It was old fashioned bookkeeping, done manually, even showing the workings out. Page after page of income and outgoings. I saw house sales, the profit being added to the running totals for one account; outgoings for gardening equipment, and then a regular amount to Calderwick Manor.

A quick internet search told me this had been a non-selective boarding school for boys which had closed just over a decade ago.

Why was The Holding paying around ten grand a term? Thankful that Amanda had been so meticulous, I scanned through the files, counting what I figured to be five years’ worth of payments. Lily had said that her parents hadn’t valued education, that they were trying to force her to belong to a world that shunned technology and modern ways. Paying a boarding school contradicted that, so who was being sent there?

I opened another folder, one helpfully labelled case notes, and found a file note added by DC Stephen O’Brien.

“Got it.” I could’ve jumped up and punched the air, but I was too comfy. The Holding’s leader was Andrew Smith, and I had an address. I rummaged around next to me for my work laptop, going through the various levels of security to get access to a browser, then I searched for Andrew Smith and The Holding, eventually, deep in a very old chat room, found a reference.

Andrew Smith who runs the Holding would be able to advise you on where to get seedlings locally. I think he can supply them to you.

That was it, but it would do. I didn’t have to reveal the pen drive. Another search and I discovered that Andrew Smith was still living at the same address, although it wasn’t the address held by Companies House for The Holding.

I went back to the case note, carrying on through O’Brien’s bullet points, all brief, nothing explanatory.

Unusual cash withdrawals – partly to avoid a penalty charge accrd to A.G.

TH paying tax?

A.S. connected to D.Sup C.M. D.Sup instructed us to -

It was blacked out. I took a big breath, closed the file down, and opened the next folder. More accounts, all in Amanda’s handwriting. The final folder contained the information I’d been seeking since the start; the notes from when the police had spoken to the doctor who’d treated Lily that morning, after she’d been found in the cemetery.

They were brief.

Tested negative for alcohol, not intoxicated. Presented as mute. No signs of assault. Hands were positive for traces of petrol. No physical injs. Slight hyptherm. No breathing iss.

It didn’t marry with Lily having run through the woods between Roselea and the church. Maybe she’d had shoes on – she’d been found barefoot but that didn’t mean she hadn’t left the house without something on her feet. But if she had, she hadn’t left in as much of a panic.

None of it contradicted what Terry Jones had told me. If anything, what I’d just read was more suggestive of Lily being guilty. She wasn’t drunk, she possibly wasn’t barefoot and if she was, she hadn’t run from her house to the graveyard. Things still didn’t add up.

My phone buzzed with a text from Lachy.

Cade breathing on his own. Stats good. Managed to get in his laptop. Videos of inside Roselea. Nothing obvious.

I responded back.

Perp must’ve been worried him seeing something. Or going in the shed.