Her phone rang just as she was turning off Luke’s computer.

“Annie, it’s Stefan Nowak. Don’t get your hopes up too high, but I might have a bit of good news for you.”

“Do tell. I could do with some good news round about now.”

“The lab hasn’t finished trying to match your DNA samples with the blood on the drystone wall yet, so I can’t tell you about that, but my team did find blood at the flat.”

“Liz Palmer’s flat.”

“Yes.”

“How much?”

“Only a small amount.”

“Where?”

“Not where you’d expect. Smeared under the bathroom sink.”

“As if someone gripped it while leaning over?”

“Could be, yes. But there are no prints or anything, just a small smear of blood.”

“Is it enough for analysis?”

“Oh, yes. We’re working on it now. All the lab has been able to tell me so far is that it matches Luke Armitage’s blood type and that it doesn’t match the samples we took from Liz Palmer or Ryan Milne.”

“But that’s fantastic, Stefan! Don’t you see? It puts Luke Armitage bleeding in Liz Palmer’s flat.”

“Maybe. But it won’t tell you when.”

“For the moment, I’ll take what I can get. At least that gives me some leverage in the next interview.”

“There’s more.”

“What?”

“I’ve just been talking to Dr. Glendenning, and he tells me the tox screen on Luke shows an unusually large amount of diazepam.”

“Diazepam? That’s Valium, isn’t it?”

“That’s one name for it. There are many. But the point is that it was mostly undigested.”

“So he died very soon after taking it, and his system didn’t have time to digest it?”

“Yes.”

“But it’s not the cause of death?”

“No way.”

“Would it have been enough to kill him?”

“Probably not.”

“Anything else?”

“In the flat? Yes. Drugs. Some marijuana, LSD, Ecstasy.”

“Dealing?”

“No. Not enough. Just for personal use, I’d say. And no diazepam.”

“Thanks, Stefan. Thanks a lot.”

Annie hung up and pondered what she had just heard. Luke had bled in Liz and Ryan’s flat, and he had undigested diazepam in his system. Where did he get it? She didn’t remember anything about medication in the information they’d gathered on him. She wasn’t even sure that doctors prescribed diazepam to someone that young. She should at least check with Robin. Even though Stefan’s team hadn’t found any in the flat, the first thing to do, Annie thought, getting to her feet and reaching for her jacket, was to find out if either Liz or Ryan had prescriptions for diazepam.

According to his file, Des Wayman lived in a two-bedroom council house on Hazel Way, just off the crescent at the Wilmer Road end of the estate. It was mid-morning when Michelle and DC Collins parked outside and walked down the path. The sky was covered in gray cloud and the air was so saturated with moisture it felt like warm drizzle. Michelle’s clothes were sticking to her, and DC Collins had taken off his suit jacket and unloosened his tie. Even so, there were damp patches under his arms. She was glad Collins was with her. He played second row for the police rugby team, and his solid presence was enough to put anyone off trying anything. As far as Michelle could make out, nobody had followed them, and she hadn’t seen any beige vans in the area.