She thought of those glinting eyes of DS Buttler, recalling that phone call from him a few days ago.

‘Bob Buttler here, Ms Shah.’

‘Oh?’

‘Just to say I’ve got your phone back. The metadata does indeed show a text from Sir Francis’s mobile was remotely deleted from it.’ There’d been a pause on the line. ‘I owe you an apology.’

‘You don’t, you were doing your job.’

‘That’s good of you to say.’ Another pause. ‘I heard about Mr Duke. A tragedy by all accounts.’

‘Yes. It was.’

‘Even if it’s not a bad rule of thumb, I know the simple explanation’s not always the right one, Ms Shah.’

‘No,’ she’d murmured. ‘It isn’t.’

‘Well, as I said, I’m always here. Any time you want to talk. Anything I can do to help.’

Maybe she’d briefly been his target, but he wasn’t a stupid man. Perhaps she would get back to him, make a further statement, do the same with the police at Reading. It would lay out all the background, including Sayyid and the documents, and all the facts, including the full account of the night of Morahan’s death and the trip to Wales. She would even admit to her teenage entanglement with Kareem.

She would tell of his shoals of fish and the message sent by Iqbal Jamal Wahab.

The one thing she would not yet mention was her suspicion of Isobel; it would appear too far-fetched and undermine her. Facts were what mattered. She needed a good person to run with them; who, as she planted the seeds, would begin to see their growth. She needed someone with her to knock down doors – to reassemble the disappeared and track down the guilty. Someone both decent and good. Someone like Patrick Duke who would work with her to see that growth blossom into truth.

And then pray that if that truth turned out to be ugly and its consequences fearful, they would intercept it in time. In time…

Chapter 33

33

2021

Wednesday 13 October

11.49 a.m.

He steps out of the lift at the 67th floor of the Shard onto the lower viewing platform, his ticket booked long in advance. An initial 360-degree sweep around reveals a bright autumnal view of London, blue sky, sun to the south nearly at its zenith, a few white vapours and streaks painted on the stratosphere but otherwise clear in every direction. Clarity. Not just of sight, but of mind. Clarity and finality.