Most spies chase terrorists. Adrian Shaw chases paperwork. Buried two floors beneath the headquarters of the International Strategic Intelligence Directorate, Adrian spends his days digitizing forgotten case files, reconciling customs records, and closing investigations no one else remembers. He's not an operative. He's an archivist. The man who discovers, years later, where everyone else went wrong. Then a routine audit uncovers an impossible pattern. A shipping company that never paid port fees. Shell corporations linked by a single insurance signature. Financial records leading to Konstantin Radanov—a shadow broker whose invisible logistics network has armed wars across the globe without ever firing a shot. When Adrian connects the evidence to a classified operation that left twelve intelligence officers dead six years earlier, someone inside his own agency moves to erase him. His security clearance vanishes. His apartment is searched. His name is rewritten into that of a rogue analyst who fabricated evidence. The only person willing to believe him is Leah Marlowe, a disgraced former field operative who has spent years living off the grid after accusing the agency of covering up the Prague massacre. Together they uncover a conspiracy reaching into the highest levels of international intelligence—one designed to ignite a geopolitical crisis in the Arctic while making billions from the conflict that follows. Hunted across Europe by the very people they once served, Adrian and Leah race to recover the last surviving paper record that can expose the truth. Because digital files can be altered. Servers can be wiped. History can be rewritten. But paper remembers. Perfect for readers of David Baldacci, Daniel Silva, Brad Thor, and John le Carré, Ashes and Paper is a gripping espionage thriller about loyalty, betrayal, and the dangerous permanence of the written record.
