“Just like that?”
He nodded. “Yeah. But don’t make it sound like you know anything or suspect her of anything. Just act like it’s part of your investigation,” he said. “Whatever she has to say… it might help us figure out if she’s involved or not.”
I sucked in a long, deep breath to mentally fortify myself. Then I dialed Ginny’s number.
She answered on the fourth ring. “Violet? Is that you?” she asked in a hushed tone.
“Yeah, I got my phone back,” I said, affecting a sunny tone despite the dread pooling in my stomach. “Sorry, did I wake you?”
“No, I’m just whispering because I’m in my sister’s hospital room, and she’s trying to sleep,” she replied. “Give me a second. I’ll go out into the hall.”
“Okay,” I replied, dropping my voice a little. “How’s your sister doing now?”
I heard footsteps, and then the sound of a door closing. “She’s doing really well,” Ginny replied. “The treatment is working. It leaves her pretty tired by the end of the day, but that’s normal.”
“That’s great.”
“Yeah, it is. It’s such a relief.” I heard another brief shuffling sound, and then another door creaking. “Anyway, is everything okay with you? Did you leave the Dionysus estate?”
“No. They decided to let me have my phone back because they trust me now,” I said. “Anyway, I’m still looking into everything that happened to Cal, and I wanted to ask you something.”
“Okay.”
“Do you remember when that crazy stalker broke into my dorm and poured blood everywhere?”
“Ugh, yeah, that was horrible,” Ginny said, her voice full of sympathy. “Did the cops ever get back to you about it?”
“No. Apparently the evidence went missing, so the case stalled.”
“Wow, another coverup at BHU,” she said dryly. “What a shock.”
“I was just wondering… do you remember taking me aside and asking something about it? Whether or not the blood was fake?”
“Yeah, I remember.” She paused, letting out a short sigh. “I didn’t want to talk about it in front of the others, because I figured it might start some unnecessary drama. But I noticed something weird a few days before you told us what happened to you, and I thought it might be relevant.”
My heart skipped a beat. Julian and Roman were both watching me intently. “What was it?”
“Dylan came up with a zombie-themed prank for his channel, and I was helping him with the setup. He asked me to go and steal some stage blood from the theater supplies, because there’s usually a spare bucket or two lying around, and I knew for a fact that there definitelywas, because we had some left over after a Sweeney Todd production we did last semester,” she said. “But the weird thing is… when I got there, there was no blood. Both buckets were gone.”
“Shit,” I muttered, my stomach dropping.
“Anyway, when you said you weren’t sure if the blood in your dorm was real or not, I decided to drop it,” Ginny went on. “Like I said a minute ago, I didn’t want to start any drama with the others when it might’ve been real blood after all, and the missing stage blood could’ve been caused by something else entirely. I mean, people takestuff from the supply room all the time. The university doesn’t care, as long as it’s not like… industrial-sized amounts of stuff going missing.”
“Right.” I rubbed my forehead, trying to keep my voice steady. “Anyway, that just randomly popped into my head, so I figured I’d ask about it. But I should let you get back to your sister now.”
“Okay. But before you go, are you sure you’re all right there?” Ginny asked, concern evident in her tone. “I know we’ve all asked that a hundred times, but… we worry. You know that.”
“I’m fine. Honestly.”
“Okay. Talk again soon?”
“Definitely.”
I ended the call and looked at Julian and Roman in turn. “What do you think?”
“I’m inclined to believe she’s telling the truth,” Roman replied, rubbing his jaw.
Julian nodded. “If she was the one who stole the stage blood from the theater and used it to scare you, I don’t think she’d bring it up like that. She’d probably never mention it at all.”
