That’s probably a weird thing to make me feel relaxed, but it does.
“See? On this one, the brain was extracted. She was aSigmasister.” I point to the report. “And theseSigmasisters were missing a lot of body parts. But there’s oneIotagirl. She had her small intestines ripped open. There’s a surgical triangular shape cut out of it.” My finger trails over the screen as I scroll through.
Mom leans over my shoulder, squinting. “Good eye. This one? I can’t read that. Too small. Where are my glasses?”
“It says that a piece of his lung was biopsied. Rowan Greaves’s roommate.”
“The boy we looked up earlier? The one who was given barbiturates and alcohol?”
“Yep. And then Ellis…”
“Ellison Williams.” Mom’s eyes search the ceiling. “It was too difficult to tell at first.”
“But then they saw a piece of her liver was gone,” I finish, tapping on the screen.
She finds her glasses and paces around the room. “Brain. Small intestines. Lungs. Liver.”
“The cuts are surgical. Like they’re made with a blade.”
“Could be anyone with connections to here.”
I stretch, taking another sip of the coffee we got from the break room. “Other than being Greek life students, I don’t see any connection between the victims. One wasSigma, oneIota, oneOmega, and one aBeta.” I swivel around and raise my eyebrows with a sudden thought. “JustThetaandDeltaleft, I suppose.”
“So why is someone afteryou? And what is this person doing with these organ samples?”
“I figured it’s because of watching Ellis get murdered. And I’m convinced it’s Ayan doing it. But the body parts? They remind me of those Egyptian canopic jars where they stored organs.”
Mom slumps into the chair across from me. Kicking her heels up on her desk, she reaches for the fast-food bag, but can’t grab it. “Hand me a burger. I need to eat so I can think. This is apuzzle.”
I slide one over to her. And return to scrolling mindlessly through the reports. Mom had to ask Xavier Cardell to help us. He told her that his sources said the records are in the hospital’s system, buthidden. His hackers helped.
“Puzzle!” Biting the inside of my lip, I hurriedly type on the keyboard.
“Yes, it is.”
“No… No! This reminds me of adissectionpuzzle.”
“Oh! Oh, my smart genius baby.” Mom sits up and spits out a bite of burger accidentally. “That’s it. Thetriangles.”
“And some squares and rectangles.”
“But theyfit.”
“Into atangrampuzzle.”
Mom sits back for a moment, confusion furrowing her brow. “Like akey?”
“Yeah. Possibly. However…”
Doom strikes my chest. The fluorescent lights hum. I can’t answer immediately. Some distant hospital monitor beeps, interrupting me. My voice seeps out in a low whisper.
“Ifthat’sa key… What does it open?”
forty
After one nighton an extremely uncomfortable wooden bed, I’mcleared for discharge.
It was a big deal, apparently. While I stood with my mom at the main nursing station, waiting for my paperwork, we heard Dr. Walter arguing passionately with someone on the phone about not keeping me longer.
