The Vanishing Stair (Truly Devious #2)(40)

“Look,” Larry said. “We don’t know what happened. But I tend to believe it was an accident, a prank gone wrong, or something like that. For all I know, they worked on it together, got the dry ice together. I think Element and Hayes were both kids who got into things they shouldn’t. Whatever she did, whatever happened, I don’t think she meant to do it. If she did it. She doesn’t strike me as a dangerous person. You don’t have to be afraid. And this place is wired now. There are perimeter lights, cameras. All the stuff I’ve been wanting for years. She’s not going to come near you. I won’t let her.”

Stevie looked at Larry now and felt the sudden urge to cry. Something in her melted a bit. Was it gratitude? Pent-up fear? She balled her hands and turned back toward the dark side of the room, back at the dank basement labyrinth she was in. There were so many places to get lost in here, up here. In life. So many dark corners.

Stevie turned back to the small window once more. It was just wide enough to wiggle through. The whole escape would have required such . . . bravado. Ellie had kept her shit together.

Larry indicated that she should return the way they had come, down the little path of lights. He pulled the cord, and the chamber went dark. Only a bit of light came in through that window, like a dim, heavily lidded eye.

As Stevie stepped out of the Great House, she noticed there was something in the Neptune fountain that had not been there when she went in. David sat in it, the streams of water pouring from the open mouths of Neptune’s mighty fish friends dumping onto his head, flattening his hair.

“This is what they call attention-seeking behavior,” she said, approaching him.

“They’re going to turn it off for the winter soon,” David replied, opening his mouth for a gulp of fountain water.

“Is that clean?” she said. “Should you be drinking it?”

He shrugged. Then he stood, his clothes dripping, and climbed out of the fountain. He stuck his hands in the pockets of his shorts and walked along beside her as if there was nothing unusual about what he had just done.

“Therapy,” she said. “It works.”

“I’ve tried it. They always end up crying. I think I’ve helped them have some real breakthrough moments. You were in there a while. What were you up to?”

“Were you following me?”

“Not following,” he said. “I just take an interest. What were you doing?”

“Just looking,” she said.

“At what?”

“The basement.”

“What did you see?”

“A maze,” she replied. “The basement is weird. But it’s clear how Ellie got out. She went through the passage, and then out the basement window.”

“We know that,” he said. “My question is, what happened then?”

“I don’t know the answer,” she said. “I’m trying. You asked me to look. I’m looking.”

David shivered a bit in his wet hoodie. It wasn’t proper fall weather yet, but it was definitely not the kind of day to be walking around in sopping wet clothes. Stevie couldn’t help but take note of the fact that he was keeping track of her, and the fountain was done to impress her. And it was making an impression. It was bizarre—and he looked good wet.

“Well, look faster,” he said.

Polite conversation isn’t hard, Edward King had said.

Even David’s voice was a little like his father’s. The words were different, but the timbre was the same. The King poison touched everything.

“This isn’t on me,” she snapped.

“I didn’t say it was,” he replied. “It’s just that time is passing.”

“It’s not my fault.”

“I didn’t say it—”

“Well, you’re acting like it,” she said, walking off.

It was amazingly easy to work herself into a state of indignation. She had to repel herself—not see David, not feel what she always felt around him. She had to drive the desire out of her. An argument was as good a way as any of distracting herself. But it only worked to a point.

Also, she had to wonder: Did David blame her for what happened? Did everyone?





11


“‘ANATOMY,’” PIX SAID, WRITING THE WORD ON THE WHITEBOARD, “comes from the Greek. The prefix, ana, means apart. The root word, tome, is ‘cutting.’ ‘Dissection’ is Latin in origin. Dis means apart as well, and secare is the root word for cutting. So anatomy and dissection are linked in language and in practice. To understand how bodies work, you need to get in there and have a look.”

Monday morning brought Stevie back to her first class, which was anatomy and physiology, taught by Pix. Anatomy was one of the things Stevie had looked most forward to studying at Ellingham—it was the kind of thing she would need to know. They had reached the dissection part of the program, which meant that they had moved into a lab. She had a new partner as well—Mudge, he of the colored contact lenses.

“On that note,” Pix said, “come down here and get a dissection kit for each of your stations, along with a sheep heart.”

Stevie reluctantly went down and got one of the trays, which was preset with scalpels, scissors, and probes. She reached into the cooler and removed one vacuum-packed sheep heart, which was a deep red, almost black.