Chapter 66

My life is still mostly studying.I got the highest grade in the class on the first exam, and I want to make a similarly strong showing on the second one. My only regret is that I can't break my own record. I go to the library every day after class and stay there until I can barely keep my eyes open.

Sasha continues to keep me company in my corner of the library. We still talk, and she still brings me coffee when she goes to get herself a cup, but we haven't had sex since the dinner with my parents.

"Black, no sugar," she says as she places the cup in front of me.

"Thanks, Sasha," I say. "You're the best."

"Am I?"

I always have to bite my tongue to keep from asking her if she wants to go to the locker room with me. I figure if I ask, she'll say no. I blew that aspect of our relationship, and I can't admit to her how desperately I miss it. I made a huge mistake that night at my parents' house. But I'm glad that I at least have her company during the lonely nights in the library.

A few days before the test is scheduled, I'm sitting in the back of the library, studying the muscles of mastication when I hear a voice from over my shoulder: "Holy shit… anatomy. Whenever I think my life is the worst it could possibly be, I remember that class, and I feel a little better."

A tall guy with a shaved head is standing over me, wearing green scrubs and a long white coat. The ID badge hanging from his lapel proclaims him to be "Resident, Department of General Surgery." He has his arms crossed and is shaking his head in amusement.

"You a first-year?" he asks me.

"That's right." I look the guy up and down. "You a resident?"

"Bingo." He holds out his hand. "The name's Norm. I'm a surgery resident."

That will be me someday. Except somewhere better than here.I take Norm's hand. "I'm Mason."

"So is Conlon still torturing you guys?" Norm asks, dragging a chair over so he can sit down.

"He's not so bad."

"He got nicer." Norm rubs his bald head thoughtfully. "You don't know what he was like in his first year teaching."

"No kidding?"

"Oh, yeah. Frankly, I think it's his fault this school has a drug problem."

I raise my eyebrows. "What do you mean?"

"I don't know… It didn't seem like it was so bad before he started working here." Norm shrugs. "But practically as soon as he started, it felt like there were drugs circulating everywhere."

"Are you saying you think he's… selling them?"

Norm seems surprised by my question. "Oh, I didn't mean that. But now that you mention it…"

"What?"

He grins. "I don't know. I heard the salary they pay professors at DeWitt is crap. I wouldn't be surprised if he decided to make a few extra bucks on the side. And hey, wouldn't that be perfect? He creates a class that's super stressful, then everyone has to buy speed from him to get through it!"

It would be kind of perfect. DeWitt has a major drug problem, and there's a lot of whispering about how a professor must be one of the sources.

Norm notices the look on my face and says, "Hey, I'm just kidding. I don't think Dr. Conlon would do that. He's too much of a square."

Is he really? Or is that all just an act? "Yeah…"

Dr. Conlon projects the stereotypical image of a dorky professor. But I've always wondered how much of it is genuine. And he's always walking around with that cane, but I haven't figured out why he needs it. It's not clear from looking at him, and he's never shared it with anyone in the class. Maybe that's all an act too.

"Plus, it would be a huge risk," Norm says. "If he sold drugs to a bunch of kids and they ended up dying because of it, can you imagine how much trouble he'd be in? He'd probably go to prison."

That's true. If Dr. Conlon really is selling drugs to students, he would need to be very careful. If the police found out, he'd be in deep trouble.

"Hey, man, you okay?" Norm is frowning. "Sorry, did I freak you out?"

"I'm fine," I say quickly. "I think I need to get more sleep."

"I hear that," Norm says, grinning. "Anyway, it's been nice meeting you. Maybe I'll see you in your third-year surgery clerkship. It's loads of fun."

I barely manage a distracted goodbye.

I close my anatomy text and rub my fingers into my temples. I have always believed I've got good intuition, and my intuition is screaming out that there's something fishy going on with Dr. Matthew Conlon. I have to focus on my upcoming exam, but all I can think of is all those kids who died of overdoses in the classes before me.

If he sold drugs to a bunch of kids and they ended up dying because of it, can you imagine how much trouble he'd be in?

The look in Dr. Conlon's eyes when I started questioning him about Frank's cause of death was chilling. I asked an innocent question, and he jumped down my throat. Seems suspicious if you ask me. For some reason, there's a dead cop in our anatomy lab, and I have no idea why.

I stand up so fast that my chair falls over behind me. My heart is pounding in my chest. I look around the library and see that it is almost empty now—even Sasha has gone home for the night. It's so empty that nobody even noticed when my chair fell to the floor. I wipe my brow with the back of my hand, and it comes away wet with sweat.

An anatomy professor has got to have some connections to the local morgue, right? Maybe there are strings he can pull to get a body to come to him rather than risking an autopsy. And once a body gets ripped apart in the anatomy lab, there's no chance of finding out the real cause of death.

Unless there's a med student in the class who gets too curious.

But Conlon would never allow that to happen.

I back away from the table, my hands trembling. My breaths are coming quickly—too quickly. I'm hyperventilating. I recently learned that during hyperventilation, the lungs blow off too much carbon dioxide. As the amount of carbon dioxide in the bloodstream goes down, the blood vessels going to the brain constrict, cutting off the brain's oxygen supply.

I've got to calm down.

This is ridiculous. My anatomy professor isn't a drug dealer or a murderer. He's just a nice, dorky guy who wears bowties to class every day. He's not murdering students and hiding bodies in the cadaver lab. Stuff like that doesn't happen in real life.

And that's when I hear that deep voice again:

Think about it. What sorts of things can kill a man but won't show up on a routine anatomy lab dissection? Seems like Conlon would know.

"Shut up!" I whisper.

The sound of my own voice startles me, but it seems to put a stop to my racing thoughts. My thumping heart slows down, and I suddenly feel completely exhausted. Maybe four hours of sleep every night isn't enough. I have to start taking better care of myself before I blow everything I've worked so hard for.