The Sixth Kind Chapter 03

The Sixth Kind Chapter 03

“Almost like someone was watching. Waiting till she was good and dead. Then let you find her?”

Edmund’s eyes never left mine.

“Yes. Like they found her exactly ‘on time.'”

I nodded slowly. “Three days. She went through the full hell of dehydration fever. For an adult, the absolute limit without water is about three days. And she was just a kid. Whoever did this timed it perfectly. Made absolutely sure she wouldn’t make it.”

“How was the case ruled?”

“Officially? Accident. Even though nobody could explain the cause. But the detective on the case, Greer——he wasn’t having it. He said there were too many loose ends. That calling it an ‘accident’ was a cop-out. Later, some people floated suicide. Like she stopped drinking and eating on purpose. But her mouth was full of food……”

“Wait——when they found her, her mouth was full of food?” Edmund cut in.

“Yes.” I nodded. My eyes were burning. “Stuffed full. The snacks our mom packed for her that morning.”

Edmund’s face got even darker. “What about her stomach?”

I shook my head. “Empty.”

Edmund’s grip on his coffee cup tightened.

“Any signs she tried to climb out? Dirt on her clothes? Her shoes?”

“Yes. Her fingers were raw. She’d lost two fingernails——left middle, right index……” My eyes were hot, but I held it together.

“……She was still holding a few dried-up fireweed blooms. They were for me.”

Edmund looked me dead in the eye and said, slow and deliberate:

“No hypothermia. Paradoxical dehydration fever. A full canteen. A mouth full of food she never swallowed. Grace Clark——I can say this with certainty. Your sister was killed.”

My heart clenched. Almost dropped my coffee.

“Why……?”

Even though I’d expected it, my voice still shook.

Who does that to a twelve-year-old?

What kind of sick, twisted grudge do you have to hold to torture a little girl to death like that?

“Dirt under her nails. Scratches on the walls. Lost nails. That means she fought like hell to survive.”

“And someone who’s fighting to live? Doesn’t kill herself.”

“Have you ever considered——maybe she didn’t refuse to drink. Maybe she couldn’t.”

My scalp went cold. “What do you mean?”

My first thought was: that’s crazy.

What kind of threat could keep a kid in that situation from drinking? From saving her own life?

“Some outside force. Something that made her too scared to drink. Or physically unable.”

Edmund’s eyes were blazing now. “If that’s the case, that outside force would have to know her inside and out.”

“So——someone she knew. Someone close.”

My mind went blank. Like I’d been struck by lightning.

For ten years, I’d gone back to that mine. Searched every inch of that ground.

Sat at the bottom of that shaft for hours, trying to reconstruct what happened.

I found nothing.

I thought of every possibility——

She hit her head?

She thought her family didn’t love her, so she refused to drink out of spite?

It never once crossed my mind that she couldn’t drink.

And then my phone rang.

It was Auntie Irene. The lady who helps me feed the stray cats.

She told me one of my rescues had died.

“Grace, honey, I’m so sorry. That cat was always so wild. She was gone for two days. When she came back, I put out a big bowl of kibble for her.”

“But something was wrong. She’d put the food in her mouth, but she couldn’t swallow. She’d spit it out, then put it back in. Starved herself to death right there in front of the bowl……”

That cat——I’d started taking care of her three years after my sister died.

Her name was Lily. My sister’s name.

My brain went bzzzzt. Phone almost hit the floor.

“Mouth full of food. Can’t swallow. Starves to death next to a full bowl……”

That wasn’t exactly what happened to my sister? Full canteen. Dies of thirst. Mouth full of snacks.

Edmund saw my face turn white.

“What’s wrong?”

I took a breath and told him what Auntie Irene said.

“Looks like whoever did this never left.”

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