Kristi stared at the screen, her pulse leaping at the thought that she might have just stumbled onto the connection she needed to find out more about the vampire cult that was supposedly on campus. But she had to be careful, not answer too quickly. What if she were wrong? What if Lucretia had given her bad information? Fingers poised over the keyboard, she waited.

The only one who responded was JustO: Mine. Who else’s?

Kristi grinned. “How about that.”

None of the other chatters was responding but Kristi wanted to keep this alive. Following JustO’s lead she typed: My own.

The other vial wearers were strangely silent until they, too, answered along the lines of JustO. Were they reticent to tell the truth, or like Kristi, liars with their own agendas?

For the first time since logging on, she sensed she was getting somewhere and could barely contain herself. She bit her lip so hard she nearly drew blood as she thought. Kristi was certain JustO was cyber-texting about blood. So who was she or he? How, if at all, was he or she connected to the cult? Kristi tried to imagine who JustO was. Someone in Dr. Grotto’s class? Someone she saw every time she stepped into the classroom? Was his or her name, like Kristi’s, for the purpose of this chat room all about blood? Was JustO’s blood type O?

Kristi felt a rush of adrenaline and could barely sit still. She felt certain this person was female, though she couldn’t quite put her finger on why. She just had some sense of it. Almost like a memory.

Could it be that JustO really did wear a vial of her own…Oh, God! It hit Kristi then. She did know who this person was! She was sure of it. Hadn’t she heard of a student at All Saints who went by one initial. Just “O”?

Kristi’s own father had mentioned the girl. He’d interviewed “O” while investigating a homicide a couple of years earlier. It had been one of the cases that had been linked to Our Lady of Virtues, the abandoned mental hospital located a few miles outside of New Orleans. One of the victims of that particular nutcase had been a student here, at All Saints.

Detectives Bentz and Montoya had driven to Baton Rouge, where they’d interviewed students, family, and staff. One of them had been a girl who had worn a vial of her own blood around her neck.