Page 260 of Time Stops With You

I’m surprised that he’s inviting me into his programming world. Josiah is very closed off about this stuff.

“Do you see that?” Josiah prods.

I squint at the screen. “Yeah. That’s a lot of numbers and letters all jumbled up together.”

“This.This.” Josiah sticks his finger against the monitor.

I squint harder, hoping that’ll give me magical programming powers. “What… exactly is it?”

“This feature set is enormous!” Josiah waves his arms. “But everything works flawlessly. There’s not a single data set interacting negatively.”

“Translation.”

Josiah thrusts a finger like a detective about to solve the case. “No one in Cullen Tech did this.”

“Huh? Have they been hacked again?”

“Not since last week when I hacked in to check on them,” Josiah says casually.

My jaw drops. “Josiah!”

“The only person who could program like this was…” His expression shifts and he glances down.

My heart thuds in my chest. “Only him?”

Josiah nods.

“Are you sure?”

He nods again. “But that doesn’t make sense. This code was added to the algorithm last week. Cullen wouldn’t have been… I mean… he didn’t do it. There’s no way.”

“Yeah.” I blow out a breath, my thoughts whirring.

“Should I tell Asad?” Josiah asks me, chewing on a fingernail.

“Not yet. Let’s keep this between us first. And if you find any other discrepancies in the PLP,” I gesture to it, “tell me first.”

“I will,” Josiah promises.

Goosebumps sweep over my arm. I scramble back to my room, slam the door shut and lean against it.

Mom will call me crazy in both English and Belizean Kriol.

But what if…

I mean…

What if Cullen isn’t dead?

Scattered puzzle pieces come together in my head.

Feeling like I’m being watched.

The magical umbrella.

The shadow outside our house.

And now this program.

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