Girls with Sharp Sticks (Girls with Sharp Sticks, #1)(91)

She watches me, hitching in breaths. She gives a quick shake of her head.

“No,” she says. “This is your chance. You can’t stay for me.”

“I won’t leave you.” The tears well up again, and I start to think I’ll never stop crying. That I’ll cry forever. “I would never leave you,” I murmur at the unimaginable thought.

Sydney comes from behind me and puts her hand on my shoulder, staring at Annalise. Marcella and Brynn do the same. We’ll stay together. No matter what, we stay together.

I lean down to press my forehead to Annalise’s, her blood sticky on my skin.

I know she won’t get far like this. We can find Dr. Groger and ask for his help—he’s probably in his residence. It might mean never getting out of this academy, but we’ll try. And we’ll be together.

“You’re going to have to get up,” I tell Annalise, even as her eye flutters open and closed, like she’s about to pass out. But together, we get Annalise to her feet.

There’s so much blood everywhere. Every direction. It’s even on my walls.

It’s on my soul.

I wonder if I’ll ever have another simple thought, or if they’ll all be tainted with murder and blood from now on.

Can you hear them too? Valentine Wright asked me that day in the Federal Flower Garden. The roses. They’re alive, you know. All of them. If you listen closely enough, you can hear their shared roots. Their common purpose. They’re beautiful, but it’s not all they are.

I did hear them. Not while we were at the garden, no. But I did hear them eventually.

And I can hear them now. Only they’re not telling me to wake up. They’re telling me to find Valentine.

“There’s another option,” I say suddenly, turning to the girls. “The key Leandra left behind in the kitchen—the one to the lab. There has to be something in there we can use to help Annalise. Maybe we can repair the damage enough for us to leave. Figure out what to do after that.”

Marcella and Sydney exchange a quick glance before nodding. It’s a good enough idea. It’s better than giving up and hoping for mercy from the men who have kept us as prisoners. There’s a key ring on the Guardian’s belt, and I slowly reach under him to remove it, frightened to touch his body in case he’s still alive. Still murderous.

These are the keys to the kitchen door, the gate. The keys to our freedom. I hold them out to Brynn, and after she takes them, there’s a fresh rise of hope in my chest.

“And we’ll find Valentine,” I tell the others. “We’ll save her, too.”

Sydney opens her mouth to argue, but I see that she realizes the truth. Valentine might already be dead, but we won’t leave her if she’s not. We won’t leave her behind.

? ? ?

The school is silent as we rush down the back stairs. I’ve never heard it this quiet, not even at night. Somewhere, Anton is on his own. In his room? In his office? Does he have any idea what’s happened here?

Part of me wants to run that way and confront him, but the professors will be awake soon enough. And when we’re not at breakfast, they’ll realize we’re missing. They’ll come for us. We have to be long gone by then.

My shoes are slippery as I walk Annalise down the stairs, leaving a trail of blood behind us. When we get to the kitchen, ready to take the stairwell to the basement, there’s a bang on the back door.

The girls and I stop and turn toward it. I have the wild notion that it’s Guardian Bose back from the dead. His violent ghost continues to seek me out. I grip Sydney’s hand and look back toward the hall, afraid the noise will tip off Anton or the professors that something’s wrong.

Sydney lets go of my hand and walks to the door. It occurs to me then that it must be Jackson, and I ease Annalise against the wall and tell Sydney to wait up.

Brynn holds out Guardian Bose’s key chain and I grab it on my way to the door.

I hand it to Sydney and she finds the key and opens the locks. She pulls the door open with a wide swing. I sigh when I find Jackson standing there.

“You made it,” I say, relieved. “And you got through the fence.” He looks awful—dirt on his entire left side, a bit of road rash on his cheek. He leans against the doorframe.

“Yeah, about that,” Jackson says. “Quentin helped me scale the fence. Didn’t go so well. I busted up my leg pretty good. It’s probably sprained, but . . .”

His voice trails off when he looks down and sees that my pants are covered in blood. And the blood quite literally on my hands. He swallows hard.

“Is any of that yours?” he asks.

I hold his eyes. “Not much,” I say. “It’s mostly the Guardian’s.” I expect to shock him. Scare him.

But instead, he lets out a soft sound of concern and murmurs, “Good.”

Then Jackson notices Annalise’s condition and immediately limps past me to check on her. He grabs a dish towel from the stove and replaces the blood-soaked pillowcase. He tells Annalise to hold the towel to her wound instead. When he turns around to us, his expression is grave.

Jackson runs his eyes over the blood on my clothes again. He sees the bruising on Sydney’s neck. His jaw tightens as he grows fierce. Protective of all of us.

“Yeah, so let’s go,” he says, pointing out the door.