“I’m leaving,” I say.
“No you are not.” Violet is on her feet then, stalking toward us like a mountain lion about to lunge at cornered prey. “Y’all ain’t going anywhere. You might not be willing to protect this place, Iris, but I am.”
She’s reaching for me—about to grab me by the neck—and I hear the shout from Rose and the intakes of breath from Poppy and Zinnia. But it’s Lily who appears behind her. Lily who grabs the scrawnier woman by the shoulders and pulls her back.
“No, Violet!”
“Let me go!” Violet tries to throw an elbow back into Lily’s gut, but Lily just wraps her arms more firmly around her.
“Thisain’t the way to protect him, hon,” Lily says. Her voice is sweet. Calm despite the tears rolling down her cheeks. “Right now, we gotta get him to the hospital.”
“I said no!” But Sol’s voice has gotten weaker.
Violet snarls, but she stops thrashing for the moment.
Lily ignores Sol’s protests. “Come on. You gotta help me get him to the truck. Me stitching him up ain’t gonna be enough.”
Slowly, Lily releases Violet, who shoots us one more threatening glare before she turns around and goes to help Sol to his feet. He barely seems conscious, his large body dead weight on the small woman’s shoulder as she practically drags him toward the door, leaving a trail of blood behind.
Lily goes to follow them, but she stops and looks behind her, giving me one last look.
“Thank you,” I say.
She says nothing. She doesn’t even nod. I wonder if that would feel like too much of a betrayal. She swallows, presses her lips together, and then turns away and joins Violet, pulling Sol out the front door.
Tears are pouring down my cheeks now, too. Lily, the kindest of us all, can’t leave him. She’s made her choice. But still, she’s giving us the chance Marigold never had.
There’ssomething else, too. By taking him to the hospital despite his protests, she’s saving his life and keeping me from having that weight on my conscience. A weight she knows herself all too well.
“I’m leaving,” I say again, this time to Poppy and Zinnia alone, who are still frozen at the foot of the stairs, seemingly unsure where they are meant to go. “You can come, too. My plan was to come back for you, once we got to town and got some help.”
“Where will we go?” Poppy asks.
“I don’t know,” I admit. “To town, but from there I’m … I’m not sure.” I hesitate. “If we go to the police, you two might have to go into foster care. I’m sorry. I don’t want that, but—”
“But it’s better than here,” Zinnia says.
“Even if they split you two up?” Rose asks.
“I’ll be eighteen in a few months,” Poppy says. “It’ll suck, but Zinnia’s right, it’s better than this. If this is how Sol wants us to prove our loyalty … I don’t want no part of this.”
“This ain’t freedom,” Zinnia says. “It’s a prison.”
“So you’ll come?” Rose sounds hopeful for the first time since Sol attacked her.
Zinnia nods.
“Thank God,” Rose says. “Let’s get out of here.”
IRIS
It’sa little past dawn by the time the four of us arrive in Culverton. Walking the winding dirt path with only one flashlight between us proves to be a slow and arduous task. By the time our feet hit real pavement, just outside the pawn shop, we’re all exhausted—both mentally and physically.
We didn’t talk much on the way here, aside from keeping each other apprised of uneven terrain. There’s a lot we want to say to one another. There are a lot of questions I’m sure I need to answer for them. But we seem to have formed a silent agreement that all of that will have to wait.
At least, I think we have, until—after several minutes of silence—Rose abruptly asks, “Was—was I really one of your trials?”
I do not want to talk about this right now. Or ever. I don’t want Rose to know that I’d been so weak as to actually consider doing what Sol had asked. But she deserves the truth, so I nod. “Yeah.”