What Lies Beneath The Clearing

4.2

Jay thought back to the reference of the point and made the connection to the rose thorns that scratched Sasha when they got to the house. 

"The thorn that scratched her." 

She nodded as she spoke. "Poison. She was the last one to walk in the door, we all walked passed those thorns and she was the only one who got scratched. I told Skye to get away from her, that the blood was poisoned, from the thorn. Caleb tried to call someone, I told him there was no point. I wasn't wrong, there's nothing we could've done to save her, the poison had been in her system for three days, that was the puzzle we had to solve. It wasn't saving a life, it was figuring out which one had been taken. But that was his sister, he couldn't just let her die, so I gave in, told him I'd drive to the hospital. She stopped breathing in the car, and then ten minutes after we got there, dad came out. Said she didn't make it. I knew, but it was my fault. All of this, everything that's happened, is because of me. None of this would've happened if I'd have minded my own business. Kept out of places I know I shouldn't go. Caleb and I fought at the hospital, he wanted to come clean, tell the cops everything, get it off his chest, he didn't care what happened to him, whether they believed him or not he just would've been grateful for it not to be his problem anymore. And I don't blame him. I wish I could take it back. All of it." 

She wiped the tear off her cheek. "I don't know what to do anymore. I feel crazy, we all do. But I got my friends killed Jay, how do I fix that?" She was finally breaking, because when she tried to speak again her voice broke like glass, and he didn't hesitate to pull her into him and hold her close as she finally released all the pressure she'd had weighing on her.