The Rush (51 page)

"Nothing I feel for you is forced or fake," Ryder confesse
d sincerely. His eyes turned into silver pools in the darkness, promising me truth, promising me authenticity and honesty. His words and the deep, hopeful meaning floated on the air between us; wrapped around me whole and sank into my skin before I could stop them. “Nor will it ever be.”

The urge to flee
was so strong and dominant that I thought it would propel me from the bench on its own but I couldn't make my feet move, I couldn't find the courage to leave him. It didn’t exist inside of me. All my lectures, pep talks and hours of reasoning to give Ryder a better life, a life without me fell to the ground in a pile of ashes when presented with the challenge. I chose Ryder. And even though I hoped to keep him as a friend, I knew without a doubt I would always choose Ryder.

A flutter t
ook off in my stomach, flapping wings of reluctant hope and distant excitement. My heart clenched in my chest, an unfamiliar pang of affection I was starting to associate with Ryder. Only Ryder.

"How can you be sure?" I challenge
d on a whisper, afraid my own voice would prove him wrong.

He smirked at me then, wicked and taunting,
"Because I don't like you.... at all. You can't fake this level of irritation. You could quite possibly be, the most obnoxious person I’ve ever met," He explained everything on a smile so that I know he was teasing me.

But that
was also how I knew I was in trouble. I was falling for him and in every single way. I wasn’t supposed to. Hell, I didn't even want to, not really. I didn’t want the baggage, or the mess, or the unrequited feelings. But there it was. I was falling. And I couldn't stop it from happening.

The way he play
ed his guitar.... the way he drank his coffee.... the way he didn't bother with his hair, the way he laughed at me, the way his silver eyes cut to me from across a room and he could determine in once glance if I was alright or if I needed to be rescued, the way he protected me from everything, even myself.... but most of all the way he made me feel when we're together, when we're not together, hell the way he made me feel anything at all.... the butterflies and blushing.... the rush of it all. Damn it. I'd fallen for the rush.

“You are
such
a brat!” I rolled my eyes and leaned back, forcing our hands apart.

“Takes one to know one,” he droned, still making fun of me.

“That was so clever and creative, I’m speechless,” I teased. “So speechless. Did you make that up? How did you get so smart? I want to be like you when I grow up!”

“Alright, smartass, let’s get you to class before Tanner hunts you down and performs the Spanish Inquisition on you.” He stood
up, legs still spread across the bench seat and reached for my hands again.

I gave them to him and let him pull me to my feet. We had another moment of staring into each other’s eyes until he reached down and cupped my face in his hands. “I will never let something like that happen to you again, Ivy.”

I knew exactly what he was talking about. And so I stayed quiet. Because knowing my life, knowing what Nix had planned for me, I knew there was no way for him to keep his promise. He didn’t react to my silence, or try to argue his way into my belief system.

But he did close the distance between us and press a
n utterly heartbreaking, devastatingly sweet kiss to my lips. I just responded. There was nothing else I could do. I couldn’t pull away, or even press back. I just let him kiss me and in doing so, take away some more of my pain.

“We’re going to get you out of this,” he promised.

And this time, I didn’t know why or what changed, but I believed him.

“Ok,” I agreed.

He took my hand again and then led me back to the main upstairs hallway. We walked quietly down the staircase and back toward the office. Just as we passed the closest classroom to the main office, Phoenix and Chase emerged from the room, carrying that same stupid oversized wooden board.

“Well,
look who decided to grace us with her presence again,” Chase called out sarcastically and then nudged Phoenix in the rib.

I cringed for a second, even closing my eyes against the awkwardness, but after a moment I realized there wasn’t really any weirdness going on. Chase sounded…. just…. casual.

“Ah, the Ginga-Ninja. How are you sensei?” Phoenix did his best impersonation of my Kung-Fu apprentice maybe….? And then turned to bow to me with palms pressed flatly together.

“Did he tell you, he’s trying to make t-shirts of that?” Ryder laughed. He had dropped my hand a few steps back, but now he threw a friendly arm across my shoulder.

“Obviously that would be awesome!” I laughed too.

Mrs. Tanner stepped out into the hall at the sound of our raucous behavior and frowned
at all four of us. “The prodigal daughter has returned,” she grunted at me, leveling me with her angry-wench eyes. “Didn’t I warn you about missing more school? Mr. Costas wants to talk to you about summer school, unless you’re seriously considering doing us all a favor and just dropping out?”

“Sorry,” I shrugged apologetically. That was not an option yet.

Mrs. Tanner’s attention snapped up to the three boys that surrounded me, my three friends. “Don’t you boys know better than to hang around Ivy Pierce? She’s no good. She’s going to get you all into trouble.”

Surrounded by this loyal company I barely even felt the sting of her words.

Ryder looked back and forth between Mrs. Tanner and me and then said in a proud, raised voice, “It’s too late for that. Ivy Pierce may be trouble, but she’s exactly the kind of trouble I’ve been looking for.”

I smiled at him for sticking up for me again and then my grin grew when Chase started clapping and Phoenix hollered a “Preach it.”

Things were still bleak. But not nearly as desolate and depressing as they had been.

Besides, tragedies were always easier to face when you had friends.

Acknowledgments

First to my God, in the land that is plentiful and when I walk through the wilderness, may I always turn back to praise.

To my husband and best friend, Zach, you complete me. Just kidding! I love you. You are an amazing man, and none of this would have ever happened without you, or because of you. Plus you’re a really good kisser.
 

To my
Stella, Scarlett, Stryker and Solo, I love you more than anything. This is all for you.

To my mother, Helen, I couldn’t have asked for a better fan or supporter than you. Your encouragement, support and fix-it-texts mean everything.

To Jennifer “Nate” Nunez, you are a phenomenal editor and fantastic friend. Thank you for helping me make sense, (deleting my parenthesis) and putting up with every long email and run-on text. But most of all, thank you for making me laugh. I couldn’t do this without you.

To Sarah Hansen, thank you for your vision. You see creative in a way I can’t and have genius in a way I never could. Thank you for every cover and every design. I am in love with this one. But then again… I’m in love with
all
of them!

To Lindsay, Miriah, Bridget, Diana, Brooke and Ashley, you girls are the greatest friends. Thank you for your energy and excitement. Thank you for letting me talk about myself. And thank you for promoting me! You are true friends. You make me feel like a
real
writer and I can’t thank you enough for that!!

To my Hellcats, Michelle Leighton, Georgia Cates, Shelly Crane, Amy Bartol, Angeline Kace, Samantha Young and Quinn Loftis, I am so beyond blessed to know you ladies. You are the greatest writers I know! Badass, rock stars that dominate this world. Love each and every one of you!

To Jenn Sterling, you inspire me daily. I am so proud of you and amazed by you! Thank you for your friendship and knowing when to call “Seahorse” when you see it.

To Lila Felix, one day soon we will share a table together. I’ll bring the fire extinguisher; you just give me the signal. It’s important we stick together! Also, thanks for being so awesome.

To Andrew James, thank you for creating real beauty out of this. Thank you for putting a soundtrack to my words. I didn’t know what to expect, but what came out of long, confusing emails and your musical genius is so insanely good there are not even words to accurately describe. Thank you for I Believe and thank you for Blackheart. There have never been greater songs.

To Kristen, thank you for supporting this, and your husband. And thank you for playing Just Dance with mine!   

And to the reader, each and every reader, thank you so very much for all your support, for buying this book and making it all the way to here. I cannot tell you how much I appreciate you and thank God for you!! I seriously have the most amazing fans ever. Thank you!

The Music

While I was writing The Rush, I had the incredible opportunity to work with Andrew James.  He is a truly talented musician, based in Omaha. His sound is this raw blues that draws you in and makes you appreciate the authentic sound of genuinely good music. And because he’s so awesome, he agreed to collaborate with me and this series and write some original music.

For The Rush, he gave Ryder a voice, and a sound and he took the concepts talked about in the book and brought them to life.

The first song released for The Rush is called I Believe and is available wherever music is sold, iTunes, Amazon, and Spotify.

The second song, Blackheart, talked about specifically in the book, will be released very soon!

If you enjoyed Ryder and Ivy I hope you take the time to check out the songs!!!

You can find Andrew James on Facebook at The Andrew James

Or on Twitter at
@Andr3wJames

About the Author

Rachel Higginson was born and raised in Nebraska, but spent her college years traveling the world. She married her high school sweetheart and spends her days raising their growing family. She is obsessed with bad reality TV and any and all Young Adult Fiction.

The Rush is the first book in The Siren Series.

Look for The Fall, the second book in The Siren Series, coming fall 2013

Other books by Rachel in 2013 are Sunburst, the second book in the Starbright Series, The Relentless Warrior, the sixth book The Star-Crossed Series and Bet in the Dark, a contemporary romance.

Other Books Out Now by Rachel Higginson:

Reckless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 1)

Hopeless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 2)

Fearless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 3)

Endless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 4)

The Reluctant King (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 5)

Starbright (The Starbright Series, Book 1)

Follow Rachel on her blog at:

www.rachelhigginson.blogspot.com

Or on Twitter:

@
mywritesdntbite

Or on her Facebook pages:

Rachel Higginson

Or

Reckless Magic

Keep Reading for an Excerpt from
Rachel’s new contemporary romance Bet in the Dark, a never before seen chapter from Lila Felix’s Down N’ Derby and a chapter from Shelly Crane’s newest Wide Awake.

Chapter One

              I blamed this on Kelly Clarkson.

             
On Kelly-Freaking-Clarkson.

             
The angry man standing across the kitchen island looked like he was about to throttle me. I had visions of large hands gripped firmly around my neck shaking me like a rubber chicken. His eyes flashed with frustration and I cursed Kelly Clarkson straight to the grave.

             
Things started out so good this morning, so unbelievably, unnaturally good. I should have known better. But at the time, I woke up in my bed to the powerful chords Kelly Clarkson was belting through my radio alarm, and laid there for the length of the song just to let her words sink in.

             
Stronger.

             
In fact I started to think Kelly Clarkson was a genius. And like maybe we were these soul sisters that had survived something awful but came out on the other side of it stronger. I started to think maybe she got me….