The Rush (22 page)

             
I looked down at my exposed stomach and quickly licked three of my fingers and rubbed at the second tattoo that ran across the ribs on my left side. I had to wet my fingers several more times to remove the concealer completely but eventually the words were revealed.

             
Ryder’s own hand came up deliberately as if he were afraid to frighten me, as if I were a wounded animal he was trying to sooth. He brushed his fingers across the identical cursive script almost reverently. His brow furrowed deeply and I wondered what emotion was playing out in his head. Confusion? Pity? Lust?

             
Only it wasn’t lust. Not by a long shot.

             
“My soul is free,” he whispered into the silence with the reverence the phrase was meant to hold. “My soul is free.”

             
He repeated the words and my heart expanded at the incantation. The words I had chosen so carefully held the deepest meaning of my existence.  I loved the way they sounded out loud, how they fell out of his lips and off his tongue with care.

             
“What do they mean Ivy?” he asked while his hand fell back to my wrist and his thumb rubbed once more along the word that was inked there.

             
“Nothing really,” I lied so obviously I was shocked when he simply waited for me to say more without calling me on my bullshit. “They’re just reminders. Things I need to remember.”

             
Ryder looked back down at the words on my stomach and wrist and when his eyes met mine the silver had been turned to gray granite, intense with anger and frustration and something that looked like…. concern. “And why do you need to remind yourself that your
soul is free
?” He bit out the words making them sound like he was dragging them across rough gravel. The reverence fell away and left only hatred for words he didn’t even understand.

             
I mashed my lips together, afraid to answer him, afraid the truth would come pouring out of me eager to divulge every last sordid detail of my f-ed up life. The thought was so ridiculous, the action so close to completing itself that I burst out into laughter before I could burst into tears instead.

             
“Ryder, seriously, they’re just words. Just little sayings I thought were…. whatever. I don’t really have a cool story or anything. I was drunk one night in Arizona and bored and I convinced this guy to ink me. It’s no big deal. Honestly, I kind of regret it,” I rambled. I took a step away from Ryder and began straightening Phoenix’s hanging shirts and jeans nervously.

             
“You were drunk during rehab?” Ryder pressed skeptically.

             
My mouth snapped shut when I realized I said Arizona out loud and that Ryder had correctly associated the time with my “rehab.”

             
“And I don’t believe you regret it,” he accused, reaching for my hand again but I stepped out of his range, putting the drums between us.

             
My shirt fell back down to cover my stomach and a surge of panic zipped through me with my tattoos exposed. My mind spun with all the ways Nix could find out about them. Why was my generation constantly documenting their lives for the world to see? If I was tagged in some candid shot online, my life would be ruined in a strangled heartbeat and the random Facebook friend would have no idea how they sent me to my death.

             
Not that I had that many Facebook friends to brag about….

             
But still.

             
“You don’t regret it,” Ryder pushed, his expression flashing with determination. “Otherwise you wouldn’t cover them up so carefully. Why do you need to cover a tattoo that your shirt already covers, Ivy?”

             
“You wouldn’t understand,” I bit out. I could explain this. Or I could brush it off like it was nothing. Or I could just walk away; remove myself entirely from this situation. Which is what I wanted to do…. but what was exactly not happening.

             
“What does the word ‘blackheart’ mean?” he changed his tactic, his voice softly begged with me to open up. He reached out his hand to me, stretching it across the void between us.

             
I melted, I couldn’t help it. Nobody had ever cared enough to interrogate me like this, to get to the bottom of something I could possibly be
feeling
. “What do you think it means?” I tested a bit desperately.

             
“Because of all the guys?” he guessed accurately.

             
“How would you know?” I countered, trying to put him on the defensive, still not ready to make myself so vulnerable. Although, I was fighting a losing battle. If Ryder kept trying, kept putting all of him into these questions like this, like he wanted to know every single intimate detail about me, I was bound to give in. I felt raw from his investigation, completely rubbed down to the bone. Exposed.

             
“People talk, Ivy.
Especially
about you. All I have to do is listen,” he explained gently. I winced at the compassion in his tone, at the pleading in his eyes for me to trust him. “Is that about Sam? Do you think you have a black heart because of Sam?”

             
I physically shuddered at his interrogation. How dare he! How dare he bring up Sam and assume that’s where all my messed up issues came from. Sam was just the frosting on a screwed up, pathetic, life-ending cake. “Don’t talk about Sam. You don’t know anything about him,” I ground out through clenched teeth. I wrapped my arms around waist tightly, holding myself together, trying to protect everything hurt and broken inside…. trying to protect Sam. Or at least his memory.

             
“I know he was the one driving that night, Ivy. I know he was the one drinking, not you. I know you can’t blame yourself because he wrapped his car around a light post and sent himself to the hospital,” he paused to let his words settle in. My chin started quivering before I registered that I was on the verge of crying and I looked up desperately at him, silently begging him to stop. “You do not have a black heart because some seventeen year old kid was stupid enough to drive intoxicated and recklessly ruin his life.”

             
There was a full minute of silence between us as I tried to digest those words…. listen to them…. really
hear
them. But I already knew the truth.
Knew
it. There was no lying to myself. I had been over this same argument a million and thirteen times before, always trying to convince myself of the same thing.

             
“I know all that,” I said so softly Ryder took a step forward to hear me better. “But here I am today. Walking. Going to school. Going to more parties. With
Chase
. And there will be more boys. After Chase. And after the guy after that. And I get to graduate high school. And live my life. And I won’t look back at him, not ever. Not Sam, not Chase, not the dozen guys before them, or after them. I have to get out of here…. I have to.” I paused for breath, to get something into my lungs, anything to keep from passing out. And then I announced with a tiny gesture toward myself, “Blackheart.”

             
“Ivy, that-“

             
Whatever Ryder was going to say was cut off abruptly when Chase, Phoenix and Kenna walked into the room noisily. They called out our names and were laughing about something that happened downstairs.

Ryder held my gaze though, not turning, not even acknowledging them. Quietly, so only I would hear he said, “That’s only true if you believe it
, Ivy.”

I nodded like his words had some deep impact on me, but the truth was I did believe it.
All of it. Because it was true. His psychobabble was completely lost on me. But I didn’t want to invite any more conversation with Ryder about it, so I turned my expression thoughtfully sad and just nodded.

Ryder let out a frustrated
sigh, apparently my act wasn’t Oscar worthy by a long shot.

“Ryder-“

He cut me off, turning his back on me. “I’m not going to tell anyone, Ivy.”

He was disappointed in me.

But at least he knew the truth. At least his eyes were completely opened to the vapid, black hole of emotional trauma that I really was. Still the strong wave of his angry disillusionment punched me painfully in the stomach.

Ugh.
Ryder.
Why did I care so much?

“I was showing Ivy your drums,” I heard Ryder announce after he left me alone in the closet.

I stood there battling with myself whether I could leave the closet and face the others or if I would need to pretend sickness so I could get Chase to take me home. I wanted to believe I was brave enough to face everyone, but I wasn’t. I was weak, and selfish and….

“Hey, you O
k?” Chase asked from the doorway. His happy, all-American face was pinched with concern. He glanced quickly over his shoulder as if gauging if he should confront Ryder or not.

“Actually, I’m kind of hiding,” I admitted, realizing my decision as I said it out loud. “I’m sorry, this party is a little more than I can handle.” I looked up at Chase from under my lashes and prayed for undeserved compassion.

“Do you want to go home?” he asked, chivalrous as ever.

“Do you mind taking me?”

“Not at all,” he offered me a comforting smile. “Maybe you need to talk about it?”

“Maybe,” I relented.
“Maybe in the car.”

He smiled down at me and I stepped into him, forcing him into a hug. I knew I wouldn’t talk about this and I knew this was the best I could give him. His comforting arms helped ease the raw pain Ryder had ripped open and I relished in the easiness that came with Chase. I wasn’t getting attached to Chase and that thought made it easier to inhale. I would be able t
o break up with him, even if the idea felt very similar to giving my favorite pet away. And though it would be difficult, it was doable. And that thought made it easier to exhale.

See?
Blackheart.

I was right all along.

Chapter Seventeen

              Thoughts of the night before attacked my emotions as I sat motionless in the passenger’s seat of my mother’s Escalade. We drove silently on the way to our Sunday visit with my little sister.

             
Usually I was dying to see Honor, make sure she was Ok, make sure the curse wasn’t destroying her life…. But last night replayed in my head like a destructive addiction.

             
How could I have been so stupid to let Ryder see my tattoo, first of all?

             
And then how could I have let his words affect me like that?

             
Blackheart. He
knew
better. Everyone knew better! Even people that didn’t want to see the truth, that preferred ignorance is bliss and all that,
knew
better.

             
I was a borderline sociopath.

             
There wasn’t an excuse in this world that covered my long list of sins. And that list would only lengthen unless I got the hell out of here.

             
“When we get there,” my mother’s melodic voice cut through the silence, “you need to be on your best behavior. I am not going to put up with any of your antics, Ivy. You
owe
me.”

             
I wanted to ask, for what? Instead I nodded meekly, “I know. I’ll be on my best behavior.”

             
“Better than your best behavior,” my mom pressed.

             
“Ok, yes. Better than my best.”

             
I thought that promise would be enough to pacify her, but she had too much experience in all of this. “I mean it, Ivy. You have no idea what you put me through last spring. You have no idea what you put Nix through! And God, Smith was so concerned about you; it was like you were
his
daughter. He immediately blamed me of course. Until I explained about the accident and what happened to that poor Sam Evans.” She said
poor Sam Evans
, but I would have had to be deaf not to hear the smile in her voice…. the excitement. “Still, Smith was so concerned about you, so worried. Honestly, it was a little sickening. I don’t know what happened to him. There was a time when he adored me. He bought me that Tiffany necklace. You know the four karats one? Just because! He bought me that gorgeous piece of art just because and now look at him! I swear it was those cancer drugs. They screwed with his mind. He’s not right. He shouldn’t have Honor. Who knows when he’ll turn on
her
? Then what? She’s my daughter and I’ll be damned before I let anything happen to her.”

             
My mother rambled on and on like that until we pulled through the gated driveway of Smith Porter’s gigantic West Omaha mansion. He was filthy rich, like more money than God loaded. It was what drew my mother to him in the first place, but he somehow clawed his way out of hell
and
my mother’s greedy fingers. He must have been a monk in a former life, or Mother Theresa or something because to defeat stage four brain cancer and the curse was like legend status.