“Are we on the run?” he grinned at me.
“This is a legit kidnapping,” I told him.
“God, you’re so boring. Why can’t I fall for a girl that has some excitement in her life?”
I gaped at him.
“You know, fall for a girl in the platonic sense of the phrase.”
My insides melted into warm squishiness. I was so beyond crushing on Ryder… this was something so much more profound, so much more earth-shattering. If he was just “falling” for me, he needed to catch up.
“Sure, platonic. I know exactly what you mean.”
“You do?”
“I do,” I smiled at him.
He wasn’t ready to let the subject drop though.
“Because you are also falling for me? In the platonic sense, of course?” He had parallel-parked across the street from the loft he shared with his dad and uncle. He shut the engine off and let his heated eyes pull me into that perceptive intensity that I just loved about him.
“I’m absolutely in platonic with you,” I promised him. I reached out and ran my fingers over the tattooed words he’d had written for his mom. “I platonic you.”
His lips curved up into a crooked grin. “Ivy Pierce, I platonic you, too.”
We climbed out of his Bronco and he grabbed my hand as we crossed the street. I reached for him at the same time he reached for me. Our hands were moving toward each other before I could ever tell my body what to do. I sought him out like a sunflower to the sun and he gave me light and warmth and life as if his own depended on it.
His warm, strong hand wrapped around mine. We interlinked fingers, and his were so much longer than mine, so much rougher and worked. But they were his. And I felt each of them as they pressed into my skin.
But it wasn’t just his fingers and hand I felt. I could sense all of him. The press of his arm against mine, the brush of his hip as we bounded up the stairs together, the bump of his shoulder. I could feel his affectionate aura wrap around me with the emotions inside of him that were swelling to the same unnameable crescendo that mine were. I could feel him. All of him. And I never wanted to feel anything else again.
How would I ever leave this boy? This boy that had reached into my life and restarted my black heart. This boy that had demanded I start fighting and living and loving. This boy that meant everything to me. This boy that I would leave so that I could give him the peace of knowing that I was free.
This boy I would think about every day for the rest of my life, dream about every single night and offer secret prayers for with every breath I breathed.
This boy.
This boy I loved.
I loved Ryder.
I had never known love before… not in any part of my soul or my life. Not like this. Not anything close to this.
But I loved him.
We stood in the darkened stairwell, hesitating to enter his apartment.
He looked down at me with such devotion and loyalty in his warm gaze that I almost told him everything in that moment. But I couldn’t ruin this. I couldn’t give myself a reason to stay.
I fell into him on purpose, catching my palms on his hard chest. I couldn’t speak my emotions to him, but I had to do something. I had to show him in some way that earth-shattering things were happening inside me.
“Hey,” he chuckled.
“Hey,” I whispered back.
He quirked a thick, arched eyebrow at me and I couldn’t hold back any longer. I kissed the underside of his jaw, then the corner of his mouth. I kissed his cheek and his jawline. My thumb rubbed a circle over his pounding heart and I smiled against his stubble-roughened throat. I finally moved to his mouth while my breathing faltered in my chest and my eyes slammed shut from nervousness.
I kissed him slowly, savoring the taste of his soft lips and minty breath. He kissed me back after just a moment, surprised by my bold behavior and initiative.
A minute later the door to the apartment burst open and we scrambled apart.
“I thought I heard someone out here,” his Uncle Matt grinned at us. “The food’s going to get cold if you take this any further.”
Ryder reached out and put his arm around me, pulling me into his side. “You really think I care about cold food after that?”
Matt barked out a genuine laugh. “I don’t suppose you will care. But Ivy might. We know she never gets a good meal.”
“He’s right,” I admitted to Ryder. “If my eggs are cold, I’m blaming you.”
I followed Matt into the apartment while Ryder shouted after me, “But you’re the one that kissed me!”
“Do you believe that?” I asked Matt mischievously.
“Not even for a second,” he confirmed.
I winked at Ryder over my shoulder and took my place at the huge cement table Ryder’s dad had bought from a student artist. The table was more eclectic artwork than functional furniture but it looked really cool in their hip downtown loft and went nicely with all his other accumulated student-made pieces.
But it had to be a serious pain to move.
Ryder plopped down next to me, dramatically exasperated. I grinned at him over a platter of sausages Nate had passed to me. Ryder leaned forward with shoulders hunched over. I tried to give him the plate next, but he wouldn’t take it. Finally, I got tired of holding it and set it down in between us on the table.
He leaned forward and grabbed my hands as soon as they were free. With one smooth move, he yanked me forward and planted a sensual kiss on my lips. I was too stunned to react at first and too embarrassed to kiss him like he was kissing me in front of his dad and uncle.
He apparently didn’t need my participation though, because he kept kissing, kept seducing me publicly, until he was satisfied. Then he trailed his lips to my earlobe where he confessed quietly so only I could hear, “That was me kissing you. There is a big difference between when I kiss you and when you kiss me.”
He scooted back and reached for the platter of sausage. I put my hand on his and grabbed his attention before he could dive into breakfast.
He didn’t make any sense. How could it possibly be different? Same beginning. Same middle. Same outcome. “Explain,” I demanded.
“You don’t know what you want yet, Red. It shows.” He flashed me a wicked grin. “I know exactly what I want and where I want to go.”
Butterflies, fast and blinding took off in my stomach. My smile wobbled and my hands trembled. I stared down at my half-full plate and knew I would die before breakfast was over. How could he just say something like that to me in front of his dad and uncle and expect me to survive?
How could he just say something like that to me and not expect me to fall completely and irrevocably in love with him?
“Ryder, what did you say to Ivy?” his dad demanded. “She looks like she’s ready to pass out.”
Ryder barked out a happy laugh. “I had to explain the definition of platonic to her.”
I blushed as bright as my hair. “I know what platonic means.”
Ryder smirked at me. “Good. Then you’ll also know when something is platonic and when something isn’t.”
I glared at him even while I freaked out inside. I should know that. I should be able to tell the difference… but I didn’t think I could. Were these fun, flirty feelings for me all friendly? Or did he feel as deeply for me as I felt for him?
And what if he did? Could I trust that? Could I trust that these feelings of his were legitimate emotions created by his free will? Or would I always blame the curse?
Would I always feel like he was trapped?
Did it matter?
“Get out of your head, Red, and eat your breakfast.” He rubbed his hand on my bare knee and I knew in that moment it didn’t matter. Every touch, every kiss, every look, thought, word spoken, and word not spoken… drew me into him.
I had barricades, walls, and fail safes for every single thing in my life, except him. I had no defense for him.
A feeling that w
as faintly familiar swelled in my chest with those thoughts. It burned through my inside and inflated my chest, it consumed my emotions, my swirling thoughts, everything about me. And it felt so tangible I thought it would surge from my chest.
Ryder looked up at me from under his wild hair and lifted his dark eyebrows while sharing a secret smile with me. He held me in that hypnotizing gray gaze while the feeling continued to build and build and build.
The pressure was delicious but too much. The pain wasn’t hurtful but complete. I couldn’t contain it anymore. He stayed right there with me, drinking me in and whispering silent secrets that only we could understand.
And then that feeling burst, just like it had in Phoenix’s room. Gold light whooshed from my body in a fast, lightning flash of some power I couldn’t name. It washed everyone and everything in the apartment and then fizzled out just as quickly as it had come.
My skin buzzed with the energy that had obviously come from me. I looked at Nate and Matt to see their reactions but they didn’t act like anything weird had happened.
I glanced over at Ryder who had gone back to eating his food.
Had nobody seen that but me?
I supposed it wasn’t such a crazy assumption since I was a creature from Greek myth and they were normal humans… still, the light had been blinding in its intensity and had originated in my chest. That had to be weird to someone else besides me. Right?
Matt looked up from his breakfast with a bite of pancake almost to his mouth. He paused in the middle of it and stared at me for a good long minute. I shifted uncomfortably in my chair and tried to ignore his attention.
He looked like he usually did on family-breakfast mornings. His chin-length hair stuck out in crazy tufts and his beard growth was several days old. He had his contacts in this morning, revealing his Sutton-esque silvery eyes but they looked at me differently now than they had before. Something had changed in the blast of that light and it had affected Matt.
Ryder and I tried to keep me away from his dad and brother as much as we could, but we allowed the occasional breakfast. Neither of us wanted them to be too affected by the curse because… because, well obviously, how awkward would that be?
Gross.
But also because I really liked them and Ryder actually loved his family and didn’t want them to have to deal with any of the things that came with being around me too much. Such as, but not limited to, falling in love with me, becoming obsessed with me, crashing a car into the light pole going way, way too fast while also under the influence of alcohol and just in general crashing anything into anything.
Such as a pirate ship into a bank of rocks and sinking to the depths of the ocean and your doom. I represented some kind of new-Greek era but that was something I was in no hurry to bring back.
Yes, I liked Nate and Matt Sutton just enough to want to avoid them forever so that they could avoid an explosive death.
But now Matt was staring at me and I felt like he had me under a microscope. I reminded myself I would be leaving in three weeks and nothing would come of this; but I still didn’t want to hurt Ryder. I wanted our last days together to be as perfect as possible.
Ryder finally noticed too and looked up at his uncle nervously. “You alright, Matty?”
Matt shrugged. “It’s Ivy… she looks so… you look so… normal.”
“What?” I wrinkled my nose at him.
“It’s just always before you’ve looked… beyond normal or what I’m trying to say is that you’ve always seemed extraordinary. You’ve always surpassed human, something ethereal and untouchable.”
“Alright, Matt,” Ryder interrupted sternly. “We get it. You have a crush on Ivy.” He clasped my hand under the table for moral support.
Matt cleared his throat uncomfortably. “That’s not what I mean. What I’m saying is that you’ve always come across that way, Ivy. But today is different. You look les, but more, at the same time. You look… normal, like I said. Less, goddess-gracing-us-with-her-presence but much happier. You look happy. And that in turn makes you more beautiful to look at but less… appealing.” He waved a hand in front of his face. “I’m not making any sense.”
“No, you’re not.” Ryder squeezed my hand but I had to do everything I could not to break down into happy tears.
“Yes, you are,” I whispered through the emotions clogging my throat. “I’m prettier because I’m happier. Everybody’s like that.”
Matt nodded and shrugged. “Yeah, I guess that’s true.”
I pressed forward, officially making every single male in this room as uncomfortable as possible. I swore Nate glanced beneath the table, estimating his chances of diving under it and staying there until I left.
“But you’re personally not attracted to me, right? I’m no longer… appealing to you?” I used his word and his eyes lit up.
“Exactly!” He slapped the table with his hand. “That’s exactly what I meant. She gets it.” He threw that same hand my direction. “See? She gets it.”
“You’re still creeping me out, Weirdo,” Ryder grumbled but his body had uncoiled some and he’d let go of my hand.
“Are things better at home, Ivy?” Nate asked with all the concern of a veteran parent. He hadn’t bothered to gel his hair in his usual style today and it looked as unruly as Ryder’s always did. But his glasses were firmly in place and they kept his signature-professor-look.
I glanced at Ryder and shoved some scrambled eggs into my mouth. Real mature.
Nate chuckled, “Ah, evasion at its finest.”
I grinned sheepishly around the eggs. Nate didn’t know any details about my home life but apparently I screamed “damaged goods.” Ryder had told me his dad was constantly grilling him on what my mom was like and if I needed a place to stay. I had always found his concern really touching. He didn’t know me or know anything about me and still he wanted to help. There weren’t that many people in my life like that. Actually… I could count two other people: Ryder and Smith.
“What about the school year?” Nate changed the topic and poured himself some more coffee. “Are you anxious to get back? You have a little over two weeks left. I think?”
Now this I did now. “Two weeks until school,” I groaned.
“What are you complaining about?” Ryder nudged me with his elbow and then caught his slip. “I mean, we’re seniors now. One year to go.”
“Yeah, you sound super enthusiastic,” I smiled at him.
“I can’t wait to graduate,” he said sullenly.
“Really? Because it sounds like you’d rather do anything but,” Matt teased him. “You sound a little depressed about it actually. You going to be alright, Buddy?”
Ryder reached for some orange juice. “I’m just bummed that the summer’s almost over. I’m not ready to move on.”
My heart clenched and my bones cracked down the center. I heard the fragmenting sound as they split in a sequential line; my skull first, rippling fissures all the way to the tips of my toes.
“Me either,” I whispered to him.
Breakfast continued over hilarious small talk and delicious food. My phone buzzed about thirty billion times in my pocket, but I ignored it every single time. Ryder and I volunteered to clean up and do the dishes and Matt and Nate went off to run errands in separate directions.
Ryder and I were officially alone.
We finished up the dishes and leaned back on the sink.
We hadn’t spoken in a few minutes and the silence between us felt heavier and heavier with each passing moment.
“Ryder… I’m scared.”
He pulled me into a hug immediately. His arms embraced me in a sanctuary of warmth and affection and I didn’t feel that same fear anymore. I felt brave.
“Me too,” he told me. “But I’m more scared for you if you stay.”
I nodded into his chest and threw my arms around his neck. “Help me plan where to go? Do you have a map?”
“Yeah,” he sighed reluctantly. And
then neither of us moved for twenty minutes. We just held each other in the middle of his kitchen, wrapped up in each other as tightly as we could manage.
Every once in a while he would place a sweet kiss in the curve of my neck, or on the corner of my mouth. And with each one, I would shiver with butterflies.
“Will you want to go alone?” he finally asked. “Because-”
Thinking he was going to start in on a lecture about traveling the world by myself, I interrupted him to assuage his fears. “I asked Exie and Sloane and their sisters to go with me.”
“Do you think that was wise? That’s a lot of people? You won’t be able to stay off the radar that way.”
“Ryder, I had to. You don’t understand what those girls are going through or will go through if they don’t come with me. I have to get them out of here. And we’ll be smart. If we get out of this, there’s nothing in this world that could get me back into it. I would rather die. We all would.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of.”
I couldn’t exactly argue against his anxiety. I would die before Nix dragged me back in.
And I would die gladly.
I wouldn’t become Anaxandra. Or Evaleen. And they were just at the beginning of their careers.
“Do you know where you want to go?” he asked quietly after a long time of heavy silence.
“Some place far away,” I said obviously. “And busy, with lots of people so we can blend in. Or… no, maybe isolated. Without any people. Somewhere we can just be. No interruptions. No men. No… anything. Just us and the sea.” As the words came out of my mouth, my conviction grew stronger and stronger. “Yes,” I decided. “By the ocean. A beach, somewhere just us and the ocean.”
“You really are a Siren, aren’t you?” he whispered into my hair.
I look up at him perplexed. How could I be so cliché? I pictured myself at the edge of the water, my feet wet from the rolling waves, the bottom of my skirt dragging in the salt water. I would be playing with my hair, because that’s how every Greek mythology picture portrayed women, and I’d be gazing into the horizon, waiting for the next ship to glide by so I could lure them to their cold, watery deaths.
The Fall (The Siren Series) Page 16
