The Rush (The Siren Series)

by Higginson, Rachel

  “Oh, no worries,” Phoenix threw out immediately. “The weed is just there, I mean available. Personally, I never do it either, but my parents leave it where all my friends can find it. They think that makes them cool parents. I think it makes them irresponsible, but what can you do?”

  “I don’t believe you,” a snide voice called from down the table. I lifted my eyes to meet the same girl that was mean to me before. I couldn’t remember her name. Initially I thought she was accusing Phoenix of lying, but by her pinched, hateful face I had to assume her statement was directed at me. “I’ve heard you’re into everything,” she continued, letting her ambiguous innuendo slide over every one of her words.

  “She doesn’t do drugs anymore. Rehab, duh, Amber,” another voice from down the table scolded but with a fair amount of amusement in his annoying voice.

  Hayden. Ugh.

  “Oh that’s right,” Amber laughed like a hyena at my expense. Her chin length hair bobbed around her face and got stuck to her overly lacquered lips. Her eyes glinted maliciously at me.

  That wasn’t the reason I didn’t do drugs. I would never do drugs. Ever. But those were reasons I had to keep private, reasons I couldn’t even admit to myself out loud. Plus, I still had to perpetuate the whole rehab lie anyway. In only three days, I had almost completely forgotten that I was supposed to be a recovering addict. That was one lie that was going to be hard to keep straight. Goodbye wholesome. Hello nasty rumors.

  “Yep, the twelve steps and all,” I mumbled half-heartedly. I didn’t even know what the twelve steps were in truth. I knew they involved forgiveness, but that was the only one I could come up with. I should have probably googled the rest for obnoxious moments just like this.

  “What does that even mean?” Ryder asked in an amused tone, drawing my attention back to our smaller group.

  “Come on, don’t be a douche too,” Chase pleaded, saving me from answering. It was a good thing too, since I had no idea what I meant by that and I should have known better than to think Ryder wouldn’t call me out on my crap. “Are you alright?” Chase looked down at me and I felt enveloped in his protective care. His hand slipped to my lower back and I instantly felt better in his bubble of white-knighthood. It was really nice to have someone stick up for me, to say something on my behalf. Even if he was a victim in all of this too.

  “I’m not trying to be a douche,” Ryder said a little bit softer and he drew my attention back to him. I met his gaze from across the table and couldn’t help but fall just a little bit into his silver depths. “Sorry, Ivy. I wasn’t trying to pick on you.” He held me motionless from where he sat; I was more than a little bit paralyzed by the look of sincerity in his eyes. I could see that he felt bad for calling me out, but that was it. There was nothing else there, no hidden desire, no blatant interest, just apology. He was completely immune to me and suddenly every single one of my thoughts was wrapped up in Ryder Sutton and how the hell he could resist me.

  “Hey, it’s fine,” I shook my head, breaking our stare down and searching for anything else to look at. Chase’s hand warmed my back, setting of anxious feelings of guilt and embarrassment for letting myself get so sucked into the vortex of Ryder’s self-control. I settled my gaze on one of my orange peels and began shredding it between my fingers, shrinking a little from these unfamiliar emotions.

  “Sam Evans doesn’t think it’s fine,” Amber half shouted from across the table.

  My head snapped up with her accusation. Instantaneously I was consumed with every negative, hateful emotion possible. “Shut your filthy mouth,” I growled, not caring that there was a captive audience surrounding me. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. Don’t you ever say his name again with that much disrespect.”

  Chase’s hand became stiff and still on my back, his whole body rigid next to me. I felt wide eyes burning into me with intense surprise and curiosity. But I couldn’t explain. I couldn’t explain how it was my fault what happened to Sam and that I would have to live with the guilt and sin of that night.

  “Did I hit a nerve?” Amber smirked pompously.

  “You have no idea what the hell you’re talking about. So I suggest you stop talking now,” I threatened in a low voice. My hands had started to tremble so I clenched them together and hid them beneath the table. My breathing stuttered and staggered in a worthless attempt to draw in oxygen. Black spots prickled my vision and I could only fear the impending breakdown that was swooping down on me between the flashes of horrific memories of that night.

  “God, you’re such a bitch,” Amber’s voice bit out from somewhere beyond the craziness playing out in my head.

  I felt Chase whisper against my ear, asking if I was alright, but I wasn’t capable of answering him at this point. It was all caving in on me, my control was slipping, my future was fading away….

  “Who’s the bitch?” a strong voice cut through my haze and called Amber out on her bullshit. “Don’t start shit you know nothing about just because you’re jealous.”

  I lifted my eyes to Ryder who was very effectively putting Amber in her place. Her face had paled and her eyes filled with tears at his admonition. I felt the shattered pieces of my soul start to mend themselves back together and I worked to pull in a full breath, filling my lungs and expanding my chest. Ryder turned back to me, his gaze softening, his eyes searching.

  “She’s been trying to hook up with Chase for two years,” Ryder explained in a loud enough voice that I knew this was still directed at Amber. “She’s jealous of you.”

  I nodded because that was all I was capable of. Ryder held my eyes for half a minute more before turning back to a stunned Kenna. He went back engaging her in conversation, giving her every ounce of his doting attention. Slowly quiet chatter grew around us and everyone at our table seemed to move on. I leaned into Chase, enjoying the strength of his chest against my back, relishing in the warmth of his body pressed against me.

  I would survive this.

  I had to.

  Chapter Twelve

  “Finally!” Sloane called from the top of her staircase when my mother and I walked into her midtown French Beaux-arts design house. Her mother had drastically different taste than mine. Where my mother worshipped at the altar of modern chic, Sloane’s mother was all classic French doors and imported antique tiled floors. The house was a magazine spread waiting to happen, with expertly decorated classic French furniture and a drool worthy backyard grotto complete with a cozy fire pit and sunken fifteen-person Jacuzzi. “Up here now!” She snapped her perfectly manicured fingers impatiently and I couldn’t help but smile.

  “Geesh! You are so bossy!” I called back, feeling a weight lift off my shoulders. I hated being here tonight. I loathed being surrounded by these people, by these women who had sold their souls to the devil without putting up any kind of fight. But I loved my girls. And it was good to see them.

  “Ivy,” my mother stopped me before I could hang up my coat and disappear into Sloane’s bedroom for the rest of the night. Her voice was poised and authoritative, her glassy green eyes narrowed and expectant. “I expect you to put in some face time tonight. You heard what Nix has planned for you. He won’t want you hiding away. You need to remind him and everyone else why he would pick you. It’s not public knowledge yet, but when he makes his claim to you I don’t want there to be a shadow of a doubt for why he would pick you.”

  She leaned forward to straighten the neckline of my mandarin collared sheer shirt dress. She brushed invisible lint off the shoulder and then adjusted it so that it layered over the dress-length slip underneath perfectly. I willed myself to be still underneath her ice cold fingers and intense scrutiny.

  “Mom, nobody will notice,” I argued doing my best to keep the pleading tone I desperately felt out of my voice. “It’s not like Nix is going to announce his intentions tonight.”

  “Don’t argue with me,” she chastised immediately. “And please, Nix’s affection for you has never been anything but
common knowledge. Do you think anyone else could have pulled that little depression stunt last spring and gotten away with it?” My mother laughed derisively, completely and effectively putting me in my place. “Hardly. So don’t you dare seem ungrateful tonight. Get your act together and give Nix what he wants.”

  “Yes mother,” I ground out obediently sounding like a Stepford robot. I knew there was no point arguing what might as well have been a command straight from God in this circle of delusional crazy people.

  She gave me another head to toe dissecting glance, pausing a little too long on my solid black leggings like they were an eye sore. And then she turned her back on me to greet her…. colleagues. I looked around the elegant rooms of Sloane’s house, each one exquisitely designed and furnished. The house cost the same as our condo which could have reflected badly on Sloane’s mother Thalia. Our circle was entirely wrapped up in price tags and paychecks. But where Thalia had been frugal with the house she had made up for with extravagant pieces of art and design.

  The first floor of Sloane’s mother’s house was filled with women just like my own, gold diggers all vying for Nix’s desired attention. Not that Nix would ever be an end all for these rich bitches, but he had his own charm and appeal that was absolutely intoxicating to these women…. to every woman. Nix floated between clusters of beautiful but conniving females, dazzling them all with his charm and wit.

  I had the sudden urge to vomit all over the antique ottoman to my left, just to cause a scene. Obviously I squashed the urge, but the bitterness stayed firmly lodged in the back of my throat.

  I took one more brave look around the first floor from my vantage point in the foyer, swearing to myself that I would never become these women, that I would never let myself get swept away in the shallow-possession-coveted existence that poisoned them. I lifted my chin in mild defiance and let the promise to myself weave a protective layer around my cynical, jaded soul, around my broken, malformed heart. I was better than this. I was better than this life.

  Nix caught my eye from across the room, his dark eyes hypnotizing me, his allure calling to me, asking me to stand by his side. He hardly acknowledged me other than the way he kept his gaze tightly locked with mine, not even a head nod or incline of his chin. But it was because of the subtlety of his authority that I felt the call to him stronger than even the oxygen in my lungs, more intimately than the blood pumping through my veins. I held my ground and fought with everything I had against the intense desire to walk over to him. His lips quirked into a perceptive smirk, and I felt his expression turn knowing. It was like my defiance only spurred him on, only encouraged him. More afraid of that truth than anything else, I broke our gaze and bounded upstairs and to the safety of Sloane’s room.

  “There she is,” Exie squealed. “Shut the door behind you, Ives.”

  I followed her directions and plopped down on Sloane’s oversized bed. Sloane’s room was decorated in the same style as the rest of the house, light and airy with touches of eighteenth century France. Every piece of her ivory painted provincial bedroom set was occupied in some way by Sloane, Exie or their sisters Evaleen and Anaxandra.

  Exie was at the vanity curling her sister Anaxandra’s hair. She had long golden curls, just like Exie and icy blue eyes framed by impossibly dark lashes. They were big-boobed Barbies with tiny waists and perfect manes of hair. Anaxandra watched disinterestedly as Exie arranged her hair in a perfect mess that would appear casual even if it had taken several hours to accomplish.

  Evaleen, Sloane’s sister shared her pale complexion and deep, dark brown eyes, but her hair was more chestnut than Sloane’s rich almost black hair. Evaleen was definitely Snow White’s older sister, and not the fairy tale princess that Sloane was, but she was still breath-taking, still heart-stopping. All of these beautiful girls could give anyone an inferiority complex.

  That is if you weren’t equally as beautiful and acutely aware that this kind of splendor came with an insipid, disgusting price you would have to pay for the rest of your existence and never, not once, not even in your outspoken fantasies or most private hopes and dreams have the opportunity to be free.

  “Hey, Ivy,” Evaleen greeted in a falsely casual tone. She lifted her eyes from a gossip magazine and pinned me with an accusing stare. “It’s been a while. How was the…. what are you calling it? The mind-vacation?”

  I gaped at her. She was speaking to me with barely hidden cruelty like she was accusing me what happened was my fault. She should know better. We were all brought into this together, the same way. We used to be in this together. But apparently Exie was right, these two girls that I used to look up to as heroes had bought into the lie.

  Everyone in the room was waiting for me to say something, staring at me with jewel-like eyes and practiced expressions of curiosity.

  “Rehab,” I finally whispered, my own voice failing to stand by my side. “I’ve just been telling everyone I went to rehab.”

  Anaxandra snorted her disapproval. “Not a very flattering lie. Fat camp would have been better than rehab.”

  I swallowed my righteous rage at her callousness and decided to save the “beauty is on the inside” fight for when it actually aided my case. In fact, all of my beauty was on the outside. All of it. So it didn’t really matter if I wanted to argue with Anaxandra or not, she would clearly win this argument.

  “But rehab isn’t really a lie,” I replied pathetically. “At least not if you hear Nix or my mom talk about it.”

  “What was it like?” Evaleen asked, sliding down from her perch on Sloane’s long gilded dresser. “Was it really intense?”

  “Yes,” I admitted. I hadn’t even had this conversation with Sloane or Exie yet. I preferred never to think about my time in the posh brain-washing camp I had been sent to. Most of the time I believed my soul was still intact, well, small pieces of it, but there were moments of weakness when I wasn’t so sure they hadn’t penetrated my mind. “Lots and lots of therapy. And Nix had several veterans visit and share their success stories with me. I guess he was trying to sell me on this whole thing.” I gestured around the room lazily, as if Sloane’s room summed up our entire existence.

  “Spa time?” Anaxandra pushed, probably noticing my glowing skin and manicured nails, both of which I had chosen to neglect before I went in. I nodded my answer. She sighed enviously. “It sounds like vacation. What I wouldn’t give for Nix to pamper me like that!”

  Evaleen squealed with laughter, “No kidding. Six months of constant relaxation and spoiling. It sounds amazing! Was it amazing?”

  “No, obviously not.” I looked at these two girls that had just as much influence in raising me as my mother did and could not believe how far gone they were. They were five years older than me, which was an insane amount of time in my life. It was the difference between fighting fate and accepting it. They were almost finished with college, about ready to enter our society completely and they were going on and on about spa time? Everything in their lives was already a vacation from reality and still they wanted more? I wondered who they were at the core of their beings; how far down the morally deluded they had really fallen.

  Evaleen once pulled me aside at a garden party when I was thirteen and slipped comfort inserts into my four inch pumps when she could tell I could barely walk straight anymore. She whispered in my ear when I turned fourteen and had to go to dinner with Nix for the first time by myself that I would be Ok, that I was strong enough to handle a four course meal and when dessert was over to simply tell him that I was exhausted and had school in the morning and couldn’t be out any later. She had shown me one of Nix’s greatest weaknesses, that he was a gentleman to a fault in public and nothing would come between him and keeping up appearances.

  And Anaxandra had been the closest thing to an older sister I ever had. She tweezed my eyebrows for the first time, taught me the tricks of well-placed duct tape and Band-Aid placements and never let me cry in public. Never. She would somehow see tears form in my eye
s from across entire ballrooms, race to me, scoop me up and hide me in the nearest bathroom until the tears stopped and she could reapply my makeup. I was gone six months and came back to invasion of the body snatchers. I came back to sell-outs. The reality of that epiphany was like a slice to my already battered heart. What if that was me one day? What if I forgot all my moral high ground and coveted convictions and allowed the idea of spas and vacation to completely cloud my judgment? That was the scariest question of all.

  “I was still processing Sam…. It was kind of the opposite of a vacation.” I breathed out in a shaky whisper.

  “Oh my god, Ivy, get over it already. It’s not like he died. You are being so dramatic about the whole thing!” Anaxandra rolled her huge blue eyes in an exaggerated circle and then removed her attention from me completely, looking down at her nails as if they held the solution to world hunger.

  Exie smacked the back of her sister’s head with a sharp satisfaction. “God, Ana, that is the ugliest thing you have ever said! What is wrong with you?”

  “Ow!” Anaxandra rubbed at the back of her head and scowled at her little sister. “What is wrong with you? And you know that Ivy is the only one upset about the accident. Everyone else seems to think it’s a good thing…. a sign of things to come!” Her face lit up with an expectant smile. “You’re a good omen, Ivy. Stop worrying about Sam and enjoy what this means for you!”

  The bile rose higher in my throat and I lunged forward, throwing myself in Sloane’s bathroom. I didn’t have time to reach the toilet, so I stood at the sink, dry heaving the non-existent contents of an empty stomach. A weighty pressure landed on my lungs and my vision blurred at the edges, threatening my consciousness altogether. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t breathe.

  Sloane appeared behind me and turned me away from the mirror where I had been unconsciously staring daggers into my own, hated reflection. She pushed roughly on the back of my head until the top half of my body hung upside down and my face was awkwardly placed between my knees.