Read Online Heart by Rachel Higginson - Free Book Online Page B

completely, I had to look at
him just to make sure he was still breathing.
    “I’m not dead, Ryder. See? Perfectly
alive.”
    His jaw clenched tightly. “I can see that,
Red. A phone call wouldn’t have hurt you though, yeah? You left me… in the hospital . Do you know what that did to me? I couldn’t
go after you. I couldn’t stop you or talk you out of it or
anything. Do you have any idea what that did to me ?”
    I struggled to swallow around the huge lump
in my throat. “I did what was best for you… for us.”
    “You did what was best for you .”
    I pulled back and jumped to my feet. “You’re
not even trying to see it from my perspective! You of all people
should know how badly I needed to leave! I don’t understand why
you’re so pissed when I did what you wanted me to!”
    He shot to his feet and prowled after me. “I
didn’t want you to leave by yourself! I never wanted you to leave
by yourself! The plan was you and me. You and me ! I never
wanted anything else!”
    I stumbled back a step. My hand flew to my
chest as if I could stop the splintering from tearing me into a
thousand unfixable pieces. “We have to stop this,” I pleaded. “I
can’t… I can’t keep doing this. I have to find out what happened to
Honor.”
    He took a step back too, but it was less
about retreat and more about resigning himself to my request.
“Fine, Ivy. Fine. You don’t want to talk about this, that’s fine.
Let’s go check out Smith’s house and then we’ll figure out how to
get into your mom’s place.”
    “We? What do you mean we ? I’m not
asking you for help, Ryder. I can handle this.”
    Anger mingled with obvious frustration and he
threw both hands out to his side. “For the love, Red! How are you
going to get to Smith’s house? Or your mom’s? Planning on taking
the bus? What if Nix shows up? What are you going to do then? You
need my help.”
    Okay, he had a few valid points.
    Still, I didn’t want to spend the day going
back and forth with Ryder about how horrible of a person I was.
    Mainly because it was agony. I could see his
points. I could understand why he hated me… why he wanted nothing
to do with me again. And that was the worst part.
    Ryder was right. And I hated that I was
wrong.
    Now that I was here, I couldn’t believe that
I had stayed away for all of this time and never considered how
Ryder was fairing without me.
    I had been selfish. I had thought only about
myself.
    Those were hard truths to face.
    “Ryder, I can’t ask you to help me,” I told
him on a whisper.
    “You’re not asking. I’m offering. And you’re
going to take me up on my offer.” When I hesitated, he finished
with, “I want to help you, Ivy. Whatever happened to us in the
past, I still want you to get out and get away from all of these
horrible people. If you think something happened to Honor, we’ll go
find out. If you think whatever is happening to your mom might
affect you, we’ll go find that out too. But as soon as we tie up
these loose ends, I’m going to help you leave and this time you
stay away. Do not give Nix another opportunity to find you.”
    I nodded slowly, unable to process all of his
words. How could he be so sweet to me after everything? How could
he still want the best for me?
    I ignored the crashing disappointment when I
realized he had said that I would get out… alone… without him.
    Not that I expected him to drop everything
for me after all of this time. Or run away with me.
    Or still want to run away with me.
    No, I couldn’t think about that now.
    “Thank you, Ryder.”
    “Come on, Red, let’s go make you safe
again.”

Chapter Seven
     
    We walked downstairs to find Phoenix
shoveling cereal into his mouth. “You want?” he asked around a
mouthful of Captain Crunch.
    “No, thanks,” I said immediately.
    “Red prefers her breakfast highly caffeinated
and in twenty ounce cups.” Ryder walked into the kitchen and
dangled his keys in front of Phoenix. I ignored