Heart (11 page)

The light turned green, but we had nowhere to
go while traffic slowly moved forward. By the time Ryder could
press significantly on the gas, Nix was right beside us.

There was a gigante driving and more hanging
out in the backseat. Nix leaned out of the passenger side window,
shouting curses at me. Ryder growled out his own fowl words and
rammed over the curb, onto the sidewalk.

We were close enough to the cross street that
he only had to cut across the corner and bounce us back to the
road, but it seemed to take forever with Nix so close. I struggled
to get my seatbelt on while I was thrown all around the cab from
Ryder’s chaotic driving.

Back on the road, we inched out just before
Nix turned the corner.

We still hadn’t lost them.

“They have guns,” I gasped.

I could see the gigantes dangling out of
their windows, semi-automatic guns planted in their heavy hands. I
wanted to scream and cry and panic, but I forced my mouth and mind
into submission for Ryder’s sake. He was doing everything he could
to get us out of here alive. I couldn’t get in his way.

“Ryder,” I pleaded.

“Red,
I’m going to get us out of
here
,” he swore.

I believed him. I had to.

“Oh, shit!” He jerked to the left, barely
missing a biker pedaling up a steep incline. He squeezed the
steering wheel so tight his knuckles turned white, but he got back
in control of the Bronco.

My heart beat so harshly in my chest it was
nearly the only sound that I could hear.

Where would Nix take me if he caught me?

What would he do to me?

What would he do to me?

I felt that stirring of power again. I felt
it pulse through me, raging against my fear. There wasn’t water
around, so there was no catalyst to bring it out of me. But it was
there under my skin, swirling in my blood, beating with my
heart.

Nix’s SUV rammed into our bumper and I
finally did scream. Ryder let out a string of curse words and
stomped harder on the gas. The engine vroomed like a racecar,
eating up the road like it had been made for this.

When the SUV rammed us again, my stomach
roiled ominously and I felt close to a heart attack. Gunshots
popped in the air, punctuating our desperate escape, but nothing
hit the car. I wondered if they were afraid to kill me.

I had no other explanation for why they
didn’t shoot directly at the Bronco.

Another scream ripped from my throat when
Ryder took a sudden, sharp right going way too fast. He handled the
wheel as best as he could, but we still slid and fishtailed and
rocked back and forth until Ryder wrestled the Bronco back under
control.

Just when I thought I could breathe again, he
did the same thing going left and then again going left again.

We’d come to a section of town that was made
of mostly one-way roads. We ended up going the wrong way down one
of the busier streets and cars blared their horns at as us we tried
not to hit them.

Ryder dodged them at first, swerving right
and jerking the Bronco left again. But there was too much traffic
and they couldn’t get out of our way fast enough. In the side
mirror, I watched two of the cars that had just narrowly missed
hitting us head on, spin out before slamming into each other.

They skidded to a stop in the middle of the
road only to have more traffic bang into them. Tires screeched,
metal screamed and all out mayhem was born as the two cars caused a
massive pile-up that reached from one side of the road to the
other.

I felt awful for causing the chaos.

Until they provided the perfect roadblock to
keep Nix from catching up to us.

Ryder took another hard right, going the
correct way down the street. I spun around in my seat, anxious,
terrified and trembling. After thirty seconds, when they didn’t
appear, I started to feel the smallest blossom of hope.

After a minute, when I could no longer see
the turn and I knew the SUV would have a difficult time finding us,
I started to breathe normally again.

After five minutes, when Ryder slowed down to
a more normal speed and there was a good amount of space between
where we’d lost them and where we were now, I turned back around
and sat down again.

Ryder reached out and squeezed my shaking
hand with his. His warm, calloused fingers wrapped around mind and
I felt comfort so intense, so profoundly familiar, that I had to
close my eyes from the force of it. I inhaled deeply, breathing in
his coconut shampoo. For a moment I just soaked in the peace and
simplicity of his touch , the miracle of his dare-devil driving and
finally
felt relief.

We made it.

I hoped.

Ryder continued to make random turns, blowing
off the speed limit completely. I never calmed down completely. I
couldn’t.

After so long of being free, Nix was in the
same town as me. All of the freedom I’d felt over the last year,
even if it had been lonely freedom, evaporated on sight. I wasn’t
free anymore, I was a prisoner.

And Nix owned me.

I could fight him for my entire life, I could
run every day until the end of time, but he would hunt me just as
long. As long as Nix was alive, I would never be free.

I would never let him have me, but he would
never let me go either.

I realized that now. It had taken coming back
to this place, nearly getting captured again, to realize there was
only one way I would ever get to truly enjoy my freedom.

I had to kill a god.

Chapter Nine

Ryder parked the car and silence filled the
space where the engine had roared moments before. We looked out on
the small town of Council Bluffs, IA and at the bluffs where the
city had gotten its name.

The sun set in front of us, painting the sky
with vivid pastels that stretched with long fingers overhead. The
natural forest around us created walls that kept us hidden. Cicadas
buzzed loudly in hidden places and lightning bugs blinked on and
off in the cover of the trees to either side of us.

I finally felt a small amount of peace after
a very stressful day.

Ryder and I had been constantly moving since
we ran into Nix. Ryder developed a plan quickly, born out of
necessity and the will to live. He would drive us somewhere and
we’d sit for a few minutes, until we were dreadfully paranoid and
convinced that Nix was going to pop up at any second, then we’d get
going again.

He’d driven almost all of the way to Des
Moines before we got gas and turned around. We stopped for fast
food around two, but it was after eight now and I was starving
again.

I’d asked Ryder what his plan was earlier,
but he hadn’t answered directly. He just didn’t want to stop long
enough for Nix to catch up with us. We were close to Omaha again
now. Council Bluffs was just over the Missouri River, only ten
minutes from his downtown loft and fifteen from my midtown
condo.

We were high up in the bluffs. Ryder had
driven to an overlook that was near the Lewis and Clark Landing.
Trains chugged along interweaving tracks at the base of our tall
cliff. The rumble of their movement and clang of metal added a
soundtrack to the summer sounds that filled in our quiet
places.

“What now?” I broke the silence, anxious to
speak again just to make sure that I could.

“I need to go home and get my passport.”

His words shocked the hell out of me. I
didn’t know what he meant or what to say, but I could guess. Ryder
had taken care of me today. I would be dead by now if he hadn’t
been with me and acted so quickly.

Or worse than that, I would be with Nix. I
owed Ryder everything and because of that I couldn’t ask anything
else of him.

I had spent the majority of the day on the
verge of a panic attack while hundreds of escape scenarios played
out in my head.

The best one I thought of involved Ryder
driving to Kansas City. He could drop me off at the airport there
and I could slip into the crowd unseen and unnoticed. I didn’t know
if he was down for the long trip though. I pretty much needed his
car services to get anywhere or I was completely screwed.

I couldn’t take a cab to Kansas City and
expect to stay alive. Nix would find me. The bus left me completely
vulnerable and I was sure that Nix had already staked out
Eppley.

In fact, looking back, I was surprised Nix
didn’t have someone watching the airport when I first got here. He
should have tagged me the second I stepped off the plane.

Even Kansas City, two and a half hours away,
was a risk. Nix could have people there too. Hell, Nix could be
watching every single airport in this country. Flying could be
suicide. But I couldn’t think of another way.

“What do you need your passport for,
Ryder?”

He swiveled in his seat to face me. When his
gaze hit mine, I sucked in a sharp breath. His gray eyes brightened
with determination, steeled with resolve. “The only reason I let
you go before was because I physically couldn’t stop you. I won’t
make that same mistake twice.”

“You want to go with me?” My voice was a
whispered squeak. I ignored the warm burn in my belly and the way
my skin tingled all over.

“I’m going to go with you,” he countered.

“It’s not safe.”

“I never thought it would be.”

“I don’t even know where I’m going.”

“We’ll figure it out together.”

“He might find us.”

“I’ll kill him before I let him hurt you
again.”

My mouth went dry and I forgot how to
breathe. “I thought you hated me.”

He tore his gaze from mine and turned back to
the horizon. “Do you think he’s watching my house?”

“Yes,” I answered immediately. I let him
change the subject because I had a feeling I was as anxious to hear
his answer as he was to give it.

He pulled out his cell phone and turned it
on. I hadn’t realized it had been off, but now that it started
ringing with all of his missed notifications and texts, I could see
why he kept it shut down. It was really hard to field your
popularity when an angry Greek god was chasing you.

“Ah, shit,” he mumbled.

“What?” I shouldn’t be so nosey, but after
the day we had, I half expected Ryder to show me a text message
with Nix’s long list of demands.

1. Hand Ivy over.

2. Hand Ivy over.

3. Hand Ivy over before I burn this entire
planet to the ground.

Clearly I thought Nix had a one track
mind.

It wasn’t about Nix or even me though.

“My dad’s been trying to get in touch with me
all day,” Ryder explained. “I’m pretty sure he thinks I’m dead by
now.”

“You should probably call him,” I
suggested.

Ryder chewed on his bottom lip and stared at
his phone. “It might be better to let him think I’m dead. I skipped
my shift at the store. He’s going to kill me.”

I tried not to laugh. And failed.

“This is funny to you?” He raised an
expectant eyebrow.

“Well? Yeah, kind of. You did almost die
today.”

“I can see why you’re laughing.”

“I’m just saying…” Shoot, what was I saying?
“You’re right, it’s not funny. I’m just… exhausted. It’s been a
long day. And yesterday was a long day. I think I’m a little
delirious.”

“We should probably figure out what to do for
the night.” He sounded just as tired as I felt. He played with the
cell phone in his hands and I could see the indecision flicker over
his face. He had no idea what to say to his dad. He’d just told me
he planned to stay with me, but now that the moment was here, he
couldn’t follow through with it.

To be honest, I was relieved that he figured
this out now, instead of when we were already on the road. And I
was happy he’d come to this conclusion.

Okay… not happy exactly. But at least
relieved.

He shouldn’t have to give up a family that
loved and supported him. He shouldn’t have to give up his future
and his friends and all of the good things he had going on in his
life.

I was a dead end. The sooner he realized
that, the better.

“What are you going to tell your dad?” I
asked in a strangled whisper. I had known the ugly truth about who
I was for my entire life. But knowing it for all of these years
didn’t soften the blow when moments like this happened.

Not for the first time, my mind jumped to all
of those beautiful places where Ryder and I could be together,
where we never separated to begin with. I imagined my life if I was
a normal girl, if I was a girl untouched by tragedy and trauma, if
I was a girl that wasn’t meant to bring down a Greek Pantheon or be
a slave to the sex-trafficking industry for the rest of her days. I
imagined what it would have been like for Ryder and me to have met
under normal teenage circumstances where we could have fallen in
love without the pressure of my curse hanging over our heads and
the twisting knife of fate stabbing our hearts.

I imagined what my life would have been like
if I hadn’t left Ryder at the hospital, if I would have stayed with
him and let him fight my destiny with me.

I imagined what it would be like for him to
still love me.

“The truth,” Ryder answered. “I’m going to
tell him the truth.”

“Wait-”

“He knows, Ivy. He knows everything.” Ryder
slowly lifted his gaze to meet mine. “I told him the entire saga as
soon as I knew you weren’t coming back. He had already known the
majority of it. I didn’t see the point in holding anything
back.”

My frantic thoughts tripped over each other
as I tried to figure out where to start. “Did he… How did he… What
did he think?”

“He was pretty disappointed that he couldn’t
sue Nix for all he was worth.”

“And he hates me.”

“He’s worried about you. We didn’t know what
happened to you, Ivy. We’ve been expecting the worst for
months.”