Carved in Ice Read online

  Carved in Ice

  Made of Steel Series Book 3

  By Ivy Smoak

  Copyright 2018 Ivy Smoak

  All Rights Reserved

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  CONTENTS

  Title

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  A Note From Ivy

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  Free Short Story

  ARC Team

  Also by Ivy Smoak

  Copyright

  Chapter 1

  7 Years Old

  Flashback

  Silence. My eyes flew open. It was only ever this quiet when it snowed. That could only mean one thing. Snow day! I jumped out of bed and ran to the window. Small flakes of snow swirled in the wind. A smile spread across my face. It was more than I had even wished for. There was no way there was school today, but I still had to check.

  I ran out into the hall. My socks slid along the wooden floor when I stopped in front of my parents’ door. I was about to knock when I heard laughter outside. And not just any laughter. I’d recognize Miles’ laughter anywhere. It was my favorite noise in the whole wide world.

  I didn’t want to miss one second of the snow or of playing in it with Miles. Maybe today he wouldn’t ignore me. I ran past my parents’ bedroom to the hall closet and pulled on my snow pants over my pajama bottoms. Miles had been pretending I was invisible for weeks. He wouldn’t even acknowledge me when I spoke. But today would be the day I convinced Miles I wasn’t invisible. I could feel it in my bones.

  I heard my parents start to stir in their bedroom. If they came out to the hall before I was outside, they’d make me wash up and eat breakfast. But I didn’t have time to do such frivolous things. I was losing precious time. I shoved my feet into my snow boots, grabbed my jacket and hat, and pulled them on as I ran to the back door. Thinking better of it, I went back to the closet and grabbed my pink mittens that matched my hat. They weren’t waterproof, but they looked really cute. And if I was going to get Miles to see me, I needed to look my best. I adjusted my pink hat with the big poof on the top and opened up the back door.

  I slipped outside before my parents could stop me and ran through the freshly fallen snow. “Hi, Miles!” I yelled from my side of the fence.

  He didn’t respond. He just continued to build his snowman.

  I pushed on the fence door but it was too hard to open with all the snow on the other side. “Miles, the gate is stuck!”

  He ignored me.

  A fence was not going to keep me away from the man of my dreams. I grabbed the top of the fence and tried to pull myself up. I lifted my leg up once, twice, until I finally got my boot on top of the fence. All the extra padding made it even harder. “Miles!”

  He ignored me.

  That was fine. I didn’t need his help. Come on. I finally hoisted myself to the top of the fence and unceremoniously fell into his yard on my butt.

  Ooof. I slowly stood up and ran over to Miles. “Can I help build the snowman too?”

  He didn’t respond.

  “Please?”

  Nothing.

  Why did he keep doing this? It wasn’t very nice. “Miles, I’m not invisible!”

  He ignored me.

  “I’m not! I’m standing right here.” I ran around the snowman so he couldn't possibly miss me. “Don’t you see me?”

  Nothing.

  Maybe he was just tired of building the snowman. That was okay, I had loads of ideas for what we could do today. “Do you want to go sledding down the street instead?”

  Nothing.

  He was being especially mean today. “Do you want to have a snowball fight?”

  Nothing.

  I pressed my lips together. “Miles Young, you are not a very nice boy.”

  Nothing.

  I wasn’t going to let him ruin my snow day. He was such a meany face. I stomped my foot, hoping to get his attention. When he didn’t look up, I started walking back toward my yard, hoping the whole time that he’d ask me to stay.

  “Summer?” My dad’s voice echoed into the silent snowfall.

  “Over here,” I said. “I’m stuck.” I didn’t want to climb back over the fence.

  My dad came running over to the fence. He wasn’t wearing a jacket. And he was wearing slippers in the snow. “Summer, you scared us. You can’t go running off like that.”

  “I just wanted to play with Miles,” I whispered. I felt like I was going to cry, but my eyes were too cold. I sniffed instead.

  “I see. You know what?” He leaned over the fence and lifted me back over it. “Sometimes the best way to get a boy’s attention is to give him a taste of his own medicine.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean if he’s ignoring you, you should ignore him too.” He carried me back into the house even though I was too big to be carried. I snuggled into his side. My daddy was my best friend, so it didn’t matter that I was too big.

  ***

  I ignored Miles all day. Right in front of him. I played on his swing set without annoying him. I danced under the snow, catching flakes on my tongue by myself. I even built a bigger, better snowman. The sun was starting to set and the sky was doing that orange thing it did whenever it snowed. But even though I’d be able to see in the dark, my parents wouldn’t let me stay out much longer. Ignoring Miles hadn’t worked. And I was running out of time.

  I ran over to him. “Do you want to play now?”

  Nothing.

  “Miles please, who else are you going to play with? We’re the only kids on the street.”

  Nothing.

  “You’re the meanest boy on the planet. There isn’t anything you could do that would be meaner than ignoring me. I’m not invisible!”

  Miles lifted up some snow in his gloves and patted it into a snowball.

  Him throwing that at me would be meaner. I swallowed hard.

  He finally looked up at me. Our eyes met. And I would have smiled if it wasn’t obvious that he was about to throw the snowball in my face.

  “Don’t you dare, Miles Young!” I gave him the most serious scowl I could muster when I was trying not to smile. I had been hoping he’d play with me all afternoon. How could I be upset when he was finally looking at me?

  He tossed the snowball straight up in the air and caught it.

  “Really, Miles. Don’t do it.” Please do.

  “Don’t do what?”

  I pointed at his hand. “Throw that snowball
at me.”

  He immediately threw it right at me.

  I screamed at the top of my lungs and tried to dodge it. But it made direct contact with my leg. Ow. I stifled a laugh. “I said not to!”

  “No. You actually said, ‘throw that snowball at me.’ ”

  “I did not!”

  He stuck his tongue out at me.

  I stuck my tongue right back out at him.

  He laughed.

  And I laughed.

  I wasn’t sure how long we stood like that. But all I wanted to do was tell him how much I loved him. And how much it hurt when he pretended I was invisible. My babysitter, Julie, had told me that when boys were mean to you it meant that they liked you. But I told her that it wasn’t true, that Miles was mean because he hated me. I hated that he hated me because I loved him with every piece of my heart.

  This was the first moment where I thought Julie might actually be right. Miles wasn’t looking at me like he hated me. He was smiling out of the corner of his mouth. He was acknowledging my existence. It felt like my insides flipped over.

  I had one chance to make him keep smiling. “Do you want to make snow angels with me?” I asked.

  “No.”

  Maybe I had two chances. “Do you want to go sledding?”

  “No.”

  I guess I had no chances. I put my hands on my hips. “I’ve never done anything to make you hate me. Why are you so mean to me?”

  “Because you’re so annoying.”

  I glared at him. My babysitter was wrong. And Miles Young was a jerk face. “Well I don’t want to play with you anyway.”

  “Good.” He turned around and started to walk away.

  I just wanted to be friends with him. Was that really so hard to ask? There were no other kids around. It was just the two of us. We were supposed to be best of friends.

  And in that moment I hated him so much. I leaned down and packed a snowball together, lifted it up in my mittens, and threw it at the back of his stupid head.

  It was glorious. The snowball made perfect contact and exploded into powdery dust. He immediately froze.

  I clapped my mittens over my mouth so he wouldn't hear my laughter.

  “Oh, it is so on,” he said and leaned down to pack a snowball.

  I squealed and started running. I didn’t even want to retaliate. He was hitting me with snowballs. Which meant he could see me. I wasn’t invisible anymore.

  In a few minutes I was covered in snow. I was pretty sure if I looked in the mirror I’d think I was looking at a snowman instead of myself.

  “I surrender,” I said. I fell backward into the snow and started making snow angels.

  He laughed and plopped down in the snow beside me. I smiled up at the falling snow when I heard him flapping his arms and legs. He had wanted to make snow angels. And I had convinced him to make them with me.

  One of my favorite things was catching snowflakes on my tongue. I was about to tell him to try, but when I turned to face him, I stopped. He was still making snow angels. And his tongue was sticking out.

  I had never seen it directed at anyone but me. There he was though, catching snowflakes on his tongue. And I realized that catching snowflakes was no longer my favorite thing. His smile definitely surpassed it.

  I was about to tell him how much I liked playing with him when his mother called his name.

  “The hot chocolate is ready!” Mrs. Young said. “Summer, do you want some too?”

  I stared at Miles. All I wanted in the whole world was for him to invite me in. I had been in his house before, but always by his mother’s invitation. He had always made it perfectly clear that he didn’t want me around.

  “I guess you can come if you have to,” Miles said as he sat up.

  I definitely had to. Yes, it was the rudest invitation in the history of invitations. But how could I refuse him? I loved Miles Young. The only thing I hated about him was that he didn’t love me back.

  Chapter 2

  18 Years Old

  Present Day – Sunday

  I slowly opened my eyes. At first I wasn’t sure what had awakened me, but it only took a moment to realize that the usual noises of the city had ceased. I stared up at the ceiling. A snow day. Great. I sighed and pulled the covers back up to my chin. All I wanted to do was curl back up in a ball and dream of simpler times. But time was a luxury I no longer had.

  It had been four months since I had slipped the note under Miles’ door, confessing who I was and telling him it was time for him to move on. When I wrote it, I thought I was going to die. In a lot of ways I had. I pushed the comforter off of me and stepped down onto the cold wood floor.

  I stopped in front of the mirror and wondered if Miles would even recognize me now. I had ditched my Sadie Davis disguise. And with it, I had ditched the last piece of myself that made any sense…Miles. I'd cut my hair to right beneath my chin and dyed it dirty blonde. I'd stopped wearing my brown colored contacts. After dozens of fights with Liza, I had gotten a fake ID with my real name – Summer Brooks. The agreement was that I didn’t contact anyone from my past. That I never actually used my ID for anything. And that I never left the house unless I could hide in the darkness or behind my new mask.

  The rules should have been easy to follow. I was wanted for the murder of Sadie Davis. But every night, I came close to breaking the rules. I crept to a rooftop adjacent to my old dorm building and waited for Miles to come look at the stars. Every night I waited. Only…he never came. He stopped going to his favorite place. My letter had told him to stop looking for me. I shouldn’t have been surprised.

  My stalking tendencies didn’t just stop there either. I watched his soccer games from afar. I watched his team win the division. I watched him celebrating with his friends. I watched him leave NYC to go home for the holidays. I watched him forget about all about me.

  And it hurt. Part of me thought he’d continue his search for me now that he knew I was alive. But it wasn’t that simple. He would have seen the news. He would have seen that I was a murderer. Clearly he wanted nothing to do with me now. And even though I wasn’t a murderer, I would be soon. Miles had made the right choice. I just hoped that I was about to make the right one too.

  I pulled on my leggings and sweater and grabbed my gun off the nightstand. I had invested in a bra holster because when I kept the gun on my hip, all V could seem to do was glare at it. This way, I felt safe and he couldn’t complain. What he didn’t know wouldn’t kill him. It wasn’t like he had been anywhere near my breasts lately anyway. I had pushed him away. Just like I had pushed Eli away. And Miles.

  Miles. He was coming back from winter session break today. I put my gun in its holster and adjusted my sweater. There was no reason to go to the roof to see if he would appear tonight. It was snowing. There were no stars in the snow. Besides, what if he did go to the rooftop? What if he brought someone with him? I couldn’t watch that. Believing that he had moved on was one thing. Seeing it though? I couldn’t.

  I quickly washed up in the bathroom and stepped out into the hall. V was already sitting at the kitchen table. When we had all agreed to work together, I hadn’t realized it would mean living together. Eli, Liza, V, and I were pretty much the worst group of roommates ever. Liza was a night owl. Eli hogged the shower for way too long. And V…it was just really hard living with V. He probably didn’t enjoy it either. It never allowed him to take off his stupid mask. When I bought the apartment for our new headquarters, I should have invested in a bigger space instead of all the extra tech. It wasn’t like our security was keeping Don Roberts away. And right now, all I wanted was more space.

  “Good morning, Sadie,” V said without looking up from his bowl of cereal.

  That. That was why it was so hard to live with him. And it was one of the reasons I had pushed him away too. Right before the bomb went off in his secret lair, he called me Summer. He confessed that he loved me. And afterward? He went back to calling me Sadie right away. And never spoke of lovi
ng me again. People did stupid things when they were about to die. His lies stung. What was I supposed to say to him?

  “Good morning.” Smooth. I walked past him to the fridge. Nothing in the kitchen seemed at all appetizing. I grabbed an apple and sat down at the kitchen counter, basically on the other side of the room as V. We both ate in awkward silence. What it came down to was that we'd had a fling. And now we were living together. We weren’t even friends really. He thought he knew me, but he didn’t. And I barely knew a thing about him.

  “Spring semester starts tomorrow,” V said.

  I looked up from my apple. “Mhm.” For a moment, I let myself stare. I remembered how safe I felt in his arms. I even remembered how nice my name sounded on his tongue. He'd said he loved me, but clearly regretted it.

  I stared back down at the kitchen counter. Miles was the one person I wanted to hear the words from, but he didn’t say it. It felt like we had made love our last night together. I had told him that I loved him. But he had never actually said it back. And now he never would. I probably wouldn’t have believed him anyway. Clearly no one ever meant it when they said it to me.

  “Are you going to stay away from him?” V asked.

  “Who?” I kept my eyes glued to the kitchen counter.

  “Miles Young.” His voice rumbled more than usual when he said the name.

  I sighed and scooted off the stool. “I made Liza a promise.”

  “So you won’t see him?”

  I tossed out the rest of my apple and turned toward him. “When I say something, I actually mean it, V.”

  He pressed his lips into a thin line.

  Maybe I should have felt bad, because technically it was a lie. They had told me to stop seeing Miles before and I went behind their backs and told him everything. I had betrayed V’s trust. All of their trusts. But I didn’t feel bad at all. I’m pretty sure all four of us were compulsive liars.

  “What is that supposed to mean?” he asked.

  “Nothing. Forget I said anything.” I started to walk out of the kitchen, but he caught my wrist, stopping me. I immediately pulled my hand away.

  “Would you please just talk to me? Something is clearly bothering you. If we could just talk…” his voice trailed off.