Crash (36 page)

“What is it?” I ask, my heart speeding up.

“Kristin Beck,” Carly's mom says.

It takes me a second to catch up, to remember who she's talking about. Then it clicks. Kristin's the girl who was in neuro-ICU when Carly first got hurt. She was in a car accident two weeks before Carly. She's been in a coma ever since, just like Carly.

“She woke up,” Mrs. Conner says, her smile a mile wide. “This morning. She asked for ice cream and the book she was reading for English class. She remembers that, but she doesn't remember anything about her accident.” She squeezes my arm. “She's going to be okay.”

The way she says it, I can tell she isn't just talking about Kristin. She's talking about Carly.

Kristin woke up. After so many weeks. She's going to be okay.

So Carly could be okay.
Will
be okay.

“And,” Mrs. Conner continues, her eyes sparkling like she's saved the best for last, “Carly opened her eyes this morning and turned her head toward me when I said her name.”

I gasp and press my fingers to my lips. I've done a ton of reading about comas; visual tracking's a major sign of improvement. I throw myself at Carly's mom and we hold each other, hope shining like the hottest sun.

When I get off the elevators a while later, I just stop for a second and take in the view. There's a boy leaning against the far wall, legs crossed at the ankles, arms folded across his chest. Honey gold hair frames his face in messy waves. His eyes are covered by black-on-black Oakleys and his smile's dark and sexy and cocky, and just for me.

I haven't seen him since our last mission, when Lizzie pulled us to the white room for our latest strategy meeting, which was about three minutes or three hours or three years ago. The time-shift thing fighting as one of Lizzie's rebels is just as freaky as it was when I was fighting as a soldier for the Committee.

But whether I see him in this world or the other, whether we're fighting back to back or sitting side by side in the caf at school surrounded by our friends, I trust that he has my back as I have his, that he won't leave, and that together, we're steering this adventure that is our lives.

“Ready?” he asks, snagging my backpack off my shoulder and slinging it over his. “Pizza for dinner?”

I cut him a glance through my lashes. “If we load it
with veggies.”

He laughs and leans in to kiss me, his lips warm and firm and wonderful. Then he hooks his arm through mine and together we walk out the doors into the cold night.

So what's the game now?

No game.

This is my life.

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[TK]

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

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EVE SILVER
lives with her gamer husband and sons, sometimes in Canada, but often in worlds she dreams up. She loves kayaking and sunshine, dogs and desserts, and books, lots and lots of books. Eve's first novel for teens was
Rush
. She also writes books for adults. Visit Eve at www.evesilver.net.

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HarperCollins Publishers

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RUSH
THE GAME: BOOK ONE

PUSH
THE GAME: BOOK TWO

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HarperCollins Publishers

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Katherine Tegen Books is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.

CRASH: THE GAME BOOK THREE
. Copyright © 2015 by Eve Silver. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

[tk]

ISBN 978-0-06-219219-6 (trade bdg.)

EPub Edition December 2014 ISBN 9780062384539

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FIRST EDITION

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