All Chapters of The Alpha and the Rose: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

CHAPTER TWOBoy Meets GirlHow many kids have to plunge down Suicide Cliff before #sheriffclueless blocks access to it...? #Governmentfails whenever we really need them... Forest Hills, the place kids go to die. — Tweet from Raven_Eye. No, I don’t know how I did it either. Call it an adrenaline rush or whatever — because I’m no track star — but it just happened. I literally leaped the distance between us and slid over to the edge to tackle him right before this gorgeous idiot jumped off the cliff. It was an honest-to-god miracle for both him and me.And no, we didn’t fall to the ground in a heap like I imagined we might. He was pretty damn sturdy. Still, I managed to drag him back a few inches so it counted as a win.I clung to him, my arms tightening around his waist, with words spilling from my mouth, “Are you crazy?!” and then, “Why would you do this?”Yes,

CHAPTER FOUR Stranger Things, Part 2   Two days after my night in the woods, dad surprised me with a car. I know! A freaking car! And it had been such a struggle just getting him to pay for driving lessons last year. “Driving before you’re eighteen and responsible just leads to accidents, Jess, and I’m not comfortable with you driving in the city with all the other drunk drivers who populate California’s teenage driving population,” he’d once lectured. But now, mere days after we’d left Orange County behind, he actually got me a car... a car! Yeah, I still can’t believe it. “Okay, who are you and what did you do with my dad?” I joked, although I w

CHAPTER SIXThe New Girl, Part 2 I woke up on the wrong side of bed the next day thanks to yesterday’s weirdness, and I was still feeling like an extra on the Walking Dead by the time I parked my car in the parking lot of the place that filled me full of anxious vibes.Yep, you guessed it. Today was D-day, and first day as a senior at Forest Hills High.I glanced over at the rearview mirror to stare at my tired-looking face. “It’ll be okay, Jess. You’ll make a ton of friends, breeze through AP classes, and not make a fool of yourself on your first day in a new school.”No, I didn’t believe anything I’d just said, but it cost me nothing to try to feel upbeat about it all.&nb

CHAPTER EIGHT Joyride, Part 2   Ollie handed me the flowers while he took the time to wipe away the fallen leaves around Ellie’s gravestone. The careful and respectful way he cleaned around her told me she must have been important to him. “Was Ellie your girlfriend?” I asked. “She’d tell you she doesn’t date jocks,” Ollie chuckled, although the laughter never reached his eyes, “right before laughing in your face for thinking she’d ever hook up with me.”  I gave Ollie a skeptical look. “So she wasn’t your girlfriend then?”

CHAPTER TEN Nancy Drew, Part 2   “Are you serious?” Emma asked as she leaned over her seat to whisper in my ear. “You saw the red fireflies?” “Y-yeah,” I replied. I was surprised by how serious Emma seemed to get the more she listened to last night’s weird episode. “Do you know what they are?” I asked. I’m pretty sure I held my breath while waiting for her to reply. Emma’s face turned contemplative just before she leaned back in her chair and said, “No, first time I’ve ever heard about them.” She was grinning back at me, and I nearly threw my book at her. “Seriously?” I frowned. “Well, you were being so serious I didn’t want to kill the mood,” she admitted. Now I really had my his