Publisher: Harlequin Teen
Published: November 26, 2013
Pages: 474
Genre: Contemporary
Rating: 4.5 out of 5
The girl with straight As, designer clothes and the perfect life-that's who people expect Rachel Young to be. So the private-school junior keeps secrets from her wealthy parents and overbearing brothers...and she's just added two more to the list. One involves racing strangers down dark country roads in her Mustang GT. The other? Seventeen-year-old Isaiah Walker-a guy she has no business even talking to. But when the foster kid with the tattoos and intense gray eyes comes to her rescue, she can't get him out of her mind.
Isaiah has secrets, too. About where he lives, and how he really feels about Rachel. The last thing he needs is to get tangled up with a rich girl who wants to slum it on the south side for kicks-no matter how angelic she might look.
But when their shared love of street racing puts both their lives in jeopardy, they have six weeks to come up with a way out. Six weeks to discover just how far they'll go to save each other.
Wow, Katie McGarry has managed to do it again with this tremendous story! She really knows how to connect with broken characters and make them so genuinely authentic. I loved Isaiah's story, I'm so glad he got his own story because he was awesome in Pushing the Limits. I did read the books out of order, but it in no way causes confusion. Unless you don't want spoilers, then don't read them out of its order.
Isaiah's story begins with him being heart broken over a certain girl. He thinks he's done with girls for now, but low and behold he comes to the rescue of a girl named Rachel. Rachel is the awkward, rich girl that everyone makes fun of for puking years ago. You see, she has a phobia of speaking in public, so she gets panic attacks and throws up. The only thing that makes her feel comfortable and in self control is when she drives. One night, she decides to make an idiotic move to drag race. Isaiah urges her to leave knowing she is getting into the wrong kind of trouble, but she doesn't listen. Now she and Isaiah are stuck owing debts to a gangster. This leaves a insta-love kind of story, but I believe it works well for them. They are two lost souls who believe that they can help each other and that is when they fall in love. There was definite chemistry between the two. They also had their steamy moments where you couldn't help but fan yourself hehe.
I loved reading Isaiah's point of view. He was confident, cocky, HOT, yet he had the warmest heart and he just wanted to belong to someone. Growing up in foster care has left Isaiah isolated with no real family except for his friends, Noah and Echo. Now that he is almost eighteen, his mother from prison has been out, and has wanted to get in contact with him. He has conflicting emotions running through him because he does not want to see a mother who has left him over ten years ago, yet deep down he is curious about his past. I felt so horrible for him because Isaiah wants to have a good future and not be one of those kids who went bad in the system. The only thing he excels at is cars. Cars are his passion and he devotes himself in his Auto mechanics class in hopes that he can get a good job when he graduates high school. He also has a real compassionate side. Yes, he's had all the girls he can get, but when he loses Beth he is done being a one night stand kind of guy. When he develops feeling for Rachel, a brand new side comes out of him that he didn't realize existed. He becomes happy and hopeful when Isaiah is around Rachel, and that gets him to see that he can have a bright future.
Rachel on the other hand was a bit of a struggle. I liked her, but I didn't love her. She had a good heart and she would blossom when she was around Isaiah, though every time she left him, she was such an insecure person. Rachel always doubted everything, and she didn't have a back bone to boot! There were times I wanted to yell at her to stand up to her family, especially her brothers who always babied her or put her down. Her brothers were jerks! I did not like them in the least bit. Also, her mother was a pain in the ass too. Rachel's mother always compared her to her first daughter, Colleen who died of Leukemia. Colleen was the perfect daughter, making never ending comments on how Rachel should be just like her. I did feel bad for Rachel on that part, but I wanted to strangle her for not saying anything. After many battles with herself, she FINALLY sticks up for all that she's been hiding with her family. That is when I started to really like Rachel.
The side characters were great. Some I really enjoyed such as Logan and Abby, but then there were the bad ones like Rachel's brothers. Ethan, the twin brother of Rachel, was okay. He at least put Rachel's feelings into consideration so he wasn't a complete (pardon my language) asshole. Abby on the other hand was awesome! I loved her abrupt straight forward personality. She some how became Rachel's impromptu best friend. They clicked in a weird way because they both didn't really have friends before and they had awkward conversations. Abby was a bad ass friend too who stuck up for Rachel when there was danger, and she flirted with boys like it was nobody's business. I really hope she gets a story of her own in the future. The next book in the series is Take Me On with West's point of view. I'm not sure how I feel about that since I didn't care for him in this book, but I'm also curious to see why he has such anger issues. We will see when the time comes.
This was a spectacular companion novel to Pushing the Limits. Katie's writing is wonderful and she really knows how to send me to the core of my emotions. She just gut wrenches me lol. This novel made me cry especially towards the end, and you will know when that part comes. I'm so happy that Isaiah got his happily ever after. I really recommend this book if you want some steamy, angsty romance. Or if you have started this series, I believe it's a fantastic sequel.
Favorite Quote:
"It's only then that I realize that we're both angled across the table. We're mirrors of each other and we are shockingly close. So close our foreheads almost touch and I can feel the heat radiating from his body. Our heads tilt in the same direction and, in the center of the table, our hands are a breath's distance from a caress.
The energy and the warmth surrounding us...butterflies swarm in my stomach and take flight. This isn't me. None of it. I'm not the girl who hangs in a bar. I'm not the girl who is comfortable talking to guys. And I'm sure not the girl who leans over the table to be close to anyone. Yet I'm doing all those things and I'm loving every freaking second."
Pg. 73 Rachel thinking about Isaiah.
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