Her song in his heart, p.39
Her Song in His Heart,
p.39
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READ AN EXCERPT FROM THE NEXT BOOK IN THE ACADEMY GHOST BIRD SERIES
The Academy
The Ghost Bird Series
Ties Left Unsevered♥
Book Fifteen
♥
Written by C. L. Stone
Published by
Arcato Publishing
The Average Rate of Change
Kota
Dakota Lee escaped his own house, if only for a minute.
Sometimes that was all he needed. A moment of peace to close out noise, to clear his head and come back with clear focus.
It was just too hard to silence out everyone and count to himself inside the house with the current chaos levels inside.
Out the front door, a quick step and he was in the yard, crossing to the mailbox. It didn’t matter if there was mail in it yet or not, he just needed the moment.
It was convenient there was actually mail waiting to be collected. He took up the letters wrapped up in advertising flyers and stuffed the bunch under his arm to shut the mailbox again.
Across the street, a For Sale sign had come up on the Griffin house right before Sang and Gabriel made a road trip to Kentucky. Today, the sign had a sticker over the front labeled “sold”.
Kota pursed his lips. Maybe they should have bought the house, but there was no real purpose to do so. It was just hard to let it go, after spending so much time there over the years.
Nathan had let go. Maybe he should be to.
He was going to have to soon. He couldn’t manage a team that lived in downtown Charleston while he, himself, lived in Summerville?
But how was he going to break it to his mother?
Kota turned back to the house, bracing himself for the noise level inside.
The first assault on his senses was the barking, huffing and snorting as a golden retriever and the tan farm dog rolled around on the carpet in the living room.
“Chica’s not even listening,” Nathan said, still wearing the red hoodie and jogging pants he’d worn out on his daily run through the woods. There was sweat on his brow as he hovered over the dogs. “I thought Max would, you know, show her how to behave.”
Kota’s mom stood with her hands on her hips, gazing down at the two dogs who were wrestling even more precariously close to the entertainment center. “Chica was so unruly on a leash that I had to bring her back to give her, and me, a break. She’s too full of energy to—” She stopped herself as she spotted Kota. “What are we supposed to do with a second dog?”
“She belongs to Sang now,” Kota said calmly. “And she’s only staying temporarily. In fact, I help Sang move in a couple of days.” As far as his mother was aware, Sang was accepted at the Academy and was moving into housing to be close to the school. “And Chica is a smart farm dog. She’ll figure out how to be a city dog in no time.”
Nathan shook his head. “Don’t know how that’s possible. How do you go from chasing deer and birds in fields all day to being cooped up and taken on leashed walks?”
“Practice,” Kota said calmly, “and patience. And plenty of time at the dog park playing with other dogs. She just needs to learn to get along with other dogs. That’s where Max comes in.” He quickly went through the mail, simply checking for envelopes with his name on it and then quickly stuffed those under his arm again and dropped the rest into a container near the front hallway meant for mail for his mother to check.
This seemed to his mother and Nathan at peace in the moment, knowing that Kota had a plan.
He always had a plan. Or at least he’d come up with one quickly. That was usually enough to get others around him to calm down. The plan could change, but as long as they thought there was a plan, people settled enough to at least think it out.
At least that’s how Kota learned to manage some people around him, especially when they asked him what to do.
Pretend to know, and eventually, you will know. It all works out eventually.
Kota turned to retreat to his bedroom when he stopped in the doorway to the kitchen. Luke and Victor were there, cleaning up dishes from breakfast by loading up the dishwasher and wiping out the sink.
“Kota,” Victor said when he spotted him. “Tell Luke he can’t have the entire attic.”
Kota put a fingertip to his lips, indicating that it might be too much information for now.
His mother might kill him when she found out they were all moving in together downtown.
“Tell Luke he can’t have the entire room,” Victor corrected himself. He touched his nose gingerly, something he started doing on occasion as if to test the tenderness of his face even though he was looking pretty healed up now. His hair was growing out, despite Gabriel’s insistence he wanted to trim it, Victor seemed to want it longer for now, so the tips hovered just below his earlobes. “We’d have to break it up.”
“Summer,” Kota said swiftly. “No decisions are being made until summer.”
Victor twisted his lips, appearing disappointed.
Luke beamed however. “So I could still get it, I just need to convince everyone else.”
“You can try,” Kota said, leaving it at that. He could technically try, but he’d have to make some really strong argument against everyone else, including Sang.
Kota continued on his way to the staircase that led up to his bedroom. Before he even reached the top of the stairs, he caught the raised voices and was tempted to turn around because he knew what would happen the moment he made an appearance.
He braced himself as he got to the top landing.
“Kota!” North nearly hollered at him and then lowered his tone. “Did you see this?” North waved a hand at Sang standing next to him.
For a brief second, Kota saw absolutely nothing except for Sang’s blushing cheeks, lowered eyes and shrunken shoulders. Embarrassed. Why?
Until he spotted that North was motioning to dark marks along her neck and shoulder.
And a particularly dark one just below her shoulder bone at her chest.
And another one lower than that.
“Don’t yell at me!” Gabriel started up. He stabbed a pointing finger in the air toward North’s face. “You leave marks on her all the time.”
“You and Silas have been doing this to her for the last two weeks,” North bellowed.
“He started it!”
“I don’t care who started it, you can’t keep her skin looking like she’s been beaten up.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Gabriel snapped back. “You’re telling us to back up when you’re the one biting her? And what about your own fucking neck? She can’t look like this but you can?”
“Enough!” Kota barked out in the sharpest tone he could muster.
That got both of their attention, and got Sang looking at him.
“Sang,” Kota said gently. Instantly his mind scrambled at how to make this right. It did pain him a little to see her skin with bruises, even if they were love marks and not anything else. And maybe in a way, that’s all it was about. Seeing it and being a little jealous. But fighting like this wasn’t going to help. “We all care about you very much.”
She nodded.
“How do you feel about the marks?”
She bit her lower lip. She tended to do that when she didn’t want to admit to something.
“You can say it,” Kota said, trying to soften his tone even further. “If you’d like. Or we can talk somewhere else?”
She sighed. “I enjoy...getting them. But I understand the marks...aren’t ideal.”
Very courteous. Kota didn’t want to assume too much, but reading between the lines a little, she, too, must not like anyone else getting jealous and getting stuck in the middle of arguments like this one.
“Can we agree to keep certain marks off parts of the body that’s visible for now?” Kota asked. “Or do we apply makeup?”
“No makeup,” both Gabriel and North spouted out at the same time, and then glared at each other.
Sang smirked a little. “I don’t care for the makeup. I mean it’s fun sometimes but feels funny. Maybe I’m not used to it.”
The open discussion seemed to brighten her mood. “We’ll have to find a good compromise somehow,” Kota said. He retrieved the envelopes he’d been carrying up, and started filing through them as he headed toward his desk to put them down there. “At least until the summer months and then maybe we can—” He cut himself off when he read one particular envelop with very familiar to him handwriting.
He froze midstep, swallowed and then quickly dropped the rest of the envelopes off on his desk, turning around and heading back to the stairs. “Sorry. Didn’t spot this one. I’ll be right back.”
He anticipated a question before he made it down the stairs but none came, as they got back to bickering.
Quickly, with the envelope seeming to burn itself to his hand, Kota went straight to the back door of the house, out of the garage and quickly moved across the back yard.
The faster he moved, the less likely someone in the house would spot him.
The faster he did this, the less likely someone would notice he was gone.
As he moved, his lips drew in tight, and his gaze narrowed. Now he could be angry. He’d allow it.
It didn’t take long for Kota to find a particularly old looking oak tree not far out into the woods. The tree was as familiar to Kota as his own home. Especially growing up, Kota spent a lot of time out here, avoiding everyone. Its leaves were missing but early March promised new leaves would be coming soon.
At the base of the tree, Kota squatted carefully to not wet and dirty his jeans to give away that he’d been outside. He pulled away a collection of branches that hid the secret nook under a root.
In it sat a long, wide plastic shoe box.
Kota opened it quickly, pulling the envelope out of his arm, and stuffed it with the others.
He twisted his lips, checking the pile. His name scrawled on the front of each one. Along with his father’s name, and the correctional institution’s address in the corner.
None of them had been opened.
He didn’t need to open them. He wasn’t even sure why he kept them. Evidence, perhaps.
And why he kept them out here, in the middle of the woods, he wasn’t sure. Maybe to keep the evil out. He’d expelled from his life everything of his father’s that he could.
Save the house.
Save the room he’d grown up in, and the memories that still were very vivid, even if Kota tried to forget.
He buried the box again quickly, and after, breathed in deeply. He expanded is lungs, filling it with fresh air.
The oak protecting his secrets. Like it has for years now.
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About C. L. Stone
Certification
● Marvelour of Wonder
● Active Participant of Scary Situations
● Official Member of F.A.M.E.
Experience
Spent an extraordinary number of years with absolutely no control over the capping of imagination, fun, and curiosity. Willingly takes part in impossible problems only to come up with the most ludicrous solution. Due to unfortunate circumstances, will no longer experience feeling on a small spot on my left calf.
Skills
Secret Keeper | Occasion Riser | Barefoot Walker Strange Acceptance | Magic Maker | Restless Reckless | Gravity Defiant | Fairy Tale Reader | Story Maker-Upper | Amusingly Baffled | Comprehensive Curiousness | Usually Unbelievable
Also by C. L. Stone
Charleston's Leading Ladies
Evelyn
Celeste
Meeting Sang - The Academy Ghost Bird Series
Kota
Victor
Silas
Nathan
Gabriel
Luke
North
North Shore
Melody
The Academy
Ghost Bird: The Academy Omnibus Part 1
The Academy - The Bird and the Beetle
Ghost Bird: The Academy Omnibus Part 2
Scarab Beetle: The Academy Omnibus Part 1
The Academy - Bonus Materials
The Academy - Touch of Mischief
The Academy - Sound of Snowfall
Cheat Sheets Remastered
The Ghost Bird Series
The Academy - Introductions
The Academy - First Days
The Academy - Friends vs. Family
The Academy - Forgiveness and Permission
The Academy - Drop of Doubt
The Academy - Push and Shove
The Academy - House of Korba
The Academy - The Other Side of Envy
The Academy - The Healing Power of Sugar
The Academy - First Kiss
The Academy - Black and Green
The Academy - Love's Cruel Redemption
Unsung Requiem
Her Song in His Heart (Coming Soon)
The Scarab Beetle Series
The Academy - Thief
The Academy - Liar
The Academy - Fake
The Academy - Accessory
The Academy - Hoax
The Academy - Tempest
C. L. Stone, Her Song in His Heart
