House of Korba: The Ghost Bird Series: #7 (The Academy) Read Free Page B

target the game anyway?”
    “We’ll have to deal with that if it happens,” he said. “But I don’t think he will. If Mr. Blackbourne isn’t there, this bomber doesn’t seem interested. There’s been ample opportunity for him to target places, but the names on the boxes are for Mr. Blackbourne only, in places he’d be, or the phone calls mention him specifically.”
    The original bomb that had shown up arrived in the music room, the one class he had, with me. I hadn’t realized the others were targeted to him, too. Or Mr. Blackbourne didn’t tell me.
    I looked to the others. I wasn’t sure if this was a trick, and I didn’t want to confirm. The request seemed simple enough. “You thought,” I said, “if you talked to me that I could convince him not to?”
    “This is not just our school involved in this anymore.”
    “We’ll see,” Kota said. “But calling her father and using him over her head can’t be done any more.”
    “The school board is requiring that I keep you Academy students with us,” he said. “But she’s my student. I’ll do what I feel is necessary for her and for the safety of all my students.”
    There was more to this. He was protecting himself somehow in his request. Maybe the bomb threat would lead to a deeper investigation, one that could expose him.
    It was tempting to let it happen, if it really was just a threat and wouldn’t hurt anyone. Like before, where they were empty boxes and a voice on the phone, it seemed it was a small price to pay to finally figure out what Mr. Hendricks was up to.
    “I’ll try to talk to him,” I said, when no one else was saying anything. “But I don’t know what will happen.”
    Mr. Hendricks nodded. “I want to hear back from you Monday with an answer.”
    Mr. Hendricks left the house, walking to a town car parked out front. We all watched him from the front windows.
    He completely ignored the car across the street; one of his people watching the house.
    “He knows my parents are gone,” I said as I lost sight of him.
    “He’s way out of line,” Kota said. “And he’s getting nervous.”
    “That’s good,” Victor said. “He’s likely to screw up somewhere now, isn’t he?”
    “Fucking shit,” Gabriel said. “He’s showing up everywhere. Isn’t it bad enough we’ve got people following us? Why can’t we just expose him now?”
    “Because if the police investigate, it’ll freeze those accounts,” Kota said. He scanned the street once more and released the blinds. He turned to the rest of us, and then looked up and called out. “All clear!”
    There were footsteps on the stairs and then Mr. Blackbourne and Dr. Green appeared. Mr. Blackbourne frowned. “We heard,” he said. I imagined he meant he was listening in on one of our cell phones to hear the conversation.
    “He acted like he didn’t know you were here,” Kota said. “I’m going to assume his people don’t know. But how do you want to handle this?”
    “We’ll have to talk,” Mr. Blackbourne said, then looked at me. “We need you unavailable at this residence from now on. Next time we get a chance, we need to inform your sister. You aren’t home is always the answer.”
    “What about at night?” I asked. “I mean I can’t always be gone.”
    “Kota’s right,” he said. “He’s getting too familiar. This interaction between him and your father has to end. He may figure out he’s never home soon enough, and it might even lead to looking into you and your family situation.”
    “We need to get her out of her family for good,” Dr. Green said.
    “One thing at a time,” Mr. Blackbourne said.
    For good. Several times, the boys mentioned me leaving, and for some reason, I always pictured I’d live here with my family forever. My mother, even while she was gone at the hospital, always seemed to be right behind me, watching, waiting for me to do something she thought was wrong. At night, I listened for her, and every creak of the house had