Free Starling by Lesley Livingston

it was more like he was Gunnar’s second-in-command.
    “Hey, Mase.” Roth held out a hand as he walked toward her. Mason took it, and he drew her into a quick embrace. “I heard you had an unscheduled sleepover in the gym last night, little sister.”
    “Yup. Complete with light show and bonus random acts of God. Or Goddess. Apparently it’s not nice to fool with Mother Nature.”
    “Better believe it.” Roth bestowed a grin and wink on her. “She has a temper.”
    “Hope Gosforth has insurance.”
    Gunnar Starling’s expression darkened, and he turned and glanced over his shoulder at the gaping hole on the athletic center’s outer wall, framed as it was by shattered rainbow shards.
    “I’m really sorry about the window, Dad,” Mason said. “It was so beautiful and I know how proud you were of it....”
    “Don’t you worry about that, honey,” he said without turning back to look at her. “It was only a thing. Things aren’t important. Possessions are fleeting....” He trailed off before he could really heartily launch into one of his signature “material things are of no consequence/life beyond this life is what’s important” lectures. It was a fave theme of his. Which always struck Mason as kind of funny. Her father was one of the wealthiest men in North America, and yet he was always telling her how unimportant it all was. From anyone else, it probably would have come off as disingenuous. But coming from Gunnar Starling, they seemed like words to live by. Mason wondered if any of Gosforth’s other wealthy patrons thought that way. Patrons like the tall, striking woman who walked through the archway at that very moment, pausing with one hand on her angular hip to scan the assembled crowd with a sweeping gaze.
    Daria Aristarchos. Calum’s mother.
    Her dark brown hair was caught up in a messy bun and she wore yoga pants and designer sneakers, and yet somehow she still managed to convey an air of movie star or post-career runway model. It was easy to see where Cal got his looks from, although Mason wondered if his father was even half as good-looking as his mom. She had never seen him. Cal’s parents were divorced and his dad lived somewhere on the other side of the Atlantic. It hadn’t been a very pleasant parting, Mason gathered, and Cal had adopted his mother’s last name in the wake of the split.
    Mrs.— Ms . Aristarchos, Mason mentally corrected herself—looked like she was barely managing to contain a simmering rage as she pulled Gosforth’s headmaster over to a corner of the quad for a private discussion.
    Mason turned to see her father looking in Cal’s mother’s direction, and his expression had hardened again. “Honey,” he said without looking at Mason, “get your things and meet me at the car.”
    “Dad—”
    He swung a blazing glare on his daughter, and Mason’s mouth snapped shut. Then he stalked across the lawn to join the headmaster and Daria Aristarchos. Interrupt was more like it, Mason thought as she watched Cal’s mom turn to her father with a look on her face that might have turned a lesser man to stone. She couldn’t hear what they were saying, but it seemed to be a bit of a heated exchange.
    Roth rolled his eyes and took Mason by the arm. “Come on,” he said. “I’ll walk you to your room and you can grab a few things. It’s Friday. There probably won’t be any classes while they’re doing cleanup anyway. You can spend the weekend at home, and I’ll talk Gunn into letting you come back in time for class on Monday morning. Deal?”
    “You will?”
    “Trust me, Mason.” Roth gave her one of his rare smiles and led her toward the door into the res wing, past where Heather still sat on the bench, looking just a little lost.
    “Hey,” Mason murmured as they passed.
    “Hey.” Heather nodded back, and then seemed to notice that Mason’s brother was there. “Hi, Roth.” She turned on a bright smile and tossed her thick blond mane over her