Happy Release Day, Star Supernova!

May 21

It’s finally here! Happy release day to Star Supernova, book 2 in the Star series and book 5 in the Blue Star collection.

Grab that book here and tell all of your friends.

How about a little teaser from Chapter 1 to get you excited? We start off this book from Declan’s perspective (yes! a new pov), and it gives a bit of a refresher on what happened at the end of Star Collapsed.

Reminder, if you keep reading, there are spoilers from book 1. You have been warned.

Why did Peritia have to be so fucking far away from everything?
Every step hurt. My lungs threatened to burst out of my ribcage, legs ready to buckle with each pound against the pavement. There was almost no energy left inside me to stay invisible. I was starting to think that adrenaline was a myth, because this sure felt like a moment it should be present, yet all I could feel was pain.
The bloodied image of Isobel flashed through my mind again.
What you feel is nothing compared to what she suffered.
If I had the energy to tell the voice in my head to shut up, I would have. The voice was right, but that guilt only made running harder… and staying hidden nearly impossible.
We’ll figure it out together.
My own damn statement back to haunt me. Before that dinner, I told Kiya we were a team; that we would figure things out no matter what. I believed it at the time, but I was a fucking liar. We weren’t together, and I had betrayed my team. I had left them to face the beast on their own, and look where that got them.
Logical, not emotional.
Hiding under that table had been the smart thing to do; it was the only logical strategy, but that didn’t make me feel less like a coward. I was supposed to be trained to fight and protect my family, but I had hidden. Three different opportunities had passed for me to jump out and try to do something to save my sister and best friend.
Three chances, but all stupid risks that would get more people hurt.
Instead, I forced myself to be patient like I had done so many times before. I stayed under that table and watched through a small slit in the tablecloth while my sister stood, bloodied and bruised, and fought back. She was outnumbered—our parents and the rest of Peritia were powerless to help—yet Isobel still fought… even though she was alone.
Watching her, I knew that if she could be that strong, I could be strong for her in return. One of the Superior guards would come by soon enough, but I had to wait. I had to make sure Iz was safe first. I had to make sure my best friend was okay, too.
I had barely caught a glimpse of Kiya’s limp body before she was dropped to the ground out of sight, but Iz? God, if Isobel looked like she’d been through a shredder, there was no telling what had happened to make Kiya unresponsive.
I’d been in the company of strong women my entire life—women who fought back and won more often than they lost—but this scared me. My sister had kept her composure through a lot of gnarly incidents, including her own broken bones throughout the years, but when it came to Kiya, all sanity left the building. And that’s what I had seen, for just a brief moment.
So many words were exchanged in the main room, but they barely registered until Isobel’s frantic cry followed Nate’s plea for help.
“She can’t walk!”
The sob that followed her shout broke nearly every bit of strength I had left. I wanted to tear out from underneath the table and run to her side, fight with her and protect our friend; my second sister who had apparently been paralyzed again. How bad of shape was she in?
Then, I saw something I didn’t think possible. Isobel forced composure. She somehow formed a logical plan despite the horrifying words that left her mouth.
Blue blood. Hospital. She’ll never make it on her own.
What the hell happened to Kiya?
Moments later, Finnley’s voice was in my head and I suddenly understood Isobel’s feigned strength. A logical voice when all we wanted to feel was emotion.
The guard is close. I’ll dull the noise, but you have to be quick.
I did exactly what she said. I found the guard, and when he was close enough, my hand wrapped around his ankle in a flash. I pulled with every ounce of strength I could afford.
His head hitting the stone floor should have cracked through the silence, but there was barely a rustle of noise as I pulled him under the table with me. Even with shaking hands, I found the key and undid his two-way cuff, latching it over my wrist as I felt my power connection return.
My mind became a blur of panic, but I needed to focus. I needed to complete a series of actions to get out of this mess. Logical, not emotional, so I couldn’t act. Not yet. Not until my sister was clear.
Finnley’s voice filled my mind again. I’m going to walk you through this, Declan. First, remember this message: No one expects the Spanish Inquisition.
Well, did not expect that.
Her small huff echoed through my head in response to my surprise, but it faded quickly. I need you to go to my office. There’s a hidden drawer under the left of my desk with a blank book. You need it.
Blank book. Did not expect that either.
Don’t doubt your skills, Declan.
Well, I wasn’t doubting them until now, but at least these were logical actions to focus on. Go into Finnley’s office for a blank book… and then what?
Escape, she said, as if there were no room for arguments.
How would that help them escape Superior control?
Don’t worry about us. Your priority is finding your sister. Finding help. Protecting… Kiya.
I would never forget the shake in Finnley’s thoughts at her last sentence. Every word she had ever placed in my head before now had been steady, confident, but she had just been an arms length away from her daughter and unable to reach her. She saw something I had missed.
If Finnley was scared for Kiya…
Hissing snapped me out of my thoughts—Isobel’s portal forming in the room—and I focused on bending the light away from me so I could turn invisible.
Logical, not emotional. Logical, not emotional.
I swallowed, sucked in a breath, and waited for Isobel’s portal to close. And then I was out of my hiding space, walking as quietly as I could toward the exit, my trajectory set on my destination. I couldn’t look back, I couldn’t see my parents trapped, or I’d break.
A series of actions, that’s all this was. I wouldn’t get emotional at the large amount of blue blood on the floor in the hallway or the several unconscious men littering the space. No, I had to get to Finnley’s office. Two rights, a left, and another long hallway. It was easy to follow steps when the Superior officers hadn’t been down this way yet.
Finnley’s office was a disaster of a mess, but the book was exactly where she said it would be. I held the old thing in front of me, and just like every other object I held when I was invisible, it looked like it floated in the air.
Don’t doubt your skills, Declan.
Was Finnley still in my head, even from this far away, or was she just that good?
If I had been emotional, I would have rolled my eyes. She was just that good. With just a slight shift in focus, I extended my power and bent the light around the book, rendering it invisible.
I almost gasped. Never before had I hidden something besides myself this perfectly, but I didn’t have time to admire my new skill. There were two more actions to escape.
Take out the guard by the exit.
Run.
Run all the way to Ryder’s house, because that was the first place they would have gone to get an injured Kiya to someone who knew about powers and could actually help her.
And here I was… still running. Trying to burn the images of Ryder’s kitchen out of my mind. Trying to forget the disaster that had become of the table, windows, and furniture. Trying to forget the blue blood. Too much blue blood.
It was so dumb of me to think they’d still be there when it was already morning. I had gotten emotional while I was escaping, distracted by the fear that Iz had somehow been forced to return with those two Superior guards. Distracted that my sister would do something irrational if Kiya was in danger, like pick a fight she couldn’t win. Distracted by the fear that Kiya was dea—
No. I couldn’t go there. Logical, not emotional.
Iz knew it was safer to go to House. She had Ryder now, who could help her stay logical. They would be there, we would figure out what that code meant, and figure out why Finnley made me grab this blank book out of her office.

That’s not all of the chapter, but now we know how Declan escaped! Grab that book and if you have a spare moment, leave a star rating or a review - it makes the world a better place (and helps indie authors like me find new readers). Not to mention it puts a smile on my face.

Happy reading!