Until We Fly by Courtney Cole is the fourth book in the Beautifully Broken series. Read the first excerpt from Until We Fly and learn about Brand and Nora.

Excerpt: ‘Until We Fly’ by Courtney Cole

I’m dreaming of bullets and blood. Like always.

There are the screams, of course, because there are always screams. High-pitched and shrill, low and keening. They’re full of pain, full of anguish, full of torment. It’s a torturous sound and I twist and turn, trying to get away from it.

That’s when I realize something.
Outside of my dream, out where the silence is thick and heavy, there’s a sound.

A real sound.

The ring of a phone is breaking the silence apart, splintering the night into a million pieces. My eyes snap open, staring blearily at the clock.

Three a.m.

A call at this hour is never anything good.

Old training kicks in and my senses numb, detaching me from the situation as I fumble for my phone. Whatever it is, I’ll be calm and ready. That’s who I am and what I’m trained to be.

Punching a button, I hold the device to my ear. I wait, expecting to hear my best friend, Gabe, his sister Jacey, or any number of our friends. I’m always the go-to person to bail someone out of trouble, mostly because I am calm and unflustered. I don’t judge people for their shit. For these reasons, I’m used to these calls.

But I’m not used to the voice who speaks in the darkness.

A thin, frail voice I haven’t heard in years.

“Brand?”

The voice is like a punch to my gut and I’m instantly still, every nerve ending frozen.

“Mom,” I utter, the word foreign on my tongue.

She doesn’t acknowledge that I even spoke. She sighs, a shaky sound in the dark.

“It’s your dad. He had a heart attack tonight.”
She pauses and I say nothing, although my heart begins to pound, filling my ears with a rush, rush, rushing sound. My blood is ice being pumped through my veins, chilling my fingers and my toes, deadening every emotion.

I don’t answer her.

A silent beat passes.

Then another.

Then she speaks again, her voice tired and rough.

“He’s gone, Brand.”

I remain silent and frozen, unable to move, although my palms immediately grow sweaty, my breath rapid in my throat.

I’m afraid if I speak, this won’t be real. It will be part of my dream, and when I wake, it will all go away.

So I don’t say a word.

Be real.

“I need you to come home,” my mother adds.

Her call to action frees me and I’m able to move again. I nod, once, curtly.
“I’ll be there.”

Because this is real.

I hang up without another word, my hands shaky.

I stare at my left hand, at my fingers, thick and long. I’m a grown man. Yet the mere thought of my father instinctively causes my hands to shake, like the scared boy I once was. I allow myself to feel the impotent emotion for only one moment, before I channel the fear into rage, a blinding hot rage that I have every right to feel.

My father is dead.

I should be upset, devastated even. A normal person would be.

But in addition to my rage, there’s only one thing I feel.

Relief.

Everyday this week a new excerpt will be released. Here are the rest of the release dates:
July 3 – Vilma’s Book Blog
July 4 – Schmexy Girls Book Blog
July 5 – The Autumn Review
July 6 – Natasha is a Book Junkie

About Courtney Cole

Courtney Cole is a novelist who would eat mythology for breakfast if she could. She has a degree in Business, but has since discovered that corporate America is not nearly as fun to live in as fictional worlds. She loves chocolate and roller coasters and hates waiting and rude people.
Courtney lives in quiet suburbia, close to Lake Michigan, with her real-life Prince Charming, her ornery kids (there is a small chance that they get their orneriness from their mother) and a small domestic zoo.