"You'd think she'd be happy to have less on her plate!" Fabian snickered.
"She's mad because you're prettier than her, and that's why he chose you to do the job.” Mattias laughed, and Marisol launched herself across the table at him.
Everyone was screaming and trying to talk over each other while pulling Marisol off our brother. Finally, after she was shoved back and had stopped yelling, Fabian cleared his throat and looked at me.
"So, what do you say, can you stay and do this with us? Help us run the park?"
I gulped.
For Johnny Blue.
I lifted a finger. "Under one condition."
Rule 7 - Koi
Don’t make deals with devils.
"She should know." I ran my hands through my hair as I paced. "It's only right."
"I don't know if her mind can handle this, Koi." Swayze, my best friend, long-time partner in every sense of the word, the rational one of us, stood and came over to me, putting his hands on my shoulders. "I want to tell her just as much as you do, but Dennis’s mom needs to be handled carefully."
I inhaled and nodded. He was right. I was hotheaded, while he was the levelheaded.
"Yeah, okay. Why don't we stop over tomorrow and talk with her and Grace? It's been a while anyways."
Just then, my phone rang. I pulled it from my pocket, and a chill ran through me.
"Who is it?" Swayze asked.
I gulped, my nerves tightening.
"It's Grace."Dennis’s little sister.
I watched it ring, and when I didn't answer, she called again.
"Just answer it, man."
I took the call.
"Hello, Koi?" Grace's panicked voice came through.
I cleared my throat. "Hey, Grace, how are you?"
"Is it true? What the news is saying?"
"I don't know what they are saying," I told her honestly.
"That the girl, the daughter that went missing... she's back? You know the one. The one that… that—" She began to hiccup and broke down in sobs.
"Grace." I glanced at Swayze, who had started to pace.
"It's true! The news said she was just a runaway. Not kidnapped, not murdered, not dead! She was just a spoiled brat who ran away from home. Koi, Dennis is dead because of her!"
I pulled the phone from my ear and let her get out all the emotions that she was dealing with. I knew how she felt about the Risky girl going missing. How her mom felt. How we felt.
"It's going to be okay. I know it's hard to hear. We were just as shocked as you are." I tried to comfort her.
"Really? Because you didn't bother to call or stop by. And you don't sound like you've been crying all day like I have," she accused. "If you were so upset you would have come and checked on my mother. She's got a heart condition, you know. This news could kill her!"
