Page 375 of Wicked Brutal

“I fucking live with Becca. That entitles me to at least one.”

“No.” Tobias’s palm appears. “One dollar.”

“For what?”

"Bad word."

He digs into his pocket, mutters “highway robbery,” and pays. It becomes a whole economy in about ninety seconds — Tobias correcting Danny’s pronunciation purely to keep the fines coming, Becca laughing too hard to defend her boyfriend, Danny going broke one dollar at a time.

“This kid is a financial fucking terrorist,” he says, which costs him another dollar, and the room erupts.

Then Tobias spots the driveway through the window and freezes mid-shakedown. “Is that Kaiden’s car?”

It is. The Skyline — the R34 he had shipped from Japan and rebuilt himself.

“Can I ride in it?”

“Yeah, dude. We’ll take you out,” Kaiden says.

“FAST?”

“No,” Ally says, from beside me.

Kaiden points at her. “See? That’s not even me saying no.”

But Cat’s eyes are already bright with trouble, and Tobias reads it instantly and grabs her hand. “Can you make it faster?”

“I can make anything faster,” Cat says.

“Cat,” Kaiden warns.

“Can you build a frog bomb for it?” Tobias asks.

I choke. Kaiden closes his eyes.

Cat doesn’t even hesitate. “Yes. Green. With frogs. Anything for my Frog King.”

Kaiden looks at me like he’s reconsidering every decision that led him here, and Tobias’s hand comes up, and Kaiden pays the dollar for the swear he’s about to say, and the whole thing spirals — Penny reclaiming her Frog King, Xander getting drafted into a piggyback lap around the guest house, Tobias somehow collecting fines mid-gallop. It’s chaos. It’s the good kind.

Near the end of the lap Tobias leans forward until his cheek is almost against Xander’s hair. “Ya tebya lyublyu.”

Xander goes still. Just for a beat. His hand reaches back and squeezes Tobias’s leg. “Yeah, dude.” He clears his throat. “Me too.”

Then Tobias kicks his heels and yells GO, and Xander runs again.

When Tobias finally slides off, Iz grabs him around the middle and tickles him into a shrieking heap, demanding to be named the favorite. Tobias screams Becca, Cat, then “MON RYAN,” and I lift my head, and Iz looks at me, betrayed, and lets him go.

That’s when Tobias notices Bella. Really notices her — watching from her chair with a real smile, not the careful one from earlier.

He straightens, looks at her, looks at Iz, looks back at her, and walks right over. “Who are you?”

Bella leans forward, elbows on her knees. “I’m Bella. Who are you?”

“Tobias Alexander O’Toole.”

“That’s a very serious name.”

“I’m six.”