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Chris ignored the double entendre and glanced at the pile of makeup work still sitting on his desk. “Could we maybe speed this up?” He could feel the rain pooling on his windowsill again. The red tail sharks in his tank circled and chased, slicing through the water until the less aggressive ones hid among the driftwood at the bottom.
Nick gave a low whistle. “Leave him alone, before the fish kill each other.”
Chris gave a pointed look at the door. “Why don’t you both leave me alone.”
Gabriel laughed and made no move to leave. “You have got it bad for this girl.”
Like that mattered. She’d been pretty clear where he stood. “Tyler shouldn’t be hassling her.”
“He’ll back off,” said Nick. “He’ll realize she’s got nothing to do with us.”
“I don’t know about that.” Chris glanced at the fish. They helped him manage his temper—he didn’t like riling them. But they seemed to be settling. “He threatened her. He told her the deal is off.”
Nick pulled his feet off the bed to sit up straight. “He said that?”
Chris nodded. “Well. She said he did.”
Gabriel rolled the lighter across his knuckles again, slowly now. “Because of last night?”
Chris met his eyes, then shrugged.
He still didn’t regret it.
“The deal can’t be off,” said Nicholas. “They can’t just decide—”
“They can do whatever they want,” said Chris, the words tasting bitter.
Nick stood. “We have to tell Michael. He’ll—”
“He’ll do nothing,” said Gabriel. “Don’t tell him.”
His twin looked at him like he was nuts. “Are you crazy? We have to—”
“No.” Gabriel sat up, any trace of humor gone from his expression. Thunder rolled in the air outside. “You saw him last night. He doesn’t give a crap what they do. All he cares about is letting them have their way.”
“So what do we do?” said Chris. He thought about the way he’d felt the water freeze into Tyler’s skin. That had been a good storm. A powerful one. He wondered how much damage he could do if he practiced.
The thought scared him, a little. But it comforted him, too.
“Tyler says the deal is off.” Gabriel flipped the lighter in the air and snapped it, lighting it as it spun. The flame danced between his fingers. “He’s not going to hold to it. Right?”
“Don’t be stupid,” said Nick. He knew his twin.
Chris knew him, too. But he liked the note of danger in Gabriel’s voice, the promise. It reminded him of that moment of solidarity last night. “Right ... ?”
Gabriel smiled. “That means we aren’t held to it, either.”
Her mom was working the night shift again. The sheer irony was that any kid with a normal social life would envy Becca’s freedom.
Quinn was sitting in the kitchen, but schoolbooks were spread across the table tonight. She looked up at Becca through a fall of blond hair. Her voice was small. “Hey. Your dad called again.”
Swell. Becca hung her jacket in the hall. “What, you’ll speak to me when you need a place to stay?”
“You’re the one who didn’t answer my texts.”
“Maybe if you hadn’t bolted from the lunch table, I could have mentioned that I broke my phone last night.”
Quinn didn’t say anything for a long moment. Becca grabbed a soda from the fridge and swung into a chair. She glanced down at the notebook on the table. Quinn was struggling with Trigonometry.
