Rule 51 - Koi

Two weeks before.

"So Chitra"s coming down the zipline next and then Domino." Blane rubbed his hands together and grabbed his Jason mask. "We gotta be ready to run the moment Chitra is off the harness."

"Do I have time to take a piss?" I looked toward the trees. "It takes time for the zipline to get back and put someone new in the harness."

"True, yeah, let"s get Chitra and then you can piss. Hell, we may even have time for a beer. Are your viewers enjoying this shit?" He looked to the ring light stand where my phone sat. I walked over and waved to my followers.

"Looks like it. How"s everyone holding up? We"re gonna play a small prank, and then we"re gonna head over to a bonfire. What kind of pranks have you pulled on others, tell me in comments, and keep those gifts coming." I stuck out my tongue and waved to them before returning to Blane. "Why don"t you take my phone with you, talk to them a little bit. I"ll get Chitra down, go piss, and catch up with you."

I paused the live to shoot Swayze a text.

Me: Don"t let her go.

I turned the live back on and handed the phone to Blane.

"I"m glad you came around to all of this. I know it was kind of awkward since you wanted to fuck her and all, but?—"

I put up my hand. "Let"s talk off-camera, okay?"

He"d already had a few drinks. It took a second for him to understand.

"Oh! Right. Yeah, okay, I"ll go ahead." He slid the mask on and took off into the darkness. I waited around, helping Chitra down and seeing her off into the dark. She took the same path Blane did, and once I couldn"t hear her anymore, I crouched down, pulling the knife from my boot. I stood, rolled my shoulders, and stretched.

I"d never done this before, but I wasn"t as afraid or full of guilt as I thought I should be. Domino was a beautiful person, inside and out. I wasn"t going to let her soul be snuffed out just because of some childish sibling rivalry.

A female scream rang out in the darkness. Relief washed over me. It wasn"t Domino"s voice. Swayze had seen my text. I raised the knife and stood at the edge of the cliff. I could hear the zipline coming closer, and right as the body came rushing at me, I plunged.

The screaming stopped abruptly as I looked down and saw Ruth. I"d fucked her once. Swayze had too. It was no secret she was hurt and jealous that we hadn"t wanted her for more than a night. Her throat gurgled and blood spilled from her throat. I let go of the knife, leaving it in her belly.

"Bye, Ruth."

I turned and ran to catch the others.

One day later.

"How many traps did you set?" This was the first chance since he got to Johnny's that I'd had to talk to Swayze alone. Domino had gone off to the bathroom.

"Like two dozen. One wrong step and the machete will swing down."

Good.

"Thanks for sticking around to do it. How was the Ruth thing?"

"The worst thing I"ve ever done in my life. Those Risky kids are clinically insane. I don"t know how Domino lasted as long as she did before running off." His eyes took on a hazy look.

Blane's been blowing up my phone," I said. "He"s not the smartest, but he figured it out. He"s not going to cover for me." I picked up my phone and scrolled through the dozen messages I"d gotten from him. All of them said the same variation of how he was going to expose me as Ruth's murderer.

"Chickenshit." Swayze snickered. "If he won"t shut up, we"ll make him shut up."

"How do you propose we get him to the woods?"

Swayze looked down the hall.

"When we get back, we suggest Mattias to have a meeting. There"s a firepit by the beach. We"ll have it there. Get Blane all pissed off, and he"ll leave. Maybe scare him a little."

"You sure that will work?" I wasn"t entirely confident in the plan.

"I am. We spook him enough, he"ll run. Now, onto more important things."

Domino returned from the bathroom, smiling. Swayze patted the space between us, and she plopped down between us. Swayze and I shared a look over her head. We were going to shoot our shot tonight, taking Domino together. Afterward, when we got back, we"d shoot our shot with Blane, and so long as we played our cards right, he"d be dead and no one would ever suspect us.

Four days after Blane"s death

"Why did you do it? Was it not enough to kill Ruth?" Chitra had dragged me and Swayze to the park. She claimed to know who had tried to drown Domino, my blessing, but it was clear now it was a ruse. She stood by the Lazy Lane River, fumbling with her hands.

"This is a setup. Let"s go." Swayze took my arm and pulled me away.

"What about Blane? Was that you too? Or Elliott Spencer? Marisol told me how you killed him too. You can"t keep doing this. Your massacre is going to stop here."

Massacre?

I laughed dryly. "We didn"t kill Elliott. She didn"t even know he was dead until I showed her the body I"d found in the woods. Nice try."

"Why did you bring us here, Chitra?" Swayze demanded.

She reached behind her. With shaky hands, she brought out a gun, cocked it, and pointed it at me. "We"re taking care of this now."

Swayze and I put our hands up.

"What do you mean?"

"It"s the fourth day, and since no one"s died yet, we"re making sure it"s not one of us. We"ve all agreed that when the police come tonight, we"re telling them it was all Domino. She"ll go to jail and Marisol is going to give us Domino"s share. All we have to do is lie. You were stupid to side with Domino. She"s nothing but trouble."

Swayze lunged for her. He slapped the gun out of her hand and it fell into the water. I ran forward, pushing us both into the water. I came up for air and found Chitra swimming quickly away. She was fast. Swayze scooped her up, pulling her out of the water. He lifted her shoulders and then smacked her back down onto the pavement. Her head made a sickening sound as is it cracked on the cement. Swayze lifted her and did it again, just as hard. Blood burst from her dark curls.

"Swayze, enough!" I yelled from the water. I swam to the end and climbed out. I went to him and looked down at the limp body in his hands. Chitra"s head bobbed to the side, her eyes rolled to the back of her head. "She"s dead."

He let her go and blinked as if breaking from a trance. "Well, shit. What now?"

I looked around for something to disguise us being here. "Let"s tie some weights on her and toss her in the river. People will think she drowned." One look at the back of her head would say otherwise, but it didn"t matter, so long as no one suspected us.

Swayze stood. "Something doesn"t sit right with me. She brought us here to distract us from something. We need to figure out what they did to Domino, and then see who"s next on our list. Asses will be lit on fire for this if she gets hurt."

We picked up Chitra and weighed her down before tossing her in the water.

"Play it cool," I reminded Swayze as we went back to the camp wearing clothes we'd taken from the lost and found. "We"ll know soon what they did to her, and we can make them pay then. I want them all dead," he said flatly. There was a bonfire off in the distance, and we turned to head in that direction.

I reached for his hand and squeezed.

"Me too. I think that might just be the only way to save our girl."

Present

It all happened so fast. In a flash, Domino was tumbling down into the dark, cold water. I flew across the platform, pushing Swayze back and diving after her.

I was going to murder her for this stunt.