The first time his tongue touched my nipple, the first slide of a finger down into my panties, I felt like I had discovered something entirely new, that the simplest of touches could be the most electric, the most satisfying, when desire was so heightened.

I stroked him with fingers that trembled from my own hot need, goose bumps on my skin in the darkness of the narrow room, wanting to give him in return what he was giving to me. When I started to peel down his boxers, he didn’t object. It was the first time I’d seen him bare to me, his erection thick and throbbing beneath my touch. It was too dark to really see what he looked like, but I was learning his body by exploring every line, every muscle, every hair, and I did the same now, taking my time, from top to bottom, feeling, stroking, learning.

“Does it get your stamp of approval?” he asked.

Even though he said it in a teasing voice, I knew that it was an important question. Guys compared. They needed to know that they measured up, literally and figuratively.

“It’s perfect,” I told him honestly. I kissed the tip of his penis and then retreated, having learned how to do that from him. “You’re perfect.” I covered his mouth with my own and tried to show him with my lips how amazing I thought he was and how I had never been happier in my entire life than I was with him.

He groaned, gripping my hips hard, bringing my body into grinding contact with his dick. “Jess?”

“Yeah?”

“Would you be okay with it if I fell in love with you?”

My heart squeezed and I paused, my mouth a hairbreadth from his, as I took in his words, as if I could breathe them into my mouth, my heart, my soul.

“Yeah,” I whispered. “I’d be very okay with it.”

It must have been the right answer, because without warning he flipped me onto my back and kissed down the front of me until suddenly he was kissing between my thighs and I was burying my head into the pillow as I cried out.

I wasn’t even naked, his mouth working me through cotton, yet I was more open to him than to any other guy I’d been with.

And I knew without any doubt that he was the guy.

Friday was my day off and I was having dinner on Riley’s lap. We were in the kitchen sharing a grilled cheese sandwich I had made, along with a pickle that I couldn’t resist doing suggestive things to.

“Seriously?” Tyler asked, eating a bowl of cereal. “You guys are making me throw me up in my mouth.”

“It’s payback, asshole,” Riley told him, shifting me on his legs so he could see his brother. “For a year I’ve been forced to watch you and Rory hang all over each other.”

“Six months,” I corrected him, kissing his temple. He was adorable when he was wrong. He was adorable when he was right. And I was as bad as every girl who’d come before me and fallen head over ass in love.

“Six months,” he repeated. “Either way, Tyler can suck it up.”

Tyler couldn’t really argue with that. But he did roll his eyes and say, “I’ll give you five bucks, Jess, if you sit in your own chair.”

Hell, yeah. “Deal.” I jumped off Riley’s lap and held my hand out.

“Fuck.” Tyler grumbled, but pulled out his wallet and gave me a five.

Riley laughed. “Dude, you should know better. This is my girlfriend, not yours. Rory isn’t about the angle, but Jess should count cards in Vegas. She’s a play-uh.”

“Thanks, baby,” I said, because he made it sound like a compliment. I dropped down into my own chair and tore off a piece of the sandwich and popped it in my mouth. “So what do you want to do tonight?”

“Movies?”

“Nothing scary.”

“Uh, hell, no, nothing scary. I won’t make that mistake twice. Having you crawl up my asshole has never been a particular fantasy of mine.”

“I wasn’t that bad.”

“You ran into my room crying because you thought there was a demon in the house.”

“You’re exaggerating!” I said, laughing. “But only a little.” My phone lit up and the ringtone was “Gangnam Style.”

“Oh my God, whose ringtone is that?” Riley asked.

“It’s my brother’s. Because this song is almost as annoying as he is.”

“Are you going to answer it?”

“No.” I hit Ignore. Why was my brother calling me? He never did. He knew I was supposed to be in West Virginia and out of cell range. I started to worry that maybe something had happened to my parents. That’s the only reason I could think of for him to call. “Maybe I should have answered,” I said, frowning.

“Did he leave a voice mail?”

“No.” Did anyone leave voice mails? But then my phone buzzed for a text. I opened it and my heart sank when I saw the picture he’d attached. “Shit.” I didn’t even have to read what he’d written to know it would be a threat, but I did anyway.

WV huh? Location says Cinci and your face says wasted. How much $ to keep quiet?

Yep. That was a threat. Technically blackmail. I stared at the picture that he had clearly lifted off of my Facebook page. Someone had posted it and I hadn’t been on my page in days so I hadn’t noticed. It was me dancing with the guy at the party at the Shit Shack. I had a beer in my hand and a goofy, drunk expression on my face. My cleavage was exploding, and his hand was lower on my hip than I remembered it being.

I was so busted.

“What’s the matter?”

“My brother has a picture of me at the party last weekend. He says he’ll tell my parents if I don’t pay him off.”

Riley’s jaw dropped. “Your brother is trying to extort money from you?”

“I told you, he hates me for no apparent reason.”

“How bad is the picture?” Tyler asked. “I mean, your parents have to know you party a bit at school, right?”

“No. They do not.” I pushed my phone over to him so he could see it. “They also think I’m in West Virginia building houses for the poor with a church mission group.”

Tyler choked on his cereal. “Are you shitting me?”

“No, I am not.” I felt sick. Like throw up sick.

Riley squeezed my knee. “Hey, it’s okay. What does your brother want, like fifty bucks? Just pay the little prick. Or let me talk to him.” There was a gleam in his eye that suggested he wanted to do more than talk.

“You think I should pay him?”

“Well, if you want him to keep quiet, it’s your best option. Though I would personally prefer to beat the piss out of him. What kind of a shit thing is that to do to your own sister?”

How much? I typed to Paxton.

Two grand.

I laughed in disbelief. “He wants two thousand dollars!”

“What? Fuck him.” Riley waved his hand. “Tell him to suck my dick.”

You’re insane. I don’t have 2k.

You have thirty minutes. You can transfer the $ to my acct or I’m going to mom.

That he said Mom instead of Dad was a good indication he was serious. Dad would be profoundly disappointed, but Mom would be pissed.

Why do you care what I do?

Though I already knew it was pointless to try to talk him out of it. Paxton had been looking for the big score, the way to topple me, for years, and he had found it. I had basically handed it to him via vodka cranberries.

Because you’re a bitch.

Well, there you go. My brother thought I was a bitch so he was going to ruin my life. “This is bad. This is so bad. My parents are going to freak.” The grilled cheese sat like a lump in my gut and my mind raced, trying to anticipate the fallout.

“Obviously they’re going to be pissed you lied, but they can’t really punish you. I mean, you’re twenty years old.”

I shook my head. “Oh, they can punish me. They’ll cut me off.”

“Rory’s dad threatened to stop paying her tuition and he didn’t,” Tyler said. “He knew in the end hurting Rory’s future wasn’t worth it.”

But Rory’s father was different from mine and I knew that. Rory had stood up to her dad, and I had admired it when she’d done it. It couldn’t have been easy to tell him she was going to intentionally disobey him. But Rory also knew that at the end of the day, her dad had her back. It was just the two of them, and he loved her.