“Oh.” I looked down at my lap. So I’d insulted his friends. Great. Just great. “I’m sure it’s a lot of fun.”

He grinned. “Even though they’re crazy?”

“Uh, sure.” I smiled back at him, but inwardly flinched. It was too late to tell him that the guys were perfectly normal. I was broken—not them. But I would look even more like an idiot than I already did if I told him I’d left because of my own lameness. “Maybe I’ll give it another chance.”

He chuckled. “Not tonight, though, right?”

“Nope. Not tonight.” I played with the hem of my skirt. “I’m all partied out. I drank too much.”

He looked at my cup. “You better watch yourself. A lot of guys will take advantage of a girl who drank too much.”

“But not you?”

His eyes darkened, but he looked away. “Not me.”

It was a pity. I’d never been taken advantage of by anyone, but if I was going to be used, I’d prefer he be the one doing it. I kind of snort-giggled at the thought, earning a weird look from him. Oh well. He wasn’t exactly the first person to shoot me that look. “Then I guess I’m in good company.”

He shrugged. “You should go home and sleep it off.”

“It’s only eleven,” I argued. I conveniently ignored the fact that I’d been planning on going home mere moments before. That had been before him. “Why would I go to bed already?”

He looked at me, running his gaze up and down my body. “You look like the type of girl who’s used to playing by the rules. Good girls go to bed early.”

I was, but I was also freaking sick of being that girl. All my life, Dad had neatly moved me around on his chessboard, a pawn to his own plans. I was done being a pawn. I wanted to be the queen of my own life from now on.

Leaning in, I caught his gaze. He stiffened, a light shining in his eyes I didn’t fully comprehend. “Maybe I’m the type of girl who’s sick of living by the rules and who’s ready to have some fun.”

When she leaned in close to me like that, I gripped my thighs. I felt ridiculously out of place right now. I was in a pair of board shorts, pretending to be a carefree surfer dude so that my overprotective, needs-therapy boss could “rest easily” while his perfectly capable daughter attended college. I didn’t even have my gun on me. And to top it off? Carrie was a cute little thing who was looking at me as if she wanted nothing more than to crawl all over me.

I needed to get close to her, but not that close. Even if I wanted to.

Her soft red hair reminded me of Scarlett Johansson as Black Widow. I had always had a thing for her—what kind of hot-blooded American man hadn’t at one point or another? I especially liked her when she carried a kick-ass gun and wore black spandex and boots. It wasn’t a far stretch of my imagination to picture Carrie in Scarlett’s getup. Her short skirt left little to the imagination, and I wanted her. Bad.

I’d never had such an instant attraction to someone before. The type that demanded I find a way to get her in my arms, naked and writhing, before the end of the month, but I couldn’t have her. I forced myself to picture Senator Wallington’s face instead of Carrie’s. That should help. “I think you look like a good girl who wants to try her hand at being a bad girl.”

“Maybe.” She shrugged. “But maybe not. You don’t know anything about me.”

Ah, but I did. I had her file memorized. And I’d been watching her from the shadows all night long. I also knew enough about her to know she hadn’t been drinking tonight. Knew enough to know the real reason she wasn’t inside was because she hated crowds. She hadn’t been to any real parties until now. And I knew her father was controlling enough to send an undercover agent to watch his nineteen-year-old daughter fumble her way through freshman year.

One thing I knew about repressed girls who went away to college: They went all Girls Gone Wild on crack as soon as they got even the slightest taste of freedom.

The girl was looking for trouble with a capital T. Even I could see that.

She licked her plump, red lips and met my eyes. “So, you going to your room or staying out here with me?”

Oh yeah. Trouble indeed. I shifted in my seat. The girl had no idea what kind of attention she was welcoming. She might only be a couple of years younger than me, but even so, she had off limits stamped across her forehead. I forced a lighthearted laugh. Something I suspected a California boy would do. Hell, something I’d once done. “I don’t really live here. I was fucking with you.”

“Oh.” Her brow furrowed. “Which dorm do you live in?”

“None.” I grinned at her, even though my cheeks hurt from smiling so damned much. “I don’t even go here. I’m just a surfer who lives nearby. Can’t afford the fancy education.”

That much had once been true, at least. When I’d been eighteen, I couldn’t afford the tuition. That’s why I had enlisted in the Marines. My plan had been to use the GI Bill to earn my degree, but I hadn’t gotten to that point in my life yet. As it was, I had shadowed my father’s footsteps and joined the Marine reserves fresh outta high school. I had been ooh-rah’ing it for five years now and had attained the rank of sergeant. On top of that, I held the title of “assistant private security officer” with the senator’s security team.

I could afford to go to college now, but I was too busy. And now I was here in California. I’d been picked for this assignment since, as the youngest employee at twenty-three, I was the most likely candidate to blend into a college campus.

And if I managed to keep Carrie out of trouble, I would return to work minus the “assistant” in my title—and a spike in my pay. But first I had to get close enough to her to be able to be in her company, but not so close that she wanted me even closer.

“Oh, I totally get that,” she said, nodding as if she had a clue about what it was like to be poor. She didn’t.

Her daddy could afford to buy this whole campus without blinking. Hell, he’d already made a sizable contribution to get the dean to allow an undercover agent to linger around campus and follow a student. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” She plucked at her skirt again, her shoulders hunched. “I mean, not personally, but I know how bad the economy is right now. I’m not some bimbo college student. I watch the news.”

Sure she did. Maybe TMZ was her version of “news,” but it sure as hell wasn’t mine. “I’m sure you do, Ginger.”

She gave me a look. I could tell she wasn’t sure if I was insulting her. Maybe she had more brains in her pretty head than I gave her credit for. “My name’s not Ginger.”

I gave her a cocky grin. “I think it has a nice ring to it, though. Don’t you?”

“No,” she said flatly. “So if you aren’t going to college, what do you do?”

“I’m a Marine,” I said. “And the rest of the time I surf.”

I tugged at my Hollister cargo shorts. Apparently that’s what all the California kids wore nowadays. I must’ve grown up since I left, because I preferred wearing a suit with a Glock or a pair of cammies…with a badass M-16.

“Nice. I’d like to learn how to surf sometime. It looks so freeing.”

I cocked a brow. What an odd choice of words. “Freeing?”

“Yeah.” She stole a quick look at me, her cheeks pink. “Like…it’s just you and the ocean, and no one can tell you what to do or how to act. No one can yell at you for riding a wave, or just sitting out there, watching the world pass by. I don’t even really know how that feels, and I doubt I ever will.”

With a father like hers? Doubtful.

I’d resented being asked to come here to babysit some spoiled little brat, but seeing her look so despondent tugged at the little bit of heartstrings I had. “I’ll teach you, if you want.”