Without allowing herself a moment’s hesitation, Karina leaned forward into the circle and spun the bottle. After a couple of rounds, it landed on Kyle Derrick, a senior on the football team who had never spoken to Karina. Now, he smirked at her and rubbed his palms together. Again, moving against her fear, Karina picked up her beer and stood. Izzy shot her an anxious look, but Karina gave her a confident wink and smile, and Izzy reflected it back. One scream and she knew Izzy would come running. Kyle hopped up as his buddies slapped him on the back and wished him good luck. “Can I watch?” one of them called out, as they climbed the staircase leading out of the basement.

Karina chose the first bedroom, which, with its assortment of stuffed animals on the bed, must have belonged to Maddie’s younger sister. Kyle followed her into the room and closed the door. Karina stood near the bed and pulled her mobile phone out of her jeans’ back pocket.

“Oh, you wanna record it? Yeah, that’s hot.” Kyle grinned. “Didn’t know you were so kinky.” He took a step closer and extended a hand toward the hem of her shirt.

In a single, swift motion, Karina swatted his hand away. “Don’t be an idiot, Derrick. You think I’m going to let you touch me?” She held up her phone, displaying the large digital numbers. “Four minutes, forty-five seconds. And counting. Go sit over there.” She pointed to a pink fluffy beanbag in the corner of the room that looked like a giant’s cotton candy.

“But that wasn’t the deal.”

“It’s the deal now,” she said. “Or I can go out there and tell everyone you couldn’t get it up. Your choice.”

“I can’t tell them nothing happened in here. What am I supposed to say?” Kyle wore a little boy’s hurt face.

Karina willed herself to not roll her eyes. “Nothing. You say nothing. I’ll say nothing. Your buddies can come to their own conclusions. You get credit for being a gentleman—or I out you as a limp-dick.” She held up her phone. “Three minutes, fifty-one seconds. Deal?”

Kyle threw his hands flaccidly into the air. He sighed and plopped into the beanbag, looking so pathetic that Karina almost felt sorry for him. She sat on the bed and took a sip of her beer. She’d felt a little woozy after drinking the first one too quickly but was now settling into a pleasant buzz.

“So, what’s your story, anyway?” Kyle said, toying with a Rubik’s Cube he picked up from the shelf next to him. “Not a lot of science geeks like to party. Shouldn’t you be home, studying for the SAT or something?”

“Already took it,” Karina said. “Beginning of this year.”

“Bet you got a perfect score?”

“I did fine.”

“Heh,” he chuckled. “Not me, barely scraped four digits. But I still got signed to play for USC on a full ride.”

“Congratulations.” She was surprised to see that Kyle had solved the blue face of the Rubik’s Cube. Karina’s SAT score may not have been perfect, but it was pretty damn close. She was laying down the stepping stones to her future, and she wasn’t going to let anything get in the way, certainly not the grubby hands of a cute, dumb jock like Kyle Derrick.