I snatched the money from his hands and shook my head at him. “What are you talking about? She’s not adopted.”

“Yes, she is. I remember that party freshman year.” Fernando’s voice was confident, and he looked up at the popcorn ceiling, pulling a memory from somewhere deep. “You guys sent me up to the guest floor of the dorm to get info on those girls staying the night.”

He paused, and I could see the wheels turning in his small brain. “I had them give me their names to add them to our made-up guest list for the floor’s party: Brittany Saunders, Megan Litchner, and Sydney Fu. They spelled out their names for me and everything, and I clearly remember Sydney saying, ‘My last name is F-U.’”

Chance started laughing and shook his head. “I can’t believe you have a nearly perfect GPA, Fernando. You’re such a sucker. F-U… Come on, man. Think about it.”

I tucked the money back in the envelope and smiled. That’s right, Sydney Fu.

 

Two years earlier…

“Okay, I got the information. Chance, cue up your laptop.” Fernando rushed breathlessly into Chance’s dorm room, closing the door behind him. “Let’s do this thing.”

He settled next to Chance at the desk.

Without another word, Chance entered FBI analyst mode. You’d think he was hot on the heels of a wanted drug lord the way he flipped his laptop open, fired up the screen, and broke through a line of streaming HTML code. He was huddled in the darkness of the room, the glow of the screen spilling soft green over his face and reflecting off his reading glasses.

“Okay, first one,” he barked at Fernando.

“Brittany Saunders,” Fernando reported, pushing his head next to Chance’s to get a better view. Fernando wore a tight black T-shirt rolled halfway up his protruding gut. His hairy belly button hung over the crunched waistband of his jeans. Chance and I could get away with our tight shirts, but when an offensive lineman tried to wear one, people started accusing him of eating a small boy and stealing his clothes.

“High school?” Chance whispered.

“Dorothy Fox High School,” Fernando said, equaling his quietness.

“You do realize the music is blasting from the recreation room and Chance’s door is shut?” I lay on my back on Chance’s dorm mate’s bed, tossing a football up in the air. “I’m fairly certain this room hasn’t been bugged by the CIA.”

“You never know, Peters,” Fernando snapped, darting glances to the corners of the room. He lifted the potted cactus on Chance’s desk, inspecting it for a wiretap. “Can’t take any risks.”

“Here we go,” Chance belted out, rubbing his palms together. His face lit up as he scanned a Facebook profile. “Brittany Saunders loves horses. She has a dog named Arthur. She likes the movies The Notebook and Ten Things I Hate About You. Her grandma had her eighty-second birthday last week.”

He twisted the screen so I could look at the picture of an old lady lighting a cigarette with her birthday cake candles.

“Shit, she’s seventeen.”

Both Chance and Fernando let out a disappointed groan.

“You guys are idiots.” I smiled to myself. “What about the brunette?” Flipping over on my side, I watched Chance type with the meticulous speed of a bomb expert trying to beat the clock. Three… two… one…

“Zero,” he said, slamming a fist on the corner of his desk. “Let me look on Google.”

Like a pro, he clicked two keys and opened a new browser page.

“Bingo.” He flipped the screen to me again and clicked on a link to Sydney Fu. An Asian girl holding a cello with her parents standing behind her popped on the page.

“She’s not Asian,” I said, rolling my eyes. “Are you sure her last name is Fu, Fernando?”

He nodded. “I even had her spell it out, and she clearly said F-U.”

Chance gave me a look and cracked up over his computer screen. I grinned at Fernando, who responded with a smile. Idiot didn’t know he was being messed with.

After discovering Megan Litchner sang in her church choir, had an unhealthy obsession with porcelain dolls, and took pictures of nearly every plate of food she ate, we headed for the recreation room.

All three of them were tucked away in the corner of the room, next to the vat of Jungle Juice. Megan and Brittany looked like mice in a snake’s den. They clenched their fists anxiously every time one of the players walked by, and their faces went beet red if they so much as got a, “Hey.”

Guests didn’t normally stay in the male athletic hall, especially females. Those rooms were set aside for visiting parents, but the college had overbooked, and luckily, we became their hosts.

A confident Sydney leaned along a wall next to them, casually sipping her drink and surveying the scene. Out of all three girls, Sydney was the most interesting to all of us. Her self-assurance was a magnet pulling in every guy on my floor, but she was scary. She sneered and her eyes were cold, so naturally, we all wanted to get beyond that rough exterior… with our bodies.

Caleb Hammill, second-string QB, approached her and whispered something into her ear. She smiled and whispered something back. Immediately, he turned as pale as a sheet and ran back to us in the corner.

“Stay away from that one,” Hammill warned, taking in an audible swallow. “I asked her if she wanted a tour of the dorm floor, and she told she had to stop by the men’s restroom to drain her snake first.” He shot a wary glance back at her, cupped his hands over his mouth like a megaphone, and hissed out, “She’s a tranny.”

I dropped my eyes to her crotch. Her blue dress lay flat and smooth. No package down there. On the way back up her body, she caught my eye, gave me a sexy smile, and summoned me with her pointer finger.

Not a second later, I was leaning against the wall next to her. She was cute. She’d had my attention from the first ten seconds she walked into our building, duffle bag slung over her shoulder. I’d tried to make small talk, which didn’t amuse her at all, and when I asked to take it upstairs for her, she responded with a low growl and rushed past me toward the elevators.

It was lust at first sight. For me anyway.

“How do you like Northern so far?” I screamed over the music, and she shut her eyes tight, taking in the impact from my booming voice. “You like it here? Did you see the cafeteria? It has all the yogurts girls like.”

“Lactose intolerant,” she responded, rubbing her hands over her stomach. “You should see me after one bite of ice cream. It’s like the Fourth of July down there, only more explosive and less colorful.”

I slammed my mouth shut and looked down to where she was rubbing.

She laughed. “I’m just messing with you. Northern’s okay. I might transfer next semester. They have a good communications program.”

I relaxed and leaned back along the wall. “So you’re not in high school?”

She shook her head. “I’m at my hometown community college. Got in some trouble over the summer so I couldn’t make it out here. Had to work off my debt.”

“What happened?”

“I stole a car.” It rolled off her tongue like it was a normal everyday occurrence. “So anyway, community college for me.”

She shrugged and took a drink of Jungle Juice. “This is awful. Got anything stronger and less likely to eat a hole through my stomach lining?”

“Whiskey, but it’s in my room. My brother gave it to me. I’m only supposed to drink a shot after Northern wins a football game. It’s top shelf.”

She nodded and pulled her hair off her shoulder. A tattoo of a guitar fret board lay against the back of her neck, blending in with her fine hairs. “Okay, then. Jungle Juice it is.” She lifted the cup for a sip and started to turn away from me, but I grabbed her arm.

“One shot would be okay. Just can’t let anyone know I have it. I don’t need a three AM dorm raid.” I drew in a breath, watching her pursed ruby lips drift up to a smile.