A hot June sun glittered on the water’s surface, but the Pacific breeze cooled Jenna and Celeste, as they settled with their drinks at Armando’s Venice Beach cafe.

“You might need something stronger than a Frappuchino to get through this afternoon,” Jenna said, and she chugged on the neck of her beer as if to reinforce the point.

Celeste eyed her, sipping nervously through her straw. “You think?” She had little doubt, however, as to what had been in Tony’s mind at their meeting the previous day. It won’t cost you a cent, he had said. You girls come party at the shack tomorrow with me and my buddies, you’ll both leave with what you need.

Not exactly awash with ambiguity, what with the cheerily wicked smile he flashed them. Jenna looked on the point of slapping him. Celeste’s own face burned with embarrassment, but neither actually objected. Well they weren’t in a position to object, were they?

“Did you know he’d suggest this?” Celeste inquired of her lunch-partner. “You kind of knew him after all.”

“Friend of a friend,” Jenna replied, her voice thick with irony. “I met him at a couple of beach parties and of course I know him by reputation, but that’s all. It doesn’t surprise me. He knows he’s got what we want and he’s never struck me as the type to give anything away cheaply.”

”What about your boyfriend?” Celeste asked, as if suddenly grasping around for an out. “Surely he’s not going to let this happen. He can talk to Tony, he set this up in the first place, right?”

“He wasn’t my boyfriend.” Jenna grimaced. “Just some idiot I was dating, that’s all. I told him all about what Tony suggested and you know what he said? He said, “Well babe, every guy’s gotta have his price.”

“Wow, you’ve ended up dating some real charmers, Jenna Clarkeson,” Celeste said with distaste. “Whatever happened to you?” She eyed her fellow Fairfax High graduate curiously. Who would have believed that Jenna, the bookish student with the grunge-leanings—too studious to hang with the misfits, too poor to be embraced by the Fashionistas—would have squandered her College prospects dating losers?

The girl had changed in all sorts of ways. She walked straighter, that was for sure, and had abandoned the self-conscious slouch, along with most of her grungy affectations. The raven-black hair was pulled back from her dark eyes and pale, delicate features. The rock T-shirt was still in place, but a tighter fit, its hang showing off the upturned pertness of its wearer’s small tits. And the shorts revealed, it also had to be said, a pair of long, elegantly smooth runner’s legs. Jenna had emerged from her High School shell. Result—her academic work had gone to shit, as she spent her UCLA Freshman year slutting around LA’s beach haunts. Who’d’ve called that?

“Never mind what happened to me,” Jenna snapped in response to Celeste’s appraising stare. “We’re in this together now, so we back each other up. Your studies haven’t exactly taken off, have they? Only this time Daddy’s not going to bail you out.”

“Jenna, that’s mean!”

“‘Mean’ doesn’t enter into it. Forget High School, that’s ancient history! You and I are on a level now. You’ll be cut off and I’ll never pay my way through a repeat year. We flunk these finals and we’re both fucked!” She stared back at her bosomy companion and felt no surprise at how things had worked out for Celeste DuPont. Once a Prom Queen, always a Prom Queen, right? She knew how this girl had spent the past twelve months—primping and step-classing her body to taut perfection, swanning around the boutiques on Rodeo Drive, making appearances at only the most exclusive events on the social calendar, with whichever sorority sisters she deemed worthy of her companionship. Oh, and paying minor attention to the education her father had insisted she pursue in order to retain her extravagant allowance.

This was the girl ‘most likely to marry money’, although that unofficial tag had not quite made it into the High School yearbook. There she sat, the loose golden-blond waves of her hair tossed in a neat cascade over one shoulder, the natural sapphire of those big-lashed eyes staring disconcertedly across at her. Prom Night’s toothpaste-commercial smile had been replaced by her default sulky pout, but those big buoyant breasts still thrust against the tight-stretched material of her little print-dress. However much duress she might be under, the dress appeared to be suffering greater.

“I know, Jenna, I know,” Celeste conceded. “It’s like fate, right? We’ve got to see this thing through together, the way everything’s worked out.”

And so it seemed—both girls taking Sociology, both in serious danger of flunking their finals, neither having attended classes all year. What were the odds? But then had come the revelation of their joint, dubious salvation. Anthony Jensen—errant son of the Sociology department head.

“He’s not shitting us, right?” Celeste pursued.

“You know as much as I do. He claims he can get to the papers—knows where his dad keeps the access codes. At any rate we’ll know very shortly. And if he can’t produce the goods, we’re outta there.”

“And if he can?” Celeste’s doubts were rising again.

“Look,” Jenna said, weighing up her partner-in-crime, “you want those questions as much as I do. And we’re kind of short on options, aren’t we? Unless you want to stake everything on a come-on to daddy Jensen instead?” Celeste’s expression was gloomy. Even if the girl had been able to stomach the notion of making sexual overtures to the middle-aged academic, she could have no certainty that he’d take the bait. “Exactly. This has fallen in our laps, so I suggest we see it through.”

“I’m ready to see it through,” Celeste snapped, “but cut me some slack here! I don’t do as much of Tony’s type of partying as it seems you …” Jenna’s raised eyebrow dared her to finish the sentence. “Look, Jenna, I’m not judging you, it’s your life. But I’ve only had steady boyfriends, I don’t do casual!”

“Bobby Matheson being the exception?”

Celeste’s golden-brown skin showed a touch of crimson and she cast her eyes down, as Jenna smiled coolly. They were both recalling the same moment in time—Celeste on her knees, the blue-satin designer Prom dress that matched her eyes stripped down to her waist, displaying her big round tits, her mouth sucking hungrily on the tuxedoed Bobby’s sturdy cock. The two of them spied in flagrante between the books stacks of Fairfax High library.

“That just happened,” Celeste said quietly, unable to meet Jenna’s eye. “It was a mistake.”

“Well we all make those,” Jenna replied, her voice kinder. “I’m sorry, that was a cheap-shot. Look, finish off your drink and we’ll head for the shack. It’s nearly time.”

“How come we have to meet him there?” Celeste asked, her voice reverting to its usual petulance.

“Well we’re kind of short on time,” Jenna reminded her, “and you did insist on having tonight free.”

“I’ve got a date! Guy Danton, his dad might be running for the Senate, he’s a real catch, Jenna.”

“Yeah, well he sounds better than Randal,” Jenna said darkly. Celeste looked at her inquiringly. “My ex-idiot. Who’s kindly passed me on to his buddy. Look—we’ll get this over with and then get you cleaned up for tonight.” She laid her hand on Celeste’s, and a sisterly moment seemed to pass between them. “Come on, Cee, let’s hit the hut.”

Five minutes’ weaving through Venice Beach’s lively rabble of hawkers, performers and political agitators took them to the fateful location. It was whitewashed with lowered green awnings, Tony’s Surf Shack splashed in red-on-white on a wood-plank sign above the entrance. A hand-written notice on the door announced that the establishment was temporarily closed.

“I hope he hasn’t changed his mind about … about numbers,” Celeste said, trying to swallow down her reservations. “If he has, I’m not hanging around. There’s only so many sweaty surfer-dudes I’m willing to deal with!”

“Let’s take it as we find it,” Jenna replied grimly, rapping on the door.

Tony opened up, his grin as amiably devilish as when they had parted company the previous day. Here was a guy assured that he was about to get his.

“Ladies, so glad you could make it.” The sun-bleached waves of his hair had been raked back from his forehead his Pacific-blue eyes sparkled with expectation. At over six feet his naturally hefty frame was hardened by physical pursuit, his scant body hair bleached blond in the Californian outdoors. A robust image of young manhood (Celeste was forced to admit it), in wide-open shirt and Bermudas. Just way not her type. “Please,” he said, ushering them inside with a sweeping show of magnanimity, “enter the surf emporium. Only two chicks as bitchin’ as you could make me shut up shop at the height of the season.”

The door closed behind them and Jenna and Celeste stared around the shack. Lacking in any kind of ostentation, this was a place for diehard surfers, illumined by a strip-light, now that daylight had been shut out. At the far end a tall fan stirred the sluggish air. The walls were crammed with upended surfboards and wet-gear, shelves stacked with gloves, footwear and tins of wax. The wood floorboards crunched with sand tramped in by numerous customers.

Behind the long, wooden counter, the wall was stuck with postcards, pin-up bikini-girls and one dog-eared photograph snipped from a newspaper—a family group at some black-tie dinner party, it seemed. The silver-haired patriarch was unmistakable to the girls—Arthur Jensen, esteemed head of UCLA’s Sociology department. And to the right of his austere-seeming wife, alongside other assorted siblings, was Tony. He was clean-shaven, hair gelled back and tamed for the occasion, at one with the image of white-collar respectability.

“Hey, checkin’ out Tony with Mom and Pops?” The laid-back voice spoke out of a darkened corner. “Dude scrubs up well, doncha think?” The speaker was lounging in a beach chair, his blond hair tamed into a ponytail. Late-twenties like Tony, he was clad in only beach shorts, his body hairless, musculature as pumped as his buddy’s. His features were broad and affably handsome. The joint on which he was toking accounted for the sickly aroma that permeated the room.

“Gotta show pride in family,” Tony said, alluding dryly to the photograph. “This dude’s idea of a joke, puttin’ that up. Oh yeah …” He indicated his associate in the corner. “Ladies, Chad. The main man at the shack when I’m not here. Chad, these gorgeous girls are Jenna and Celeste.” Chad gave a vague but friendly wave and looked quietly delighted to see them. The girls nodded back, radiating unease. “The other guys should be here anytime—you girls are a little over-punctual. I’m guessing that shows eagerness, right Chad?”

“Certainly hope so,” Chad responded with an easy grin.

“But hey, why don’t you two relax?” Tony moved to the chill-cabinet at the end of the counter. “What do you want to drink—water, soda? Got some beers …”

“Water,” Jenna said brusquely, and Celeste concurred with a silent nod. “And before we even think of going any further, let’s see the papers.”

“Very business-like,” Tony said, handing them both a bottled water. “But hey, that’s only fair.” He went behind the counter, unlocked and burrowed into a low drawer and withdrew two Cellophane-wrapped sheaves of paper. “A copy for each of you,” he said, holding both packages by the top, so Jenna and Celeste could lean in and look.

Sociology Paper One - Fundamentals of Sociology

Monday 17th June, 2013

He plucked one set of sheets from its plastic folder and flipped through it, thoroughly displaying the exam questions and confirming the presence of a Paper Two. Then he replaced the papers in their cover and locked both packs back in the drawer. Jenna and Celeste exchanged glances, each mirroring the other’s look of scared hope.

“All yours for a little downtime with me and the guys.” Tony smiled, strolling out from behind the counter. Chad was laying down his joint, rising from his seat to join them. Even the bagginess of the guys’ shorts could not conceal the substantive stirrings beneath.

“I hope you appreciate the risk involved in procuring that item. My credit’s none too good with the old pater familias as it stands, without adding a criminal charge on top. The things we guys do for a piece of …” Rather than finish the sentence, he reached out expansively, resting a big hand on each girl’s upper arm. “What I’m saying is, I went out on a limb for you two chicks.”

“We know,” Celeste said , smiling tentatively and thrusting out her naturally protruding chest a little further, “and we appreciate it. We’re going to show you how much, right, Jenna?”

Jenna looked at her busty companion, amazed at the speed with which the proffered test papers had altered the girl’s mood. Celeste appeared to have made an instant switch to ‘brazen’.

Not to be left behind, she drew her fingers lightly down the hem of Tony’s open shirt. “Sure we are,” she said, adopting a huskier tone. Chad was closing in on Celeste, trailing surf-coarsened fingers down her lower arm, while Tony ran his fingers through Jenna’s hair.

“Pretty pair we’ve got here,” Tony said with a relaxed smile. “A feisty grunge-muffin and an all-American Prom Queen.”

Celeste shot Jenna a sharp How does he know? glance, although she was instantly distracted by Chad cupping her breasts beneath the thin material of her dress. “I guess I let that slip.” Jenna shrugged apologetically, before becoming preoccupied with Tony’s looming closeness. “When I was talking to Randal.”

“Speaking of which …” Tony said, checking over his shoulder to where a further pair of guys were bustling enthusiastically through the shack’s back entrance, propping their boards against the wall and tugging at their wetsuits. They were dishevelled from recent immersion in the ocean. The foremost was particularly tall, some ten years older than the others—a touch more grizzled and weathered by the surf, but no less bulked out and athletic. Behind him was his swarthy, dark-haired buddy, revealed to be hard and lean of torso, as he stripped his wets down around his waist along with his fellow-surfer. The guy looked like a male fashion model, it occurred to Celeste, minus the grooming.

Jenna, however, registered instant recognition and sounded none too happy. “Randal? What the hell …”

“Hey baby, didn’t I say I was coming along?” he grinned, striding up to her and planting a salty kiss on her lips. “I didn’t want to miss out on you and your Prom Queen girlfriend.” He gave Celeste the same briny face-on-face treatment as Jenna, but thrust his tongue into her shocked mouth for added effect, then utterly ignored the outrage on both girls’ face. “Surf’s great by the way!” he announced to Tony.

“Fuck yeah,” his companion agreed. “Dude, we ripped some of the best moves of the summer.” Then he was crowding the girls along with his buddies. “I am so freakin’ buzzed, baby!” He caught Celeste around the waist and squeezed her close.

“This is Mike, by the way,” Tony said, indicating the elder statesman of the group, “and Randal, Jenna already knows.”

Jenna appeared mutinous in the face of Randal’s unexpected arrival on the scene, but her look to Celeste confirmed to the ex-Prom Queen that they were seeing the operation through. The prim blonde swallowed down her unease and anger, as relaxed weed-smoker Chad stroked her face and neck on one side, while from the other, adrenalized, oak-solid Mike palmed her stomach and lower abdomen. Feet away Jenna was having her neck kissed from behind by Randal, the ex who had drawn from her so much horror. Tony, instigator of the whole sordid liaison, was up close and in her face, drawing his hands upwards from her thighs, over her svelte, athletic body.

“So are we all down with this?” he was asking.

Jenna arched backwards, as if reluctantly giving in to the effect of Randal’s lips, while offering up her breasts to Tony. “Uh-huh,” she said, and this time Celeste took Jenna’s cue, resigning herself to the low-key molestation and the tingling sensation it was unexpectedly producing in her pussy.

“In that case,” Tony said, “there’s one more bit of business. A task for you both, to spice things up.” He moved from the stricken Jenna and went behind the counter, returning with a small box-like device, not much bigger than the hand in which it was held. “Neat, isn’t it? Perfect for capturing the party.”

Jenna and Celeste both spluttered in sudden defiance, faced with a digital camera, their sexually-induced calm shattered. “What the fuck do you want with that?” the brunette snapped, wresting herself from Randal’s attentions. “Nobody’s filming anything here!”

“Oh they are,” Tony said affably. “You’re gonna shoot each other. Hey, it’ll be fun.”

“The fuck we are!” Celeste had broken free from her two guys’ physical attentions and stood, elbows crooked, palms outstretched in protest. “Do you really think I’m going to let myself be filmed doing any of this? Do you think I’m crazy?”

“Hey, chill girls.” Tony was smiling, unphazed. “It’s a little memento, that’s all. No one is gonna see it outside this room.”

“How stupid do you think we are?” Jenna stormed. “You film this, you could do anything with it! Sell copies to your buddies, put it on the internet … Well you can lock up that camera or the deal’s off. Right Celeste?”

“Damn right,” the blonde answered, though she looked torn by the sudden receding of her exam hopes. “Deal’s off, and we’re out of here.”

“Look,” Tony said, “I can see why you’d think that way, but trust me, there’ll be one copy and it’ll stay with me. I won’t want it out there any more than you do. My old man’s not too hot on my chosen lifestyle, he almost disowned me when I dropped out and he would for sure if any of my private DVD collection went public. Goodbye Jensen family fortune! I’ve taped all my girls and I’ve never fucked over one of...