Author: AnonyMPC

Title: My Private Camwhore 4: Kinships and Rivals

Summary: Andrew and his sister/lover learn they have a rival in the blackmail game.

Keywords: inc, mf, blackmail, voy, exhib, anal, 1st, coer, nc

If you came to this link first, you came in the middle. You should start at My Private Camwhore

My Private Camwhore IV: Kinships and Rivals (inc, mf, ff, blackmail, voy, exhib, les, anal, 1st, reluc, coer, nc)

Chapter One:

I sat in the front row, trying not to fidget, as the grey-haired man behind the pulpit spoke about immorality and the dangers of lustful thoughts, all while giving me the stink-eye. Never before had I felt that a sermon was directed towards me, but then, I was dating the his daughter. Maybe he'd seen the glazed look in my eyes earlier and assumed I was daydreaming about his daughter and of committing sins with her they don't even have a name for.

He needn't have worried about that. I did drift off into some sexual fantasies, but none of them involved Madison. Not that she wasn't beautiful, in a thoroughly conventional sort of way. She had chestnut brown hair that was long and silky looking, perfect skin that I'd never seen in a breakout, and wide eyes with long lashes. She had a pretty good body, too, breasts that were on the small side but very perky, and she was thin and trim all around. But her body wasn't the one that filled my thoughts. Her dad would probably be shocked if he knew that the naked body I was imagining was that of my own sister, Erin. He'd probably be aghast if he learned that this wasn't some idle fantasy. My sister and I had committed the sin of incest more times than I could count over the last few years. If he learned that Madison was also more likely to be imagining sex with Erin than with me, he'd probably have a heart attack.

My relationship with Madison was a sham, you see. She was a lesbian, but couldn't come out for fear of her parents' reaction. I was in love with my sister, and couldn't come out for fear of everybody's reaction. We both needed cover, and so, as far as the public was concerned, we were boyfriend and girlfriend. The arrangement started as my sister and I blackmailing her, but it's turned out to be convenient for both of us... at least, most of the time.

Any time I had to deal with Madison's parents was not one of those times. They were ultra-religious, ultra-conservative, and had a way of not taking no for an answer. I'm not an especially religious person, and if I was, it certainly wouldn't be this particular brand of faith, the kind that demonizes gays and rants about how awful it is liberals have taken prayer out of school. But dating the preacher's daughter you have certain expectations... I'd escaped going to church during the school year, using that as an excuse, but over the summer, they talked me in to attending, and so I sacrificed one morning a week.

Luckily, this would be the last Sunday before school resumed. I hoped I could use the "too busy with schoolwork" excuse once more. The time I wasted on church could be spent on far better things, and for once homework actually did qualify. Of course, so did sex with my sister. As soon as the weather had turned nice, Mom had taken up jogging on the weekends, and Erin and I had come up with our own workout plan to match. Mom was usually only gone about half an hour, sometimes a little longer on Saturdays, so the moment she cleared the driveway, Erin and I would run up the stairs and have a frenzied session of lovemaking, everything heightened by the time constraint. We would throw ourselves at each other, like two animals, concerned only with getting done as fast as possible... our half an hour limit also required time for a quick shower. Sometimes we even did it in the shower, our bodies slick, the water itself feeling like an extension of our passion, flowing everywhere and yet never running out, her bracing herself on the glass door while I thrust myself inside her again and again...

Madison elbowed me, jerking me out of my daze and the erotic memory that was just starting to form. The sermon had ended. Finally. I wasn't able to leave just yet, but at least the end was in sight. "Remember, it's your turn," she whispered.

Right. Madison and I weren't friends, but we were civil, like two co-workers who both agree they don't want to work, and so will cover for each other when the boss is around. So we'd come up with a system. When one or both of us wanted to get away from the expectation that we'd be together, we'd stage a fight and pretend like we were on the verge of breaking up and needed some time to cool off. That way, we could pursue our own interests without anybody thinking it odd that we weren't together.

Of course, such fights usually required one or the other of us to be completely unreasonable. When we were with my friends or around my Mom, it was usually her, when we were with hers, it was usually me, but we had to switch roles now and then, just to keep things fresh. It wasn't actually as even-handed as I made it sound. I don't like being a jerk, even for pretend, while for Madison being a bitch seems to come natural, so I usually let her start the fights when I could. Lately, she'd been growing irritated at that, and so I agreed that this time, I'd start it. So, I nodded to her and waited for my opportunity.

I'd already decided to use a variation on the truth... always a good idea for a lie, and I really wanted to get out of there early today. If I stuck around, I'd soon be press-ganged into service with some task or another, followed by an inevitable invitation to Sunday dinner which included a post-sermon sermon. Meanwhile, my real circle of friends were enjoying some time at the beach, sort of a last hurrah to the summer before school started.

As Madison's boyfriend, though, I was expected to support her in her interests, and one of those was coming up in a few days. Madison liked to sing, and although I don't much personally like her, even I have to admit she was pretty good at it. She had dreams of auditioning for American Idol one day, and in the meantime had a YouTube channel. That was all under the radar... her friends at school knew about it, as did her mother, but she tried to keep it from her dad. He thought most popular songs were overly sexualized and didn't like her doing them. The approved-by-Jesus method of using her gift was the church choir. She'd already performed earlier that day.

I could see Madison's dad getting ready to finish off shaking his hands and volunteer me to do something to help out the church. I guess I could have sparked a fight just by saying no to her father, but we still needed him to generally approve of us together. So, the fight had to be between us, and hopefully before he got to us.

"Oh," I said casually to Madison. "By the way, Kirk and I were going to check out a movie Wednesday night. Do you want to come?"

Madison saw where I was going instantly and played along. "Andrew, you know that's my choir practice."

"Oh, right. I forgot. Well, you can blow it off one night, right?"

"No, of course not. Choir is part of how I show my devotion to God and His Church," she said, a hand over her chest. I thought that was a little much, but people were listening. We'd talked about it just once and Madison had told me that she believes in a God something like in the Bible, but is pretty sure the Church is full of shit on a lot of things. She said it was like God and Jesus and Moses and all them are celebrities, and the Bible is the trashy tabloid... you can never know exactly what's true and what's just there to sell papers. I actually kind of liked that. "It's important to me, and if you're my boyfriend it should be important to you. You should be there to support me."

"Hey, if you don't want to come to the movie, fine, but it's the only night Kirk can go. And I'm not going to waste a night here when I could be doing something fun."

"Waste?" Her eyes bugged out with rage. If I didn't know she was acting, I'd have been a little afraid. "So, spending time with your girlfriend, supporting her, is a waste."

"Oh, come on, don't be so oversensitive, it's just sitting around and listening to you sing. The same songs over and over again. I spend enough time with you, can't I have some with my friends, too?"

"I didn't realize it was such a burden to spend time with me," she snapped.

"When you act like this it is," I said, thinking that that should cover it.

"Fine!" She stamped her foot. "Then maybe you should just go. Right now I don't even want to look at you."

"Madison, you don't have to be such a bi..." Every in the church looked at me, so I paused and said "big drama queen." Bitch might have been going too far.

"Maybe if you'd stop being such a jerk, I wouldn't have to be!"

I put on my best fake frown, shook my head, and said, "That's it, I'm out of here. I'll talk to you when you've calmed down a little." I made my way out of the line and towards the exit.

There, it was done. A few moments of uncomfortable looks from the Church People (as I called them), who no doubt thought it was a shame a nice girl like Madison couldn't find a better guy, but I could go off to freedom.

Once I was out of the church and into my car, though, I didn't have to worry about them or what they thought any longer. I drove home first, so I could quickly change, then headed out to the beach. Once there, I realized that finding her was going to be impossible. It was a warm day, and sunny despite the dark clouds that loomed in the distance and so there were plenty of people with the same idea we had, one last day of summer fun. I couldn't even pick out my friends cars, although I lucked out and got a parking space right as somebody was leaving.

I dialed my sister's phone. "Hey Andrew," she said before I even spoke. We had special ring tones for each other. "Did you ditch Queen Bitch?" One of her little nicknames for Madison. Even though we'd been working with her for mutually beneficial reasons, Erin had never quite forgiven her for the way she was treated last year. Neither had I, for that matter.

"Yeah, I'm actually here at the beach. Where are you guys?"

She gave me some quick directions... not too far from the washrooms, about midway up the beach. I found them within a few minutes. My eyes locked on my sister Erin first, the love of my life. It's strange to most people, but absolutely true. She was stunning, familiar and exotic all at once. Over the nearly two years since we'd started dating, she'd changed, grown from a cute girl with fantastic hidden charms to a beautiful young woman. Right then, when I saw her, she was lying on a beach towel, wearing a bikini that showed off her growing womanly figure. She was slight, also with small breasts, even for a fourteen-year-old, but everything seemed in perfect proportion, and the wind tossed her black hair, and one purple streak, across her face when she turned to look at me. She greeted me with a sultry smile for me alone. "Hey, you made it," she said simply.

It was one of the small cruelties of our relationship, the contrast between our feelings and how we had to act in public. I wanted to walk up to her and greet her with a kiss on the lips and wrap my arms around her, but there were people around, friends and acquaintances, and we couldn't afford some of them to even let them think we were anything more than brother and sister. "Yeah, I made it," I said, keeping my voice neutral, like it was no big deal. I'd made it, all right... to where I'd wanted to be all day. Not the beach, per se, but with Erin, my sister, my best friend, and my true love.

***
Chapter Two:

"Andrew! Flying solo, I see. Madison didn't want to come?" That was Kirk, standing beside another towel just a short distance away, my best friend. My best male friend, at least. As I said, Erin was really my best friend... I shared so much more with her, she really deserved the unqualified title. Kirk was this gangly goofy guy I've hung out with since I was a kid. His hair looked even sillier than usual right now, probably because he'd been in the water earlier and it has dried funny.

"Yeah, we had another fight." I tried to act sad. I don't think I did too well. It's hard to act sad when you don't really feel it, especially when the sun's shining above you and there are girls in bikinis all around you.

Kirk sat back down beside his girlfriend Cassie and said, "Too bad. If there's one thing you can say about her, it's that she really looks good in a swimsuit." Cassie elbowed him in the ribs. "Ow. I didn't mean it like that, babe. I just meant that poor Andrew here's missing out on of the great boyfriend pleasures, seeing your girl in swimwear. I mean, that's been the highlight of my day." He put his arm around her and squeezed.

I shook my head at him and smiled to myself, but he seemed to have turned potential disaster into something that was almost sweet, because Cassie smiled, then gave me a sidelong glance and said, "I'm sure Andrew will cope, somehow."

Cassie was Erin's best friend, and the only person who knew about our relationship that we didn't have blackmailed into silence. She didn't entirely approve, either, but she was loyal to her friend. We got along, but weren't close.

One of Kirk's flaws is that sometimes he doesn't know when to shut up, and that happened again, "Besides, you fill out a swimsuit much better than anyone." I inwardly winced. What Kirk said was meant as a compliment, and she knew that enough to not start yelling at him, but Cassie was sensitive about her weight, and the comment must have reminded her of it because her smile faded. Kirk didn't even notice. Cassie was just slightly overweight, with a little bit of a belly, that would hang over the bottom of her swimsuit, but generally she fell into the category of chubby and curvy, which some guys like, especially because it gives plump breasts and a round ass, but earns its share of teasing. Not really my type, but she had a pretty enough face, and even pulled off her hair... it was normally a shade of blonde but she'd gone pink lately.

"So, did Tony and Jay not make it?" I asked, to change the topic.

"No, they're around," Erin said.

"Playing Volleyball with some of this year's crop of freshman girls," Kirk elaborated, cocking his head just up the beach.

I looked over and saw them, playing Volleyball with a couple girls, and with several more watching. It was a casual game, two on two, with a raggedy net. Tony and Jay were each on opposite sides, the one male on each team. Tony was a kind of thin and lanky. Jay was a bit shorter but better built and coordinated, so I would have guessed he was winning. Jay also had big ears that stuck out his face in a funny way, and, although he'd finally tamed it recently, used to have a bit of a unibrow happening.

Most of the girls I didn't know, but I recognized a few of them, and some I knew intimately. There was Winnie and Amber, two girls of what I called our little blackmail club. My relationship with Erin also started with blackmail, a shameful moment that she forgave me for... and the two of us, together, went on to blackmail other girls, girls Erin knew but who had wronged her. Since then, the girls had become something more like friends, in part because they didn't know we were the ones blackmailing them. They thought all of us, Erin and I included, were blackmailed by a mysterious third party who enjoyed making people engage in perverted acts for his voyeuristic pleasure. Manipulating this situation to our advantage, I've managed to fuck both of these girls, with Erin's complete permission. In fact, they were practically our sex slaves, although it was a very friendly sort of arrangement.

Winnie was Chinese, although with darker skin than I'd have expected, and she typically looks annoyed. Amber's a blonde (not naturally so, I think, but I'd never seen her as anything but), with a slighter build and looked maybe a year or two younger than she actually was, both because of her body and because her face just looked more childlike. She had a tiny nose that was a little pointed. Winnie looked the more athletic of the two, just because of her build, but Amber actually was, if cheerleading counted as athleticism. Despite that, neither of the girls were playing, they just watched on the sidelines along with a couple other girls who were working on their tans.

Tony's sister Gianna was there, playing on Jay's side. Dark hair, nice ass and a pretty respectable bust, she looked like she was built to be chubby like Cassie but worked hard to keep her waist skinny. I'd never really talked to her much, beyond hellos given in passing, but Erin insisted that Tony and Gianna were having sex, another little incestuous couple. I didn't see any evidence, and Erin had none to show me, but swore she knew it in her gut. Tony's volleyball partner was a girl I didn't know, reasonably cute, also with dark hair.

"I was going to play with them," Kirk said, "But the ratios were off. Two guys on one team's an unfair advantage already, and when one of them is an Ultraman..." He tapped his scrawny bare chest and trailed off, as though that said it all.

"You know," Erin pointed, "If you both played, there'd be two guys on each team. Go on, Kirk, show off for your girl. And Andrew, I expect you to defend our family honor."

I'm no sports god, but I'm better than Kirk and we both know it, but he never really shied away from a challenge. He gave me a curt nod, and we went over to join the game, Cassie and Erin trailing behind a half minute later... Cassie had stopped to put on a big t-shirt that covered down to the middle of her ass.

"Hey Andrew," came a chorus from Winnie and Amber, and Tony and Jay paused the game long enough to wave and nod as soon as a ball went out.

"Want a few more players?"

"Sure," Tony said. "I could use a hand here or my sister's going to wind up kicking my ass. I'll never live that one down." She grinned and stuck her tongue out at him.

"What's the score?" Kirk asked, and a girl on the sidelines shouted the answer. 6-3, Jay and Gianna winning. So, we divided up. I took Tony's side, in the interest of fairness, Kirk went with Jay, and we played.

It was a tough game, but we lost. I didn't take it too hard, even though I'd started on the side with a three point gap, by the time the fifteenth and final point was scored, we were only down by two. By my reckoning, that counted as a win for my side while I was playing.

After the game, Erin suggested we merge our previously separated groups and just all sit together. Cassie, Kirk and Jay had little connection to the fourteen-year-olds, and even Tony just knew his sister and had a passing acquaintance with some of her friends, but Erin formed a kind of strange nucleus we could form around, because she knew everyone. She went to school with the younger girls up until last year when she was jumped ahead to high school, and was now part of my own social group and Cassie's best friend.

We sat in the sand and chatted, and eventually a few of us went in the water... all of the guys, except Kirk, who opted to stay with Cassie went, and of the girls, it was just Amber, the girl playing volleyball I didn't know before, but who I'd since learned was named Christine, and Erin.

After some time, laughing, splashing, Tony and Jay went to challenge each other to a race swimming back to shore, and I decided to just drift a while, enjoying the relaxing sensation of floating, when I heard my name. It was Amber, standing beside an inflatable green raft thingie she'd brought. It was shaped like a frog, with a hole in the middle, so you could relax with your arms and legs dangling over but your ass in the water. "What?"

"Come here," she called.

"Why?"

She waved with her hand urgently. "Just come here."

I looked around, saw Tony and Jay were already making their way back to shore, and didn't see Erin or Christine anywhere, so decided to swim over and see what was up. "What?" I said again, when I was a little closer.

"Your sister wanted you," she said with a smirk, and just before she did I could already see Erin. She was blocked from view by the floating green frog until I got close. Erin's eyes danced as she had her impish grin directed at me.

"What?"

She crooked a finger at me and I came closer, and soon I was close enough to feel her other hand, beneath the water, touching the front of my trunks. "Ever have an underwater blowjob?" she asked teasingly.

She knew I hadn't, of course, all of my sexual experiences were either with Erin or someone she'd approved... and though the thought of it, combined with the feel of her hand made my penis swell up, this was far too public for my tastes. "Erin, we can't." She was far more adventurous than I, but we'd had close-enough calls. The rule was supposed to be sexual stuff stayed at home, or the home of friends we could trust.

"Oh, come on... Amber's going to block for us." Amber smiled and shook her head, like she thought Erin was a little crazy for wanting to suck her brother's dick at the beach, but then turned outwards to watch towards shore.

The inflatable frog shielded much of us, and the water shielded what we were doing, but I was still uncomfortable. Erin didn't care though, she pulled my dick out of my trunks, and then took a breath and went under. It pretty much just lasted long enough for her to take my dick in her mouth and suck it up and down once, before she had to come up for air and take another deep breath, look around for more observers, and then submerge once more.

This time it lasted a little longer, but apparently when you're giving a blowjob you do occasionally need to breath. In terms of sensation it was a little odd, because the wet feeling was constant, the only change was the friction of her lips and tongue, and the sudden difference in warmth between the water and my sister.

The third time going down lasted longer still, but came up sputtering and raised one hands to her nose to wring out excess water, and I couldn't take it anymore. "Okay, that was great, but it's enough. I don't think I can cum out in public anyway."

"Is that a challenge?"

"Come on, Erin," I said. "We've been over this, it's too risky." She pouted a little, but it was one of her fake pouts, just to get my attention. "Besides, Mom'll probably still be out when we get home, we'll have some time to ourselves..." She's said today she was going out shopping with a friend.

She grinned and gave my cock one last pump under the water before letting go. "Okay. Thanks for playing lookout anyway, Amber."

As the three of us padded towards our spot on the beach (after I'd let my erection go down, of course), everybody else seemed to be talking casually once again. "Hey," Kirk said when he looked up and saw our approach. "What were you guys doing out there, anyway?"

For a second I froze in panic, but the question was asked innocently enough, not like he or anybody else suspected, and nobody else looked especially interested.

Erin came up with an answer before I did. "Oh, there was a crab or something out there. So what are we talking about?"

"School," Kirk said.

The word was greeted by an instinctive groan by Christine. "I can't believe we have to go back already."

"I don't know," Tony said. "I'm kind of looking forward to it this year."

"Easy for you to say, you're a senior. Top of the heap." Hardly, we weren't exactly the in-crowd or anything. "We're coming in as freshman, bottom of the..." she reached around for a word and finally settled on "barrel."

"Don't worry, being a freshman's not so bad. Most of the stuff they tell you's an exaggeration. Like, we only make freshmen carry our books on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, not every day. And only one freshman a year is sacrificed to ensure a good football season." Kirk's lame joke was rewarded with an elbow from Cassie.

Erin dropped down on her blanket, chest down. "Anyway, because I went to school with you guys until last year, the Principal suggested I be a peer ambassador. So I'll be showing some of you around the first day and you can always come to me with any problems you have."

"Yeah, but you never had to be a freshman," Winnie pointed out, with a little sourness. Erin had been skipped ahead several grades, and I think Winnie went back and forth between resenting Erin for her intelligence, and being relieved that they weren't directly competing for the top spot in their grade any more.

"No, I had it worse. I mean, you guys all get to stay together. Most of the day you're going to be with the same batch of people you were last year. Trust me, you guys will find it a piece of cake. In a few weeks, you'll wonder why you thought it was such a big deal."

Amber began rubbing some suntan lotion up her arms and legs as she said, with a sly grin, "I can think of one thing that'll be a big deal." She paused for effect, then said, "High school parties." There was a chorus of approving nods from the incoming freshman girls, all looking forward to this development. A few of the more sexually advanced middle school girls might get invited to a high school party, and a few with older siblings who threw them, or older boyfriends, but for the most part there was an invisible barrier that seemed poised to be lifting.

Cassie tugged at the edges of her t-shirt, then spoke, a little meekly. "You might want to be careful of those. It's easy to wind up doing something you'll regret."

"Yeah, sure," Amber said, completely dismissing the advice. "I think I can handle it." She should have listened more closely, Cassie was the only one in our little group who'd ever been a freshman girl.

She passed the sun-tan lotion over to my sister, who began spreading it on all over herself, and I forced myself not to look. Instead I caught Kirk looking, but he met my eye and quickly looked away, saying quickly, "Call me a geek..."

"Geek," Tony, Jay, Erin, and I said in unison.

Kirk smirked, and continued unabashed, "but I'm just glad our school's finally joining the twenty-first century. I mean, other than in school, who takes notes with pen and paper anymore? We should have had laptops when I was in middle school." It was the school's big new initiative this year, every student would be given a school laptop, which would wirelessly interact with the school's network. A few parents had protested the dangers of Wi-Fi radiation, but most of the kids were looking forward to it. "I don't have to worry about my hand cramping up any more."

"I thought you stopped worrying about that when you started dating Cassie," Jay joked.

Kirk looked puzzled for a second, then finally got it and threw an empty water bottle at him. A few of us laughed, Cassie blushed a little. "Hey, at least I have a girlfriend."

Jay shrugged, smirking a little. "Yeah, but I got a car." Tony and Jay had both gotten summer jobs and bought cars, and I had one for over a year. Kirk was the last of our group of friends without one, and we never let him forget it. "A girlfriend's easy when you got that."

"Sure, sure. And I'm telling you, I'm this close to getting my car." He held his fingers apart a tiny distance. He probably was telling the truth, the problem was, he was that close for months. "And I'd just like to point out, that although three of you have cars, two of you are single, and one's dating the Chastity Queen. So, apparently it's not so easy after all. I'm the only one getting any action on a regular basis."

"Kirk!" Cassie said, blushing again.

"So enjoy your car."

"Yeah, but I'm single mostly by choice. And speaking of enjoying my car," Jay said, checking his cell phone. "I've got to go, I've got stuff I need to do." I waved, and didn't really question what he had to do... Jay was often like that, he was a good guy, could joke around with the best of us, but never shared much about his own life. In all the time I'd known him, I'd never even been to his house.

"Hey, Andrew," my sister said as Jay was walking off. "Would you mind doing my back?" She passed me the suntan lotion and laid down on her chest.

"Uh, sure," I said, feeling a little awkward, but we were out among others, so I couldn't argue the point about how I wasn't comfortable putting my hands on her body in front of other people... I'd have to take it up with her later. That was probably her plan.

Sure, it was pretty innocent, and I tried to make it as unsexual as possible, but there was a point last year with a rumor, one that happened to be true but we managed to quash anyway, and sometimes I thought my friends still suspected. With one hand, I rubbed the white goo over her back quickly, and thankfully she didn't make any appreciative sounds that would draw even more attention to what I was doing.

The job done, I put the cap on the bottle, and Erin opened her eyes. "You should really put some on."

"I'm okay. I might go back in the water soon anyway."

"Well, until then, you should put some on. You might burn. And skin cancer is serious, you know."

I sighed a little and slathered some over myself, but secretly I liked that she looked out for me, even when I wouldn't do so myself. I'd do the same for her. It made sense... we did, after all plan to spend the rest of our lives together. It would be a shame for something preventable like skin cancer to shorten that.

***
Chapter Three:

As it turned out, I never went back into the water anyway, none of us did, we just relaxed, talked a little, and enjoyed the sun until it began getting blocked out. A line of dark clouds was getting closer to us all the time. "Damn," Winnie said, "looks like it's going to rain."

"Well, it's mostly been a good day," I said, and it was just in time, really. I like the beach, but only for so long, and it was just reaching the point where I was getting bored and wanted to do something else. We gathered our stuff together, I put my shirt on, and then I looked around. "Okay, Kirk, Cassie, you need a ride?"

"Actually," Kirk said, "I'm going to go with Tony. I'm helping my uncle for some extra cash, and he lives right near them. But take Cassie, if you don't mind." I nodded absently, while he kissed his girlfriend goodbye.

Amber's mom was already on her way to pick her up, and Winnie was going with her to 'hang out', which I suspected meant they'd be enjoying some lesbian sex. Although neither of them were actually lesbians, both could probably be described as bi, and that was probably our fault... if we hadn't forced them into it, they never would have known they liked it. Gianna would naturally go home with her brother Tony, and they took one of the girls I didn't know with them. That left me taking Cassie, Erin, and Christine, who, although I'd just met her, seemed pleasant enough and I didn't want to leave her taking the bus. We waited around by our cars just long enough to be sure Amber's mom arrived, and then prepared to go our separate ways.

Before ducking into Tony's car, Kirk looked at me and gave me a mock salute. "Next time we meet, comrade, we shall be enemies."

I smirked. We'd wound up in different AP History classes taught by Mr. Withrow. He was one of those few good teachers that everybody liked, he knew his stuff, explained it well and with passion, probably because that's what teaching was for him... people said he won the lottery or something and kept on teaching. He was also known to be a fan of the Cold War, but it wasn't in dealt with as much as he liked in the curriculum, and so every year he ran an extra credit role-playing scenario where each of his two classes were a country on the other side of the Iron Curtain and had to complete certain goals, with some people assigned as spies, double agents, or innocents with family on the other side. The games went on between classes as people tried to accomplish their objectives... the whole scenario made History one of the more popular courses at the school, even among people who didn't have much interest in the subject. Kirk was a little premature, though, the game wouldn't start until later in the year, usually not until after Xmas break. Still I saluted him in kind, with mock seriousness.

The rain started to fall on the way home, and I kept my eyes on the road, not really joining the sporadic conversation. Cassie was more Erin's friend, and Christine was in her age group. At one point, though, as we were getting close to Cassie's house, Erin broke from their conversation and said, "Hey, Andrew, when we get home, I think I'm going to make a Sundae. You want me to make you one too?"

Even though it was raining now, it'd been pretty hot and still was. Probably be a while until dinner, too. Some ice cream sounded pretty good. And it was sweet of her to offer. "Sure," I said.

"What kind of ice cream you want?"

"Vanilla, I guess..."

"Strawberry syrup?"

She knew my tastes. I smiled. "Yeah, thanks."

In my rear view mirror, I could see Christine shaking her head with wonder. "I can't get over how well you guys get along. My brother and I can barely be in the same room without getting into a fight, but you guys like, hang out and stuff, like friends, and do stuff for each other. I wish we could have a relationship like you." Erin smirked and our eyes met. "You guys are really lucky."

Cassie rolled her eyes a little. "Yeah, they have a special kinship all right," she said unenthusiastically.

Erin's smirk turned into a grin. "Yes. That's right, we do." She turned back in her seat and looked at Cassie as though daring her to say something.

Cassie didn't. Even if she didn't entirely support our relationship, she had never condemned it, either. Sometimes I thought it was just because she didn't want to piss Erin off, since my sister was her best friend, and she didn't have many of those. I pulled up into Cassie's driveway, and she said, "Thanks for the ride. I'll text you later, Erin." I gave her a casual wave, and she got out, covering her head with her beach towel so she wouldn't get overly wet on the run to her front door.

Christine lived just down the street, so we dropped her off only minutes later, and then it was just me and my sister... and she had the brightest smile on her face. It wasn't an ordinary smile, it wasn't even the slightly sultry "we're going to do it" smile she sometimes got. It was that look she got sometimes when something had caught her imagination, a new idea, and she was exploring the possibilities and having a great time doing it.

I let her enjoy it privately until we got home, and then, after dashing into the house from the rain, and doing a quick check to ensure Mom wasn't home, I noticed she still had that excited grin, and I couldn't resist it anymore. "Okay, what? You've had that look since the car."

"I love it. What Cassie said about us... that we have a 'kinship'. It's perfect. It's just what I was looking for."

"For what?"

"Rebranding. Incest is such an ugly word, aesthetically speaking... sounds a little like 'cyst', and when you read it looks too much like 'insect', both generating subconscious undercurrents of disgust with the concept. I'd think it was deliberate if it wasn't so old." She spoke rapidly, the way she did sometimes when she was really excited about an idea, and continued without even a breath. "Also, incest as a term is indiscriminate, applying to the bad cases as well as the good. In order to get people to accept relationships like ours, I needed a new term that doesn't have all that baggage. 'Wincest' isn't bad, but I still don't like some of those undercurrents. I was playing around with variations like 'funcest', or 'lovecest', but 'kinship' is much better. I mean, it's perfect. That's what we have. You know how people in fandom ship characters like Azula and Zuko? And I bet after that rumor last year, a few people even ship us. Well, why shouldn't they? We're kin, and we have a 'ship', a real relationship. We're a kinship. It's so beautiful. Words have so much power. I mean, when they changed the name of the Patagonian Toothfish to 'Chilean Sea Bass', sales went through the roof. And would Canola oil be as popular if it was still called rapeseed oil? No way. It's the same thing here. When you say 'incest', people's prejudices flare up... but when you say 'kinship', there's no negative stigma... in fact, people hear it and think of something good. It's a totally positive term, so you can't use it to mean something like molestation. The world can grow to approve of it. And until then, you can even say it in public without people knowing what you mean, unless they're like you... like a secret code!"

I gave an indulgent half-smile. Getting people to accept incest was Erin's thing. She called it 'Project Girlfriend', her long-term goal to get the world to accept us together, with her as my girlfriend. I thought it was a little unrealistic, but I didn't tell her that. Although I loved her more than anything, I still wondered if what we were doing was a little bit wrong. I'd like nothing more than to be able to go and express my love to her openly, but I didn't see the whole world embracing incest as necessarily a good thing. Still, I knew it was important to her, so I didn't try to rain on her parade. It really did feel good to see her so excited. "Okay, sure, sounds great."

I guess some of my skepticism must have crept into my voice. "Don't worry Andrew, I know this isn't going to happen overnight. But it's a start. 'Kinship'. I'm so using that." She stepped close to me and tugged on the front of my shirt. "So, what do you say, Andrew? You want to go upstairs and make sweet kinlove?"

That was a suggestion I had no reservations about. We darted upstairs into my room and undressed quickly, then got into a naked embrace and kissed, our tongues wrestling. Finally, our lips broke and my sister turned us around and pushed me backwards onto the bed and crawled on top of me.

She did much of the work this time. My sister had her moods, sometimes she liked to make love romantically, sometimes she liked me to be rough, and occasionally, usually when she was on a high from an idea that tickled her just so, she liked to take charge and pretty much just use me to get off. It was almost as though she wanted to cum fast so she could work out the implications of her ideas with a clear head.

I loved those times, and didn't mind being used, the feel of her tight pussy sliding down on my dick until my balls touched her ass was heavenly. Once she'd settled her weight on me, the fun really began, she rode up and down, impaling herself again and again on my cock with a ferocious intensity, and one hand played with her clit.

I could have just lied there and enjoyed it, but I did my part too, mostly to reach up and play with her tits, squeezing them and rubbing the pert nipples between my thumb and forefingers, and occasionally I would provide a little bit of upward thrust right as she was sinking down.

My grip shifted from her breasts to her ass as she pressed down closed to me, close enough to kiss. When our lips made contact it was sloppy and fleeting the first few times, but then finally we locked together, joined at both ends, and stayed that way for a half-dozen thrusts.

I came soon after that, and Erin rode me with a new frenzy as I squirted my seed into her pussy, her pussy clenched rhythmically like she was milking me and she let loose a little whine of passion as her body tensed up.

When she was done, she continue to lay her sweaty body on top of me. "Did you cum?" I asked, to make sure. I never liked leaving her unsatisfied, and there was a chance I'd gone soft just before she'd gotten over the hump. If she hadn't reached climax, I would have found another way to finish her off.

"Oh yeah," she said, letting out a deep breath. "I was already close, but the feel of you flooding my womb pushed me over the top." We kissed again, and then I just held her close to me reflecting again how lucky I was to have a sister like Erin.

It was only later, after she's returned to her room that I realized she'd forgotten all her promise to make me a Sundae. She must have been so eager to work on her new idea that it had slipped her mind. That was okay, though, I went downstairs, made one myself, and brought another upstairs for her. Her eyes lit up when she saw what I'd brought through the door. "Christine was right," she said, mirroring my earlier thoughts. "I'm so lucky to have a brother like you."

***
Chapter Four:
The first few days of school were a bit of a clusterfuck. Our laptops were supposed to be distributed to everybody on the first day, but apparently there was a fuckup somewhere along the line, because they weren't even at school, and now weren't expected to be there for almost a month.

You'd think that wouldn't be a problem, considering it was a new initiative. Just go back to the way things were done before, right? Except that many of the teachers, who'd had their own laptops for a year already to become proficient in them, had based their lesson plans on everybody having them this year, so that we students could copy the notes on the screen and they could send things directly to our systems instead of making photocopies and handouts or writing on the board.

So there was a lot of confusion, mostly among the younger set of teachers who were excited about the changes and frustrated with having to go back to writing on the blackboard. The old guard who never trusted computers were pretty well ready to teach their old way if civilization melted down and the computers never arrived and were probably praying for just that.

It was pretty chaotic for the teachers, but for the students, it was just amusing and to most of us, a good thing. We had less homework, with some teachers opting to just let us off the hook rather than do a little extra themselves. That suited me just fine, I was collaborating online on a game idea with a guy I met at a convention over the summer. It was more his game than mine, something he wanted to turn into a MMO, but I liked working with him, and would probably learn more useful skills doing that than homework. Coding for multiple players had always been one of my weak spots, and the collaboration was giving me a better grasp of things.

I'd always loved games, and had a personal dream of one day making it a career. Right now I had a string of abandoned half-finished games that argued against that happening, but I'd had some big successes too. I already earned a small amount from advertising and iPad app sales of a couple simple games I'd invented solo... not much, but enough to keep me in gas money and earn a little stake for college without having to work summer jobs.

So I really was working a lot that first week, just not on school. Erin had her peer ambassador job, and already this year seemed to be turning out better for her than last, she was reconnecting with friends her own age and, without Madison to torment her, was fitting in among those in her grade, too.

About a week or two into school, we still hadn't gotten our new laptops, but we'd settled back into a system that works about as well as any public high school does, which still meant most of us were able do our best to deny it had any impact on the important things in our lives, cars, sex, parties, and popularity at least until midterms or a looming project deadline got too close for comfort.

One morning, I was hanging out with Jay and Tony in our usual before-school-chatting spot in one of the hallways near our lockers. Kirk texted us and asked us to meet him by the doors, and we did. He had a smug little smile on his face. "What's up with you?" Tony asked. "Cassie finally give you anal?" She wasn't around, and neither was my sister, so we could be a little cruder than we usually were.

"Nah," Jay joked. "They must have found a cure for ugly. Don't get too excited, it'll probably take years to make it to market." He snapped his fingers. "Maybe you could sign up for one of the clinical trials."

I smirked, and was about to try and come up with my own jibe, when Kirk held up a hand. "No, don't even try to ruin my mood today. Guess who drove to school today?"

"Your mom let you borrow hers?" Tony said, but must have known what Kirk was getting at, he was just drawing it out so Kirk could savor the victory.

"I finally got it. Face it boys, your days of making me your buttmonkey are over. I'm now the most successful member of the group. Now I got a car, AND I have a girlfriend that puts out, so..." He pointed to Jay, "Suck it," then to Tony, and repeated, "Suck it." The finger finally went to me, but his expression broke and said, "I've got too much pity for you dating Lady Blueballs, man..." Madison and I "made up" again that first week, right after her choir practice, and I'd manage to avoid going to either it or Church during the school year by claiming to be too busy. "So you don't have to suck it."

It was all good-natured, we all talked shit about one another all the time, and the three of us took it in stride, grinning, and finally Jay said, "So, you going to show us the car, or what?"

We all headed out to the parking lot and Kirk pointed out his new ride. "Shit, Kirk," Jay said appreciatively. "You really DID find the cure to ugly. Even I'm starting to think you're hot."

"Shut up. Anyway, why do you think it took me so long?" Kirk asked. "I didn't want to just buy the first thing I could afford. If I'm going to have a car, it should be something to be proud of." It was pretty cool. It wasn't just a nice car... it was, dare I say it, a hot car. It was a red BMW M3, a little on the older side, but still looking very good. It should have been outside his price range. Sure, it wasn't anything compared to the kind of cars the wealthier kids got, but it was better than Kirk's station should have allowed. He explained as though reading our mind, "I got an amazing deal because the engine and transmission were shit, but my uncle knew a guy who could fix it up, I just had to scrape the money together, and last night, we did the deed."

"How'd you get a parking permit so fast?" Tony wondered aloud.

"All you need's the registration and a license to buy one, so I got it before the school year. This baby's actually been sitting in my uncle's garage for a while, I was just keeping it a secret until it was drivable, so I could see the looks on your faces. And man, those looks are sweet."

"Impressive," I said. I was even a little jealous. I could maybe have afforded a car this nice, but probably not the insurance and upkeep as well, at least not without getting another job or getting back into blackmailing for money. And then I couldn't afford the questions about where the money to buy it came from. Kirk was my friend, but I always thought of him as a bit of a screw up... this time, though, I had to give him credit. "You did good."

"Yeah," Tony said. "A ride like this, you could probably trade in Cassie, move up to a hotter model."

Kirk grimaced. "Don't joke like that, that's my girlfriend."

We took a few seconds more to savor the car, when suddenly Tony said, "Hey, looks like you made it, and just in time, too."

I was confused for a split second, thinking he was talking to us, but as I turned my head I spotted his sister Gianna jogging across the parking lot, her large boobs bouncing appealingly with her steps. Her forehead was scrunched up in annoyance, focused on Tony. "I can't believe you did that to me." She stopped in front of us and put her hands on her knees to catch her breath.

"I warned you I was going to leave without you." He seemed smugly amused. "You should have got ready faster."

"I didn't think you'd actually do it!" Gianna smiled, a little. It looked like she was still pissed, but on the level of a trivial sibling annoyance. They didn't live too far from school anyway, so it couldn't have been much of a run. She looked around at all of us, then asked, "What are you all doing out here, anyway? Did you tell your friends what you did to me and waited to see if I'd make it?"

"Nah, just checking out Kirk's new car," I said, nodding towards it.

She looked at it, then at Kirk. "Oh, nice. Maybe next time Tony's being an ass, I should ask you. I mean, can you imagine it?" She directed this part to me. "Not waiting for your sister just because she's doing her makeup?" I couldn't, actually, which was part of the reason I doubted Erin's claims that Tony and Gianna were a couple... or a kinship, to use her new term.

Before I could answer, first bell rang, informing us we had five minutes to get to class. "Damn it, I still need to get to my locker," Gianna said. We all had our books already, even Kirk, who'd stopped at his locker before meeting us.

She continued past us, and as she did, Tony said, "Yeah, you better move that ass," landed a playful swat on her ass, causing his sister to momentarily straighten up in surprise, and then stick her tongue out at him before running off.

That little incident started to win me over to Erin's opinion... not the swat itself, which was just light contact with the back of his hand and certainly not a grope, nor even the playful expression he got in response, some siblings might be comfortable with such horseplay, others weren't, people are different. What made me think that maybe Erin was right that they were in a sexual relationship was the sudden, panicked look in Tony's eyes after he'd done it, like he was worried that he'd gone too far and given the game away. The expression on his face seemed to match what I felt when I'd thought I'd done the same, and he did just what I did after one of those moments, too... try to change the subject so nobody would notice. "So what classes you guys got first again?"

Nobody else seemed to comment on Tony's actions or his moment of panic, so maybe it was one of those things where you'd have to be in a kinship yourself to notice. I got more evidence of it later, at the very start of our lunch break. I met Tony and Kirk as they were leaving a class, continuing a conversation they were having inside. "No, she's dating what's-his-face, Barry," Tony said.

"Really?"

"Well, I don't know if it's dating, but they're hooking up, and, either way... no thanks."

"What's up?" I asked.

They nodded in acknowledgement, and Kirk explained, "Now that I'm the top dog of our particular group, I've decided to be generous and help out my bros. I'm trying to hook Tony up with somebody to who might punch his V-Card."

"I told you, I'm not a virgin..."

"Nobody believes the 'girl I met on vacation' story, Tony. Even if it really happened. It's like Wikipedia, truth doesn't matter, only verifiability does."

"Well, what about you and Cassie? Because for all I know you're both gay and just using each other as decoys. So you got pictures of you two together?"

"None you'll ever see," he said with a smirk. "Anyway, I'm trying to help you out here. What about Jill? Jill S., not Jill K. Just go out and ask her out." He nodded towards her at the end of the hall.

"Nah, in eighth grade I threw up on her at a class picnic. I doubt she's forgotten. Besides, she's got kind of a weird nose." I thought it was cute, but she was kind of boring to me. We had to work on a group assignment together and she talked incessantly about one of those MTV reality shows.

"Okay, fine, how about her." He pointed out a slim, athletic girl I didn't recognize entering the cafeteria just ahead of us. "Her name's... Krista, I think. She just transferred, doesn't know anybody, so maybe she won't realize that she's out of your league. She's in some of Cassie's classes, so maybe she can set you up."

"She is cute," Tony admitted after a long look. "But..." he paused, long enough for me to mentally supply what my sister would think, that the problem with her was the same problem he had with other women... that it wasn't his sister. "I don't want to just ask out a stranger, I want to build up some kind of connection, otherwise the first date gets awkward. Anyway, leave me alone, I'll ask somebody when I'm ready."

By this point we'd reached the cafeteria, and Cassie waved from her seat and joined us in the lunch line and we all got our food, found a place, and sat down. As it turned out, the table beside us had some familiar faces. Winnie and Amber were there, along with that girl Christine from the beach, and a few I didn't recognize.

Winnie caught my eye and smiled. "Hey, Andrew... Erin not with you?"

"Not yet, I'm sure she'll be along though."

"She's doing one of her peer ambassador things," Cassie supplied. "Giving someone advice."

"How are you doing?" I asked. "You fitting in all right?" Although I'd started out not liking Winnie, or Amber, because the justification we used to blackmail them was them being mean to Erin, over the year or two since I'd developed something of a fondness for them. They weren't bad girls, really, and I didn't want to see harm come to them. It wasn't quite a sibling-type relationship, especially considering how I felt about my sibling, but it was more like we were cousins.

"Oh, we're doing just fine," Winnie said, and then added smugly, "We're already the cool freshmen."

I grinned. "Oh yeah?"

"Yeah, we got invited to a party already, because we're so cool." She waved her finger around the girls she was sitting with. "With a junior."

"It's just with the other peer ambassador, Holly," Amber clarified. "She really connected to us while showing us around, we're going to hang out at her place on Friday, she wants to introduce us to a few of her friends."

"Don't go," Cassie said suddenly, urgently.

***
Chapter Five:

Winnie scrunched up her face and looked at Cassie like she intruded on the conversation. Which, I guess, she did. In fact, all of us looked at her, but it was Winnie that spoke. "What?"

Cassie looked like even she was surprised that she'd spoken up. Now that she'd already said it, she withdrew a little, but said, softly, "Holly's not a nice person, she's just acting that way. Take my word for it, the party's a bad idea."

"Nobody asked you for your opinion," Winnie sneered.

Cassie seemed to visibly bite back some comment or display of frustration, but tried again, "Look, I'm just saying you have to be careful. But I can tell you're not going to listen to me, I should just let you make your own mistakes."

"No offense," Winnie said, and I reflexively cringed. Winnie usually said 'no offense' when she had just finished or was just about to deliberately offend somebody. And she hadn't just finished.... "But you're not exactly the kind of person we'd look to for advice on anything. I mean, those fries on your plate don't say much for your judgment. With those thighs..."

"Hey," Kirk said angrily, having looked up from his conversation with Tony to be aware somebody had just insulted his girl.

"I'm just saying, maybe a salad would have been a better choice. And no Coke."

"Okay, that's enough, Winnie," I said softly. One of the few times I wished she knew I was her blackmailer, as I could have silenced her without question as soon as she'd said 'No offense'.

She opened her mouth as though she was going to say something else, but then apparently remembered that Cassie was good friends with Erin. "I need to go get another drink anyway." She shook her empty can. "And I can afford the calories. No offense."

"What a bitch," Kirk muttered, but then resumed talking to Tony. I looked out over the crowd and spotted Madison headed my way. Damn, now that we were back together again, that probably meant I'd be dragged off to eat lunch with her friends.

Cassie, meanwhile, decided to try again without the hostility of Winnie getting in her way. "You can't trust Holly, she's..." She faltered, looking for words. "She's really... two-faced. Take my word for it." Both of us could read on the other girls faces that they weren't planning on doing that. "Fine, then at least... don't let Holly talk you into doing anything you wouldn't normally do. Don't drink anything. And if guys show up..."

Madison reached us then. "Hi, honey," she said sweetly.

Everyone looked up. "Oh, hi..." I said.

"Hi, Maddy," Amber said with a sultry, knowing smile. By the rules of our blackmail club, Maddy started as Amber's sex slave. Maddy still seemed to have sort of a crush on the much younger girl, and Amber obviously enjoyed it.

Maddy responded in a businesslike manner, but what she actually said showed that she had impure thoughts on her mind too. "Hi Amber. We still doing your tutoring after school today?" Amber nodded and smiled. Tutoring sessions were pretty much just a pretext at this point. Maddy turned her attention back to me. "Come on, let's go eat with my friends."

I wanted to protest, and even started to. "But we were..."

"You can talk to them later, I'm your girlfriend and I'm asserting my girlfriend rights." She grabbed my hand and pulled me away.

"Fine." I waved to my friends and started walking with her. Boring lunch ahoy. Maddy's friends, like Maddy herself, were mostly vapid and boring. Maybe the conversations me and my friends had weren't much better, but at least they were fun for me.

"I see Cassie's being bitter bitch again about Holly," Madison said conversationally while we strode across the Caf.

"Yeah, what's that about?"

"What do you think? Jealousy."

"Cassie doesn't really strike me as the jealous type." Then it occurred to me, Madison was gay, maybe there was some secret gaydar club. "Wait, you mean like, they were together?"

Maddy rolled her eyes a little. "No. At least, I don't think so. But they were best friends at the start of freshman year. Practically inseparable."

That was news to me. "So, what happened?"

"Holly got more popular, and Cassie started getting chubby and into anime, which does nobody any favors. I don't know exactly what it was, but they had a falling out, and now Cassie badmouths Holly all the time."

"Maybe Holly deserves it..." Cassie might not have counted as a good friend to me personally, but she was certainly in that circle, and my first instinct was to defend her. "I mean, dropping a friend just because she was less popular?" I then realized who I was talking to. Madison was a Queen Bee type who probably did that dozens of times on her rise to popularity.

"More Cassie lies. Holly makes friends even with the loser set, people I wouldn't even be seen talking to. Like I said, Cassie's just playing bitter bitch."

We sat down and Madison plastered on a fake smile for her friends, and I had to pretend too, pretend I was interested, pretend I didn't find her friends mostly shallow. Madison didn't like many of them either, especially the ultra-religious sort who were popular with her parents, but at least those were the minority. Worst was having to try to contribute to the conversation, mostly I ate quietly and did my best to hope it swung to some TV show that we all liked.

I couldn't even understand why she wanted me there. Popularity-wise, I thought of myself as firmly middle-of-the-road, the forgettable class of people that has friends, gets along with most people, but isn't in the in-crowd. Dating Madison probably upped my social standing, and I got more invites to parties I didn't care about, but I assumed the opposite was true for her, that I dragged her down a little. I guess the fact that I was a senior mitigated that a little bit, but I would have thought she'd want to keep me off-screen for the movie of her life.

This lunch was more unusual than most, Madison was more openly affectionate, laying her head on my shoulder, putting her arms around me, even, once, asking for a kiss. I indulged, with an eye out to make sure Erin wasn't around to see. She wouldn't have gotten mad at me, we agreed the pretense was necessary, but I knew it hurt her to see me kiss somebody else the way she couldn't kiss me, not in public at any rate.

I didn't see Erin, but I did spy the reason for Madison's sudden ardor. Her old best friend and former secret lover, Sharon was sitting at a nearby table, with her new boyfriend... or the new guy she was constantly hanging out with that everybody, Madison especially, assumed was her new boyfriend, although they hadn't made it official. Sharon broke Madison's heart, and now they weren't even really friends anymore. I guess Maddy had a half-assed plan to make her jealous, or maybe just convince her ex, more than anybody, of our relationship. Like Madison wanted to tell her she was also straight, that Sharon was just a phase for her too. Sharon's expression was unreadable, but she was watching, at least until Madison was looking in her direction. At that point, she paid full attention to the guy she was with, putting her hand on his arm, laughing, smiling.

With the whole charade of dating Madison occupying all my attention, the little incident with Cassie completely slipped my mind, but that would probably turn out to be the most important thing to happen that day.

I didn't learn the truth about Cassie's history with Holly, or the party and how it would affect all of us, for a few days yet. That all came to a head on the weekend. Mom was out, supposedly with a friend. She'd been doing that a lot lately, and my sister and I were betting on when she'd introduce us to the new guy in her life.

Naturally, as much as we love her, Mom being away was always good news for me and Erin. It meant we could be as openly affectionate and as sexual as we wanted. We'd already fucked once that day, a leisurely romp that started in the missionary and ended with me cumming in her tight pussy from behind, and we were relaxing and considering another go. "We should play Blackmailer again," Erin suggested. "Get us in the mood."

"What, you're not in the mood already?" I joked. "Cause I am."

"Oh, you know me, I'm always in the mood." Not quite true, but she'd rarely refused me. "But it's still fun, and we do have to keep up appearances." Erin believed that if we stopped regularly requiring things from our blackmailees and the girls got used to the freedom, they might not be willing to start up again if we wanted it.

I wasn't so sure that was a bad thing... I still thought we should be phasing out the blackmail entirely, but I couldn't deny, having someone in your power who'll do anything you want and won't say a thing was exciting.

Erin hopped into my computer chair and activated our spy program. "Okay, so who do you think we should play with today? Make Madison masturbate with her parents downstairs? Watch Winnie with her vibrator?" She paused, looking at the screen. "Oh, looks like Winnie's at Amber's house. That works."

I stood behind my sister and watched. They were sitting on the bed, talking in hushed tones that the microphone couldn't pick up. They probably weren't even aware they were being watched, that was one of the benefits of our program, it made it so cameras didn't light up like they usually did. As long as the computer was on, we could spy without anybody knowing... at least, mostly. The sudden activity did cause memory usage and so if somebody was alert they might be able to tell, but there was no sign on the screen of the two girls being aware they were being watched.

Erin hit the button to open a message window and typed, "Hello, my lovelies, how are you today?"

Amber got up to read the message when she heard the chime, and said, "It's him. I'm asking, I don't care."

"No, what if it's, like, a test?"

I hadn't a clue what was going on, and Erin had a confused furrow on her brow as well. Amber continued, "We have to know sooner or later."

"What's going on?" Erin typed, then erased it, and replaced it with, "If you have a question, ask it."

"I just wanted to know, if... I mean, are you behind that other blackmailing thing this weekend?"

***
Chapter Six:

Another blackmailing thing? "What?" I said aloud, and looked to Erin, worried for a moment that she'd been doing something behind my back. She seemed as shocked as I was. "I think you'd better explain," she typed.

"We went to a party this weekend," Winnie said, overcoming her previous reluctance to tell, or maybe she just saw there was no point now that it was already started.

"Right," I said to Erin, remembering the conversation of a few days ago, although I had to struggle a bit to recall the name. "At... Holly's." Erin nodded, as though she already knew about that part.

"Things got a little crazy," Amber continued. "Holly's parents were gone, and we were drinking, and some senior guys she knew showed up, and, well, it was a dare, she said if we wanted to be cool, we had to act cool, so, we, you know, blew them a little."

Winnie added defensively, "You said we couldn't have sex with anybody else without getting your permission, but you didn't say anything about oral." I didn't even really remember making that rule, although I wasn't surprised to find out I had, in the early days, out of fear of picking up an STD.

"Anyway, today we received these..." Amber leaned forward to click something on her computer, then said, "Can you see that?"

Erin switched over to the view of Amber's own desktop. There was a picture of Amber kneeling down in front of a group of guys, who were only shown from the waist down. In one hand, Amber held an upward-curving erect cock, while she had another one in her mouth. Her cheeks were a little sunken in proving she was sucking it vigorously.

The picture slowly scrolled, and I realized it was the window of a message in her e-mail, with the title, "Wasn't Friday fun?"

Beneath the first picture was a second, this one showing Amber and Winnie with cum on their faces, in sort of a mock kiss, with one dribble of white goo stringing from one to the other. There were a couple other pictures, but Amber scrolled straight to the end so I couldn't get a good look at them at that moment. There was a line of text from the message sender. "On Monday we're going to have a little meeting to discuss exactly how much you want to keep these pictures away from your parents."

"Another blackmailer," Erin said with a tone of awed fascination. "Right under our noses. What are the odds?"

"We have to help them," I said. I had an irrational guilt, that it was somehow our fault, if we hadn't gotten them involved in sex, they never would have blown the guys at the party. Of course, neither girl was that innocent... Winnie was fucking her teacher for higher grades before I even knew she existed.

"Do we?" she asked. "Maybe we can just reach an arrangement, Holly gets them Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and we get them the rest of the time. It would stop us from having to watch them so often." She turned to me with a half-grin, which faded when she saw my face. "I was kidding," she said. "If anything, we'll end up owning Holly by the end of this." That wasn't much better.

"This is serious, Erin. I mean, we're no angels, but chances are not everybody who blackmails is going to care much if they get hurt. And who knows what Holly has planned, anyway?" As I said it, I realized who might. "Cassie," I said. "Cassie knew this was going to happen. She tried to warn them against going to the party."

Erin bit her lip a little. "I'll talk to her. First we need to find out what Holly's game is." She typed another message to Winnie and Amber, which read, "Don't worry, I'll make sure things turn out all right. If I have to, I'll blackmail her, too. It may take a little time, but by the time I'm done, you might end up owning her."

Upon reading that, the girls relaxed, and Winnie developed a bit of a smug smile. I was astounded that they actually seemed to have so much faith in the Blackmailer, that he'd somehow turn it around, even though they had no idea who it was and what he'd done to them was probably as bad or worse as what Holly had planned, but then we'd already built up the idea that we were all-powerful and potentially omnipresent in their mind from the very beginning. I guess people prefer the devil they know.

"I'll have Erin loan you her hidden camera. Wear it to the meeting tomorrow, play along with whatever she proposes, and then upload what you record when you get home. I'll figure out what to do then. In the meantime, I realize you're upset, so if you don't feel up to performing for me, I'll go watch Erin and her brother today."

They didn't mind though. Erin said it might have been out of relief that they wouldn't have to worry any more, I felt for sure it was a little forced, like they wanted to please the person who promised to help them out so he wouldn't get second thoughts. Either way, we watched the two of them have lesbian sex. Winnie took off her pants and spread her legs and Amber got between them, licking her slit.

While we watched, my sister got up to let me sit down, and then sat on my lap, planting small kisses up and down my neck. Any other time that would have driven me wild, but as it was, I was only about half-hard. Eventually, she noticed. "You're not really into this today, are you?"

"I'm just worried about them," I told her.

"And you think I'm not?" I wondered, a little. She had seemed a little cold about the whole thing, and then there was that joke. "I'm sure we can handle it, though. She probably just wants money or something, and if that's all it is, I can probably pay for them with my savings. I'll even rescue the other girls too, if I can afford it."

"Maybe, but I can't help thinking this is our fault somehow... or at least that we're no better. And looking at Winnie's sex face doesn't help." Winnie had a disturbing tendency, especially when she was being fucked but when she was approaching orgasm even form oral, to look like she was being hurt and on the verge of crying. Occasionally, when I was in dark moods, it was hot, but usually it was a little disconcerting, even though I knew that she did it no matter how much she enjoyed it.

"This one isn't our fault. And we will take care of them." She turned halfway around so she could reach behind her, and minimized the window. "And if Winnie's sex face is ruining the mood, well, let's go over to the bed and you can watch mine."

Out of sight wasn't quite out of mind, but at least I managed to push my thoughts away from guilty areas long enough to get hard and start fucking my little sister. Once I started that, it would take more than a little worry to ruin my erection, we just fit together perfectly, and I pushed into her until she came, loudly. I shot my seed into her a minute later.

On Monday morning, we left home early so that Erin could meet Winnie and brief her on how to use the hidden camera. The device was hidden cleverly in a plastic headband, with a separate receiver that could be concealed in a backpack, and a remote control that fit in a pocket. Erin had used it before to get blackmail material... it worked remarkably well, recording a view of pretty much whatever the person wearing it was looking at. Whatever Holly's game was, we'd soon know.

Winnie and Amber must have been anxious about their meeting, and so was I, but I didn't actually have anything to do but wait. And other than that, it was a pretty average school day. We heard the rumor that the long-promised laptops were going to be delivered to the school sometime that week, although it might still be another week or two before they get distributed, there was a supply teacher in my math course (which almost always means it becomes a goof-off period with just a little assigned homework), and luckily, I didn't have to see Madison and play the good boyfriend more than a little in the halls.

We left school that day knowing no more than we did when we arrived. The incident with Holly started after the end of classes, and Cassie wasn't at school at all. Kirk mentioned she'd been sick all weekend and didn't want to see him, which he attributed to 'female problems'. That put off Erin's planned conversation with her... she didn't want to do it online or over the phone. I suggested she stop by after school, but Erin decided it would be better to wait until after we saw what Winnie recorded. "Whatever it is, Cassie doesn't exactly want to share. I'd rather not make her if we can handle it ourselves."

By the time Winnie returned and transferred the video to her computer, where we could retrieve it at will, it was into the early evening. Mom was home, so we couldn't watch it together... instead, we networked, each watching it on our own computers in a shared session. Winnie herself gave no real explanation, just said, "Watch it yourself. If this is just you playing some kind of game, I'd rather you just admit it."

On that ominous note, she went into a sulk on her bed, and Erin started the video she recorded.

The scene opened on a room in our school. I didn't recognize it, off-hand, but it had the standard types of desks normal classrooms contained... it wasn't a science lab or anything else that was obviously special-purpose. Winnie sat at such a desk. Seated beside her, we'd later see from whenever Winnie whipped her head around, were about four other girls, including Amber. None of the others were girls I recognized, although my sister had all their names before the video was over. They were all pretty cute... no absolute stunners, mind you--in fact, Amber was probably the best looking of the bunch--, but none of them were unattractive either. A few looked like they might have been seriously hot if they dressed more sexily, but it was hard to tell for sure from the video.

At the front, where teachers would be if class was in session, were five other girls. Three of these girls I had at least a passing familiarity with. Two I barely knew. Karen was a freckled redhead sophomore with a short bob hair cut and a bit of a turned up nose, and the only thing I knew about her other than that was that she transferred to our school in the middle of last year. I only noticed her at all because she had roughly the same hair color as my previous fake-girlfriend, who left at about the same time she arrived. I actually thought her name was Carol until Holly later mentioned her by name. Then there was Andrea, a tall blonde junior who shot down Kirk when we were sophomores and he thought a freshman might be more open to an invitation to a dance. He was wrong. She had a bit of a fivehead going on, but was otherwise pretty, more of the statuesque type than most of the other girls.

Among the more recognizable were Miranda Cherski and Tori Bains, both juniors with dark hair. Miranda was a tiny, friendly-seeming bundle of energy who looked closer to my sister's age than that of her peers. Tori looked a little like a young Jessica Alba, with a hot body and who constantly wore clothes to show it off. Like usual, she was wearing a shirt that showed off her tanned belly-button.

Both of those girls I knew because they were on my sister's revenge list last year. For the early part of the year, they'd made fun of Erin constantly. They weren't as bad as Madison or Sharon, or a couple other girls, but they were on the list, and had never been officially crossed off of it, either. We'd tried to get Tori to strip for us on camera so we could release it to the school, but although she got flirty and teased, she never made the jump, probably because there were already two cases that year at our school of a girl doing it and getting exposed for it. We had some circumstantial evidence that Miranda had gotten in a threesome at a party last Halloween, and we were planning on compiling more damning evidence, but we sort of lost our drive. By the time we blackmailed Madison, most of the teasing had dropped off, and what we had once called Project Vengeance no longer seemed like a priority. Still, given how long my sister carried grudges, I could bet she was imagining this being her chance to settle the score.

At the center of the other four, though, leaning casually on the teacher's desk like she owned it, was Holly. She looked like one of those girls you'd expect to be class president or something... pretty, but not bombshell pretty, dark hair that wasn't in any trendy style, but very well-groomed, and she was wearing clothes that were stylish (at least according to my admittedly not-very-in-touch fashion sense) but not especially slutty.

My first ever impressions of Holly were positive. Last year Erin showed me a hidden video, taken on the same camera Winnie borrowed, of some of the girls in her class harassing her. Holly was the lone person who seemed to publicly stand up for her and ask the other girls to lay off. It wasn't a dramatic impassioned defense, but it left an impression. Later, for some reason, Cassie warned Erin away from trying to be friends with her, and those two hit it off. The only other time I remembered noticing Holly was at a Halloween party. While my sister got drunk, Holly helped give her beers and suggested setting her up with some friends. I didn't like that at all, but after a while, I forgot about it, there were more important things going on, and I figured maybe she was trying to be nice, but just using poor judgment.

She must have had a lot of experience at sounding like she was trying to be nice, because as she began, she still sounded like she was leading an after-school club of friends. "So, I'm glad all of you received my little message, and could attend this meeting. Believe me, none of us wants those photos to get out, especially not to your parents. And if the whole school saw them, well, let's not dwell on that. It wouldn't be a good start to your high school career, though... that's the kind of reputation that follows you everywhere. Now the good news is... the guys you sucked off? They can be trusted to be very discreet. So your reputations are safe as long as the photos don't get out."

"So just delete them then," said someone. Winnie's head whipped around to reveal it was a Hispanic-looking girl. Kate was the name my sister supplied, through our link.

"I'm afraid I can't do that. I mean it, even if I wanted to, there are already copies out there," she said in mock helplessness. "But don't worry, they're in safe hands, and they'll stay in safe hands as long as you do exactly what I say, when I say it, until I decide you've earned your freedom."

"What exactly do we have to do?" Winnie asked.

"Whatever I say, when I say it," she repeated. "We're going to have a real problem if you don't learn to listen better. Mostly, though, you're going to be making me money. Now, I'm going to team you each up with one of my best girls here." She waved to her friends. "They'll show you the ropes. If they say to get down on your knees and suck a cock, you do it. By the way, how many of you are virgins?" Winnie's head whipped around to check out the other girls. Both of the ones I could see reluctantly raised their hands. Amber of course didn't. The last one I never saw answer on camera, but apparently was one too. When the camera swung back to Holly, she seemed disappointed and looking dead center into it. "Really? I thought Asian girls were supposed to be all about upholding the family honor." She shook her head to dismiss the thought. "Whatever. Don't worry, the virgins among you will get to keep your virtue for a while longer. In fact, if you give it up before I say, some of the pictures get released as punishment. I have special plans for your cherries."

"We could just go to the police," said one girl, named Olivia, the virgin we didn't see raising her hand. She had brown hair and large eyes... magnified by the fact that she wore glasses. I think she was at the lunch table with Winnie and Amber when Cassie gave her warning, but didn't talk while I was there. "It's better than being... prostituted." She caught on quickly.

"I'm glad somebody suggested that," Holly said with a grin. "Somebody is always stupid enough to think that involving the cops might be a good idea. So let's get it out of the way quickly. Karen?" Karen, the redhead I thought was named Carol, stepped forward with a phone. A picture was loaded on it and she waved it in front of the girls being blackmailed. It was a girl who'd been shot through the head, in what looked like an alley.

***
Chapter Seven:

The picture of a girl our age with her... well, her face blown off, was startling, and it looked pretty gory, but we only saw it for a second before she moved it on to the next girl. "This is the last girl who tried going to the cops. There is no help for you. Some of the police are my best customers... so are some very powerful, very dangerous people. You fuck with me, you fuck with them, and you do that, you end up like this. I might even do the job myself." Holly seemed dead serious on that part, but then slipped back into her more relaxed persona. "I didn't get you into this. I took the pictures, but I didn't make you suck those guys off. You all got yourselves into this mess, and if you want to get yourself out, you can either play along, or suffer the consequences. This is my business, being a friend and getting you out of your messes. If you don't want to be my friend, fine, your embarrassing photos will be all over the school and everybody will know you'll suck off a guy you barely know at the drop of a hat... you can deal with it any way you want as long as you don't mention me. You may have heard of that happening a couple times last year... not quite the same photos, but embarrassing nonetheless." She shrugged, as though it didn't bother her in the slightest. Then her gaze turned deadly, with no humor in it at all. "But if you go to the cops or do anything else that hurts my business, you become an enemy, and I do not fuck around with my enemies. I'll go for your throat and end you... Understand?" There was no verbal answer, so she continued, now with exaggerated sweetness, "I want to hear you say it. If I have to put a gun to your head, I don't want you groveling at my feet saying you didn't know. Do you all understand?"

A chorus of weak, mumbled "Yeses" followed.

"Good." She smiled again, pacing back and forth between the girls, getting close, occasionally running a hand through one's hair or on her shoulder as she spoke the next bit... "Relax, all of you. This doesn't have to be entirely unpleasant. We can make it win-win. I'll win more, but if you behave, you'll enjoy a level of popularity you couldn't have earned on your own. You'll go to the hottest parties in school and even some outside of school. I'll even buy you clothes and makeup if you need it to fit in... I know a couple of you can't afford the best." Winnie looked around quickly at the girls, and especially focused for a few seconds on a blonde girl who I'd assume had cheap clothing. It was a T-shirt and jeans, actually which lots of girls wear, but I guess they were inferior jeans. "So, before we begin, is there anybody here who wants to be let out now, get branded as a slut in front of the school and their parents?" Again Winnie looked around, but no hands went up. "Good. So let's pair up." Holly called out each of her friends in turn and assigned them to one of the girls. Andrea took Kate, Karen took Olivia, Miranda had the poor blonde who turned out to be named Samantha, and Tori was put in charge of Amber. "And I guess I'll take slutty Asian Winnie under my wing," Holly said with some disdain.

The camera tilted down at the desk, as though Winnie was looking at her hands. "Cheer up," said a voice, I think it was Miranda. "It's not as bad as it sounds, you get used to it."

"And we'll start you out slow," Holly promised. "You'll have your first assignments today, just to get you started, but other than that, we're going to ease you into the life." She looked to her friends. "You all know where you're going, right?" They nodded. "Okay, I'll expect your money tomorrow morning. Fill them in on the rules." She looked towards the door, then turned back. "Oh, and one more thing. Confiding in a friend gets you the same as telling the police, and I have ears everywhere. Don't think I won't know. Don't think I won't kill them, too, just to tie up loose ends." Her eyes flashed dangerously, and she let that sink in, before the smile returned. "This week we're going to be spending a lot of time together until you get used to things, and we come before all obligations except for family. Tell us if you have a conflict and we'll try to work with you, unless I get the feeling you're trying to screw with me. I know you're a cheerleader, Amber... play ball and you'll be able to stay one. But when I don't need you, you can still participate in your extra-curricular activities or do whatever you want. I'd normally say you can also hang out with whoever you want as long as they don't suspect anything, but remember that girl who left the party early? She gets shut out. Don't talk to her, don't hang out with her. She made her choice, she doesn't even get to be cool by association." Now she really did turn towards the door and left the room, only to poke her head back in and say, "Coming, Winnie?"

Winnie got up from the desk, gave one last look at Amber, and then followed Holly outside. They walked in silence, except for the clattering of heels on the floor, Winnie a few steps behind, and I finally recognized that they were on the second floor, near my history class. It wasn't until they got into the stairwell, on their way down, that Winnie spoke. "Where are we going?"

"We're going on a little drive."

"Where?"

"Where I tell you. That's all you need to know."

"Why are you doing this? What did we ever do to you?"

Holly was quiet for a long time, then looked back to Winnie with a hard, unsympathetic face, and said, "It's not always about you. Sometimes things just happen, and the only thing you can do is deal with it."

"But..."

"If you ask me one more question, you're going to piss me off, and you don't want to do that this early in our friendship." They got to the door, and Holly put on a fake smile again. "Besides, asking questions is never an attractive quality to guys, and we want you to be attractive, don't we?"

The video continued until they were out in the parking lot, and then jumped suddenly to the front door of somebody's house. Winnie must have stopped recording until she got wherever they were going, but at least she was smart enough to start up again in time to get more material we could use to blackmail Holly. I could see the house number, 18, but not the street, so I guess she wasn't that smart.

Holly knocked on the door, and it opened to an older man, in his thirties, maybe forties, dressed in a suit and tie. He looked around, as though to checking for witnesses, then stepped back and let the two in. Once they were safely inside, the man said, "This one of your new girls?"

"Yes. You wanted an Asian, and I got you an Asian. Don't ever say there's no customer service."

"Is she a virgin?"

"No, sorry to disappoint you. But you will be her first customer." Not if you counted back before we blackmailed her when she traded sex for gifts or grades from older men, but he had no way of knowing that and Winnie didn't say it.

The man grunted a bit, and said, "Let me see her tits."

"Show him," Holly said.

With a point-of-view camera stationed on the top of Winnie's head, we couldn't actually see what he saw, but I'd seen it before. She had pointy tits that had sprouted in middle school but hadn't grown much since, each tipped with a dark nipple. "Bigger than I was hoping," the man said, and rudely, without waiting for an invitation, reached out to grab one. Winnie pulled away, and the camera suddenly jerked to the right as I heard a smacking sound. She quickly looked back to Holly who was holding up a hand.

"Did I tell you to back away?" Winnie's head shook hurriedly. "Show him your pussy, too."

I couldn't see that either, but the expression on the man's face lit up for the first time. "Shaved," he said. "Nice." He reached out again, and this time Winnie didn't pull away. "She's not a virgin, so that mean her pussy's fair game?"

"No," Holly said. "The rules are the same. Right now the new girls are performing oral services only, whether they're virgins or not. I'll let you know when her cunt's on the market. This one's mouthy, so it might be sooner rather than later. Now do you want to throat fuck her today, or should I take her to someone else?"

He hesitated over the decision, but finally said, "Okay. You've sucked cock before?"

The camera shook very slightly, and I guess Holly jostled her arm or something to get her to answer, because Winnie said, "Yes."

The man shook his head a little, "I thought you were going to go for younger whores, ones who aren't such sluts?"

"Hey, it's hard. You want girls who haven't given blowjobs, you've got to go to middle school these days. We're working on it, but remember, any completely virgin hole is going to cost you at least 10 times as much." I guess her customers didn't know she pressured them into giving blowjobs to have something to hold over them. "Unless you're due for a raise, I'd stop hoping for purity if I were you."

"How much?"

"$150. Remember, you're her first customer, so you're still getting a deal."

"And what about you, if I can't get in her cunt, can I get in yours?"

Holly smirked. "Nice try, but you couldn't afford me. If you're desperate for a fuck, I can tell Miranda to drop by later, maybe an hour?"

"Nah, I'll be busy. I guess I'll take this girl's mouth... what's her name?"

"Winnie," Winnie herself said when it became obvious Holly wasn't going to volunteer it herself.

"Okay Winnie." He unzipped his slacks and pulled out a small but erect dick. "Let's see you put that pretty mouth of yours to work."

For the next three minutes or so, the video just had Winnie performing oral sex, but, since it was still taken from the headband, it wasn't very entertaining, even on the level of porn, just repeated close-ups of his belly and an occasional shot of dick, and sounds like she was being gagged or choked by something. This was no leisurely blowjob, the guy was rough, thrusting his dick in deeper than she was willing to go on her own. I skipped ahead, and overshot the end of the act. The next thing I saw was a shot of Winnie herself, wiping the cum off her face in front of a mirror. My heart broke a little as I realized she had tears in her eyes.

When she came out of the bathroom, Holly was collecting the money, mostly in twenty-dollar bills. She put them in her purse and then snapped her fingers and pointed Winnie to the door. "I'll let you know when her pussy goes up on the market."

He nodded. "You do that. Oh, and say hi to your Dad for me." Holly nodded absently, and the two left.

On their way back to the car, Winnie asked, "So how much of that money do I get?"

Holly looked at her incredulously. "What makes you think you get any of it? Get it through your pretty little head, I own you. Maybe, if you're really good, I'll decide you can get a share of what you earn with your cunt, like my other girls, but your mouth got you into this, and that's all mine."

The rest of the video was a near silent car-ride, punctuated only by Holly asking where Winnie wanted to be dropped off. The video ended a few minutes after the question but before the drop-off, when Winnie finally remembered to shut off the recorder.

I didn't really know what to say, so I waited for Erin to type. She didn't consult with me, just typed directly into the message window. "Winnie, I promise you I'm not behind this, and that I will get you out of it. I could do it right now, but I can't promise it won't be messy. But if you're willing to play along with Holly for a while, and work with me, I'll make sure you and Amber are out with no consequences to your reputation." I was worried about making promises we couldn't keep, but on the other hand, I didn't know what we could say other than that we'd look into it and see what we could do. If honesty wouldn't inspire confidence, maybe hope was the better option. "Keep track of all the money you earn for her," Erin added while I was mulling this over. "I'll make sure you get it all if Holly has to earn it for you herself. Okay?"

Winnie read the message, and a bit of a smirk formed on her face, and she nodded. "Okay."

"You'll work with me, and play along?" Erin asked.

"For a while anyway."

"Erin, Andrew!" I heard my mother calling from downstairs. "Dinner's ready."

Erin sent one last missive, instructing Winnie to fill Amber in, because the Blackmailer had to work on 'some plans', but really, that was just an excuse to get out of the conversation. We may be evil genius blackmailers, but we still can't get out of our Mom calling us for dinner.

***
Chapter Eight:

Erin and I met on the stairs going down... she seemed relaxed, confident, and though we didn't say anything, she didn't seem worried at all. But then, I didn't want to look worried either, or like there was anything on my mind, not during dinner, so I put on a blank face and went down to eat.

Dinner was simple because Mom had been running late today, just chicken and vegetables. We ate quietly at first, which was a little odd. Mom usually took advantage of family dinners to ask us what was going on in school or our hobbies. Of course, we couldn't tell her everything about our lives, there was one gaping hole between us, that of the special relationship Erin and I had, but we still appreciated the connection... we were all in it together, after our dad died. Erin and I were closer to each other, but Mom was still an important part of our family unit, and her silence gradually became a little unnerving.

I was about halfway through my meal when Mom finally spoke up. "I wanted to talk to you both about something."

I looked up, feeling that flush of instinctive fear that she was onto the secrets we'd kept from her, but she didn't seem mad at all, just a little nervous. "What's that?"

"I'm not sure exactly how to say this, but... well, you know both of you are the most important thing in my life. And that's never going to change, no matter what happens. But, lately..." she hesitated, looking for exactly the right words.

"You've been dating," Erin said for her, giving me a little sidelong grin, and I relaxed a little. About time. We'd assumed it was happening for a while.

Mom looked both amused and flustered at being caught out before she revealed herself. "No," she said. "Not exactly. I mean, we're just friends right now. But I know he wants more, and I'd be lying if I said I hadn't thought about it, and he's a very sweet man."

"Mom, it's okay," Erin said. "You don't have to sugar coat it. We're not babies. We don't mind if you date."

"I just don't want you guys to think that I'm trying to replace your father or anything like that. Nothing will ever change how I feel about him, or you guys."

"We know, Mom," I said. "Really, we just want you to be happy. If he makes you happy, who are we to stand in your way?"

"Okay," she said, and took a deep breath, looking relieved, like all of this had turned out to be much easier than she'd been preparing for. There was a little bit of flush in her cheeks, too. "I was thinking of inviting him over for dinner one of these days, if you guys are okay with it. He really wants to meet you."

So much for them not dating yet. I didn't think people talked about meeting each other's kids until they were pretty well in a relationship already. Still, I meant what I said. "So what's his name?"

"Lawrence," she said.

"Tell us about him," Erin suggested.

"Well, he's about my age... he runs his own business. Does volunteer work."

"Any kids?" Erin asked, bringing up a good point. That could get complicated if we all started hanging out together, especially if they went to the same school.

To my relief, Mom said, "No."

"Ever been married?"

"Once, but she passed away several years ago."

"You sure he didn't kill her?"

Mom was more amused than outraged, surprisingly. "Erin!"

"Well, that's how it always is on TV. A girl dates a widower, turns out he killed her." I knew Erin didn't really believe that. My sister spent so long pretending to not be as intelligent as she was, she still slipped into the role. Surprisingly, she did it most often around Mom, like she was trying to reassure her she was still a normal kid despite her freakish IQ and photographic memory.

"Well, this isn't TV. He's a wonderful man. I'm sure you both will like him." I hoped so, but it really didn't matter, I figured, as long as he wasn't some kind of monster, if he made my mom happy, I'd do my best to get along with him.

She described him a little more, how she met him while jogging, some of the dates, or as she described them 'friendly outings' they went on, but then wanted to close the topic and talk about us. As usual, we told her everything that was going on in our lives except for anything that was actually important.

It was only after dinner, while Mom did the dishes downstairs, that Erin and I resumed the more secret portion of our lives, and talked about what we'd just seen. "What are we going to do about Winnie and Amber?" We sat in my room, talking in hushed tones. As long as we continued to hear the occasional clang of dishes from downstairs, there was little risk in that.

"Exactly what we said. We just get enough material to counter-blackmail her, and then they're out. Bet you oral that we get it done within the week." That was a joke bet, since she blew me or I ate her out nearly as often as we fucked.

"Come on," I said. "This isn't some random mean girl we're taking down, this is... a prostitution ring. And what about that picture on her phone?" The dead girl.

"Isn't it obvious? Did you recognize the girl? I didn't. She googled 'gunshot victim' or something and took the image from there. It's all a bluff." That made sense... there weren't any cases of a girl we knew being murdered in recent memory. Car crashes had claimed a few, and at least one had ODed on something last year. A few have just disappeared, but everyone assumed they were runaways. If someone we'd recognize was dead in an alley with a gunshot wound, we'd know, wouldn't we? "I know a bluff when I see one. She's got a bunch of girls fooled, but so do we. And did you see how she took credit for stuff we did?" That I had noticed. Angela and Stella, the only two girls who had nude photos spread school wide, were down to us. Stella we did together as part of Project Vengeance. Angela, my last show-girlfriend, was ruined because of Erin's jealousy, and was still a sore point between us. "All we have to do is bluff her better. We could probably even make some good money on this, bring back Blackmailers Incorporated, and squeeze her client base."

I felt a rumbling worry in the pit of my stomach. A couple years ago we'd blackmailed two people we knew were having underage sex. Both paid up, but in the years since, I'd had the occasional nightmare where they tracked us down and decided killing us was better than living under the fear of more blackmail. "Let's not rush into this," I suggested. "Besides, we still need to find out what Cassie knows."

"Cassie proves my point," Erin said. "She obviously knows something about what's going on, and yet nothing's happened to her... there's not even any rumors about incriminating pictures." She saw my unconvinced look, and promised, "But I'll talk to her tomorrow. We'll go slow."

Sometimes I think about what might have happened if Erin decided we could handle it ourselves, without involving Cassie, and we blundered into something that was far more complicated than we were aware of.

***
Chapter Nine:

Nothing of note happened in school the next day, at least to my knowledge, but I kept my eye out for Winnie and Amber in the halls, as well as for their blackmailers. I saw Amber, once, alone, in between classes, gave her a nod and she didn't even seem to see me. During the lunch rush at lockers, I saw some of the freshman girls with their older escorts, keeping them on a short leash. None of them looked all that happy.

Speaking of not looking happy, Cassie herself was back at school, but seemed glum and not very communicative. I looked to Erin, who just shook her head... she hadn't yet talked to her. The lunch break certainly wasn't a time to press the issue.

Erin later told me she spent most of her time with Cassie that day getting her to accept an invite to our house after school, ostensibly to watch anime, but really to get her alone where they could talk. Cassie didn't want to go anywhere, but my sister talked her into it, promising her new subs of a series she was into.

I gave both of them a ride, and before we went inside, Cassie stopped to have a cigarette. Erin and I went in ahead, and she told me that she was going to try to get her to open up about Holly, and that I should watch on her webcam.

A few minutes later, Cassie came in, and Erin, who enjoyed opportunities to flaunt our relationship safely, kissed me on the lips and said, "Okay, Cassie and I are going to watch some anime now. Try not to make too much noise."

I was a little flustered, both at Cassie's refusal to look at us, and the sudden unexpected suggestion that I might be noisy, but tried to play it off as coolly as I could. "Oh I won't, I'll probably just be working on one of my game ideas."

Although I lingered downstairs for a minute or two after they left, getting a glass of water and a cookie, I soon went up to my room, woke my computer from sleep mode, and opened up the program that would give me secret access to my sister's webcam. It was a bit of a disturbing reminder of the past... I'd rarely done it that way since Erin found out about what I'd done to her when I blackmailed her. She might have forgiven me, but I didn't think I'd ever fully forgive myself.

Erin was right at the computer, clicking through something on her mouse, and then said, "Cassie, I actually wanted to ask you something..." It was as if she knew exactly when I'd started watching. I immediately realized that was quite possibly the case. My sister is after all very smart, and she not only heard me coming up the stairs, but might well have been monitoring processes for the one which signaled that my spy program had been launched, or even just the sudden uptick in CPU usage.

Cassie was sitting on the bed, looking through some of my sister's notes, making updates to her own. She certainly hadn't noticed my spying. "Yeah, what?"

"What do you know about Holly?"

Cassie's head snapped up, eyes wide opened, looking like she'd just been slapped. "What?"

"You used to be friends with her, right?"

"I don't want to talk about it," she said curtly.

"Please, Cassie. You know my friends Winnie and Amber, right? I have a feeling they're in some kind of trouble, and it all started when they started hanging out with her. You know something, don't you?"

"I can't talk about it," she said, and I could hear a catch in her voice, like she was on the verge of crying. "Please, just drop it?"

"I can't, Cassie," Erin said. "Remember when we first started hanging out, you said she was only pretending to be nice, and that if I fell for it she'd get very mean, very fast. I think something like that's happened, but I need to know what's going on so I can help."

"You can't help!" Cassie snapped. "Nobody can help! She's a monster."

"All the more reason I need to know the truth! Cause if I don't know it, I'm going to try and might screw things up, right?" Cassie didn't answer. "Cassie, you're my friend... my best friend. You know my biggest secret, the one I can't tell anybody. I trust you with it. So why can't you trust me?" Cassie sat with a grumpy look on her face, but I thought I could see glistening tears welling up in her eyes. "I promise, if you don't want me to, I won't tell anybody. Not even Andrew." I inwardly winced at that, but the promise seemed to work. Cassie looked up at her speculatively, and what Erin said next seemed to seal the deal. "Swear to... well, you know I don't believe in God, but... I swear on our friendship. Maybe just telling somebody would help. Nobody likes being alone with a secret."

"You can't tell anybody," Cassie said.

"I just said I wouldn't."

"I mean it. This isn't just me. If anybody finds out I told you, they won't just take it out on me, it's my family, too."

"I won't. Even if it means not helping Winnie and Amber."

"I don't know what's going on with them," she said. "Not for sure. All I know is what happened to me." I waited on the edge of my seat. "We were friends at first. I told her everything, we hung out after school. Anyway, there was this guy I really liked. He was a senior, really popular, so there was like, no chance, but we were having a sleepover one night and Holly said she had a surprise for me." She practically spit out the word 'surprise'. "It was a guy who came over. She said he was a good friend of Henry... the guy I liked. He owed Holly a favor so he'd coach me on what kind of girls Henry liked, and so I'd have a chance of attracting his attention... and he'd talk me up, you know, get him interested in me. I got really excited about it, I was totally in love with him, and then they hit me with the catch. I had to blow him. I wasn't a total slut, I didn't want to, but then he said that if I didn't, Henry would hear all the wrong things about me, that I was a dyke." She closed her eyes and winced. "I talked him into just letting me jerk him off. I thought it was no big deal, so long as nobody knew but... Holly took a picture on her phone."

So far there was nothing very surprising, but it was still an engrossing story. "She blackmailed me with it. I thought she was just kidding, at first, but she put it on her computer and had it ready to send to Henry's e-mail, and was just getting ready to hit send. So I put my mouth on the guy, and I knew she was going to take a picture of that too but I didn't think I had a choice. And he came down my throat, it was so disgusting. From then on I did whatever she wanted me to... I went to her place after school the next day and she made me suck off her Dad." I flinched, and Cassie confirmed my thought. "They were in it together. They wanted me as their whore. He didn't fuck me right then because I wasn't on the pill, but he fucked my ass, and the next day Holly gave me a pack of birth control pills and made me start taking them, and a couple weeks later they were doing everything, not just him and her, but other guys, even a couple teachers. It was the worst few months of my life. I didn't want to do it, but they threatened me. Every time I told them I wouldn't, Holly would show the picture of me on her phone, and say that first she'd send it to Henry, then my parents, and then everybody else..."

"So what happened?" Erin asked. "How did you get out?"

"I was at her place. She usually had me do ads on Craigslist and then we'd go either to a motel or the customer's house, and her dad would wait outside, but this time her dad had a friend over. They watched me and Holly, you know, do lez stuff with each other. I hated that, I'd have rather done some guy than touch her ugly crack. After we'd gotten them hard enough, they both had sex with me, and they were complaining about me, making jokes about how I was getting used up, and they should get another whore, and then went downstairs for a beer, Holly too. They said I could take a shower, 'just because I looked like a pig there was no reason to smell like one.'" She winced at that and her voice cracked as she got through it, as though that was somehow more painful than everything else. "When I was done, they were still downstairs, and I noticed Holly's phone on her bed. I crept in, deleted the pictures on it, and then did the same on her computer. Emptied the recycle bin and everything. It took so long I was sure they were going to catch me in the act, but when I was done they were still downstairs, laughing and looking through our old middle school yearbook like it was a shopping list. They said I could go home when I said my dad was expecting me."

"So, what happened when she found out the pictures were gone?" Erin asked.

"She didn't even notice until the next day. She tried to get me to go with her again to do some guy on Craigslist, and I told her no, that I wasn't going with her ever again. She freaked when she realized the pictures were gone, she hit me, hard. I told her I was going to call the police on her, that now I had evidence that she'd hit me, and she just smiled, told me to try it." She took a deep breath. "When I got home from school that day I found out my Dad had been pulled over and arrested for crack possession. My dad never did drugs. Holly did it to him, she has friends, customers even, all over. I knew it even before she showed up at my house to gloat. She said 'The police are my friends, not yours,' and then said that if I wanted my Dad to get off with probation, my bruises were an accident." She was quiet for a while, then said, "My Dad lost his job because of that, and Holly kept making threats. She said that I could be arrested up for prostitution on the way home. Or they could seize my dad's computer and find child porn. Or that I could just get raped one day, or be dragged into a van and... disappear, and the police would pretend they had no idea who did it."

"She said this to make you go back to working for her?"

"No," Cassie said. "I thought she was going to, but she said that I was lucky, because it would be more trouble to keep managing me than I was worth. I'd gotten too fat, she said, and her customers liked 'hot young pieces of tail' with the 'innocent schoolgirl' vibe. So she said, because we were 'friends' once, she'd let me go... so long as I never got in her way. If I messed with her or tried to tell anybody what she did, she'd destroy me. Then she told me I owed her one, like she was doing me a favor. That was the last thing she ever said to me, except like, in class once or twice when we had group work, or gym, shit like that."

Erin took a second to think about it and said, "I'm so sorry, Cassie, I had no idea."

"She's a monster," Cassie repeated. "And I'm a coward."

"You're not a coward."

"Yes I am. I kept to myself for a whole year, just locking myself in my room after school and watching anime. But in school, I saw her going after other girls, ones who didn't have many friends, who were thrilled she was hanging out with them. If I'd just told them the truth..."

"She might have gone through with her threats. And you did do something. You tried to warn Winnie and Amber. You tried to warn me."

"You just looked so young," she said. "And I didn't think she'd care if I never said the whole truth. She's gone after girls before and they never bit, so I figured, she'd just think she failed."

Erin leaned over any hugged Cassie. "You saved me, you know? And not just from Holly, you don't know how much I needed a friend." Cassie smiled weakly, but seemed genuinely touched. "I'm going to pay you back. I'm going to defeat Holly for you."

"No!" Cassie snapped, pulled away from the hug almost violently. "You promised. Nobody can know. If she found out I told you..."

"She won't."

"She might. She knows we're friends, and if you got in her way she'd think I was behind it. And even if she didn't, it could all get out, if Kirk found out I was a whore, he'd never forgive me."

"I'll make sure he doesn't. Trust me, I'm super-smart."

"I know you are, but... please, Erin. I'm not a math test... this is my life, here. If you try to take on Holly, she'll squash you and me both, and my family, and maybe even Andrew. She can do it, too... if she can get cops and judges on her side, she can do anything. Leave it alone. I'd never have told you if I thought you were going to try to do something. You promised me."

"Okay," Erin said soothingly. "I'll keep my promise." After a second, she said, "Hey. Thank you for telling me. It means a lot."

"Yeah, well, you were wrong. It doesn't feel any better getting it off my chest." She sighed, and said, "I don't want to talk about it anymore. I just want to forget it."

"Okay. Let's just watch this." She got up to go to the computer again. "It'll take your mind of things."

"Hey, before you start it... you got any snacks?"

"There are some chips downstairs."

"Get 'em."

I thought about meeting Erin downstairs, but instead decided to wait until Cassie was gone. I stopped watching them a couple minutes later, watching people watching subtitled anime is not very interesting and I doubted there'd be much of note. So, I did a little bit of my homework, then did some work on some games, and got a little caught up in it and lost track of time. Next thing I knew, there was a soft knock at my door.

I opened it, found Erin and Cassie standing together in the hall, Cassie nervously rubbing one arm with her opposite hand. "Hey, Andrew, I don't mean to bug you, but, it's starting to get a little dark out and I was wondering if you could give Cassie a ride home?"

"Oh, sure." I grabbed my keys and my jacket, and then we went out to my car. Erin didn't come along, which left me alone with Cassie, a somewhat rare occurrence... I wanted to try and comfort her somehow, tell her how horrible what happened to her was, but I couldn't, not without revealing what I knew, and certainly not without feeling a little like a hypocrite. So instead, we rode in near silence... about the only thing we said to each other was when I asked her how the anime was, and she grunted something like fine, and when I let her go, she thanked me for the ride.

***
Chapter Ten:

Mom was home when I got back. "Where were you?" she asked, just wondering, not accusingly. I explained. "Oh, right, that explains the cigarette butts out on the porch." She sighed and shook her head. "I can't stand that girl." She looked at me suddenly and said, "Don't tell Erin I said that. It'd probably just make them hang out more."

"I don't think Erin's quite that rebellious," I said. "And Cassie's not so bad, really."

"I'm sure Cassie's very nice, I just worry she's a bad influence, all that smoking and drinking. She was at that party last year, wasn't she?" She'd actually mostly given up the smoking, but she'd slipped and started up again over the last few days.

Mom still hadn't let that go, the Halloween party Erin got drunk... it was my fault, although Cassie should have kept a better eye on her. "Because she was dating Kirk. They both went with me. It wasn't her fault Erin showed up."

"Never mind, I just wish she'd hang out more with wholesome girls her own age, like Winnie and Amber." I'd almost have laughed if it wasn't so sad. Clearly Mom was in a bit of a mood, rare for her, but we all have them, so I decided just to nod and went upstairs.

My sister's door was open, Mom was safely downstairs straightening up before starting dinner, so I went in. She nodded at me. "Thanks for giving Cassie a ride, I didn't want to leave her alone today, after, well, that."

I nodded. "That was pretty heavy stuff." I took a peek at her screen. She was on an anonymous message board in one window, looking up something about spyware on another. "I have to admit, Holly sounds a lot more dangerous than I thought."

"Yeah," Erin agreed reluctantly. "I'm... less sure everything was a bluff. I think most of it is, but she might actually have some police on her side, and that could get dangerous. I still think I can take her out, though. I just have to be a lot more careful about it." She looked back at me, as though expecting me to disagree. "She has to be stopped, right?"

"Yeah, I guess. I just would rather somebody else did it." Yet, I didn't think anybody else was going to step up. "But we should be really, really careful before we do anything. Maybe we can institute a revolt from within or something."

"It's an idea," Erin agreed, looking back to the screen.

"It might even be the safest, if we could get the blackmail material, to just release it... then nobody would have a reason to follow her."

Erin hmmmed. "I promised Winnie and Amber I'd get them out with their reputations intact. I really don't want to break my promise."

"Yeah, well, what about when you promised Cassie you wouldn't tell anybody what happened to her?"

She looked back at me with a puzzled expression. "I'm not going to break that either."

"You already did. You said you wouldn't tell anyone, even me. And..."

"And if you weren't watching, or you came down with amnesia or something, I couldn't tell you. I never said anything about you listening in. Not telling the whole truth isn't the same as lying."

I knew most people didn't think that way, but the truth was, I always did, at least when it applied to myself, so I didn't challenge her on it. "It's going to be hard to get them out of this." Cleanly, anyway.

"I know. I've got some ideas, but they need to be developed first."

"Such as...?"

She smiled at me. "I'll tell you later, when I've weeded out the really stupid ones. It's how I maintain my reputation as a genius."

"Just as long as you do tell me," I said. "And not go flying off trying to handle this on your own." She had a history of doing things without really checking first, assuming that it would be easier to get my forgiveness than permission. I guess she was right in that, but it bothered me more and more every time.

"I won't," she said. "Before I do anything with Holly, I'll tell you." She refreshed the page, read what seemed to be a bunch of new posts, and smiled.

Curiosity got the better of me and I leaned over her to get a better look. "What are you doing?"

"Test marketing," she said. She scrolled up to the top of the thread, where there was a sex picture of Azula and Zuko from the cartoon Avatar: The Last Airbender, and, in text beside it, "Kinship stories thread! For those who don't know, a kinship is the proper term for a committed, consensual romantic relationship between people who are related. I've had a kinship with my older brother since I was 13. We're deeply in love, and I can't imagine any other guy making me happy... the only thing that gets me down sometimes is that society just isn't ready to accept us. I know we're not alone, though, and our numbers are growing. If you have any questions, I'll try to answer them, and if you're in a kinship, whether with a sibling or cousin, tell your story!" She scrolled back down before I could read much of the first few comments, and I couldn't see most of the replies except that for some reason pictures of Spider-Man were being posted, but the last one included a story of somebody who was in love with their cousin.

I guess like me, she wanted a distraction, to think about something else, other than Cassie and Winnie and Amber, but still, revealing our story? "Oh, Erin," I said, shaking my head.

"It's no big deal," she said. "It's anonymous, and I'm making up most of the details. They wouldn't understand the true story anyway, it just muddies the issue."

"Because it wasn't consensual," I said, frowning. I just couldn't escape reminders of that, it seemed.

"It was... I didn't do anything I didn't secretly want to. Yeah, there were... icky parts. I've forgiven you for all that, I just can't use the story if I'm trying to promote this term the way I want to."

"What's the reaction?"

She shrugged. "Mixed, of course. Lots of people don't believe it, some want me to post pictures to prove what I say, a few are trolls, some white knights are trying to convince me you abused me. A few people telling their own stories, and a surprising amount who are really supportive even though they don't have sisters."

"You're not actually planning on posting any pictures, are you?" We had some on both of our computers when we were in the mood to see what we looked like having different kinds of sex, not to mention videos we made with Winnie and Amber that were supposedly for the Blackmailer.

She grinned. "No. But I'm thinking about it." She rubbed my crotch. "Come on, wouldn't it be fun? No faces, of course, but just my hand on your dick, maybe a little sign saying 'I love my brother'?"

"Sounds fun, until they track us down."

"Come on, you know I know how to make us totally anonymous. You should think about it. Not now, of course, not while Mom's home, but I'm going to have to do lots of these threads to help get the idea out there, sooner or later it would be fun to blow their minds."

The idea did hold a strange attraction to me, even though I knew it shouldn't. Mostly I knew it would make Erin happy to rub our relationship in other people's faces, even if they were faraway strangers without any faces. "Maybe. Let me think about it."

She nodded, let go of my dick, and then typed something up, in reply to somebody else, about how their story isn't really a kinship story, it's more of a kinlust story, but it was still really hot. She told me her definitions. 'Kinplay' was just fooling around, experimenting sexually, either from boredom or curiosity. 'Kinlust' was a rampant sexual urge for someone you're related to, but not necessarily with romantic content. 'Kinlove' is a romantic love, and a 'Kinship' is supposed to be making it official, deciding to be like boyfriend and girlfriend, even if secret, although she said you can also use it more loosely as a general term for all positive incest relationships. "I've already uploaded definitions of this to urban dictionary and sites like that, and created a few webpages that talk about it so if anyone googles the terms they'll see it as a real thing. I mean, obviously, it'll still take a long time for this to go anywhere in changing people's perceptions, but it's a start."

I shook my head to myself, still not thinking she had any chance of doing it, but leaned down and kissed her softly on the cheek. "Have fun. I have some reading to do for English tomorrow, going to see if I can get it done before dinner."

"Love you," she said. Whenever she said that, I really did feel like everything was going to be all right.

"Love you too."

***
Chapter Eleven:

The rest of that week was pretty quiet, but a lot happened in the next one. It started pretty slowly from my perspective. The first, and most annoying, was I got an invitation to a party, one I'd rather have passed up, although not many others in the school would have felt the same way. I'm not much of a party person in general... I'd prefer hanging out casually with a small group of friends rather than getting drunk and high in a large crowd of people. For those who did like such things, though, I got invited to what would be considered pretty much the ultimate party invitation, at Eddie's house. He regularly threw parties, big ones, because his parents went out of town at the drop of a hat, leaving him alone in a huge house with more allowance than is probably healthy for a kid. In fact, I don't think he actually had an allowance, just a credit card his parents always seemed to pay off.

I wasn't cool enough to be personally invited, but Madison was friend of a friend, and so although we didn't go to every party, since I'd started dating her, I'd been dragged to a few of them. Usually I just made an appearance, wandered around until people got too drunk to notice, and then went to my car to 'get something'. Really, I crawled into the back and took a nap until Madison wanted to go home.

The system worked remarkably well. I was too much of a nonentity in that crowd to be missed, and whenever anybody did see me they thought I'd just gotten hammered. I gained a reputation not being able to hold my liquor, but I didn't care about that. I still would have preferred not going at all, but a nap beat hanging out with people I didn't care about.

Madison dropped the bomb on me on Monday, that Eddie was having another party the following Saturday, and we would be going. The funny thing was, Madison didn't like most of the people there much either... to her it was just one of the chores of being popular, you had to be seen in popular circles, even if you didn't much like them. This was especially true when they were not only popular, but a year ahead of you. Madison was one of the most popular girls among the juniors, but to seniors, she was barely a blip on the popularity radar. I don't mean that to be insulting, me and my friends weren't even a blip. So hanging out with the seniors, dating a senior, all of that increased her cache among her own set. Madison was friends with Chelsea, another junior who was dating one of Eddie's good friends, and a handful of others, which was the only reason we got an invite.

Of course, when Kirk heard, he wanted me to find a way to invite him and Cassie along, and wheedled me through an entire lunch period. Jay and Tony probably would have liked to be invited but were more realistic and didn't push. My sister didn't want to go, she was just disappointed that we'd lose out a night together on a night Mom would probably be going out on a date with her new guy.

Speaking of him, we met him officially on Tuesday. He drove my mother home, or rather drove her home again. Her car was there when Erin and I got home from school, but Erin had a message on her voicemail that Mom was going out for a while with 'a friend'. She still felt self-conscious about using the word boyfriend, it seemed. There was a promise that she'd be back before dinner, and once we were assured that we'd be alone, Erin and I made love in my bed. It was playful with just a hint more urgency than usual, because we didn't know exactly when Mom would be arriving.

As it turned out, we heard the downstairs door open just a few minutes after I came inside my sister, and worse, she called for us. Erin pranced into the bathroom clutching her clothes, and I sprayed on some deodorant, put my shirt back on, pulled my pants up, and then started down the stairs. I could already hear that Mom was talking with somebody, a man.

I had a feeling this was coming, the meet the boyfriend moment, even though I didn't expect it just this second. I put on a fake smile before they were in view. "Yeah, what's up?"

"Where's your sister?"

"I don't know," I lied, then looked back upstairs. "Bathroom, maybe?" Erin was light of feet and didn't make much noise in the upstairs hallway, and closed the door softly enough that she could plausibly claim she was in there the whole time. "I know she's here somewhere."

Mom nodded, then decided that introducing us one-at-a-time was going to have to do. "Andrew, I'd like you to meet Lawrence." The man she introduced was probably a little older than her, maybe forty, forty-five, with light brown hair, taller than me and with more of a bigger build, like he was the kind of guy who played football in high school when he was young and kept the size but the muscles had softened. I also realized he was startlingly familiar, although I didn't know exactly from where.

"We've met, actually," he said, but extended his hand anyway. I took it warily, and he shook it, and with the grasp I realized where we'd met before, where we'd shaken hands before. He was one of the parishioners at Maddy's father's church, one of the ones I thought was always a little too friendly and talkative for a stranger.

Now I knew why, I guess. He was already friendly with my Mom, knew who I was, and wanted to make some kind of connection without revealing himself. "Right, you go to Maddy's church."

"It's God's church, son," he said, giving me an instant sinking feeling no matter how pleasantly he smiled when he said it. "But yes. I noticed you've missed the last few."

"Yeah, well, lately I've been busy with school. I only really go for Madison anyway." It was probably the wrong thing to say to one of those every-weekers, but I couldn't think of a better lie.

"I know, you were brought up like your mother, you believe in Christ and his sacrifice, but don't like to make a big production about it." Actually, though I was kind of up in the air about whether some kind of God existed, I was pretty well convinced Christ was just a guy with a few decent ideas about peace and brotherhood who got blown way out of proportion. "And that's fine, I can respect that, but Church does provide an important role, fellowship with other Christians lets us all help each other fulfill God's plan for us."

"Uh-huh," I said noncommittally. I didn't want to argue, make a bad impression for Mom's new guy, or for somebody who could rat me out to Madison's parents. Alarm bells were starting to ring in my head, though. "I prefer to deal with God privately, in my own way." He leaves me alone, I leave him alone. "Like you said, that's the way we were raised."

"To be honest, we could probably deal with a little more spirituality in this family," my mom said, and those warning bells became huge klaxons, like when a ship's approaching self-destruct.

Erin started down the stairs before I could get any more worried about my mother becoming crazy religious. "Who's this?"

"This is Lawrence. Remember, I told you about him."

"Oh, right. Hi." She didn't sound interested at all, just polite.

"Hi there. You must be Erin. Your mom talks a lot about you. You're the genius of the family." I wasn't sure, but I thought I could see it in his eyes when he talked to her, that he was attracted to my sister. That's not unusual, my sister's very pretty, lots of people get that look and never do anything about it, but it was one more thing to be worried about.

"I guess," Erin said with a shrug. "I can't be too much of a genius though, or I'd be rich and famous already."

"Well, there's more to life than money and fame. Jesus said that it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get into heaven."

My sister flashed me a look, one that said, 'is this guy serious?' "Sure," she said out loud. "But it sure makes life easier while you're waiting."

At least Lawrence had the good grace to smile at the joke and not push the issue. Instead, he looked at me and said, "Andrew, you look like a strong young man, mind giving me a hand getting something out of my truck?"

The something turned out to be a bench for the front porch my mother bought, the reason she went with his car instead of by herself... her car wouldn't fit it. I found myself wishing that my mother's dating him was all an elaborate scheme to make use of his car and save on delivery fees, but didn't see it as very likely.

Luckily, he didn't stay for dinner, he had other plans, or, as Erin later suggested, maybe Mom thought it would be best if we only experienced him in small doses until we built up a tolerance.

Thursday, my morning started on a hopeful note, besides the morning blowjob Erin gave me. At school, people were abuzz because Ben and Chelsea had broken up. They'd been dating a little over a year. I normally don't care about gossip, but two things made this about me. First, Chelsea was Madison's friend, the one who extended the party invite to Madison and therefore myself. Second, Ben was one of Eddie's best friends. Naturally, I thought that Chelsea might be disinvited, and therefore that Madison and by extension me would be as well. It was like I got out of a jail sentence on a technicality.

That thought made the first few classes of the day go by pleasantly, but when I finally caught up with Madison at lunch, those hopes were dashed. "No, we're still going," she said. "Chelsea's going to the party. Ben's not." She must have seen the deflated look on my face, for she smirked and touched my arm gently. "Relax, it's just one night."

I mentally rolled my eyes, and told her that I was going to eat with my friends that day, and she let it go. Lunch was a quieter affair than usual, with Jay off doing something in the music room, and my sister wasn't there either, Erin said she had to work on a project with someone, which, knowing her, meant she would be in the library doing all the work. Conversation wasn't the greatest among those left, either... Kirk and Tony were discussing going to Tony's place after school, or rather Kirk wanted to go and Tony wasn't sure it was a good idea, because he had assignments or something, but looked willing to be talked into it.

It was stupid, but I was a little offended. I wasn't asked. Used to be Kirk mostly hung out with me. Even if I had better things to do. "What are you guys gonna be doing?"

"Not much, just playing some video games," Kirk said. "You could come too, but I figured you'd be too busy planning for your party."

I rolled my eyes, this time not mentally. "Hey, it's not my party. Madison's dragging me there. I thought I was going to get out of it because Chelsea broke up with Ben, and she's Madison's 'in', but..."

"Chelsea," Kirk said. "Now there's a girl you could go for, Tony. Cute, vulnerable, fresh from a breakup." I didn't find her all that cute, her hair was way too big and she wore too much flashy makeup.

Tony laughed. "And way out of my league. Besides, she did the breaking up. And I think she's already got somebody else."

"Who?"

"Eddie." He shrugged, as though embarrassed by the fact that he was even aware of such gossip. "S'what I hear."

"It's true," Cassie revealed with a bit of a grumble. "I heard her talking about it. She's probably been doing him on the side for weeks, too. I don't get how someone can be that insensitive."

"Yeah," Kirk agreed quickly. "It's pretty sick."

"I guess that would explain why she's still going to the party and he's not." We talked a little while longer, and at one point Cassie got up to get another Coke and when I next looked over, Christie was in her face, angrily gesturing. I nudged Kirk, and he got up to defend his girl. I followed behind.

"It wasn't enough that my life is ruined because I listened to you, but now you make me spill my drink all over my bag? But you're sorry, so I guess that makes it all better."

"What's going on here?" Kirk demanded.

Christine, red faced, flung her hand in the direction of Cassie, like she was too angry to point. "Thanks to your girlfriend my friends don't even talk to me anymore."

"What did you do?" he asked Cassie, with not a hint of accusation in his voice.

"Nothing," she said simply. "Just gave some advice."

"Bad advice," Christie spat. "I don't know why I ever thought an obvious loser like you might know anything. I mean, if you did, you wouldn't be such a... loser!"

"Hey," Kirk said defensively, but Christie was already walking off, pushing past Cassie and heading off to another table to try and wipe down her bag with napkins. He looked a little befuddled, then asked his girlfriend, "You okay?"

"Yeah," she said, and I could tell by her face, she really was. She was almost happy. Anyone not knowing the situation might have thought it was smug, but I knew better and smiled back... and then realized there was no reason I should have known, so quashed it.

"You know I can't hit a girl," Kirk said. "But if you want I can look the other way while you hit her. I bet you can take her." I agreed on that part... Cassie could flatten her.

Cassie shook her head and smiled. "Nah, she was probably just having a bad day, and needed someone to explode on."

That seemed to be the Day Of Inexplicable Cheer among my circle. Or Occasionally Inexplicable Cheer. Cassie was happy despite that little confrontation but I figured it was because she knew she was successful at saving somebody from Holly's clutches, even at the expense of a social life. Others though, were happy for reasons that were less clear. I later saw Jay in class and he was grinning like a madman all through a boring lecture, but he refused to explain it as anything other than "I'm in a good mood today." Kirk was pretty cheerful about convincing Tony to play video games, and of course Erin had an enigmatic smile when we met by my car. I didn't get to ask her about it, because, with Kirk hanging out with Tony, Cassie caught a ride home with me and Erin, but both of them seeming pretty happy, it actually made me smile by the end of the day too, even though I had nothing in particular to smile about. Aside from the usual fact of having a beautiful sexy sister like Erin.

"So you look like you had a good day," I asked once we got home.

She rolled back and forth on the balls of her feet excitedly. "Yup."

"What happened?"

"It's a secret." I raised an eyebrow. "Well, more like a surprise. I'll tell you in a few days, I promise."

"Do I get a hint?"

"Hmmm, I don't know. Let's just say something I thought would be hard just got a whole lot easier."

That sounded surprisingly ominous, but I didn't want to put a pall on the Day of Inexplicable Cheer, so I made a decision not to question it and trust her. "As long as you had a good day."

"How about you? Did you have a good day?"

I shrugged, but with a little smile. "It was okay. Could have been better." If only I could have gotten out of the party.

She grabbed my hand and tugged me towards the stairs. "Then wanna go upstairs and make it better?"

That's an offer you never want to refuse. We went up to my room and made out for a while, her just lying on my stomach, both clothed, while we kissed. Gradually my hands started to dip under her shirt and feel her breasts, and soon the shirt itself was abandoned, and the bra. She could certainly feel my erection through my pants but we continued to take it slow, kissing for a few more minutes, with soft caresses all over, before her hands finally worked the button on my jeans free. She rolled off of me for a second, then pulled her own pants off, and soon she was back on top of me, riding me while I lay down, probably my favorite position because I can see the best parts of her, and her obvious enjoyment as I thrust myself inside of her.

Eventually we shifted positions and I was on top for the finish, staring down at her as she had an orgasm that preceded mine, which was unusual, since I hadn't eaten her out much, it was just making out and feeling up. She was pretty wet when we started, so she must have pretty well been simmering for some time... even though she said this was for me, it was clearly as much for her, and I wondered briefly what had set her off. But we both had days where we were extra horny for no real reason, and I just assumed this was one of them.

After she came, she had this beatific look on her face, serene, despite that I was still fucking her pretty intensely, she looked like some kind of angel just about to drift off to sleep. It was so beautiful that I almost wanted to just stop and stare at her, capture that moment forever, but my balls were telling me I had to keep going, I was almost there, and I listened to them, coming inside her barely a minute later. She smiled widely when we were done, asking, "So, now you had a good day?"

"Yeah... definitely a good day," I said, catching my breath. I leaned forward and kissed her once more softly, and she kissed back. "God I love you."

"I love you too."

Friday started pretty dull, but Mom did go out with Lawrence so Erin and I would have most of the night to ourselves. Instead of just fucking non-stop like rabbits, which, don't get me wrong, always makes a great Friday night, we decided to make it something of a date night of our own. I took her to a movie, far from home and the movie'd been out for a few weeks already so the theatre was almost empty. We didn't do anything sexual, unless you count Erin regularly stroking my cock through my jeans, but I put my arm around her and we kissed a few times like a couple, out in public, because to anybody who was nearby, complete strangers, we weren't brother and sister, just a couple in love. It was one of those things that was missing from our relationship and seemed all the more special when we could pretend. On the way home we grabbed some take-out, and ate in the car.

After that, we returned home, fucked, cuddled naked and planned to fucked again. "Because you might not get laid tomorrow", was what she told me. "At least, I hope not."

"Not until I get home... and only if Mom has an unscheduled sleepover."

"Yeah. Let's hope Lawrence is a hypocrite, at least when it comes to 'no sex before marriage'." She stroked my cock, getting me worked up for our second time. "Kind of disappointed. Thought she would have had better taste."

I shrugged. "You don't always choose who you fall in love with. I mean look at us."

"Do you think she is? In love?"

I thought about it for a second. "I don't know," I admitted. "She seems happier."

"I hope not," she said. "Not until I'm sure I won't have to break them up."

I let the remark go without comment, because I knew where she was coming from. I wasn't sure I liked the guy either... okay, I didn't like the guy, but I wasn't yet sure if my dislike of him actually would affect my life. I regularly interact with loads of people I don't much like and just don't have to worry about them when I'm not with them. I probably wouldn't have considered breaking up Mom's relationship, but my sister feels it's her right to interfere with others more than I do. Considering I help her blackmail people, I don't have much room to condemn, though.

I wasn't very much in the mood to, either, especially when she got up and crawled on her hands and knees to the other edge of the bed, then wiggled her ass at me invitingly. At that point, all urge to condemn or even comment was replaced by an urge to fuck her until I filled her up with another load, and that's what I did.

***
Chapter Twelve:

Saturday night, I picked Madison up from the house of one of her hangers-on. It was a girl I didn't know, not part of her usual circles, but someone who wanted to be enough that she was willing to be Madison's alibi in the hopes of currying her favor. With her parents the way they were, Madison wouldn't be allowed to go to a party where drinking or drugs might take place, but there was evidently no shortage of people who were willing to be friends she would be "helping with a project" or having a sleepover with. Once in a while I did take her from her house, but it was always officially to go to some safe activity.

The girl was a little pathetic, more excited for Madison going to the party than either of us were, at the door cheerily exhorting her to "have fun!" and "tell me what it was like!" and I kind of felt bad for her. It seemed like every girl in school was using somebody else. Not that I had room to judge, I was using people just as much.

Madison and I rode there mostly in silence. We weren't friends, so why pretend when nobody was watching? "Well, let's get this over with," I muttered, mostly to myself, as we pulled up on the long driveway to Eddie's house.

"Yeah, yeah, I know, you'd rather be home with your sister." She sighed. "Just try not to let it show."

Whenever I walk into one of Eddie's parties it feels like I'm entering a time warp. They all feel exactly the same. Mostly the same people, at least the guys... the girls change a little more frequently. There's loud music, people drinking, people hooking up. The only one that was different was my first, and that was only because it was a little more crowded, with an open invitation. The rest of the parties were mostly for Eddie's circle of friends and acquaintances, and a few friends-of-friends, and when you're rich and popular, that can get a pretty big crowd, but nothing compared to the free-for-all of my first time.

I nodded to the people I knew, just a casual 'what's up' type greeting. I wasn't in the in-crowd on my own, but I wasn't disliked, lots of people knew me and might even have stopped for conversation. Within a minute or two of us entering, Madison spotted a mane of wild blonde hair and called out the name of her friend Chelsea, then went to talk to her, and I was free to disentangle myself from her.

I headed for kitchen, got myself a Coke, and then into the dining room, where the table was laid out with bowls of pretzels and chips. I killed a bit of time there and went back into the kitchen to get another drink, and this time, when I rounded the corner, I bumped right into Amber. Her small hands were holding two beers.

"What are you doing here?"

Amber looked behind her, worried a little, and said, "Um... I was invited." She frowned. "Shit, that means Madison's here, too, isn't she?"

I nodded and looked over her shoulder and saw who had invited her, or who had come with her, at least. It was Tori, her chaperone, waving her over. "You got those beers, Amber? Come here, I want you to meet someone."

"Shitshitshit," Amber muttered, and smiled at Tori. "Just a second."

"Amber," Tori said with a warning tone.

Amber handed her one of the beers and repeated, "Just one second!" Tori glared at her, and opened her mouth, like she was going to speak. "I just need to talk to him really quickly," Amber said, and Tori, scowling a little, stopped her interruption, stood back and waited.

Amber shuffled back to me, looked back to her minder, and tugged on my arm with her free hand. "Can I talk to you privately for a second?"

I nodded, allowing myself to be pulled along. It was hard to find a spot that was really private, but we found the end of a hallway that wasn't too occupied and the music was loud enough to cover your conversation. Amber leaned in close, and I realized my main concern was that somebody might think I was cheating on Madison. "You know what's going on, right? I mean, I know the Blackmailer told Erin, and she tells you everything, so..."

"You mean, with Tori and Holly?" She bit her lip and nodded. "Yeah, I know some of it."

"Eddie paid to have us entertain some of his friends. I need you to keep Madison from finding out what's going on. I don't want her knowing about this stuff." I must have grimaced or hesitated a little too long, because she begged, "Please?"

"I'll try," I said, trying to figure out how I was going to manage that. I mean, it wasn't just finding out she was a prostitute that was the problem, I was sure... she was asking me to keep Madison from knowing she's doing things with guys. That alone would flare up Madison's jealousy and make her even more unbearable to be around. "You going to be okay?"

"I'll be fine," she said, with a faint smile, but it looked manufactured.

Tori had been watching us for a while, although she was too far to overhear, she'd apparently had enough, and stepped up close and took Amber by the hand. "Sorry, but I really need to pull Amber away for some serious girl talk." She spoke happily, with a bright smile that looked even less real than Amber's, and then Tori dragged Amber away.

I walked after them, not deliberately following them but trying to get an idea where they were going, while also keeping an eye out for Madison so that I could steer her away. I didn't see her, and found myself trailing slightly behind Amber and Tori until they slipped into a bathroom and closed the door.

My curiosity got the better of me. I sidled up to the bathroom door, trying to look like I was waiting for it to be free, and did my best to listen over the music conversations. Luckily, the song was a quieter one.

"I just asked him to do me a favor and keep his girlfriend from finding out I'm here. She's my tutor and knows my parents," was the first thing I heard, although some of the words were guesswork. "I didn't tell him anything." Tori said something I didn't hear, and then I heard a sharp cracking sound. "Oww. What the fuck was that for?"

"If I tell you to come with me, you come. You don't tell me you need to talk to somebody like you have any say. You ask respectfully. I would have let you cover yourself, but that's not the point. You didn't ask. Understand?" Evidently she did, because the next thing I heard was "for tonight?"

Amber spoke so softly I couldn't hear at first, but then I caught the words "Whoever asks," and, immediately after. "I don't mention money or being paid at all. I'm just a slut."

"Right. And if Eddie personally introduces anybody to you, you fawn all over him like you think his dick might be made of chocolate." Something about 'the next week' followed, and then, "whips out their camera or a phone, you get right up out of there and find me. Otherwise, you're the easiest freshman in school. Got it?" Again I didn't hear a response. "Then take this and let's go." I took that as my cue to get away from the door as quickly as possible and wander behind a corner so they wouldn't see me eavesdropping.

Instead of wandering around and getting some snacks and then taking a nap in my car, I spent most of the night running interference for Amber, or trying to. First I tried hanging out near Madison, near the entrance to whatever room she was in so I could steer Amber away if she got close... but Madison practically pushed me away, not wanting to hang around me any more than I wanted to hang around her. I don't think it was me, particularly, but she was communing with her circle of girl friends at the party, and none of them really wanted me around. I figured on that when I overheard Chelsea talking, or asking, about what you should do the first time you have anal sex, then spotted me and her face curled up into a little sneer.

Following that, I tried to keep track of Amber, although first I had to find her again. I wandered the public areas of the party before it hit me that, considering what she was there for, she was probably not going to be in the public areas very much. I felt like an idiot for not realizing it sooner.

Upstairs was where most sexual activity happened at Eddie's parties, either in the bathroom or the spare bedrooms. Of course, there was a fundamental problem with that... I couldn't exactly open doors to try and find her without looking like a pervert. Even wandering around upstairs made me look like I was looking for a cheap hookup or to spy on people, or at least I was worried it did enough to come up with an excuse about the downstairs bathrooms all being in use. In truth, people were probably too drunk or self-involved to care where I was unless I walked in on them. Even then, some of them probably didn't care.

Whoever was doing Amber and Tori didn't much care either. I finally found them when Nathan, one of those guys I wasn't close with but occasionally talked to, brushed by me holding a couple beers and some hard lemonade in his hand. He gave me a speculative look, then disappeared into one of the rooms... but only for about fifteen seconds. He came out again and looked me up with a grin. "Hey, you're still dating that Madison chick, right?" I nodded. "She still keeping her legs welded shut?"

For me, yeah, for guys in general yeah, but I knew they were anything but. Amber could part them with a flick of her tongue. Still, part of the deal we had was upholding her reputation. "Yeah."

"Come on, check this out." He waved me over to the door, opened it, and there I saw Tori, her pants off and top pulled up over her breasts, and kneeling down between her legs was Amber, licking her pussy to the whispered encouragement of a handful of guys.

"Yeah, lick that slit," one guy said, like he was the director of a cheap amateur porn film. "You like that, don't ya slut."

Nathan said, "God I love easy freshmen, eager to please. You want a piece? Seeing as how you're not getting any? Can't promise you a fresh hole, but we can probably squeeze you in when everybody's done."

As I watched, somebody I didn't recognize positioned his naked body right next to Tori's, and pulled Amber's face away from her snatch and onto his cock. Of course I was aroused at the scene, but I also felt a little sick and wanted to get away. "Uh, no thanks."

Nathan shrugged and closed the door, and I wanted to open it up, grab Amber and take her away, tell everybody that she was being blackmailed into it, that they weren't studs, they were being given mercy fucks paid for by a rich friend, but the fear that Holly might actually have some power behind the threats stopped me, and instead, I walked downstairs, ashamed. Not just for leaving, but because as I did, I was forced to realize that Amber would probably survive, it wasn't much worse than what Erin had I had done to her before. Why was it so forgivable when we did it?

I told myself that we should stop the blackmailing as soon as possible, but I'd made such promises before only to fall back into it... I wasn't any more confident that I'd do any better this time.

***
Chapter Thirteen:

After that I went back downstairs, knowing that Amber would be busy for a while, although a little later in the night, she came downstairs too, and, luckily, I caught her just before she walked into the kitchen, where Madison was refreshing her drink while holding court with a few more of her friends, although Chelsea had already moved on, probably to take it up the ass from the her new rich boyfriend. "Maddy's in there," I whispered, and Amber's eyes widened and she nodded, taking a wobbly step backwards. I could smell alcohol on her, and the heady smell of sweat and sex. "You okay?"

"I'm fine," she said. "Just needed a little breather." A pause, then, "Can you get me a bottled water? The lemonades are starting to get to me." She had an empty bottle of the beverage in her hand.

I grimaced and nodded, ducked into the kitchen, rating barely a glance from Maddy, and retrieved a bottle, then thrust it in Amber's hands and took the empty from hers. "I could take you home," I suggested. "It's a big party, maybe nobody would notice you were gone." Everyone might think she was busy fucking somebody else. Amber just shook her head, not saying what I already knew, that Tori probably would notice and report back.

As Amber started to guzzle the water down, I heard the sound of Maddy's conversation getting closer, and I turned back around and met her just beside the door. "Hey, Maddy," I said, loudly enough to give Amber the clue that she needed to get out of sight. "Where you been hiding all night?" She looked at me with suspicious, uncomprehending eyes, and then drifted down to the bottle in my hand. I wasn't drinking, but it inspired me... why not play it up? "I missed you. Come on, give me a kiss."

For some reason this generated an "Awww" from one of her friends, I guess because I'm not usually affectionate with Madison, but from my official girlfriend herself, all I got was a scowl, but she leaned in and kissed me on the lips. "You been drinking?" She certainly didn't smell it on my breath, our lips didn't even open.

"Nah, just a lemonade."

"It's a hard lemonade, dear. It's got booze in it. And you're driving me home later, remember? Maybe you should sleep it off in your car for a while."

"I'm fine," I said. "I just wanted to talk to you."

Madison rolled her eyes and asked her friends to give us a minute, then glared at me. "What?" she asked shortly, whispering through her teeth.

I dropped the drunk act, tried to think of some kind of lie. "I just thought it would look good," I said at first. "You know, a drunken declaration of love." Or wanting to kiss, anyway.

With a fixed smile and a wave to somebody passing by, she said, "Nobody's asking you to hang around, just do what you normally do." Again, the suggestion to just go sleep in my car.

But that would risk Amber and Madison running into each other again, and I promised Amber I'd try to avoid that, so I needed to think of something that would get Madison to want to come with me. Suddenly, I thought of it, a lie, and one that had a chance of manipulating Madison in the way I needed. "Look, I don't know if it really matters to you or not..." I continued. "I overheard someone say Sharon was here with her guy, and they were going to, you know, fuck in one of the spare bedrooms." If Madison found out later that her secret ex-girlfriend wasn't here at all, I could just claim I misheard. "I just thought I'd warn you so you wouldn't be... you know, surprised."

"Oh," she said, and her face dropped, not sad, but just like she couldn't be bothered to show emotion when she was thinking about how she should react. But she actually sounded genuine when she added, "Thanks." A second later, she asked, "Did you see her?"

I shrugged, and said, "I don't know. I saw someone who might have been her making out with some guy pretty heavily, but I wasn't close."

"That bitch," Madison muttered. "She's not even supposed to be here."

"Yeah, well, I'm sure she didn't do it just to piss you off and make you jealous," I said, assuming that Madison'd think that's exactly what Sharon did. "I think I'm going to go to my car now, unless you want to use driving me home as an excuse to duck out."

Her eyes lit up at that, and I knew I'd succeeded. "Yeah, maybe that's for the best... Chelsea's already gone up to Eddie's bedroom, and the rest..." She waved a hand as though they were inconsequential. "Just let me say a few goodbyes."

I stressed out on those goodbyes, but Amber didn't make another appearance, and I could live with Madison's condescending excuse that she had to bring me home because I'd had a few too many drinks and was a bit of a lightweight, and soon after that we were out of there.

By the time I got home, I was pretty tired. It wasn't even that late, but I hadn't slept well the night before, and all that trying to keep on top of things at the party took a lot of energy out of me, especially without having had the expected nap. I wanted to talk to Erin about what happened with Amber, though, except I found her and my mom in the living room, watching a movie from Mom's childhood with homemade popcorn on the couch between them, like old times.

"Hey, Andrew," my sister said. "We're having an old movie night. Want to join us?"

I glanced at the screen, saw it was the third Indiana Jones movie, he was on that invisible bridge. If it was the beginning, I might have sat down and watched, but I knew most of the best parts were already gone, and I was pretty tired. "Nah," I said. "I think I'm going to call it a night."

I fell asleep quickly, but didn't stay that way for long. I was roused only an hour or two later when a warm body slipped under the covers and up next to me. I instinctively embraced her... who else would it be but Erin? If it was Mom, my life would be too weird for words.

One of my hands found her breast and I knew for sure, just a second before my sister's voice whispered, "I hope you don't mind."

Mind? "Of course not." I kissed the back of her neck. How could I mind? Sure, there was the risk of our mother catching us together, that was always in the back of my mind and I sometimes awoke in the middle of the night from a nightmare involving exactly that, but my sister was quiet and my mom slept pretty deeply, I'd stopped worrying so much about the occasional nighttime bed sharing, especially when it felt so right. Some people say they find sleeping with another person uncomfortable, but I find having someone to wrap my arms around just feels right. When my sister's not there, I sometimes wake holding my pillow.

"Have a good time tonight?"

"What do you think?" I muttered, and then decided I might as well tell her now. "I ran into Amber. She was 'working'." I gave a little rundown of what had happened.

"I thought they were sticking to oral," Erin said.

"Didn't sound like that's all Amber was doing," I said. "Maybe they figured, since she wasn't a virgin anyway..."

"Winnie's still doing oral," she said. "At least, that's what she says. I hope she isn't lying to me."

"We need to do something," I said.

"We talked about this," she said. "We will... we just need to be careful." It was funny, the other day I was the one advising her against rushing in. "I'm working on it. I'll probably have something to show you in a few days."

"What?"

"It's a surprise. A way we can keep track of Holly, maybe figure out if she really is connected to anybody. I'll show you when it's ready." She snuggled back into me and asked, "Trust me?"

"Okay," I decided. It was too late to be suspicious. It could wait, especially when I realized her hands were working to slide my boxers down my legs. My dick sprang forward, bumping into the warm crack of her ass.

She slid up and down a little to help me get worked up, and then finally rested at the perfect spot that I could enter her. With one hand, I guided my dick to her hole by feel, and pressed inside.

It was a gentle, quiet fuck, we couldn't get too crazy with Mom sleeping down the hall, but even slowly pounding her slick hole felt like heaven, and without the intensity, it seemed to last longer. The best part of such fucks is that once they're done, there's nothing left to do, so I don't have to fight falling asleep. Drifting off with my dick still inside my sister, slowly shrinking after having filled her up with my seed, is the best way to fall asleep, and always seems to give me sweet dreams.

In the morning she was gone, of course, back to her own room, but I couldn't take it personally, light was already coming through the window and it wasn't safe to stay together to a point when Mom might be awake.

***
Chapter Fourteen:

It was Sunday, which turned out to be the day Mom asked her boyfriend Lawrence over to dinner. I didn't go to church, which I know would have caused Madison to get a bit of an earful from her parents, but this time I really did have some homework to do, even if I wound up procrastinating it for much of the day, even past the time church would have taken.

A large part of that was because of some unexpected good news. A flood of mail, and my profit stats showed a healthy bump, already exceeding what I'd earned in the prior week, all because my old game Robot Repair was featured positively on a game review site. So I had to bask in the joy of that for a while and instead of ruining it with work, shared my excitement with my sister, my love. "Well, it's about time you got some recognition," was her response, with a grin that almost matched mine. The game had been out for a while, and I'd had some bumps of activity before, but nothing this big. One of my other games, Antigravity Bleed, was doing better overall before the review, but Robot Repair had a special place in my heart, being the first one that ever made me any money.

When you get a flood of positive feedback, not to mention cash, for something creative you've done, it really excites you and I spent a good hour bouncing ideas off my sister for future gaming projects, new ideas for ones I'd already started, and whole new concepts, most of which I had to reject pretty quickly, but the creative surge was pretty fun.

Eventually I went to work on it, and while I was there, got to the homework and chatted a bit with Kirk online. Nothing else dramatic happened, nothing even very fun, not even the simple joy of sex with my sister. That was out of the question that day, what with Mom being in the house, cleaning and preparing dinner, aside from a quick trip to the store for some corn.

Lawrence showed up at six, Erin and I gave a polite hello but then found excuses to return to our respective rooms until we were actually called down to dinner itself.

That was where things started to go wrong. The dinner itself was great, a nice beef roast, mashed potatoes, good gravy, and of course the nearly forgotten corn. While Lawrence gabbed on about his job, I enjoyed about half a plateful of food, pretending to listen. Unfortunately, he eventually realized that "getting to know his girlfriend's kids" required more than talking about himself. "So, I noticed you weren't at church today with your girlfriend," he said finally, directing his gaze at me.

I shrugged. "Like you said, our family isn't really big church goers. I only ever go for Madison's sake, and I had a lot of homework today."

He nodded, thankfully not making an issue of that, but instead said, "Your mom tells me you're graduating this year. Have you thought about college?"

"A little."

"What do you want to do?"

I shrugged again, and then decided to tell the truth. "I already know a little bit of programming, so I thought I'd focus on that." He nodded, so I continued, "I'm hoping to get accepted to a college with a program that includes game design."

"Game design?"

"You know, video games."

He put his fork and knife down and intertwined his fingers casually on the table. "Hey, I like video games as much as the next guy," he said, "but that's kind of pie in the sky, isn't it? It's not the sort of thing you build a career on."

"Considering I'm probably going to pay my way through college with money I've earned off video games already," I said, "I don't think you're right about that." Maybe paying my way through college was a little optimistic, but I had just made a bunch of money that day both in ad revenue and app sales. With that, along with leftover blackmail money, I didn't have too many worries about tuition and books.

"He's really good," Erin chimed in.

"I'm sure he is, and he probably can make money in it," he backpedaled. "I'm not saying don't pursue it, just, you know, have a backup. Every kid with a talent for computers these days seems to want to get into video games, and not all of them can make it. And, even if you can, it might be a good idea to develop some loftier ambitions. You seem like you've got a lot of potential and it would be a shame to see it wasted on something frivolous like video games."

"Yeah, well, thanks for the advice."

Erin spoke up in my defense again. "You know, video games do have lots of practical applications. They're using a video game to help find the way complex proteins fold, and it has real applications to medical research, for example. There's a protein in a virus that causes AIDS in monkeys that scientists have been trying to crack the structure of for decades. Gamers found the solution in weeks." She took a mouthful of food, swallowed, and added, "When you get right down to it, video games are about creating models of reality, and scientists use models like that all the time. Not to mention education and industry. Andrew's games often require problem solving skills, they're not just shoot-em-ups."

"Okay, fair enough," Lawrence said. "I just think keeping options open is a good thing. I'm not against games, I used to play loads of Mario Brothers and Metroid when I was a kid." I wouldn't have expected they had electricity back then, but I didn't say that out loud, at least he was trying to connect. He turned his attention from me to my sister. "What about you? I know you're still a couple years from graduating..."

"Only one year more than Andrew," she said proudly. "I probably could graduate already if I wanted to, but I thought the high school experience would do me some good."

"Then you must have already started thinking about what you want to study afterwards."

Erin nodded. "It's hard, because there's so much that interests me, but mostly I think I want to go into biology, especially genetics."

"Why genetics? Why not become a doctor?"

"Genetics is where medical breakthroughs happen. A doctor can save lives, but only of the people she sees. Research can affect the whole world. And just because I'm focusing on genetics doesn't mean I can't have be a doctor too, just, focused on that side of things. I kind of like the idea that I might be able to help people who might want to have kids but can't, because of, like, genetic issues, and I can help with screening and make their dreams come true."

"That's a very noble goal."

Erin continued, "Well, I have selfish reasons too. I mean, just plain curiosity, for one thing. All of that's always fascinated me, you know, what makes us what we are, why some people get diseases, the origin of life..."

That was where the conversation took a turn for the worse. "Well, the origin of life is God," Lawrence said with self-satisfaction.

To her credit, despite not really believing, Erin didn't outright try to start a fight by arguing against God's existence, she just paused, looking a little stunned, then said, "Umm... okay, maybe origin isn't quite the right term, but how it developed, through evolution."

"Evolution is... one theory," he said with a grimace on his face. I exchanged a look with Mom, who seemed a little panicked, knowing what was coming.

"It's pretty much the only theory," Erin said. "When people talk about the theory of evolution, they don't mean they're not sure it happened... it's like the theory of gravity, we know it exists, but people still study exactly how it works so we can better understand it."

"How can you say you know it exists? Nobody's ever seen it happen."

"Yes, we have. When diseases get resistant to antibiotics, that's evolution in action."

"That's not the same thing. That's adaptation. Microevolution, not macroevolution."

"And when small changes pile up over millions of years, you get speciation. What do you think would stop those changes from piling up?"

"For one thing, there hasn't been millions of years..."

"Seriously?" Erin interrupted with a roll of her eyes. "I mean, every scientist pretty well agrees that the Earth's billions of years old."

"Not every..."

"You know," my mother interjected sharply. "When I was young, my family had a rule. No talking about politics or religion around the dinner table." I knew she was lying, or that our grandfather had broken the rule at every family occasion we'd ever had, but wholeheartedly supported the lie at that point. "Maybe we could keep that rule here, too?"

Lawrence shut up right away, but Erin wasn't quite ready to let it go. "Don't blame me, Mom, I wasn't the one who brought up religion. I was just talking about science. You know, actual facts."

"Erin," Mom warned with a glare.

"Fine," she said with a little sigh. "I respect your opinion, but let's agree to disagree, all right?"

"That's probably a good idea," Lawrence said, and it seemed like the crisis was over, but I knew Erin, and she just went cold. Not rude or impolite, just not willing to engage in conversation or give him any benefit of the doubt. Lawrence tried a few more times to start non-controversial conversation, but she only answered him in the shortest possible ways.

It was only after dinner that she loosened up, after Lawrence and my mother went out for a walk. We sat on the couch, watching TV, and finally she said what was on her mind. "I think we have to kill him."

"What?"

"Lawrence. He's not right for Mom. Kill him now and get it over with." I didn't know what to say, but she turned her head and grinned at me, relieving me of the worry. "I'm not serious. At least not about killing him."

"Yeah, I don't much like him, either."

"It's not just because he's religious," she stressed. "I don't mind if people believe in God, but there's believing and there's being anti-science. Even the Pope says evolution and belief in God isn't inconsistent."

"I don't believe his church follows the Pope." They'd never badmouthed him from the pulpit, but I'd overheard a couple conversations about poor, deluded Catholics being misled into an evil perversion of the Truth.

"I just don't get what Mom sees in him. He's nothing like Dad."

It'd been long enough that mentions of Dad no longer hurt, but I still felt a little wistfulness for him. "Love doesn't always make sense," I said.

"Do you think she loves him?" She sounded worried.

"I think, right now, he seems to make her happier. Can't you just play dumb around him?"

"I got sick of playing dumb years ago. But I guess I can save my disdain for when he's gone." She suddenly lay back against me, like she was using me for a pillow, and I put an arm around her... hesitantly, at first, but I quickly decided that we'd hear Mom at the door long enough to separate and look innocent again, so long as we didn't do anything like have sex. "I hope she doesn't love him," she said. "I hope it's just some fling, to get her groove back, and she dumps him in a few weeks."

"I don't think I've ever heard her say she loves him," I pointed out.

"I love you, you know."

It still filled me with that warm glow to hear it. "I love you too."

The conversation turned milder, things so inconsequential I can't even remember them, commenting on the TV or commercials or some bit of news about one of our friends. The Amazing Race came on, and we watched it, the only reality show my sister admits to watching, because she likes seeing the other cultures, and there was rarely any fake drama, it was all competition. Her only complaint about it were the artificial wait periods that force everybody to start at the same time again, and prevent people from benefitting from a lead they worked hard for. In her mind it should be the case that sometimes people get a full leg ahead or behind others, just like life.

That wasn't what was on her mind this time, though. "We should totally go on this show in a few years if it's still on," she said, after easily working her way through a clue before the show revealed the answer. "We'd kick ass."

"Yeah, right."

"No, really," she said. "Imagine it... travelling all over the world, making love in every country we pass through... I could talk about our special kinship in interviews, giving hope to couples like us everywhere. And I really think we could win the million."

My hand, which had been resting on her belly at the time, slid playfully beneath her pants and to her slit. "Well, I certainly like the part about making love in every country..."

Before I could get much farther than getting one finger in, though, we heard the distinctive jiggle of the knob at the front door. I removed my hand and Erin pulled away, retreating all the way to the other end of the couch as we both stared at the screen, doing our best to look bored.

To our relief, Lawrence announced that he was just stopping in to say goodbye, it was time for him to leave. "It was nice getting to know you both a little better," he said, and then looked Erin in the eye. "Erin, I'm sorry things got a little awkward between us, earlier, it was my fault. No hard feelings?"

Erin looked up at his suddenly outstretched hand with a skeptical look, but eventually she grabbed it. "Yeah, sure, whatever."

"Maybe next time we'll all go something fun together," he said on his way to the door. We didn't answer with anything more than ambiguous noises, but he didn't seem to mind. I couldn't help but crane my neck back towards the door while they were saying goodbyes, and was treated with the sight of my Mom kissing Lawrence on the lips. I didn't know if she loved him, but the way she flushed a little after they parted, she was on her way.

***
Chapter Fifteen:

"And, one final announcement, the school laptops will be distributed today." A half-hearted cheer went up at that, from a few of the more awake students, while the vice principal read on. "Throughout the day, students will be called to Room 116 in groups determined by their homeroom. When your home room is called, proceed directly to Room 116, and, once you have received your laptop, return directly to your class. If you miss your group, you may pick them up tomorrow."

The day had finally come. It had been so long I almost thought they weren't going to be handed out at all. I waited anxiously for the first group to be called, only to be disappointed... they were starting with freshmen.

It was kind of strange how eager I was, really... I had a computer, and a pretty good one... it was unlikely that the laptop would be any better, although it would almost certainly be better than the old laptop I sometimes used. Yet I wanted to get my hands on one of these ones, see how it handled, what blocks would be put on it by the school administration... although it turns out that last wasn't going to be a problem. Before I found that out, I didn't expect the laptops would be much practical use to me outside of schoolwork, but I did think they might be cool to play around with, and it felt singularly unfair that I would be among the last to get that chance.

It wasn't that bad, though, and the day wasn't without its good side, a new rush of accolades from a few people who were open or closeted gamers and tried my game after seeing it featured. Word had gotten around that I was the one who created it, so throughout the day I had people coming up to congratulate me or tell me they were stuck on one map or another. There was even a girl in Erin's class who turned out to be a gamer girl and corralled me for a couple minutes before class to talk, not just about that game, but Antigravity Bleed, what I was working on, what games I liked... I got the impression she was trying to flirt with me, but I had a girlfriend, publicly and privately, so I stuck to being professional.

By the time lunch rolled around, the laptops were only fully distributed to about half the juniors. Neither Erin nor Madison were among those who'd had them yet, but I spotted Amber toting one around and asked to see it. It was a nice system for its time, connected via Wi-Fi to the school network, and a clean desktop. Amber explained what she'd already found, that a lot of sites, like Facebook, were blocked with a notice saying they weren't allowed during school hours, which implied that maybe they were allowed outside of school hours. She also showed me an in-network messaging system program that connected only people in the school. "The teachers and administration can monitor it, though," she explained. "They tell you that when you sign in. And they turn it off for class."

"Still, it's kind of cool to have." She was with her minder, so I didn't plan to talk about anything else, until Tori went off a few feet to talk to a guy. She kept her eye on Amber the whole time, but I didn't think we'd be overheard.

I'd just opened my mouth to say something when Amber beat me to it. She must also have been watching how close Tori was. "I wanted to thank you, you know, for Saturday."

"You don't need to thank me," I said. "Are you... I mean... okay?" I mentally kicked myself. "I mean I'm sure you're not totally okay, but..."

"I'm fine," she said flatly. "It's no big deal."

"You sure? Because what I saw..."

"It's no big deal, just forget it, okay?"

Before I could say anything else, Tori stalked towards us. "Come on Amber, we have to go, Amber." She actually said her name twice. Amber gave me a look, apologetic with a bit of sadness behind it, and then closed up the laptop and they walked off.

I spent lunch with my friends, where, in addition to an assortment of other inconsequential topics, we spent the time sharing what we'd discovered and speculating on whether they'd get to us today or leave us to the next.

Senior homerooms were called in the middle of next period, but I didn't get my call until last period, which was my History class. Our teacher, Mr. Withrow, decided that, since everything would be interrupted either with people who already had their new laptops, or people being called out to get them, that he just declared the class a loss and would do no teaching. Instead, we played a game of history-themed Hangman.

Finally, in what must have been the second last group, my homeroom was called, and I made the trip to Room 116, where I got in one of several short lines, each determined by my last name, and a few minutes later, was handed a laptop in a non-descript carrying case. Before I could walk away from it, I had to sign my name on a form that included the serial number and a promise to abide by all school policies, and was handed a bundle of papers indicating those policies. I thought that was a little dumb... they should just put it in a text file on the computer itself. Likewise, the instructions on how to turn it on seemed a little useless too... who doesn't know that, aside from like, grandparents?

I stuffed the paper in my pack and carried the laptop out, looking it over. It looked exactly the same as Amber's, but this one was mine, and I wanted to give it a little test run. Others around me were doing similarly. Since it was the last period, a few just left right away rather than returning to class, assuming, probably rightly, that nobody would bother to make an issue of it, but for many of the rest, it made a good excuse to dawdle and waste more class time. Of course, there were always a few kids who followed the rules exactly and left right away. I wasn't one of them, but I was close... I just gave it a quick boot-up, let it go through and apply an automatic update from the school servers, then got on the web, unfortunately with Internet Explorer. I tried a gaming site, the first site I could think of... it was blocked, but it looked like it just was the school network blocking it, not a hard-wired block. Social networking sites were also blocked by the school network. I tried Wikipedia next, and that was allowed. 4chan and, oddly enough, BoingBoing both came up with net-nanny blocks and a reminder that access to websites containing pornography or illegal materials was not allowed. I had to guess that it wouldn't be allowed even if I accessed it from home.

With that revelation, I closed up and headed back to class. I didn't mind returning, we weren't exactly doing regular schoolwork and the teacher was cool enough that even if we were I wouldn't find it boring. The new-computer glee faded quickly once it was actually here, especially with all the restrictions they put on it. It seemed silly to me to try and block pornography... if anybody who wanted to find some pornography wasn't able to find any on the laptop in an evening's effort, they wouldn't be able to turn it on in the first place. No blacklist could be all-comprehensive... even Wikipedia had pornographic images if you knew where to look. I hoped the school would be a bit more forward thinking, but I supposed that was just naive. I had to hand it to them on efficiency, though... the entire school, aside from those who were absent, managed to get their computers that day. No class was left to wait till Tuesday.

Erin rode home with me, alone this time, and with the laptop on her legs as I drove, at least for a little while. "Damn," she complained when we were only half a block away. "The school's Wi-Fi doesn't extend very far. Hope the thread's still up when we get home."

"What thread?"

"Just a second..." She scrolled upwards. We were stopped at a red light, so she held the screen where I could see it and I took a quick look. The first post asked for people to post 'wincest pictures and kinship stories', and the first post was some amateur porn pic with some text added. I'd seen them before, Erin had a collection of them... although I couldn't read it from the thumbnail, I knew the text implied the people in the picture were brother and sister.

Normally, I'd have smiled indulgently, finding it cute, but this time my stomach twisted a little. "I wish you wouldn't post those from school," I said. "They're probably spying on what we do online..." Suddenly, it hit me. "Wait, how did you even get on there, anyway? That site should be blocked."

Erin grinned. "Yeah, and we're not supposed to be allowed to install our own software, either, but I wasn't using I-E if I didn't have to. I got around the blocks and spyware on the walk back to class. Rules like that are for other people."

That I was proud of. I would have looked into it myself, but I hadn't had the time to sit down and see what I could do... I was driving. "Still, someone could look over your shoulder while you were posting that."

"I didn't post it, I stumbled on it. That's what makes it so special." I didn't answer right away, so she must have guessed that I didn't get it. "Other people are taking up the phrase 'kinship'. At least one other person, anyway, but that proves it's got memetic potential."

"Memetic potential?" I joked.

"You know, that it can spread, like an internet meme."

"Memetic is so not a word."

"It is so. And even if it wasn't, I'm already reinventing one word, what's one more? The rules of English are as bendable as any other." She stuck her tongue out at me playfully. "Hurry up and get home, I don't want the thread to 404."

The laptops wouldn't automatically hook up to our home network, we had to add it to a whitelist, so when we got home, Erin ran upstairs to her room to check on the site from her own computer. I was still downstairs when I heard her exclaim cheerfully, "It's still going."

I didn't rush like she did, but I slowly made my way upstairs and into her room. The thread didn't really interest me as much, personally, but it was always a joy to see her excited about something, so I sat beside her while she read through the responses. It was surprising how many people seemed to be in favor of incest... of course, it was anonymous, so they many of them could have been the same person... some could even have been my own sister, but the people opposed could do the same sock-puppet tricks and there didn't seem to be nearly as many of them. Fewer people actually claimed to be in relationships with their sister. I pointed at one, for Erin's benefit.

"Probably fake," she said.

"What makes you think that?"

"Come on, it says she walked in on him masturbating, and then offered to help him out? That's like a cliché porn plot." She had a point. I was silent until she looked at me sidelong. "Hey, want to give these guys a real thrill?"

"Like what?"

Instead of answering me verbally, she reached over and grabbed a Sharpie from a pencil case, pulled up her shirt to just over her breasts, and wrote the date and time, and the words "I love my brother's cock" on her belly.

***
Chapter Sixteen:

She'd mentioned this before, showing off our relationship for the camera, but I still panicked. She'd just written on herself, something that admitted incest. "Erin! What if somebody sees it?"

"It'll come off in the shower," she said. "And who's going to see it? You think Mom's going to ask me to strip down?"

She tilted the webcam and snapped a picture of her tight stomach, then took a couple minutes to wipe the file of any identifying metadata, and started writing up a post about how she and her brother have been 'in a kinship' for two years, committed and forsaking all others. I watched her, without comment, until she posted. "Now they're going to think I'm just being an attention whore, so the next shot will need your dick."

I shook my head in amusement, but pulled down my pants and allowed her to take another picture, holding on to my erect cock, posed right over her belly, and held up a little piece of paper with the words "Told you" on it. By the time we were done taking that one, the thread had exploded in response to the first one, one indeed suggesting she was making it up, playing with her boyfriend, not her brother, although applauding the effort. Most, however, merely asked for details or just more pictures.

"Shall we?" Erin asked.

"How much more can we give them?" I asked. "I mean, we're definitely not going to be showing our faces." Despite that many people were asking for just that, there was kinky and then there was stupid. Even if you couldn't make out her features I'd be afraid... the distinctive purple streak in her black hair could potentially be recognized by someone who knew us, and teens from all over the world lurked that site.

"Of course not."

"And what if they realize you're underage?"

"I'm fourteen," she said. "Fourteen-year-old pussy looks pretty much the same as eighteen-year-old pussy, especially close up. They'd just think I was petite." She shrugged. "And even if they didn't, who cares, we've got proxies, it's not like they're ever going to catch us. Come on, be a little adventurous."

"Okay, so how are we going to do this?"

Rather than getting a separate camera and moving to the bed, we decided to stick with the webcam, which meant that we were a little more restricted. So, Erin got up, and I sat on the chair while she took off her pants and underwear. When she returned, she climbed over me on the chair and I aimed my rigid meat at her hole while she slowly sank down.

I always loved being inside her, even if this position wasn't my favorite, mostly because the view wasn't as good, and I couldn't easily kiss her. I love kissing my sister. This time, though, the view issue was temporarily mitigated as she adjusted the camera and I could watch ourselves on the screen, me holding her under her breasts before it focused on the spot where we were joined. You could still read where she wrote 'I love my brother's cock' in ink.

After she snapped the picture, she leaned forward and once again stripped the metadata and got it ready for posting. Her small movements as she did this mundane task provided unexpected pleasure, in part because it didn't quite match the expected rhythms of sex.

Once she hit post, she leaned back against me and my arms encircled her, and she began to slowly rock up and down on me while she read the posts that had come up in response to the earlier pics. I read them too, but with another mindset. I took the requests for 'more' to be cheering us on, not for incest in general, but for the specific act we were in right then, imagining a virtual audience right there with us, and helped bounce her up and down on my dick.

They weren't even responding to the latest picture at this point, but it didn't matter, when I saw somebody asking, "let us see him fucking you", I pretended I was doing it for that audience, squeezing her tit in one hand and increasing my pace.

Erin mmmed, although after a couple minutes leaned forward just enough to grab the mouse and refresh the page. Our newest picture now appeared, as well as a flood of new comments on it. It was here that I had to stop pretending, but only because trolls had arrived, some calling Erin an attention-whore, others posting pictures of Spider-Man or calling me, inexplicably, a faggot, not to mention a few seemingly sincere people who suggested what we were doing was sick or wrong, and one who reminded me of the consequences if she got pregnant. There was still plenty of supportive posts asking for more, it was in fact the majority, but the trolls ruined the fantasy, and so I closed my eyes and just concentrated on the far more pleasurable fact of my sister riding my cock.

The naysayers dispelling the fantasy might have slowed me down, but Erin made up for that, starting to grunt softly in pleasure as her own pace increased. When I next opened my eyes, it was because I felt her hand on my hair... she was turning her head back to me and pulling mine down, stretching us towards an awkward kiss. Kissing wasn't as smooth or easy in this position, but it could be done, and my mouth met her soft lips, pressed together openly, and our tongues sought each other out, connecting us at both ends for a minute before she broke away so that she could ride me with more force.

It went on that way until I felt her cum, which was good because I was about to do the same. My cock was tingling like there was an electric shock, and only a matter of seconds later my balls felt like they tightened in spasm and began shooting out everything I'd been saving up since the last time we'd fucked, which was Saturday night.

For the next few seconds, while I came down from my climax, we just breathed together, heavily, and then Erin turned back for another kiss. I obliged her, this one slower, less urgent than the first, more like an affirmation that the affection was more than the merely sexual.

After, she took one last picture, of my seed leaking out of her, and posted it along with the message, "Good thing I'm on the pill, so I can take my brother's load where it belongs..." I wasn't as pleased with that one, but then I was less excited about everything we'd done in the exhibitionist vein now that I was no longer horny. The risks now seemed to outweigh any possible benefit. But the damage was already done, so there was no point in making an issue of it. Instead, I told Erin I was going to the bathroom.

"You coming back after?" Sometimes I just went back to my own room... I loved spending time with my sister, but I did have other interests too, and knew she was the same.

That she asked told me she wanted me to return though. "Sure," I played along. "Have to see how the thread develops, right?"

"Yeah," she said. "Also, I've got something I want to show you... a surprise."

Surprises tended to worry me a little. I know my sister meant well, but sometimes she did things thinking I'd be okay with them, or even like them, when really I'd rather she left things alone. So I had a quick piss and returned with a little trepidation.

Erin, who had thrown on a shirt and panties while I was gone, was glaring at the screen with a bit of a frustrated look on her face, then turned to me at the door and gave a little apologetic half-shrug. "Okay, I meant this to be a lot more impressive than it's turned out to be... but it looks like Holly's school laptop isn't connected to a wireless network at the moment."

I stepped further into the room, making a guess. First day with the new laptops, everybody passing them around, maybe Holly was even one of the first adopters and showed it off when she got to class. "You snuck the spying program onto Holly's laptop?" I asked. "Clever," I said, but what I wanted to say was dangerous. What if she'd been caught?

"Not just Holly's," she said. She looked back to the screen and brightened. "Ah, here we go." She clicked a few times with her mouse, and a new window appeared on the screen... a video. There was a girl staring blankly ahead, in what looked like a home somewhere. I recognized immediately that the girl was Andrea, one of Holly's girls, the blonde one with the high forehead, who was put in charge of Kate, one of the freshman girls I'd probably never even have heard of if not for this whole blackmail-prostitution thing.

Andrea slid her eyes away from the computer, and said, disgustedly, "My god, will you hurry the fuck up? Blowjobs shouldn't take this long, if you're doing it right."

A voice I didn't recognize, a male voice, said, "Why don't you come and show her how it's done?"

Andrea grimaced. "I already showed her the first few times, if she doesn't have it by now, she's hopeless." She sighed, and said, "I have an appointment of my own in..." She paused, must have checked the time on the screen, "Fifteen minutes, if he doesn't cum in five I start slapping your ass until he does."

"Fuck, you want me to come, you could let me fuck her ass," the guy suggested. "Bet it's tight as fuck."

"I wish. Might teach the prissy little bitch a lesson... but no, not yet. But trust me, Kate, you do not want to piss me off. He doesn't cum soon, I'm going to make you lick the cum out of my ass at the next stop. So get working." She nodded approvingly. "Yeah, that's it, go all the way down." A very faint coughing noise could be heard, and then she said, "I don't care if you choke, get back on it, if you're going to puke you can do it after."

"Hey, if she pukes on me, I'm not paying for that."

I looked to my sister. "You got it on her laptop, too?" She grinned, biting her lip. "Anyone else of Holly's brood you got a backdoor into?"

"Andrew," she said. "You should know by now I don't think small." She clicked onto a partially obscured window, which had a list of names with numbers after them. The numbers were IP addresses and I recognized a few of the names from school. There were about a dozen visible in the window, but it scrolled. "I got us a backdoor on everybody's laptop."

***
Chapter Seventeen:

My mind reeled at the revelation, even as part of it couldn't resist exploring the possibilities. A backdoor into every laptop at school? But it was so hard to believe that could be possible, so I figured I must have misheard, misinterpreted. "What?"

"We can spy on anybody in the school, as long as they're connected to the Internet with one of the school laptops," she clarified, removing my doubts. "Want to see what Kirk's up to?" She called up his name on the list, and a new window appeared, although Kirk wasn't on it, just a couch, and not one in Kirk's house. It took a moment to recognize it, but I realized it was Tony's, they must have decided to hang out after school. When he didn't appear for a few seconds, Erin said, "Okay, a lot of times it's going to be boring, but we can do all the usual stuff, check out what they're looking at..."

One button click later and we were looking at Kirk's Facebook page, where apparently some time ago he was just talking to Cassie, sending her a message "Love you, I'll call you later."

She continued the demonstration. "Keyloggers, so we can grab passwords, get into e-mail accounts... there's even a GPS on these things, we can figure out where anybody is at any time, although right now it's still numbers. Now, that I think you'd be best at, writing up a program that would ping them all, grab the results, and plot them to a real map.

"How did you manage all this?"

"How do you think? I went to the source. All the laptops get their marching orders from the school servers. They can install software in a remote updates, and they get the GPS data in case one is stolen... they can even remotely access the webcam, themselves, which is a little creepy if you ask me, but don't worry, I blocked ours already. Anyway, I managed to get remote access to the server last week and have been working to get it to push our spying program on all the laptops as an update. I wasn't sure it would work until today, though."

"And how'd you do that?"

"Well, it turns out, the school IT guy has a weakness for teen girls. The school really should be more careful about who they hire. Anyway, all it took was a blowjob and a promise of more, and I was in."

My heart seemed to fall into my stomach... it was like I was going to be sick. "You... gave him a blowjob?"

"Yes," she said, staring at me... and then broke into a grin. "From Winnie." I exhaled in relief, although to an outside observer, that wasn't much better, to me it was the world. Erin knew the effect it had on me. "You're so cute when you get jealous... you didn't really think I'd do that, did you?"

"No, but..." I didn't think she'd do what she did, either.

"I wouldn't. I love you, and I don't want any other guy touching me. You should trust that, if you don't trust anything else in the world."

Such vehement insistence filled me with a strange mix of pride, satisfaction and shame. The first two I don't really need to explain, and the last was simply because I didn't feel deserving of such devotion. She didn't even hold me to the same standards, she'd let me be with other people, even though I thought I could give up sex with other girls, she never asked for it. How did I ever earn such unselfish love, particularly when our relationship started with my own selfishness? I didn't know what to say.

Maybe she mistook that for doubt. "I have a video of what happened, if you don't believe me."

"No, I trust you," I rushed out. "I just... I love you too."

She smiled again, and even blushed a little. "Well... do you want to see the video anyway?"

I knew she wanted to show me, and as long as it wasn't actually Erin doing anything with a guy, it was probably worth watching. "Sure."

She loaded up a video file that was on a USB stick, explaining why I hadn't seen it before in our shared directories... she really had wanted to keep it a surprise. The first thing the video showed was Erin's face.. of course, because the camera was on somebody else's head. Winnie's, if what my sister told me was true, and I had no reason to believe otherwise.

"Okay, it's on. You ready?" Erin, the one on the video said.

The camera bobbed with a nod. "It's just... what if Holly's looking for me?" Winnie's voice, sounding more worried than I'd hear her in a long time.

"She can't watch you all the time. And she thinks you're working on an assignment, right?" Another camera nod. "Don't worry so much... we're doing this for you, remember? Go do your stuff, girl."

They walked down a hallway near the gym, and Winnie stopped by a door beside a vending machine, and waited. One uncertain look back confirmed Erin kept walking, but I didn't see where she went, Winnie's head, and the camera, focused entirely on the door. A few seconds later, the door opened, and a twenty-something guy in slacks and a unbuttoned dress shirt came out.

"He comes out every lunch at exactly this time," Erin, sitting beside me, explained. "To look at the volleyball players, I think."

He looked momentarily surprised to see somebody right there when he opened the door, but then averted his gaze down towards the floor, and he turned in the general direction of the nearby vending machine.

"Hi," Winnie said.

He looked back, then in both directions to ensure he wasn't going to make a fool of himself by answering a hi meant for somebody else. "Oh, uh, hello."

"You're the school computer guy, right?"

"I guess you could say that, yeah."

"I hear they got the new laptops in."

He relaxed a little, visibly... it was as though he was expecting some kind of trap, but now that he knew she had a legitimate question related to his field, she wasn't really a threat. He even smiled a little. "Yes, the rumors are true, we did."

"Think I can get a sneak peek? See how it works?"

"Sorry.... most of them are still in boxes. I still have to load them up with the school software. They'll probably be released next week."

The camera jiggled up and down briefly, and there was a pause before Winnie said, "See, here's the thing... I kind of bet my friend I could get a look at them today, before anybody else?"

"Sorry," he said again. "I might get in trouble."

"Please?" Winnie whined. "I'd make it worth your while?"

The IT guy visibly drew back, startled, now looking a little scared again, too. It happened after the offer, so I think Winnie did something else surprising, but I had to imagine what. Maybe she licked her lips seductively, or pulled up her skirt, although the latter would be especially daring in a busy hallway. "What?"

"What, it's no big deal, you're kinda cute, I'd probably do it for free, but I really want to win this bet." He didn't answer, just stared, blinking, and so Winnie must have taken that for agreement. "Wait, like, 3 minutes, and then come down to the supply room beside Room 113. Don't worry, no one ever goes in there during lunch."

She gave him a few seconds to look agog, and then turned and started walking down the hallway. As she did, she passed by a little alcove where Erin was waiting, and gave her a brief nod, before continuing.

The video jumped then, into a cramped room full of reams of paper, stacks of binders, and other boxes containing less-immediately-identifiable stuff. "I took the liberty of editing to the good stuff," Erin, beside me, explained.

Seconds later, the door opened, and the IT guy stepped in, looked around, then swiftly closed the door. "I was starting to think you weren't going to come," I heard Winnie say.

"I almost didn't," he said. "This is a very, very bad idea..." I tried to imagine what went through his mind, the fear that they could get caught warring with the desire, and all the self-justifications. It hit pretty close to home.

"Aw, it's cute that you're scared. Trust me, no one ever comes in here. So, are you in? I give you a blowjob, you give me a sneak peek at one of the computers?"

"You really shouldn't be doing things like this. I mean it, it's not... nice."

She stepped forward, and the camera focused on his pants... "I'm not a very nice girl... but I am a lot of fun. Maybe I'll even let you do a little more." One of Winnie's hands appeared in the frame, reaching for his obvious erection. "I can tell you want it. It must be hard working here... oh, what am I saying, it IS hard." She giggled a little at her own joke.

"If we do this, you're not going to tell anyone, right? Like, even your friends?"

"I promise."

"When do you have to see one?"

"Huh?"

"The laptops. You said you made a bet, when do you have to see one?"

"By the end of today." A paused, and she added, "And I have to take a picture of myself holding one."

"Okay, right after school, knock on my door, ask again. I'll tell you 'no', but I'll go to the bathroom. I'll unpack one of my laptops on the desk. Get in, take a picture, and get out. If anything goes missing, I'll tell them you must have snuck in."

Winnie sounded hurt. "What, you don't trust me?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that, I'm just... this could ruin me."

"But you still want it, right?" She worked on his pants, unbuttoning the fly and unzipping it. He didn't stop her. "We have a deal."

His cock sprang out then, it was kind of stubby-looking, and had a pronounced curve to the left.

Winnie leaned in, and then began giving him a blowjob... or at least, she seemed to be. I don't mean I thought she was faking it, and really just sucked on a popsicle while he stood there, but just that I couldn't actually see. Like last time I watched one of the headband-cam blowjobs, it didn't really provide a good view of the act itself at all, just his torso or, occasionally, his flushed face.

That thought, that it was just like the time with Holly, was what put a damper on my mood. I listened to the slurps, or his groans, for several minutes, and maybe if I could actually see Winnie performing the act, or if I hadn't just cum in my sister, I could have suppressed the thought, but as it was, I couldn't, it just kept rattling around in my head.

"I'm going to..." the guy said, and Winnie pulled off.

"Already? But I was going to let you..." A chime went off, and Winnie reached for her phone, where you could just make out a text reading 'Done.' "Oh, actually, never mind, I've got to go anyway."

"You're not going to finish?" he whined.

Winnie didn't say anything, the camera just focused on him for a second, but then went down again. About thirty seconds later he let loose a throaty, "Oh yeah..."

Erin turned towards me finally and said, "If I hadn't texted her to let her know I was done, I guess she'd have had to fuck him, too." She squinted, looking at my face. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," I said flatly, but she didn't believe it and with her eyelids narrowed, staring at me, I couldn't hold it in. "It's just... we're kind of doing the same thing Holly is... making her blow some strange guy, for our own ends. What makes us any better?"

Maybe I should have just kept my mouth shut, because it certainly wasn't the right thing to say. Her face went blank, like all her emotion was wiped away. That, I knew, was a sure sign I'd upset her. She didn't like showing when she was angry or upset, especially not when I was the cause. "It's not the same thing at all," she said coldly. "We're doing this FOR her."

"I know," I said, and put a hand on her shoulder, trying to comfort her. She casually slid away. "I'm not saying you did anything wrong, it's just... it still makes me feel guilty. Maybe we shouldn't have gotten started blackmailing them at all."

"That's not logical," she said. She still wouldn't look at me... she stopped the video she was playing, and began working on a new file. "If we hadn't, we wouldn't be in any position to help them now. We wouldn't even know Holly was abusing them. Besides, they did deserve what we did to them then."

Did they? I wasn't so sure. Whenever I thought about them being mean to Erin, I thought they deserved some kind of punishment, but turning them into sex slaves was more about us than them. "For all we know, Holly might think the same thing."

"Holly's not smart like we are," she said. "Besides, when's the last time we really forced them to do anything they didn't want to do? This time doesn't count, we're helping them, after all. Because of what Winnie did today, we can figure out exactly who's involved in Holly's operation, and how to shut it down. That doesn't just save Winnie and Amber, it saves all the other girls too. That more than balances the scales for everything we've done." As she spoke, she was creating a list on her computer, detailing what she knew so far, Holly's crew, with space, currently blank for 'known customers', 'partners'.

"I hope you're right," I said.

"Of course I'm right." She was still angry, but I had a feeling I'd past the crisis point... unless I'd said something stupid, my doubting her would be a minor annoyance that she'd get over and probably forget entirely. "Now, do you want me to give you access to all the laptop backdoors on your system, or do I have to work on this myself?"

"We're in this together," I told her.

She seemed slightly mollified. "Don't worry," she said. "We're going to take down Holly quickly now... as soon as we've mapped out the extent of her operations, and gathered enough blackmail material to take care of any potential influential partners. After that, Winnie and Amber will be thanking us for what we made them do."

***
Chapter Eighteen:

For all that I tried to take the moral high ground, for all that I genuinely felt guilty for what we did, as usual, I succumbed to less noble temptations later that night, and began spying on people over the laptops for my own amusement. At first I limited it to Holly's friends... Holly herself never connected her laptop to any wireless network while I was watching.

But nobody in Holly's prostitution ring was very interesting to watch, at least not that night. They didn't seem to be on-the-clock, they just did ordinary stuff like watch videos, check Facebook, or do homework.

That evening, I did about half of the program Erin requested... enough so that it pinged every laptop that it could find and got a GPS value from them, and I decided I'd work on the rest, plotting it to a real map, the next day, and as I stared at the list of people I could spy on, I couldn't resist. I clicked on a random girl, just to see what they were up to, and was rewarded with the sight of a girl in my History class laying in bed, the laptop on her stomach. She was just wearing a bra, at least on top. I couldn't see what she was wearing below, obviously.

I watched for a while, feeling a bit of that same voyeuristic thrill I used to get watching camwhores, one I no longer really felt with Amber, Winnie, and my sister due to them becoming so familiar. At any moment she might decide to remove her bra, or start masturbating.

Watching somebody else and getting aroused wasn't cheating on my sister, of course. We'd discussed it. If I found out she was watching some guy and masturbating... okay, I'd feel a little jealous, but I wouldn't hold it against her, it's biology. People like looking at hot people naked. As long as she wasn't doing anything with him, I could deal with it, and Erin went one step better with me... she occasionally allowed me to fuck other girls, as long as she could be sure they weren't a threat to our relationship. That usually meant people we blackmailed... the one time she let me fuck an unblackmailed girl, solely to keep up the public pretense of having a girlfriend other than her, it turned out badly as jealousy did rear its ugly head. I won't make that mistake again.

Still, sex was sex and looking was not, so I didn't feel at all guilty at checking out the bra-covered breasts of a girl in my class, and watching for a few minutes in the hopes of more. But then I got bored, and started clicking other names. I only chose girls, for obvious reasons... the slim chance I might have caught a guy fucking his girlfriend or something was far outweighed by the chance I might see them masturbating, and I didn't want that mental image of any guy, much less any one I knew.

Of the girls names available to me, most weren't interesting... there were a lot of cameras facing empty rooms, a few that were entirely blank but with a little bit of sound, like the camera was covered with something, and even when the girls were on camera, mostly they were dressed. Because it was evening, some of the girls were dressed for comfort, in nightgowns or bra and panties, but not many, and, after watching too long with the girl in my history class hoping she'd strip down to less than the bra, I didn't spend much time on these, either.

Finally, I hit paydirt. I opened a window and was instantly treated to the sight of a dark-haired slim girl in her bra and panties, reclining back in a chair with her hand playing around in her crotch. My eyes automatically flew to the other window to see exactly who's computer this was... I hadn't given it much thought when I clicked other than realizing it was a girl, but now that I knew there was something going on, I wanted to remember her name. That name was Krista, which didn't really ring a bell... the face had that vague familiarity of somebody who I'd seen in the halls on a regular basis, but never had a conversation with, much less shared a class.

Krista looked directly at a camera, and her expression seemed to say "I know you're watching, and I like it..." and I realized that she actually was on cam, deliberately, with somebody else. She was showing off for some other guy, but I could pretend it was for me, that she was my private camwhore.

She smiled at whatever her beau said or typed, and then reached behind her to slide her bra off, still connected but now slung around her stomach, letting her tits show. They were small, probably even smaller than Erin's, reminding me of what her own tits looked like a couple years ago, just a little round, but perky, with pink nipples. You could make out just the slightest triangles around her breasts, the shape of a bikini, a tan that was starting to fade but still visible. Krista shifted around in the chair and then pulled her panties down to the knees, showing off her shaved slit, as she worked her fingers in.

She said something, but I couldn't hear... I kept my headphones plugged into my computer screen, so that if some kind of embarrassing sound came out nobody would hear it. But I loved hearing the little moans or grunts of a girl experiencing sexual pleasure, so I reached over and put them over my ears.

There they were, those delightful sounds, soft, as though she was trying to suppress them herself, but if she was ashamed of the sound, she certainly wasn't of the visual. Krista rubbed around her clit furiously, the slit spreading open or squeezing shut with the motion, and all open to view of whoever she was talking to.

I couldn't see him, but I heard a familiar sound of hand stroking cock, soft already but made hollow-sounding through being played over her own speakers and then picked up by her mike, and me hearing it through my headphones.

The motion of Krista's probing fingers slowed, and she whispered, "Bobby? You're getting close, right?"

A soft, tinny grunt. "Yeah."

"Slow down a little, give me time to catch up..."

"I'll try, but it's hard..."

She grinned. "I can see that..." She returned to her own furious masturbation. I decided to join in, watching and stroking myself. They couldn't see me... even if they had a spy program like mine, I kept my camera covered if I wasn't intending to use it, and I liked that just fine. I always had a touch of the voyeur in me.

"Okay," she said, through a held breath. "I'm almost ready." I wasn't, but picked up the pace watching Krista. "Cum for me, Bobby..." Seconds later, Krista's back arched as she sucked in her breath and then her whole body seemed to freeze, her hand no longer moved. Seconds later, she sat down again, smiling dreamily.

"God I love you, Krista," I heard the mysterious Bobby say. There were at least a half-dozen Bobbys throughout the school, and I had no idea which it might be, or if it was one of them at all.

"I love you too," she said. "I miss you."

"Me too."

I hadn't cum, and although Krista was still naked, it looked like the masturbation part of the show was over, and I was losing interest. I closed her window and cast around for other cameras, looking for something to sustain me, but eventually just gave up without completing it. I'd already cum thanks to my sister earlier that day, I didn't need to finish what I started there... maybe before bed I'd rub one out to get to sleep.

Before I actually went to bed, I stopped by the bathroom where my sister was brushing her teeth. Mom was still downstairs, so conversation was safe. "I finished about half of that GPS program," I said. "Figure I'll do the rest tomorrow."

"Uh-huh," she said. Of course, she had a toothbrush in her mouth, so she couldn't say much more, but it still sounded a little cold, and I had a feeling she might still be nursing a bit of a grudge over my earlier reaction to her use of Winnie. Correcting that compelled me to add more, to try to demonstrate that I really was on her side. "So, I was checking out some of the cams earlier..." Her eyes slid to me with interest. "Caught a girl in your class masturbating on cam for her boyfriend."

She took the toothbrush out of her mouth. "Really? Who?"

"Her name was Krista."

"Hmm... dark hair, sporty type?" I nodded. "I didn't think she had a boyfriend... in fact, she said she didn't just a couple days ago. Did you see who it was?"

"No, I told you, it was just on cam."

"You could have just flipped to watching her screen," she pointed out.

I felt a little stupid. "Yeah, I guess I didn't think of that. Anyway, I wouldn't want to, he was masturbating and I don't need to see that. His name was Bobby, though. Don't know which one."

Erin's eyebrow quirked. "I wonder if it was Bobby Kozik. They seemed pretty chummy when they were working on a presentation together, but... he's pretty serious with Jackie..." I had no idea who either of those people were. "Maybe that's why she's been keeping it a secret. If she's on the school laptop, I've probably got her password to her Facebook by now, I'll take a look before bed, figure out who it is."

"Does it matter?"

She shrugged. "Information is power. You never know what'll come in handy... and that's especially true for information that somebody's trying to keep hidden. Besides, for all we know, Krista's one of Holly's friends and we'll need leverage on her."

I didn't see that as very likely, but said nothing as she resumed and finished brushing her teeth. I waited until she was done and then gave her a kiss goodnight before using the washroom myself.

The next morning, my sister woke up completely cheery, with not a trace of previous day's minor argument. Mom was home, so it was only during the ride to school that she told me... her grin just got wider and wider until finally she couldn't hold it anymore and said, "So, I figured out who Krista's secret boyfriend is..."

"Oh yeah?" I was a little disappointed, watching that grin, I thought it was going to be something good. "What, was it Bobby Kozik, like you thought?" She shook her head, white teeth biting her lower lip. I tried to think of other possibilities, but none came to mind. "Okay, so, I give up, who was it?"

"I'll give you a hint... they share the same last name, and they're not married." Before I could answer, she blurted out, "It's her brother!"

"Huh. I didn't even know she had a brother. Does he go to our school?" That they had sex on cam and talked about missing each other didn't mean anything... Erin and I did that sometimes, separated only by a hallway but with a Mom in the house.

"Nope. From what I could piece together from digging through old Facebook messages, their parents found out and separated them." The smile faded a bit, as she probably wondered, as I had, whether the same might happen to us. "Krista lives with her grandmother now. But what's important is that they really love each other... they're having like a long distance relationship. It's the first real kinship that I've verified in the wild. I thought for sure it was going to be Tony and Gianna, but they've barely been on their laptops."

"I still don't think they're together..."

"Wanna bet?" she asked with a grin. "Say, I win, you have to eat me out..."

"Oh, there's a punishment," I joked. I realized I never did collect on the bet about us taking down Holly within a week, at least not officially, but she'd blown me so many times since the point was moot. "What happens if I win, I get to eat you out and a hundred bucks, too?"

Her grin widened, showing teeth. "Okay, then, if I win... you go into a sex shop and buy me fuzzy handcuffs."

I raised an eyebrow. "Are those for me, or for you?" Nervousness crept into my voice, but not about that... it was about how Erin specified going into a store. That was the real punishment of losing the bet. Novelty handcuffs couldn't cost much, but it would be extremely embarrassing to go and buy in person. Those sorts of things should be ordered online.

"Depends on the mood I'm in when I win."

"And what if I win?"

She shrugged. "We could get the blackmailer to order you and Queen Bitch to fuck."

I made a face. "Hardly a prize. I spend more than enough time with her as it is." Okay, there was some appeal, a confirmed lesbian being coerced into fucking me, but I was trying to get us out of the coercion biz, and besides, I never wanted Erin to think she wasn't enough for me.

"Okay, then you choose something. In fact, I'll leave it open-ended. If you prove me wrong, you can decide what you want after. I'm that confident."

I raised my eyebrow. "I don't see why, I haven't seen any evidence."

"I feel it in my bones. Sooner or later I'll catch them at it and prove it to you, and then you'll owe me a pair of fuzzy pink handcuffs." It was then I realized that even if Erin was wrong, I might never cash in my favor... compared to proving something is happening, proving something isn't happening is virtually impossible. I had to grin. Clever girl. "But anyway, this Bobby and Krista thing... this is something special."

"I guess it is nice to know we're not alone..."

"Exactly. Now all I have to do is blackmail her..." My eyes snapped to her, and her smug grin. "Kidding," she admitted, and then continued, "You're so easy to wind up sometimes. But I am going to make friends with her. I mean, we have so much in common."

"Why? I mean, you seem to be convinced Gianna and Tony are doing it but you don't seem to be trying especially hard to be friends with her."

"I have made friends with her... online, under a fake account. She's not willing to open up about her kinship, even with somebody else who does it. Maybe if she matures a little. Krista's different, I hope. Don't worry, I'm not going to admit anything to her unless she does first."

"Okay... but still, I don't see why you have to make friends with her just because she's doing her brother."

She shrugged. "It's just, nice to be able to talk to somebody else. You're an important part of my life, and we have to keep it secret from almost everybody, and those we don't..." Another shrug. "Cassie's great, but she doesn't really approve. And Winnie and Amber, well, they don't really get it either." Madison went unmentioned... she was in on the secret, but despite being one of our blackmail group, she wasn't a friend of Erin's and probably never would be.

I was never much of a sharer myself. I mean, sure, life might have been easier if I could talk to my friends about how I really felt about Erin, but I didn't feel deprived. Even if I wasn't dating my sister, with all the secrecy that required, I wouldn't have felt much need to talk to somebody much about who I was seeing. But Erin was different, I guess, and though she would deny it, other people's approval really mattered to her. "Just be careful," I suggested. "If it's true, she might not be willing to open up... especially if she was already caught at it."

"Yeah." She sighed. "Why can't people just be rational about this kind of thing?" I wasn't sure they weren't, as much as I loved it, I thought we were the crazy ones, but didn't want to say that, so instead I said nothing, and eventually she changed the subject on her own.

***
Chapter Nineteen:

The first few full school days with our new laptops were a bit of a mixed bag, with respect to how they changed things. There were the old school, probably technophobic, teachers who still taught a mostly traditional lecture, with the only difference being that the students typed their notes instead of writing them, and, if they could figure out how to do it (and my first period teacher wasted 10 minutes trying to do just that), putting multimedia directly to our screens instead of projecting it at the front of the room. In many of these classes, very little learning got done at all, for a simple reason - these teachers weren't great at policing non-classroom activities on the keyboard. They didn't know, or think to look, if we were typing to capture important parts of the lecture, or to use the messenger features to talk to friends. Those were supposed to be disabled by default during class hours, with each teacher having the ability to make an exception for their class, but it was easy enough for enterprising students to turn it on for everybody under the guise of 'helping' the teacher set up something else. It was almost sad, really.

Then there were the other classes where the teachers had been waiting for this, and managed to use it to get the whole class involved, letting us work on material together or making a game of problem sets. Some of these teachers were cool and left the messenger options on deliberately, others monitored our screens carefully and called people out for not paying attention, but either way at least I felt a little more engaged in the class. It's not like it changed teaching forever, but it just made it a little more natural than how we used to learn.

My favorite was my History class... you wouldn't think a History teacher would adapt smoothly to new technology, but Mr. Withrow did, striking a good balance between 'cool' and 'Nazi', providing us with the information mandated by curriculum, and allowing us to look up supplemental information ourselves. It boded well for whenever we did our Cold War game. He said he was still trying to decide whether to ban most of the activity from happening on the laptops, to give us a better sense of the era it actually happened, or to make it something of a modern Cold War and use the school laptops to comment on issues like internet surveillance in authoritarian regimes. We spent a few minutes of class discussion on it when he asked our opinion, not as a vote, but just to give him pros and cons. Most of the class recommended for the use of the laptops. I suggested against it, mostly because I didn't want the Mr. Withrow, or anybody else, looking too closely at mine. Even though I intended to keep it pretty sanitized, you never knew what might crop up. Plus, it wouldn't be fair... I had a backdoor into everybody's computer and I didn't think I'd be able to resist the temptation to cheat.

During lunch, I noticed my sister sitting down next to Krista. Krista didn't start a conversation immediately, so whatever Erin's plans for friendship, they hadn't been completed yet, but there was no scowls of dislike, either. For my part, I had to suffer another day of eating with Madison's friends, particularly annoying in this case because her friend Chelsea couldn't stop obsessing about her ex. "You can fake a hickey, right? I bet that's what he did, he just did it to make me jealous."

"And it seems to be working," somebody else said.

"It is not. I don't care what he does. But I mean, come on, after how he whined about how I was breaking his heart, I was the love of his life, now he shows up with a hickey a couple days later? I don't buy it."

"I buy it," said the same girl. "He looks like he's over you. And what are you complaining about, you dumped him for Eddie."

"I know, but that's the point, I dumped HIM. He should still be staring at me and hoping I change my mind, not messing around with sluts."

"That's what guys do," Madison said. "Messing around with sluts is like, their therapy."

I couldn't resist a little bit of my own cattiness. "Yeah, I know if we broke up, I'd be under somebody else that night." My sister, actually, and it would be more of a celebratory fuck than therapy. Madison glared at me, with murder in my eyes, silently warning me I was going too far, so I grinned and added, "Only because I'd be so destroyed that I'd want to make you jealous." That seemed to appease her, although she made a little 'hmph' sound of offended dignity.

"Look at him," Chelsea complained again. Ben was at another table, in a casual conversation with some guys, seeming relaxed and confident. "That smile is so fake. You guys think it's fake, right?"

Normally, I'm not the type of person to get involved in conversations like this. Usually I'm the type of guy who would keep his mouth shut rather than offend someone. But I suddenly realized that if Madison's friends thought I was a jerk, I'd probably get let off lunchtime pretend boyfriend duties more often. Maybe I'd even get permanently disinvited from Eddie's parties. "I don't know, but I hope it's real. Ben deserves to move on. Nothing worse than being all mopey over a girl who isn't even worth it."

Chelsea's mouth hung open. "What did you say?"

"Sorry," I said, actually feeling guilty. "I don't mean you're a worthless human being, but... let's face it, you cheated on him with one of his best friends, and..."

"I did NOT cheat," she said angrily. "We got together AFTER Ben and I broke up."

"Yeah, I don't believe that and neither does anybody else. Even if you didn't, you were publicly on top of him just a couple days later. You didn't even have the good taste to sneak around for a while first." I had a feeling it was because she'd gotten sick of sneaking around with Eddie before the breakup. "And here you are, upset because he's NOT crushed about it. How selfish can you get?"

"Andrew," Madison warned.

"I'm just saying, Ben's a good guy, he deserves a better girlfriend than that. I bet that's why he seems happy, he realized it too."

"Madison, are you going to let him talk to me like that?"

That just made me a little angrier. "Like what? I'm just saying the truth. What, did you expect him to just wait around as a backup because you're not sure things with Eddie would work out? Grow up." Madison's hand landed on my arm, squeezing me with just enough force to get my attention. I deliberately shrugged it off, intending to say something along the lines of it not being long before Eddie got tired of her, but then I looked at Chelsea, and underneath all that makeup she actually looked more sad than angry, and I lost my nerve. "Anyway, I'm sorry if I offended you. I'm just in a bad mood." I stood up, taking my tray, and said, "I'm going to find Jay, I need to ask him something about a project." It was a lie, just to get me out of there.

As I walked away, from behind my back, I heard, "It's not like Ben was the most perfect boyfriend or anything, you know..." It wasn't directed at me, it was Chelsea trying to justify herself to her friends, and maybe to herself.

I never did find Jay, but ate the rest of my lunch with Tony, chatting about the usual inconsequential bullshit. When I asked him how his sister I saw a flash of something in his eyes... irritation, or maybe jealousy, and he asked "Why?" just a little too sharply, and once again I thought, just for a second, there might be a possibility of something going on. I just told him I was making conversation and steered the conversation over to a video game idea I had, tentatively titled "Foxy Squirrel", focusing on a hot female squirrel. I didn't tell him the origin, of happening across some furry porn while surfing the bed before bed. I'm not really a fan of furry porn... I didn't fap to the images or anything, but a comment on it sparked the idea, which I developed for a while as I lay in bed trying to sleep. The basics of the game were that you'd play a foxy squirrel, and horny male squirrels would be following you everywhere... basically you'd be luring them to different areas to complete puzzles. Lure too many squirrels onto a weak tree branch, the branch breaks, for example. Sort of like a little flash game (a port of a much older game, I think), called Lemmings. Most of the task would be leading the squirrels around, but you could also do things like point to nuts and get the male squirrels to try and impress you by gathering them, but at a cost, such displays force you to eliminate one of the other squirrels. It'd probably get labeled as a bad depiction of women, but sexism is pretty rampant in the gaming industry anyway, and I thought if you did it with a sense of humor you could get away with it without being too offensive. Erin thought it was funny, anyway, when I told her about it in the car, then joked it reflected the true state of the world... the women get everything done by manipulating the men with sex.

Tony listened politely and said it might be a fun idea, but I don't think he "got it"... but I'm used to that, a lot of people aren't excited by an idea like I can be, they have to actually play it before they get a handle on it. At least I was excited, enough to want to start work a little once I got home.

Not right away, though. Holly walking past me, for all I knew on her way to sell another girl's sexual services, reminded me that I had another duty first, finish that laptop tracking program so that we could find a way to trap her.

That didn't take long. I finished it up in the first hour we were home, and that included a short break where I sixty-nined with Erin. Sometimes you need a little break for coding, and cumming down your sister's throat while your tongue makes them squirm with pleasure is just the thing to refresh you and remind you that numbers and functions and if-statements aren't the only thing in the world. Of course, by that point I just had a few minors bugs to work out - if two or more people were both in the same area it would only put one name on the map... took me forever to figure out what was causing it.

Once I had it done, I showed it off proudly to my sister. "See?" I moved the mouse to one of the names and clicked on the map. "It opens directly onto the spy program for that person." Unfortunately, in this case, it was just another girl staring at the screen. As cool as the idea of being able to spy on everybody's laptop might sound, I foresaw a lot of that.

"Wow," Erin said. "You did a great job. So... who do you want to look in on?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. Holly's still not on."

"Mmm," Erin said. "She uses it at school enough. There's always the keylogger to dig through, though. Winnie's not on either, maybe they're somewhere without free Wi-Fi." Her eyes looked over the list. "Hey, why not see what Tony's up to? Maybe he's engaging in a little kinlust, and I can earn my handcuffs." She clicked on his name, and Tony's room appeared in a window, as did Tony himself, but he was watching the screen intently while his fingers moved about nervously... probably playing a game of some kind. Whatever the computer was resting on, it was a little lower than it should have been... I could see up his nose, which began to be all I could focus on.

"No luck again," I said. "I should probably decide what my favor's going to be."

Erin hmphed dismissively and closed the webcam view. "You only get the favor if you prove it... and you never will, because I'm right." She clicked through another few cameras... any place where two or more people of opposite genders were listed at the same location seemed to attract her attention, but the first set was just a group of stoners smoking up, and the second had people who had abandoned their computers to do something outside of the range of the camera. The third attempt looked like it might just be a legitimate case of studying between two friends, both sophomores I didn't know. We watched them for about thirty seconds discuss some aspect of trigonometry, and then the guy sidled up to the girl and slid his hands up her top.

"Hello," I said, perking up. They couldn't hear me, but Erin looked back at that window... she'd been watching the list.

"You know what would help me concentrate?" the guy asked, massaging her tits.

"I know what you want," the girl said, "But I doubt it would help you concentrate."

"It's hard to think when you've got a boner. Trust me."

"I know, I've got brothers."

That got Erin's attention. "Hello!" she echoed with a grin.

The guy was also taken a back, but not in a pleased way. He stopped playing melon inspector underneath her sweater for a moment. "What?"

"They become idiots too, whenever a pretty girl's around. It's pretty pathetic." It was apparently a satisfactory action because the hands started moving again.

"Well then, help me not be an idiot..."

"Your dad's like, right downstairs."

"Trust me, he won't care. And if we're quiet, he'll never even know..."

"We're not having sex with your dad right downstairs," she said emphatically.

"There are other things you can do..." he suggested hopefully.

She sighed and rolled her eyes a little. "Fine. Lie down."

He did, with a shit-eating grin on his face, and then the girl crawled over his lap, and proceeded to give him a blowjob... one we couldn't even see, aside from the girl's jean-covered ass and her head bobbing up and down over his lap, accompanied by slurping sounds. "My old nemesis," I lamented. "Bad camera angles." Erin snorted, and we watched casually for a while, but the view didn't really get much better, and our attention drifted. I was working out some elements of Foxy Squirrel in my head.

My sister's attention was drawn somewhere else, back to the map of laptops we could ping. "Diane. Macey... that's Miss Macey, isn't it?"

"I guess so." We had a file full of porn of her labeled with that name... recorded by a teacher at our previous school who dated her.

"What are she and Jay doing together?" I saw what she was looking at. I hadn't really noticed before, but of course teachers had their own laptops too, and they showed up on the list as well as anybody's. Even though they had the machines for a whole year, Erin's program pushed the same update on them. I'd just never noticed... I didn't program the map program to distinguish between students and teachers, so their names were easy to miss among the rest. And in this case, both Miss Macey and Jay's names were together at one point on the map. And it certainly wasn't the school.

***
Chapter Twenty:

By the time I got the words "I don't know," out, Erin was already clicking over to Jay's webcam.

It was situated in a kitchen, that much I could tell, but there was nobody in view. The same was the case on Diane's cam... all that could be determined was that they were in the very same kitchen, and it wasn't Jay's house. I had never been there in person, but I knew where it was on the map, and they were several blocks away. "You hear that?" Erin asked.

I listened, carefully. On the microphone, you could hear voices... soft, difficult to determine, but I thought one of them was Jay. "Maybe she's tutoring him?" I suggested.

"Send him a message."

"What?"

"Send him a message on the school laptop messenger. It'll make a sound, right? Maybe he'll come on cam."

I got out my laptop and called up the program, pondering for a little while about what to say. Finally, I just asked what he was up to and asked if he wanted to play Modern Warfare. I heard the chime through the webcam view... of Diane's laptop, as it turned out. A few seconds passed with no response, so I sent another, with a "You there?"

Finally, he appeared on screen and, as though to prove my suggestion of tutoring as naive, he wasn't wearing a shirt. He did have pants on, but I couldn't think of any innocent reasons he might be at Miss Macey's without a shirt. Unless Miss Macey had a daughter at a spectacularly young age.

Jay looked at the screen and a flicker of annoyance passed over his face, but he began typing.

"Who is it?" I knew that voice well. When I was in middle school, I used to get boners in class from hearing her talking about fingering. Obviously, she was talking about instruments, but with a little imagination, she was the hot older woman instructing a young student in love.

She came in view of the camera and I saw that she was playing the role for real, only not with me, and the student significantly older than I was when I first had the fantasy. I didn't take music anymore, so I only saw her rarely in the halls or at a distance, but she was still as pretty as I remembered, looking like she was in her twenties although, by now, she was probably in her thirties. She was still in good shape, though, and her face was open, inviting, eyes gentle and encouraging, like they were made to say "You can do it if you only try." Right now, unlike at school, her long dark hair was a little tousled, some locks even getting in the way of her eyes, and that made her look even younger. That wasn't the only way she was different from school though... if I didn't already have a collection of porn of her, I'd have been scandalized by seeing what she was wearing. She had only a pair of bra and panties, cream-colored.

Jay smiled up at her as she leaned over his shoulder. "Just a buddy of mine. Andrew. Wants to play games."

"Mmm." She nibbled on his ear playfully, smiling. "And is that what you want to do right now? Play games?"

"Holy shit," I whispered while she was saying this. I mean, it was pretty obvious when she was out there in underwear, but seeing that just really hit home. They were actually hooking up. Jay had bagged Miss Macey. "No wonder he's been so happy lately."

Meanwhile, Jay had said, "Not with him." He turned his head slightly, his ear slipping out of her mouth, but he quickly replaced it with his tongue. They made out, pretty aggressively, and Miss Macey pulled away and giggled a little, and then got into what must have been a more comfortable position, on his lap, straddling his legs. They continued to kiss for another minute or so, and then Miss Macey stood up and strode away out of camera. Her hand held his, rising while the distance increased, until only their fingertips touched, and then dropped. He looked to her, then the screen, back to her, back to the screen, and finally sent the response he'd been typing. It was an apology. "Sorry, I can't right now," it said, followed by another one, seconds later. He was "busy".

I'll bet.

We didn't see what he was up to after he left, from either laptop's cam view, but we could hear it, on Jay's laptop best because it was nearer to where ever they were. Not right away, mind you, but before long, the soft sounds of distant talking gave way to guttural sounds of passion, both male and female. Jay was loud in the sack, it seemed. Not verbal, though, at least if they did dirty talk, it was too softly to overhear, but we could make out groans from him and moans, followed later by screams from her.

And even if I couldn't see it, I could imagine it quite well, because I knew what Miss Macey looked like having sex, and really, that's all I would be interested in anyway. I didn't care what Jay looked like getting freaky. I imagined he'd be a little awkward and reserved, just like in real life, but he was making noises that belied that impression... and I also knew that even the sweet, innocent looking music teacher could sure act like a slut in the bedroom. I'd seen the videos plenty of times, enough to put a very vivid mental image in my head. She seem to like it doggy style most, and it was easy to picture her ample tits swinging from the force alone, of him thrusting into her while she thrust back just as vigorously, her hair going all over the place, falling all over her eyes as she nevertheless tried contort her body to look back over her shoulder, a little slack-jawed, and watch what was being done to her, as though even she was surprised how easily she took a cock. Or maybe she'd let him be on top of her, and dig her nails into Jay's back like we saw her do on one video, like she was warning the guy she was with that he'd better not dare leave her unsatisfied.

"I can't believe it," I said to my sister while this was going on.

"I never even had a clue," Erin said in wonder. "She seemed so... wholesome. I mean, I knew she had sex... we've seen it. But I never would have thought she'd ever be with a student."

"I guess everybody has secrets."

"True... everybody has something they wouldn't want to get out." She grinned at me. "Maybe we really should bring back Blackmailers Incorporated, and not just on Holly's clients."

"What? You want to blackmail Miss Macey? For money?" That idea didn't feel right to me. But then I'd always had a soft spot for her.

"We did it to the last teacher we caught fucking students," she pointed out. "Kind of a double standard just because it's a girl teacher."

"But it's not the same thing. Those girls were like was twelve. Jay's eighteen... it might not even be illegal." I was pretty sure it was, because she was his teacher, but I guess I was looking for reasons to excuse it. Still, there was a big difference... the girls were doing it for grades, which meant they might well have been pressured into it... Jay's groans left no doubt he really enjoyed what he was doing right then.

Erin hmphed softly. "It's still unethical. And Cassie said she was forced to sell herself to teachers sometimes. What do we do to them if we found whoever they are, let them get off?" We still hadn't found any evidence of that, and Erin couldn't ask Cassie to name names without revealing that she was working on something to interfere with Holly.

"I'm pretty sure this is consensual. And she probably doesn't have much money anyway." Teachers were always complaining about how poorly paid they were.

"Maybe." We watched, or rather listened, as Miss Macey started screaming, first the word 'More,' repeated several times, and then becoming wordless, a cry of pleasure, and then it went silent. "It still might come in handy to blackmail her, even if it's not for money. I mean, you never know, we might need something from her one day. A teacher in our back pocket might not be a bad thing, she could be an emergency alibi or something."

I just made a sound, like I was considering the point but wasn't sure I agreed. We had too many people to keep track of, and the more people we actually did blackmail, the more people who could potentially put together that we're behind everything.

Suddenly, music blared out of the speaker. I knew the ringtone, it was Jay's phone, although he usually sent it to voice mail when he was around us. It rang for almost half a minute, and then Jay appeared on screen. He was still naked, so I averted my eyes a little. "Yeah," he said into the phone. "What? I can't understand you. Mom. Mom, shut up a second. Start again, what's going on?" He winced, as she must have yelled at him. You could hear that even over the webcam, although not exactly what was being said, that was pretty well incoherent. "Okay, sorry... what do you need?" He listened, shaking his head, knitting his brow together in frustration. "No, Mom, I'm not loaning you money." Pause. "Because I know what you're going to spend it on. No." A sigh. "I'm at a friend's. I don't know how long it's going to be. I ate already." I noticed for the first time there was a plate with crumbs of food visible at the edge of the table. Jay and Miss Macey must have had dinner together, too. Jay listened to a response from his Mom, although to me, it sounded like more meaningless gabble. "Okay."

Miss Macey appeared on screen, wearing just a robe, her hair even more a mess than before, and some strands were clinging to her neck, damp with perspiration, but it didn't look like she cared about how she looked. Instead, she watched Jay's face, the worry clear on her own. Jay talked to his Mom for another minute or so, before saying, "I'll be there when I can. Bye." He hung up. By this point, Miss Macey was sitting, her breasts visible to the camera. She still looked at him with worried eyes, asking a question without using words. Even her breasts somehow looked sad, like they her nipples were eyes watching him in concern. "She's drunk, of course," he said bluntly, even a little angrily. "I should probably get back. She's going to need me."

"You can't make yourself responsible for her," Miss Macey told him. "That's not fair to you, and in the end, it doesn't help her." He just shrugged, not willing to meet her eye. In fact, he walked off. She remained seated, speaking after him. "I know she's your Mom, but... this is her problem. Until she's ready for help, the only one you can control is you."

Jay reappeared on screen, thankfully wearing boxers, and with his jeans and shirt in his hands. "I know, but I've got to do this."

"Have you thought any more about what I said earlier? About Alateen?"

"I've thought about it," he said in a tone that suggested he still didn't think it was for him.

"It really does help."

After putting his jeans on, Jay leaned over the table so his face was level with hers, and put a hand gently to the side of her face. "You help."

"I'm only one person," she said, eyes dropping

"One's all I need. I love you, you know?"

"I love you too." He leaned forward and their lips met again, softly. "But I still think you should think about going to a group setting."

"I'll think about it," he said, pulling away, again sounded like it was the last thing on his mind.

She tugged on his arm, preventing him from turning away. "I'm only pushing it because I care about you, you know?"

He nodded, even smiled... a weak smile. "I know. And I love that. I'm just not ready to talk about it in a big group of strangers. Not yet." He took a deep breath. "But I really should go. I'll see you tomorrow."

"And call me tonight?"

"Of course." With that, abruptly, he slammed the laptop closed, ending our view. Erin switched back to the feed from Miss Macey's cam, but by the time we did, she was moving out of the kitchen, following him to the door, I guess.

"Maybe we shouldn't blackmail her," Erin decided. "I mean, they seem to be in love... real love. I thought maybe she was using him." She still might have been, of course, but I didn't say that. "Besides, it looks like Jay's got enough problems to deal with."

I had to agree. I'd discovered two things about the secret life of one of my best friends, and it turned out the one I was least bothered about was that he was in an illicit affair with one of his teachers. I wanted to talk to him, extend him some sympathy, let him know if he needed someone to talk to or whatever... but I knew I'd never be able to do that, not without revealing where I'd got the information. Sometimes being a spy sucks.

***
Chapter Twenty-One:

The ability to spy on virtually everybody we knew, indiscriminately, was pretty addictive, not just to me, but especially to Erin. Often when I looked in on her, I'd find her browsing random people, hoping to catch them in the act of something interesting. I did that too, but in my case, I was more often either looking for specific dirt on Holly's crew, or for random nudity (female) or sex... I just didn't have the patience to keep looking hoping to find people's deepest darkest secret. Not Erin, though. It would rarely be the only thing she was doing, but often she'd have several windows open, just watching because she suspected there might be something juicy coming on one of them.

It was especially bad those first few days, and I had to tease her about it sometimes, like it was an actual addiction, like drinking or something. Of course, that was ridiculous, it was just like any new toy... you sometimes use it incessantly after you first get it. Still, only a couple days after we got this new toy, I had to virtually drag her away from it.

Then again, it was another night Lawrence was over for dinner, so she had a good excuse for not wanting to come without being dragged. In fact, it probably would have been more pleasant if one of them had been too busy with other things and skipped dinner, although I naturally would have preferred it be Lawrence.

That wasn't the case, he was there and even helped with some of the cooking, and Mom called me and Erin to come down for dinner, and I came down. Erin didn't, although she had shouted, "In a second!" We waited a few minutes. Still no Erin. Mom called up again, but this time there was no answer.

She sighed, dramatically, and I could tell she was about to get up and see to her in person, so I volunteered instead. "I'll go get her," I said. If she really was so wrapped up in something she'd forgotten about dinner, it was better I be the one to see her, rather than risk Mom catching a glimpse of the screen... even though our computer screens faced away from the door, Mom might have been annoyed enough to walk in and check for herself before Erin could switch it.

I darted up the stairs, and opened Erin's room, without knocking. She had her headphones on and was leaning in very close to the screen, although she looked up when I came in, and freed her ears so she could hear me and blinked her eyes, intently, like they were sore and she needed a second to refocus on me. Probably from staring at the screen too long. "Come on, Mom's getting pretty impatient."

She groaned theatrically. "Awwww, do I have to?"

"You do if you don't want her to drag you down for dinner herself. Why, what's going on that's so enthralling?"

"Well, there's another juicy kinship thread going on 4chan," she said. "And I'm listening in on a phone conversation... of this guy I went to middle school with. He's talking all flirty-flirty to a girl that I think is a friend of his sister. His sister's a senior, you probably know her, Becky Resnick?" I knew her enough to recognize her, but we never interacted much. "Anyway, all her friends are seniors too, and he's only a freshman, so it's kind of interesting. Usually only senior guys date freshmen girls." That was true... the last freshman guy at our school who openly dated a senior girl was Eddie, and... well, he WAS rich. "I was just trying to figure out which one it is..."

"Well, it's time to pull yourself away from your crack," I joked. "Come down for dinner before Mom realizes what an addict you are."

"But I'm sure I can nail it down in just another few minutes..." I gave her a skeptical look, and she sighed again and started disentangling herself, placing her keyboard back on the desk instead of her legs, and putting back the headphones where they usually hung.

"Come on, don't tell me you won't be able to figure it out later..."

"Yeah, but I'd rather do it now than spend time with Lawrence." She said the name in a sing-song way that made it clear she didn't like him. But she joined me at the door, and then, before descending the stairs, took a deep breath, as though she was about to descend into some dark ocean.

Which, in a way, she was. She came down, apologized for being held up in a conversation, and then greeted Lawrence with about the minimum of politeness. She still hadn't really forgiven him for their previous argument. But she was at least civil, again not really volunteering anything but not challenging him or anything either. Soon Lawrence stopped trying to get anything other than monosyllabic answers from her.

That is, until the conversation turned to movies. It seemed like such an innocent topic, too. It started with them talking about movies, possibly something to rent. It went back and forth, but Lawrence suggested the Narnia movies. That actually got Erin interested a little, enough that I wondered if Mom had prepped him, suggested he talk about it in order to help win her over. Erin read many of the Narnia books as a kid, before the movie even came out, even though she must have been like seven or eight when that happened... in fact that was one of the first signs we had that she was precocious. We took her to see the first movie at least three times in the theatres. She still loved the world, although she now recognized the blatant Christian allegory and thought some of the messages it sent about gender roles and other things were screwed up, and now imagined her own adventures... including incorporating her love of incest. She shipped Peter/Susan, telling me on more than one occasion that, during the time when they were Kings and Queens of Narnia, they almost certainly hooked up. I suppose now she'd consider them a kinship... a kinship within a kingship.

Lawrence, surprisingly, had read them too, although was less likely to have read incestuous fanfiction about it, and talked at length about how he thought the movie was a fantastic adaptation, how it brought his childhood dreams to life. "The moment I saw Mr. Tumnus by the lamppost, it was like I was a twelve-year-old boy again."

By this time, Erin looked like she might actually have thawed a little. "Yeah, he was pretty good," she agreed, and then, as was her way when she didn't dislike somebody, she volunteered a little extra information. "That was James McAvoy playing him. He's the guy who plays the young Professor Xavier in the newest X-Men movie."

Mom mentioned that she really wanted to see that... although she wasn't a comic fan or anything geeky like that, she appreciated good action/adventure flicks, and I'd dragged her to some of the earlier movies in the series. Lawrence though, frowned, and said, "I'm not all that interested in that one."

"You don't like the X-Men?" I asked. I'd soon come to regret asking it, but it was just so odd. Who doesn't like the X-Men?

"Not particularly, no."

"Why, because it's about evolution?" Erin asked, a little of her snark returning. Her brief bonding moment with Lawrence was over, it seemed.

"No. I mean, their ideas about evolution are so fanciful I don't think anybody takes them any more seriously than say, lightsabers and The Force." He was silent for a second, to have a bite of food, and chewed slowly, and it looked like he might not say any more.

Erin pressed. "So why don't you like it?"

He bobbed his head from side to side, like deciding whether to go into it or not, but finally said, "Mostly, because it's marketed for young people and I don't think it's very appropriate. It's rather violent, and I don't like how it covertly promotes the homosexual lifestyle."

"Promotes the homosexual lifestyle?" my sister asked incredulously.

"Mutants are an allegory," he explained. "And it's good so far as it tries to promote the idea that you shouldn't attack people just because of the way they're born. The problem is they always use phrases from the homosexual movement, they make jokes about being 'in the closet' about their powers, and all sorts of other things, to subtly try to push the idea that gays are in the same situation, when really they're not. It's pretty clear that these movies are part of Hollywood's agenda to push the mainstream acceptance of homosexuality."

"If that's the case, I think I like the X-Men even more, now," Erin scoffed, although I'm pretty sure she recognized that metaphor herself. "You know, you're a little late to be worried about the mainstream accepting homosexuality. Nobody who matters has cared about whether somebody's gay since the 90s at least." That was quite an exaggeration.

"God cares about it, always, and so I care about it."

The first time Lawrence mentioned homosexuality, I looked down at my plate, thinking, 'here it comes'. Now it was threatening to dominate the whole discussion. In a futile effort to try to divert the storm, I said, "Hey, Mom, this rice is really good tonight. Did you put anything in it?"

Mom's eyes fixed on me, grateful, but before she could answer, Erin spoke again, ignoring me. "Really? God cares about little things like that? What's the big deal? Why would any God, who's got a whole universe to take care of, worry about something so... petty?"

"Because God has an order to things. Homosexuality is unnatural."

"So what? Plenty of things are unnatural. Visiting your girlfriend in a car is unnatural. How do we know God doesn't think you're an abomination?"

"God never said gays were abominations. God said the act was an abomination. And it is, it's pure fornication, they can't have children..."

"And that's what the goal of life, is, right?"

"Basically, yes. Even you have to agree on that, what doesn't breed doesn't belong. Even the flawed, but well-intentioned, science of evolution holds that as its highest principle."

"Nothing really stops gays from breeding, though, they just have to be a little more creative about it," Erin said smugly. "In fact... 'unnatural' love is in many ways the purest love." Lawrence opened his mouth to say something, but my sister continued, seizing on the idea. "I mean, you meet a girl, you fall in love... or you think you do... but maybe it's really just your body trying to trick you into breeding. You don't know if it's love, or something else. But if you love somebody that nature says you shouldn't, I think I respect that more. If somebody's love is against all the rules of nature... man, now THAT's true love!" I saw her flash a glance in my direction... I knew she wasn't just talking about gays anymore. "If God really is Love, he has to see that, right?"

"It's not real love, because it's not sanctified in the sight of God. God's already made it clear what he thinks about homosexuality. It's in the Bible. You can make all the arguments you want, but that's the final word. It's a sickness, no better than incest or bestiality."

Boy, was that the wrong thing to say. Her eyes flared. "Or eating shellfish, if you listen to Leviticus! Gah, don't you ever think for yourself? You've got to be one of these... literalists? There's no logical reason to be against it these days!" It was hard to say which 'it' Erin was referring to this time, although Lawrence and Mom surely suspected homosexuality. "But no, your magic book says it's bad, so it must be true! Can't you at least believe like Galileo? He used to say, 'I do not feel obliged to believe that same God who endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect had intended for us to forgo their use.'" She pushed her plate away from herself. "I bet if you were around in his day, you'd be one of the people wanting to burn him."

"Erin!" my mom said.

"Of course, take his side. You know what, I've lost my appetite," she said, standing up. "I'm going to my room." She stomped off.

It was quiet there for a minute or two after she was gone, before Lawrence finally said, "I'm sorry, Stephanie."

"No, I'm sorry," she said. "Even if she disagreed, there was no need to be so rude."

That got my own blood in a bit of a boil, and I almost wanted to leave the table and join Erin's protest. "So, what are you going to do, ground her?" I asked, semi-sarcastically, hopefully to point out what a stupid idea it was, rather than suggest it.

She glared at me. "No, Andrew. I'll talk to her later."

"Don't punish her on my account," Lawrence said, the one thing he said that whole evening that made me like him, just a little. "The argument was as much my fault, and... I know it's never easy for girls her age." So, I didn't leave, we just sat and had an awkward dinner with only limited conversation. He left shortly after.

I went up to see Erin while Mom was walking him to his car. To my surprise, she wasn't playing spy on the computer, she was lying on her bed. I did my boyfriend duty by crawling up beside her, giving her a kiss on the cheek and just holding her, my arms around her waist. I could tell she was still upset, so upset that she wasn't really willing to open up and talk to me at all, she just let me hold on tight. It comforted her, I knew that much.

I let go of her only when we heard Mom coming back up the stairs, and quickly moved into a sitting position, so Mom would see us in an appropriate brother-sister pose, my hand just on her shoulder. Mom knocked softly on the edge of the open door. "Can I talk to Erin alone?"

I looked to her, not sure what I'd do if she looked back at me, her eyes begging me to stay. It was Mom, after all. But Erin just lay stiffly, like she didn't care, which I guessed was permission to go. I got up and left, and Mom closed the door as soon as I was in the hallway.

I know it was supposed to be a private conversation but... well, eavesdropping is probably the most minor of my sins. I was curious, so as soon as I got to my room I went to my computer, activated my sister's webcam (secretly), and put on my headphones so I could see how Mom would handle it. I didn't really think Mom would ground Erin for her outburst, but she was doing all sorts of irrational things since she started dating Lawrence, and I wanted to know how it was going to play out.

On the screen, my mom stayed near the door, like she was afraid to approach the bed where Erin now grumpily sat, chin under a pillow. "So, what, are you going to punish me or something?"

"Of course not. I just wanted to talk." Erin wasn't helping start that, they remained in silence for about thirty seconds before my mom said, "I know you don't like him."

"You think?" Erin snapped.

"Maybe I went into this too fast, me and Lawrence. You may be a genius in some ways, but emotionally, it's always going to be difficult to see your mother dating somebody..."

"It's not that," Erin insisted. "I don't care that you're dating. I WANT you to date. I just want you to date somebody worthy of you."

"Lawrence is a good man..."

"He's a bigot, and stupid, and..." she sighed. "Please tell me you don't buy into all of what he does?"

"We differ on a lot, but that's okay. We work well together, and he IS a good man. He's involved in charity, and he's good to me, and...." she sighed. "Yeah, he's a bit of a bigot in some ways. But it's not evil, it's just ignorance. And ignorance, that can be worked on."

"Not that level. I mean, that's a pretty big deal."

"Sure, he's got flaws. I'm not blind to them. I've got flaws too. I can't hold out waiting for the perfect man. Everyone's got flaws." Erin said something. I heard it, but apparently Mom didn't, so she said "What?"

Erin repeated herself. "Dad didn't."

Mom approached the bed, and casually sat down just at the edge. "Your father... he was better than most. I'm very lucky I met him. But even he had flaws. His family didn't like me, and that's not his fault, but he wasn't very good at standing up for me against them. We almost broke up over it, but in the end, I was able to see past it for the good man inside. Like I am with Lawrence. I gave up expecting to find the perfect man long ago... or even a man as perfect as your father. When you get to be my age, and especially when you're a single mother... sometimes you have to settle for good, but flawed. And I really do like Lawrence. So he's a bit of a bible-thumper. It's not such a bad thing. Except..."

Mom took a breath, and slid a little closer to my sister. "What you were saying at dinner... Erin... we've always been close. If you were gay, you'd tell me, wouldn't you?" She seemed to be steeling herself a little, her body got all tense. Erin couldn't see, she was looking away.

Maybe she sensed it anyway. Her response was, "What if I was?"

"Then I would love you and support you, and nothing would change between us. I don't think I could date Lawrence any more, no matter how much I..." She didn't finish the thought, and I wondered if she was about to say 'love', and thought better of it. Instead, she said, "I'm accepting of flaws, but if it comes to a choice between my kids and him, you guys win every time."

Erin's mouth twitched a little, and I could practically hear her thinking, 'If I said I was gay, I could get her to drop him'. It could even be weirdly helpful in a way, with that little lie, Mom wouldn't be asking herself questions about why Erin doesn't have a boyfriend yet. Those kinds of questions might lead to observations about how Erin and I are awfully close, and those kinds of observations could cause our secret to come crashing out. She must have thought of it. I thought of it, and she thinks rings around me.

Instead, Erin decided for the truth, or a partial truth. "No, I'm not gay." I knew she had bisexual leanings, but that wasn't the question, so it wasn't really a lie. She sighed. "But I really, really don't like Lawrence."

"I'm not asking you to. I'm just asking you to respect that I like him, and not get into fights with him."

"I can't help it, Mom, he's just SO stupid."

"He's not stupid."

"He is. I mean, you deserve so much better. Did he even graduate high school? Because if he did, I think I know why employers require college degrees for everything these days. Couldn't you like somebody who I could at least respect?" I had to agree with that. I always kind of wished she'd hit it off with our ex-neighbor, who was a good guy and into sciencey stuff, like Dad was. When I was twelve, I thought there was a good chance of that happening, he certainly had an obvious crush on her, but it never went anywhere, and he married somebody else and, eventually, moved away entirely.

"Erin," Mom said with a smile. "If I restricted my dating choices to men who didn't seem stupid to you, I'd be alone my whole life." That got a little grunt from Erin, but it was an amused, self-satisfied grunt. What can I say, Mom knew us, and she knew flattering Erin's intelligence, even in a cheap and transparent way, made her feel better. "He's not so bad when you get him away from his issues. And I know you're smart enough to dance around those issues. Just try not to talk to him about religion."

"Or science," Erin pointed out. "Because apparently he doesn't believe in most of that, either." She sighed, though. "Okay, I'll try to be nicer to him. But for you, not him. I'm still not going to like him." Mom smiled, apparently willing to take her victories where she could, and leaned over to kiss her on the forehead. "And you owe me," Erin added suddenly. "Someday, you're not going to like who I'm dating, and you don't get to say a thing, even if you don't approve."

Mom tousled my sister's hair a little and grinned. "Sorry, Erin, it doesn't work that way. Moms always get to butt their nose in. But I'll tell you this, I'll promise to do my best to be understanding and not object unless there's a good reason." Erin made an 'Mmm' sound, like she wanted more but she, too, would take what she could get. "So, this someday guy... is he purely hypothetical, or is there somebody specific you have in mind?"

"Don't worry, Mom... there's nobody you should be worried about." That satisfied Mom, and she didn't press. Again, Erin didn't exactly lie... from her perspective, there was nobody Mom SHOULD be worried about. There was just me, someone she almost certainly WOULD object to, if she found out we were together. Not telling the whole truth wasn't the same as a lie. We'd excused a multitude of sins with that belief.

***
Chapter Twenty-Two:

I soon had my own moment of rebellion against intolerant religious types, and oddly enough, again with homosexuality as the cause, but it wasn't against Lawrence. I'm sure his presence in our family fed into it, though. I had many of the same issues with him Erin did, but I didn't want to make trouble for Mom... what I was doing with Erin was going to cause her enough grief if she ever found out. So, I just buttoned my lip and played dumb, something I was getting good at from hanging out with Madison. Not her, personally, of course. I didn't much like her, didn't think I ever would, but at least I understood her, and, when we were by ourselves, she didn't much care how I acted... again, it was like we were co-workers with our own interests that didn't overlap. It was only when her family or some of her friends were nearby that I had to put on a mask. So it only makes sense that I blew up at her family before Lawrence, although 'blew up' is an exaggeration. At the very least, I became vocal about some things I normally would let slide.

It happened during another scheduled dinner with her folks, where I was playing the dutiful boyfriend, even dressing in an outfit Madison picked out for me. Apparently, I dress too much like a slob, on my own.

Dinner, I got through. Her father was his usual bombastic self, dominating the conversation and occasionally decrying the decaying moral fabric of our nation, or talking knowingly about how Obama was a secret Muslim that wasn't even born in the United States, but just as often just talking about things that didn't offend my intelligence, yet still just bored me. I paid just enough attention to nod at the appropriate times or mumble one-word answers (two, if you count 'Sir', the addition of which seemed to satisfy him a lot more and make him less likely to ask follow-ups), and mostly spent the time thinking about buying pink fuzzy handcuffs and what Erin might like to do with them.

Yes, Erin won the bet and proved my friend Tony was engaged in acts of incest... kinlust, at least. It was earlier that day. I'd just gotten out of the shower, and was about to dress in the supposedly 'respectable' clothes Madison suggested, when I heard Erin's voice. "Andrew, Andrew, come quick!"

I could tell by the hurried, high pitch exclamation that she was excited, not scared or in danger or anything, but just the same, when the woman you love tells you to come quick, you do (especially if it's because you're having sex and someone might catch you at any moment, but that's another story). So I rushed into her room. She pointed eagerly at her computer screen.

There it was, my friend's little sister lying on a bed, naked, with her brother on top of her. Gianna's chest was on the bed, face turned in the same direction as the camera, ass raised slightly in the air. Tony was supporting himself mostly on his arms and thrusting his hips into her. I thought his cock was sliding in and out of her pussy, although I suppose it could have been her ass, it was hard to see for sure... they weren't exactly posing for the camera. What I could see was that it was clearly Tony and Gianni, brother and sister. There was no chance one of them was fucking some other guy or girl. They even looked a little alike, although obviously she was far prettier than he was. I'm biased on that I guess, but I think even leaving the gender aside, she was prettier for a girl than he was for a guy.

I was surprised by the smug satisfaction I felt while I watched, after I realized what it was I was watching. Erin was right... it felt good just to know we weren't alone. Krista didn't count because I didn't really know her. Even if she was fucking her brother, they were like the statistics of couples I knew were out there, intellectually. But Tony, I knew him, he was a friend of mine, and so knowing he was doing the same thing with his sister that I did with mine made me feel a little better about myself. Like I was more normal than I thought I was because one of my good friends was going through the same type of thing.

"You totally owe me fuzzy handcuffs," Erin said, beaming.

"Yeah, yeah," I said. "I'll get them for you." Somehow.

"And..."

"And what?"

She grinned impishly. "I want you to say it."

I looked at her, not comprehending. "I love you?"

"Not that." But she hopped up and kissed me on the lips. "I love you too, of course, but I mean, that I was right."

"Oh." Of course. "You were right, and I was wrong." She deserved to hear me admit I was wrong. She'd been insisting this for months, and I always doubted. And, in fact, she once told me she tried to set it up. "Are you taking credit for this?"

Erin bobbed her head from side to side, looking like she was playing coy, but finally said, "I don't know for sure. I mean, last year I did anonymously try to put the idea in her head. But maybe it would have happened without me. Or maybe it already was." They certainly looked pretty used to it, on camera, Tony didn't look like he was afraid he might break his sister, and his sister didn't look nervous at all, maybe even a little bored, but for the smile on her face, so they had to have been doing it long enough that it they were familiar with each other's bodies, but it didn't take long for Erin and I to reach that point.

It was only a couple minutes after I started watching that Tony's movements changed, he was resting more on his knees between his sister's spread legs, and he was no longer giving a regular pounding like a ticking clock. Now he was going in harder and staying longer, pulling out for just a second before burying his cock in to the balls for another several. This regular plunge was accompanied by a soft groan, of Tony's, not Gianna's, and soon he stopped pulling out. Instead, he grabbed his sister's butt and pulled her in to him, like he was trying to stop her from getting away, and his face contorted into a grimace as he must have cum. His sister just turned her head back to watch him, and grinned a little.

After he was done, she rolled onto her side, the first time I'd seen her naked... she really was hot, with a well-developed body that was a dream for breast and ass men, and very appealing to me personally, although her nipples were a little larger than I'd like, or at least the areolas were, and she had a little more hair on her pussy than Erin. The view wasn't close enough to see much more than that, and I started to feel a little guilty... which was stupid, considering everything else I did, but some part of me was aware that "ogling a friend's little sister naked" was a line I hadn't yet crossed until now. It wasn't even really a rule, at least not one that would be followed by any guy with a penis, but I knew how I'd feel if one of my friends was looking at Erin that way.

It didn't stop me from looking, it just made me feel guilty about it.

"Thanks," I heard Tony say, a little embarrassedly, making me re-evaluate my earlier assessment of how long they'd been doing this. He still sounded like it was something new, at least new enough for it still to be a little awkward afterwards.

Gianna didn't seem to be bothered. "Uh-huh. Anyway, I'm going to take a shower." She disappeared into the bathroom that was attached to her room, and Tony left for the hallway.

Erin's mood seemed to dampen at that, just a little, maybe because they weren't obviously lovey-dovey like we were, but it didn't last long. Her vindication at being proved right after all my doubts soon put a smile on her face, and I knew she wouldn't let me forget it. In fact, for the next few days, she'd say "Trust me, I'm right... just like I was right about Tony and Gianna," whenever I doubted her about anything, big or small.

As my part of the bet, I had to buy some fuzzy pink handcuffs, which I had to admit, terrified me a little. Not buying them, per se, but going into a sex shop to do it. It just seemed like an awkward situation of the kind I loathe... but I supposed I could probably man up and do it. The thought of what we might do with them would probably help, and it was that more than anything else that helped get through the dinner with Madison's parents.

We were seated in the living room, which was more awkward and uncomfortable, but at least Madison's mom was dishing out the dessert. Although I didn't much care for either of her parents, her mother was a good baker. Tonight's dessert was just cupcakes, but they were nice, big cupcakes, pumpkin-flavored, with cream cheese frosting, also pumpkin-flavored, and walnuts on top. They tasted a lot like pumpkin pie, and were very moist and delicious.

When I complimented her on it, I got a surprise. "Oh, Madison made these."

I looked at her, suddenly, and she shrugged, seeming embarrassed. "Wow, I'm impressed. I guess it runs in the family, huh?"

Her mom beamed, and Madison allowed herself a slight smile. "I don't do it very often," was all she said.

I figured that since Madison was supposed to be my girlfriend, it was the perfect excuse to have a second one. I mean, a boyfriend has to act like he really likes anything his girl does, right? So I enjoyed another cupcake, a little more slowly... and I had to take my pleasure where I could. I knew at any second Madison's dad would open his mouth and start in on another attempt to either gently push me towards his faith, or not-so-gently intimidate me into not getting his daughter involved in anything that would damage her perceived purity. Oh, the words were usually polite, but you could tell in his eyes when he was talking about, say, how kids today don't understand the dangers to their souls that their bodies can tempt them into, he was really saying, "If you ruin her, I'll send you to hell personally."

This particular time, before he could open his mouth, the phone rang, and he got up to answer it. He spoke for a couple minutes, and then returned to his easy chair, with a more pensive expression. His wife squeezed his hand. "Something wrong, dear?"

"No, just..." he almost said a name, but an eye towards me made him think otherwise. "The son of a parishioner of mine just relapsed. I'll be praying especially hard for his family tonight." I nodded in sympathy. "I hope you're staying away from that."

"Yes, sir," I said automatically.

"Even marijuana is dangerous, the first step down a dangerous path. I know kids today don't think 'weed' means anything bad, that it's cool, but this young man started with marijuana, and it's ruined his whole life."

"I've never even tried weed, sir. My mom would kill me." That at least earned a smile.

"Good. Madison's had some friends who were unfortunately into drugs. She doesn't associate with them anymore, but it's still troubling. I've often wondered if it wouldn't be better to take Madison out of public school and put her in a private one."

"Daddy," Madison warned in her best whining tone, but she didn't say anything else... like they'd had the argument too many times for her to need to do anything other than restate her objection.

I spoke up. "I'm not sure private schools are really that much better, there's plenty of drugs there, too."

"Yes, you're right. In this decadent world, there are fewer and fewer safe refuges for the faithful." He sighed. "The drugs are just a symptom, unfortunately. It's the dangerous attitudes that are a real threat, that promote a culture of sin. There's something wrong in this country if you can't pray in schools, but you can get guns or drugs. A baby isn't even considered a human being, but gays want their relationships recognized as being just as valid as anybody else's."

I thought I saw a flash of panic, not on Madison's face, she didn't even flinch, just looked down at her cupcake... the panic was on Madison's mom's face, followed immediately by a glance towards her daughter. It only lasted a second, but it was long enough to make me believe she at least suspected something that wasn't entirely Bible-approved was going on in her life, especially with what happened next. "Honey," she said abruptly. "I was talking to Susanna the other day, and she was saying that her brother just got their backyard deck redone, and the guy did a really good job on it, and charged a very fair price."

He looked at his wife, confused for a second at the utterly irrelevant interjection, but said, "I'm still not sure we need it." He sighed, as though resigned that he'd have to give in eventually. "But I suppose it wouldn't hurt to get an estimate. Did you get his name?"

"I did, but I didn't have a pen. I'll call her to ask again."

He nodded absently, then looked at me. "Where was I?" I could have let it slide, just given a shrug. Madison's mom had skillfully diverted the conversation in a way that might have been intentional. Just like I'd tried when Lawrence and Erin were about to get into it. Maybe if I said nothing, he would have moved on to some other topic. Then again, maybe not.

And yet, for some reason, I felt an urge to continue, to poke that bear and see what the result was. I tried to do it respectfully, at least at first. "Umm, gay people and their relationships," I reminded him, having second thoughts as soon as I did. "I'm sorry, sir, but I don't see how they aren't just as valid. I know gay people. I know same-sex couples." If you considered Madison and Amber a couple. Other than them... well, there were a few in our school, but I didn't even know them well enough to know if they're really gay or if that's just what people say because they hang out so much. In my first year of high school a few people said that about me and Kirk. But I felt my point was true nonetheless. "Their relationships seem just like anybody else's. If they want to get married someday, I say let them."

He glowered at me a moment, and then said, "See, the secular brainwashing's already working on you and the sad thing is, you don't even realize it. Marriage is a sacred covenant between a man and a woman in the sight of God."

"Religiously, sure. But in law, it's another matter. They're just asking for the same legal rights as everybody else. It's not like they can control who they're attracted to. They were born that way."

"No, that's a common myth. They have been led into perversion... perhaps it was so subtle that they didn't realize it at first, but the Bible tells them that what they're doing is wrong, and they should be doing everything in their power to resist whatever urges have taken hold and pray for God's help in overcoming them. People have managed to change, when they really wanted to. And yet most of them stubbornly refuse to see, they tell themselves that they know better than God, and that pride is their greatest sin."

I chuckled nervously. "Come on, you make it sound like they're monsters. Many of them are good people, deep down."

"No, gays aren't monsters, and some of them are good people in other ways, but, deep down, their souls are crying out for help. They should be treated with compassion, but they are sick, and encouraging the sick to celebrate their disease is sheer folly."

I shrugged, realizing that everybody else in the room, other than him, seemed to be uncomfortable, and was just about ready to let it drop. "I don't really see what the big deal is. I'm not saying there's not some serious troubles in the world, but I don't think advancing gay rights is one of the ones were should be most worried about." I intended it to be my last word.

"That's exactly the kind of attitude that's so insidious." He didn't seem angry anymore. He was behaving as though he were a teacher, imparting some wisdom that we had been missing. "Sin, and love of sin, breeds more sin. That was the lesson of Sodom and Gomorrah. Do you think they started out totally immoral? No, I'm sure it started one step at a time, one sin being overlooked, leading to another, and another, until finally they created a place so abhorrent that God decided to wipe it off the map. The people of Sodom gloried in their sin, and were destroyed. If we fall in the same way, we might meet the same fate."

Now, I hadn't read all of the Bible, but I had read Genesis and knew a bit about the story of Sodom and Gomorrah. And that suggestion that we might deserve annihilation just pissed me off. So, I admit it, I got a little snotty and abandoned my earlier decision to back away quietly. "You know what always bugged me about that story? The whole town wanted to have sex with Lot's guests. Now Lot, being the godly, respectable man that God decides to save from the destruction, says no. Okay, fair enough. But then he offers his two virgin daughters to the crowd, to do anything they wanted. And if Sodom was that horrible den of sin, for them to be virgins, I figure they had to be really young. I mean, that's pretty messed up, wouldn't you agree? And this was before he even knew they were angels. To Lot, they were just random guests, like me. If a gang came here and wanted to have sex with me, would you offer your daughter up instead?"

"Don't mock the Bible," he said in a grave voice. Outside, there was a thunderclap. I think it was coincidence. Either way, it didn't stop me.

"I'm not mocking," I said. Okay, I was. "I'm just saying, there's a lot in there that you can't take literally." Of course, he was a preacher, so he very probably did. "Or, at least I can't." I remembered the line Madison told me, about the Bible being the tabloid, and was about to use it... then worried that he might somehow be able to trace it back to her. So I quickly adapted it. "For me, it's like the Bible's one of those movies 'based on a true story', where they'll make up a lot of stuff to fit the point they're trying to get across. And whoever wrote it, their priorities are pretty screwed up. Homosexuality they call an abomination, but slavery's okay, and rape... as long as it's a virgin, that's a crime punishable by marriage. They actually say a man has to marry the virgin he raped. How's that fair to her? And they don't even mention pedophilia directly." I'd googled that once when I was lusting after my sister, in the early days of blackmail. I thought I might be going to hell and made an attempt to enumerate all the commandments I'd broken. Surprisingly, there weren't many. False witness, if you counted lying, absolutely. Dishonoring my father and mother, probably. Theft, if you stretched it to Erin's innocence, sure. I even was willing to consider "coveting my sister's ass" a commandment breach, although I doubt it was intended in that context. Later I moved on to check out specific things forbidden outside of the big ten, found incest, but had a lot of trouble finding pedophilia. Just one phrase, appearing in several of the gospels, that if you interpreted very loosely, might be stretched to cover it... but it would also cover a multitude of other things. I would have thought it might be a good idea to make that one explicit. "So I guess that's also less of a sin than homosexuality? After all, banning gay sex made it in. What you're not allowed to eat made it in. But I don't think I've ever seen a passage where he condemned pedophilia. If the Bible's really the word of God, maybe He's actually a pedo... after all, wasn't Mary only fourteen when He knocked her up?" That was probably going too far.

He stood up swiftly, so swiftly I thought I was going to get hit. Instead, he stared me down. "You are being disrespectful young man, and I can tolerate disrespect to me and my house, but you will not disrespect the Almighty under my roof." Luckily, although it was still pouring out, the thunder didn't hit just then, or I might have started questioning. It was clear, though, what I said was definitely going too far.

"I'm sorry." I dropped the jocular, mocking tone and continued more seriously. "I just think you're on the wrong side of history on this. And the wrong side of morality. There's a lot of great people out there, who happen to be gay, and if there's really a loving God up there watching over us, I hope He'd be more concerned about whether we treated them with the dignity and respect that they deserve than that we do everything we can to keep them from being happy if they won't do it according to the Bible."

"There is no true happiness but for God's grace, and we attain that only though the laws He set down for us. I'm sorry that you have been lead astray. You are deep in the woods, my son. I wish I could lead you out of them, but right now, you wouldn't let me. I could sit here and address every point you made, but it's very complicated, and with the attitude you've displayed already, you would just discard whatever I had to say. I can see you're too arrogant in your own blindness to be in a proper place to listen. One day, that may change, and I will be here for you then. Until then, perhaps you should leave."

His words were calm, but his face was red and I got the impression that he was using all his strength to keep himself from shaking. The thing was, he was an expert in the Bible.. he probably did have some kind of answer to every objection I'd raised, either correcting my misconceptions or at least offering some kind of argument. I guess he was just so unused to being directly challenged that he was too furious to even attempt it... and that made me want to get out of there with as little fuss as possible. I looked towards the door nervously. "Yeah, perhaps I should. Thanks for the meal, and the cupcakes." I said my goodbyes to Madison, who glared at me but didn't say anything, and then got up and got my jacket and shoes on.

"I'll pray for you," was the last thing Madison's dad said to me, before closing the door in my face. He practically slammed it, but I didn't care... it was pouring out and I had to make a dash to the car. It was only there, safe and mostly dry that I had time to reflect on what had happened. Even when I know I'm right, I try to avoid conflict, but I kind of dropped the ball there and seriously pissed him off. I hadn't meant it to go that far, and I was a little bothered, but it did have an upside... Mom was on a date with Lawrence, so it mean I got to go home early and potentially fuck my sister. As upsides go, that was worth almost any trouble.

***
Chapter Twenty-Three:

Erin wasn't upset when I told her that I'd potentially torpedoed my relationship with Maddy. "It's served its purpose," she said simply. "I don't think there are many people left who think we're together." I don't know that people actually did believe it, all that much, but I did know I still heard the occasional joke suggesting it. "Although you might have to go on a few dates..."

"Are you sure you're going to be okay with that?" I asked.

"If we do it carefully. No more than one date per girl, and you can choose girls you won't have chemistry with. Girls with reputations for not putting out. If we have to, we can get Winnie or Amber to give you a little fling that everybody knows about."

"Using them again, you mean."

She scowled at me. "No, they'd be happy to do it. It would probably give their popularity a boost, too."

"Like Holly's doing."

"I'm not like Holly," she snapped, making me worry that sex was out of the question. "We're helping them, remember?"

"I know. I'm not trying to accuse you... it's just, you say we're helping them, but it feels a lot like when we're not talking about doing the same thing, we're just standing around letting it happen." It had to be more than a month, now, and it didn't feel like we were any closer. "I guess I'm just frustrated."

"You're the one who wanted to be cautious," she pointed out. "We could probably have moved on them earlier, but we want to be sure, right?" I nodded. "And you might be standing around, but I'm working on the problem. Look." She pulled up a file on her computer and waved me over. It was a set of dossiers, expanded and reorganized out of the list she created when she first showed me the expanded spy program. "This is everyone connected to Holly and her gang that I've been able to piece together, all her girls, all her customers, all her friends that definitely know what's going on even if they're not directly involved, and all the suspicious contacts on her Facebook account. You'll notice no cops, by the way, though it's hardly conclusive." She pointed further down the list, a much longer one. "These are people I think might know something or be involved, but I've got no good evidence on it, I'm still digging."

"You've been busy." She shrugged, but I could see her smiling. "What's this one?" I pointed to the folder that contained the dossiers. She'd selected and opened the file named "Holly's Network", but below it was one called "Leverage".

"Well, not everybody I looked into had anything to do with Holly. It seemed a shame to waste what I've found." She pulled up the spy program. "This thing's a goldmine... and, yeah, it is kind of addictive. I mean, already we've found three kinships."

"Three?" There was Krista's thing, and Tony and his sister. I hadn't heard of a third.

"Ben, from your class? You know, who used to date Madison's friend Chelsea? I found out while you were out... he's secretly dating his cousin. It seems pretty new, but they're really mushy in their Facebook messages. It's really cute, actually."

"Cute enough to use as leverage."

She waved dismissively. "It's just a name. I don't actually plan to use this against anybody... unless I have to. And there's plenty of other juicy stuff, too. There's almost too much cheating going on to list, there's a certain football star who's secretly gay, and I'm pretty sure Eddie's bi."

"Really? I never got that vibe."

"Trust me. I was right about Tony and Gianna, right? He's definitely bisexual. Or maybe even trisexual... he'll try anything. He's got a Gmail account filled with porn of all types, straight, gay, transsexuals, bestiality, and he was jacking off to lots of it earlier tonight."

I wrinkled my nose. "You watched that?"

She shrugged. "Hey, you weren't here... watching's not cheating, remember?" I nodded. We had made that agreement. Hell, I got to do a lot more than watch, and it wasn't considered cheating... still, it always made me uncomfortable to know other men attracted her.

I changed my subject to get my mind off it. "Anything else you discovered?"

"I think a girl in my class is on heroin." She sounded glum about it. "I'm thinking about anonymously tipping off her parents. I mean, weed's one thing, but... heroin's the kind of thing you don't just grow out of."

I kissed her forehead. I liked seeing this softer side of her, the caring side, the kind that wanted to improve everybody's life. I knew it was there, of course, but sometimes, in all the bad things we've done, it was easy to lose track of. "It might not be a bad idea."

"But I worry about, like, where do we draw the line? There's plenty of people taking pills, I think a few people on coke but who seem to be functional... it's just... I don't even really know this girl well, but seeing her shooting up in her room was really disturbing. I want to help her if I can."

"I don't know," I admitted. "I guess you have to follow your heart."

"I guess," she said, smiling up to me. "Hasn't steered me wrong yet, has it? Maybe I'll sleep on it." She grinned. "Of course, it's a little early to sleep..."

She had that look in her eyes. "Mom say when she was coming home?" I asked.

She shook her head. "But I figure we've got an hour."

As it turned out, we had a lot longer than that. After wriggling my tongue around my sister's pussy until she squealed with pleasure, I was getting ready to fuck her to a second orgasm, when my phone rang. The ringtone suggested it was Mom. "Hello."

"Hi, Andrew... where are you?"

"I'm home." Looking down at my sister's naked, flush body, legs spread and pussy wet and ready for my cock. She knew I was hard and teased me a little, spreading the lips open with her fingers while I was talking and couldn't do anything about it.

"Oh, good. Listen, the play ran a little long and in this weather, I'm really not comfortable driving home. I hate to leave you two alone, especially on a school night, but I think it might be safer if I just check into a hotel. Is that okay?"

"Sure," I said with a grin. "It's important that you stay safe. So you make sure Lawrence uses protection."

"Andrew!" she said, scandalized, but I could tell what was going on. I could also tell, just from her voice, that she was blushing.

"Don't worry, Mom, I understand, you have needs, he has needs. I'm almost eighteen, you don't need to sugarcoat it." Erin tilted her head with a curious grin.

"It's just a hotel, Andrew, that's all."

"Right. Well, don't worry. It's okay to spend the night away. I'll take care of Erin." My sister grinned at that.

Mom groaned though. "Look, don't share your... theories about what's going on with her, okay?"

"Okay, but she's smarter than me, she'll probably figure it out. Have fun. Remember what I said about staying safe, I don't want a little brother." I said goodbye and hung up. I guess it was a little mean of me to tease Mom like that... I knew I was potentially ruining the mood for her. I mean, I wasn't deliberately trying to sabotage it, but if she was too put off thinking that her kids knew exactly what was going on and couldn't go through with the sex, I wouldn't be too disappointed either. If she was with a guy I liked I probably would have kept my mouth shut.

"Mom and Lawrence are finally doing it?" Erin asked grumpily.

"Well, she wouldn't admit it, but... I think so."

"He's such a hypocrite. He'll lecture other people about what the Bible says, but ignore the rules about sex before marriage, just because he's got a boner."

"Maybe," I said. "But everyone's a bit of a hypocrite." Even us, we were all outraged about Holly's blackmail when we did the same thing, and what I've done to my sister and others is probably worse than being an intolerant bigot. I just never saw myself as an evil person... one who made some really bad mistakes, sure, but at least someone who tried to be good most of the time. Dwelling on my own hypocrisy was liable to put me in a bad mood though. "How about we stop worrying about the Biblical laws he's breaking, and start breaking a few of our own?"

She grinned. 'You're right, this is an opportunity we don't have often. She's going to be gone all night, right?"

"That's what it sounded like."

"Then we can spend the whole night together. This could be our anniversary celebration." This year, I'd convinced Erin that we shouldn't celebrate the first times we did anything sexual. Those times, in my mind, were tainted, because I was blackmailing her. I celebrated two anniversaries... the first one, what we agreed was our official anniversary, was when we both admitted that we loved each other more than brothers or sisters should, even though I was still technically blackmailing her at that time, the declaration itself was spontaneous and honest. The second anniversary was closer to Thanksgiving, when she forgave me for what she'd learned I'd done, and I celebrated that more personally, not telling Erin but being especially nice to her. We were very near to the date of the first... unfortunately, the timing didn't quite work out to allow us to plan anything special. She was right, this would be a perfect time to substitute. "A shame you haven't had time to get those handcuffs, we could have a lot of fun trying them out."

Even without the handcuffs, we managed to have a lot of fun anyway, even playing a little with bondage as she let me (or rather hinted strongly that I should) tie her hands to her bedposts with nylons while I ravished her. We could be loud, too, or at least louder than usual. We weren't screaming or anything, but sex with the door open, her tied to the bed, and calling out for me to fuck her heightened everything, probably because we could theoretically be caught at any time, but we knew we wouldn't.

After I untied her, we watched some TV, did some spying on our fellow students, and eventually went to bed... my bed, this time, where we had sex again, more gently, more slowly, but still a lot of fun, and then fell asleep in my favorite way, with her in my arms. It's like there's a space she's just meant to fill. And her ass cheeks provide a space for my cock to nestle, too, even when it wasn't ready for action. "Maybe it won't be so bad," she said softly while we were ready to drift off to sleep. "Mom dating Lawrence. If he keeps being a hypocrite."

***
Chapter Twenty-Four:

I saw Madison at school the next day. Actually, she texted me first, before school, and asked me to meet her by the athletic field. I didn't want to, but I felt I owed her that much... while I was having an awesome night with the woman I loved, she probably got in some shit from her parents over my behavior.

She was already there waiting for me, hands on hips, tapping her foot... she looked angry, but not outrageously so. It was as though she was only angry I made her wait. When I finally got close enough, she shook her head rapidly and spat out, "What the hell was that about yesterday? You were supposed to play the Good boyfriend. The one who'd keep them from thinking I disappointed them?"

I shrugged. That didn't quite seem like the deal as I understood it, particularly with all our manufactured fights. "I don't know, I just couldn't take it anymore. I don't know how you live with it. Sorry if I got you in any trouble."

"You know my Dad doesn't want me to see you anymore." So that was confirmed.

"As if we've been seeing each other already." I smirked a little. "Anyway, it's probably for the best. We don't have to pretend, I don't have to hang around your friends, you don't have to hang around mine." It was a relief, really.

Her demeanor softened a little, no longer angry, just... normal. Flat, even. "No," she said firmly. "We had a deal. You cover for me, I cover for you. That stays on."

"But... if your Dad hates me, doesn't that kind of defeat the purpose?"

She grinned, an evil little grin, too. "Only if he knows."

"But..."

"My parents were only half the arrangement, but there's still people at school to consider. And that means you still have to pretend to be my boyfriend... only now you're pretending to be my SECRET boyfriend, the one I hide from my parents." Her eyes lit up, and she must have seen a look of terror in my own, because she punched me on the shoulder. "Relax. It'll be easier on both of us. You don't have to come to church or my place anymore. But this way I can tell my friends I'm sneaking out to be with you, and all you have to do is stay home with your sister, while I get to go see Amber." The grin faded. "We haven't had much time for each other for some reason."

I knew the reason, but I couldn't exactly tell her. "I'd rather we just break up..." She gave me a glare that suggested it wasn't an option in her eyes. "But okay, I guess we can pretend for a little longer."

"Good. And thanks."

"Yeah, whatever."

I turned to go, but she held my arm and forced me to turn back to her. "No, seriously. Thank you, for what you said. To my Dad. I know you weren't exactly saying it for me, you don't even like me, but... it was like... nice, anyway. It felt like somebody was on my side. And somebody had to say something to him."

She actually seemed sincere. Madison. Superficial Queen Bitch. It was kind of creeping me out more than the evil grin. "It was nothing." It was then I remembered. "You know, you might already have someone in your corner. I think your Mom suspects that you might be gay."

Her eyes widened in disbelief. I wondered if she might have had some idea, but apparently this came as a complete surprise to her. It was like she hadn't even considered it. But it can sometimes be that way with family... you know them so well in other areas that you get comfortable about knowing everything... so you're blind to the ways they can completely surprise you. "What? Are you sure?"

"As soon as your Dad started in on his anti-gay thing, she looked to you and tried to change the subject." And she looked uncomfortable when he was railing about them to me, although it could have been me she was uncomfortable with. I shrugged. " I don't know, maybe I'm wrong, I just got that vibe that she was trying in some small way to protect you." Another shrug, an awkward silence while she considered it. "And you know, even if I am wrong... you're not alone, if you ever do need someone to just talk to..."

I let it dangle. It was Madison's turn to shrug, then, like she herself was uncomfortable with this new proposed level of intimacy, and she wouldn't meet my eye. I figured maybe we weren't as close as that, and anyway, it was almost time to go to class. I was about to say something in that vein, when suddenly she leaned forward and kissed me on the cheek, very close to the lip.

It was a shock, and my first thought was of my sister, what she might think. Maybe Madison wasn't really gay, merely bi, but that wasn't the issue... I'd already been down this road with a fake girlfriend, and hurt Erin with it. I didn't want to make that mistake again, it felt a little like a betrayal even to receive the kiss, and especially from somebody who had deliberately caused Erin pain. Maybe even my being nice to her was too much. My mind worked furiously to backpedal, to act like a jerk. "Uh... what the hell?" It was the best I could do on short notice.

"Relax," she said, tilting her head with one of her fake plastic smiles. "That wasn't for you, it was for them." I saw where she was looking, at some of her classmates, at a distance, too far away to hear us, and I relaxed. The performance was on again. She grabbed my hand, and then took a step back as she let it go, hopping off. "Talk to you later," she said cheerily, and loudly.

Luckily, I didn't talk to her again the rest of the day. Although that left me in a little bit of a quandary because I didn't quite understand what the new rules were. She kissed me in front of her friends, but didn't drag me to eat lunch with her. We were supposed to be 'secret', but I knew at least some of her friends and a number of her classmates had parents at the church. Madison wasn't secretly "out" after all... the only people at school who knew she was gay were ex-lovers and our little Blackmail group. The main reason for that was that, if it were common knowledge, even just among the students, she knew it would get back to her parents. So shouldn't the same be true of her "secretly" dating me? It didn't make sense.

At least, it didn't to me. Apparently it did to Maddy. Later, through the school messenger service, she explained that she didn't care if her parents heard rumors we were still dating. As long as we didn't flaunt it, she didn't think she would get in much trouble. Given her dad, I thought that was a little too optimistic. Erin suggested that Madison had an intuitive understanding that in order to appear 'normal' to her parents, she had to rebel a little, in minor ways. "If she was too perfect," she said, "they'd figure she was hiding something." Maybe, maybe not, but it worked out in my favor... Madison wanted her cooler friends to know we were still dating, and I should tell my friends we were still going out, but we wouldn't be spending a lot of time together in public.

That first day, though, I didn't know what the rules were going to be. So, when Kirk asked me how things were going with Madison, the only thing I could say was "I don't know. It's kind of up in the air."

"Too bad. Hey, you have any idea if there's going to be another open party at Eddie's like last year?"

"I don't think so." Erin got in the way of that, by leaking video of a girl doing pot as part of her revenge plans. Nobody knew who was the snitch, but open parties weren't likely any more.

"Too bad. Hey, we could always have a little party ourselves. Maybe Cassie and Erin can invite some friends over for you guys to hook up with." That was directed mostly at Tony and Jay, although I supposed if Madison and I had broken up, he meant to extend the offer to me too.

Of course, Erin was pretty well Cassie's only friend, which made the whole thing a little insensitive, especially as she wasn't with us. Cassie didn't comment, just fidgeted.

As it turned out, there was a Halloween party planned, and it wasn't Eddie's. Or rather, there was one that Eddie planned, and a completely separate party that Holly planned on the same day, the Friday immediately before Halloween. At first we thought it was the same party... it seemed a rational conclusion to come to... Winnie and Amber told us all of the 'new girls' of Holly's ring were instructed that they had to be available that day, to go to the party. If they had to, they were to sneak out... if they failed to show up, there would be consequences down the line.

We'd assumed that they were being asked to 'work' Eddie's party, much like Amber had before. Even she thought that. But soon we realized this wasn't the case. Erin spied on a conversation between Eddie and Holly where he was trying to do exactly that... arrange some girls for some of his friends.

"Sorry, we have something big planned for that night. Can't spare any of my girls. If you moved your party to Saturday, I could accommodate you." That was obviously not going to work, Eddie's party was already set, plans were made. Eddie continued to ask, offering more and more money, and Holly relented, a little. She'd send over one girl to be the party slut... but only someone from the junior year. The freshmen girls were more valuable.

They haggled and settled on Miranda, who would go to Eddie's party. The rest would be needed at whatever Holly had planned.

"What do you think she's going to do?" I asked.

"I don't know, but if she needs all of them there, it's probably big. To pass up the money Eddie was offering, expensive, too." She thought for a second, and said, "She's only sold blowjobs off the new girls so far. Maybe this is graduation day."

"What, like some kind of... exclusive sex party?"

"Maybe. Or an auction. It's what I would do," she said. "If I were Holly. Highest bidder."

"Shit." Some of those girls were virgins, too, at least that's what they claimed. "Should we stop it?"

"How? We don't have anything solid on Holly, that wouldn't expose ourselves, or at least who did the recordings... if Holly does have allies, that could be a critical mistake, they'd take it out on Winnie. The only way I can think of is that we could release the blackmail material they have on the girls ourselves. It might save a few cherries, at the expense of their reputations. But shouldn't that be their choice?"

"We've never shied away from making choices for people before...." I wasn't so sure it wouldn't be for the best.

"It would ruin Amber and Winnie's lives you know, and they'd never trust the blackmailer again. Especially because we promised to get them out clean. Unless you wanted to leave them out of it and just release the pictures of the other girls. And that would still leave them under Holly's thumb." She let that sink in, and I thought about it... Holly was probably expecting a lot of money from them all and might run whoever she had left ragged to make up for it. "I'll do it if you tell me to... I just don't think it's the right call."

Decisions, decisions. As much as having somebody else in your power was exhilarating, it often sucked, too, because in some ways you were responsible for them. And in this case, it wasn't just Amber and Winnie, but the other girls in the prostitution ring, girls whose lives we would be impacting through action, or inaction.

Yet, inaction had a compelling argument behind it... as Erin pointed out, at any time they could have agreed to let Holly's blackmail material come out, but they chose not to. For them, doing anything Holly wanted was worth that. Which means if we let it go ahead, at worst we just wouldn't be saving them from their own stupidity. There was no risk of us actively putting them worse off than if we'd never been involved at all.

"Okay," I decided. "We'll hold off. But we really need to get something on Holly."

Erin nodded. "Agreed. I'm working on it. This... event might give us what we need. We just get Winnie and Amber to gather evidence for us. Get a couple cameras, more proof Holly's organizing it all, a bunch of her adult customers, and there's so many people there she can't pin it on anybody specific as being the leak, in order to retaliate. We could even pretend to be a customer with a conscience or something."

I nodded. It seemed workable. "Okay, just be careful. We don't want them getting caught."

I filled in Winnie and Amber on our plans, to record the event in great detail and use that as blackmail material to push Holly out. They seemed pretty pleased by the prospect, and if they had any reservations about going through with it, they didn't share them. I did make sure to offer them the option of getting them out of it the embarrassing, reputation-destroying way. Neither of them wanted it.

Erin helped them more personally with the setup. She bought some better spy-gear online and helped the girls use it. The old hairband thing was a couple years old now, and although it did the trick, cameras were getting cheaper and with more storage time. Cheaper, but not cheap... Erin must have spent a few hundred dollars from her blackmail savings just on the cameras, and then had to do some work to convert them stealthily so that they could be smuggled into Holly's party.

There were a couple options. We had the laptops, which we hoped might stream us a view live, if they could be set up without being obvious about it. There was the hairband standby. We had a camera built into Winnie's purse, with the instructions that she should put it somewhere with a good wide view. A small teddy bear attached to Amber's backpack had the same job.

Other things went on, of course. School, firstly, it was one of those times when a bunch of assignments became due at once. Lawrence came over for dinner again, and no argument broke out, mainly due to everyone, Lawrence included, striving to stay away from touchy topics. Cassie and Kirk had a big fight over him not making enough time for her, which I understood, I mean, not only was the school stuff piling up but he was studying up for another crack at the SATs (his one last year didn't go so well), but for a couple days they didn't talk much, and she ate with Erin and Krista instead of us. A sophomore girl's parents took her out of school to put her into a rehab facility. And I picked up a pair of fuzzy handcuffs.

There's not much of a story there, it was embarrassing as hell, but I got through it. I think the guy behind the counter knew I was a high school student there for the first time, but he didn't even question me about my age. I guess a sale is a sale.

More worthy of note was getting home with it. I thought, since I was the one who lost the bet, that I'd be the one getting restrained. I almost looked forward to it, actually, it would have been a new sensation, but instead, Erin handcuffed herself to one of the bedposts and pointed out how I was totally in her power. It felt more like the other way around... I couldn't stop myself from sticking my dick in her until I'd cum inside her. After that, I left her tied up a little and rubbed her with my hands, always holding off before she came, until finally I was ready for a second go. The second time I fucked her and let her cum, and then unlocked her. It was fun, but the appeal was overrated, and I think most of the novelty was worn away from the times we'd used makeshift restraints. If this was the first time I'd ever used anything to tie her up, I probably would have cum a lot harder, but, when you got right down to it, I didn't want a prisoner, I wanted a partner. I made that decision long ago.

The Friday before Halloween seemed to sneak up on us. All of a sudden, it was the night, and all of our preparation (Erin's preparation, really) was over, and all we had left was to watch what was coming. Madison wanted me to go Eddie's party with her, so we could pretend to be not very good at hiding our secret relationship, but this time I had to put my foot down. She took it okay, actually... in fact, immediately after I did, she suggested that if I wasn't going to be going out anywhere public, that I could be her alibi. She wanted to go do something with Amber, maybe some kind of Halloween party where they could be together but wearing masks so no one would recognize them.

I didn't have the heart to tell her. She found out soon enough that Amber had other plans, too, and all her pleading couldn't change them. From what I understand, she went to Eddie's party after all, solo. If anything interesting happened at that party, I never heard about it... Holly's private party had more than enough scandal and debauchery to put anything Eddie did to shame.

***
Chapter Twenty-Five:

We only caught part of the show live, and that was more of a pre-show. Winnie and Amber were both supposed to bring their laptops as far as they were allowed, using the excuse that they had homework to do... not a great excuse, considering it was a Friday night, but Holly could buy a big project due Monday that they wanted to get done as soon as possible.

Erin and I weren't watching it together. We would have liked to, but Lawrence was spending another evening at our place (although not, thankfully, staying the night), so we had to watch together in separate rooms, with one eye on closing all windows on the screen at a moment's notice. We'd already had dinner, luckily, and both of us declined the opportunity to watch a movie with them.

We waited, alone but together, chatting occasionally about one thing or another when suddenly Winnie's computer came online, and we both switched to the feed. So, we saw them first somewhere, the home of one of the girls, but not Holly's as it turned out, and they were getting ready. Or I assume they were. Winnie's hair was wet and wrapped in a towel, and so was her body. Another girl behind her was putting on lip gloss. We watched for a couple minutes and another girl apparently came out of the shower, hair all wet.

Holly was nowhere to be seen, at first. Of her girls, the three who'd been with Holly for a while seemed relaxed and were joking around, but clearly in charge. The girls who'd been blackmailed by Holly this year were mostly quiet, like they were resigned to their fate, whatever it was, or too nervous to do much but sit and follow orders.

Finally, there was a commotion from somewhere around the door, and as it approached where Winnie's laptop was, it became clear that it was Holly. That was by voice first. "Hello," she called out sweetly, like she was talking to friends. "I've got your costumes for tonight..." The girls looked up at some interest at that. "I decided we're going for a Disney princesses theme." She came into view then, wearing her costume... a sparkling red dress, slit up one side, as well as gloves, and a dark red wig. I guess she was Jessica Rabbit, who I don't think was a princess... I wasn't even sure if she was Disney, but then, Holly wasn't much of a princess, and certainly wouldn't feel she had to follow the rules. She also carried a large shopping bag, and began handing out the costumes to different girls, actually seeming to take a little time to match them to the girl's hair color or look.

At least in most cases. "What's this?" Winnie asked, wrinkling her nose as she scrunched up her face in confusion, or preparation to take offense, when she looked over her tan-colored costume.

"Pocahontas," Holly explained.

The offense became full blown. "I'm not Native American, I'm Chinese..."

Irritation flashed on Holly's face. "Yeah, well, they didn't have any fucking sexy Mulan costumes, so you've got two choices, you can put it on and be Pocahontas..."

"Or?" Winnie asked after a few seconds silence proved that Holly was waiting for it.

"Or you go as Pluto. The dog. I take you there naked wearing nothing but a collar and leash. And I call the guests and tell them they can bring their dogs to breed to you. Maybe I should do that anyway. You're not even a fucking virgin, I've got to do something to make up the money you're not earning."

They stared at each other for a second, and finally Winnie said, "Fine, I'll be fucking Pocahontas."

Holly's smile returned. "Good." She looked to the computer screen. "What's this, what are you doing here?"

"Homework. I don't exactly get all the time I'm used to having. I need to keep my grades up or my parents will ground me and I can't exactly go out after school."

A message flashed on my screen. "I bet she thinks Winnie actually finds that threatening," Erin sent. She was referring to their earlier conversation, a few seconds back. "Bet Holly'd be shocked to know how much experience Winnie has with dogs."

Holly just hummed to herself at Winnie's explanation, but found it satisfying enough. "Fine. Everyone had their shower?" This was directed at one of the girls in their junior year.

"Yeah, just finished the last one."

"Got them good and clean, right down to their buttholes? All shaved?" The responses to those questions must have been nods that we couldn't see, because she said "Good. So, listen up girls. You know tonight's a big night. The men you're going with like young, innocent-looking girls, like you. Even if they're not your first time..." she glared at Winnie before continuing, "You'll act like it's near enough. You're nervous but curious and a little excited. No hint that you're doing this out of anything other than your own free will and a desire for sex and money. You will not mention the dicks you've sucked prior to tonight, or anything else you've done. You will not worry about or suggest protection... these guys are clean and we'll give you morning after pills later. You will not cry. There are guys who are turned on by that, and some of them will be there, but trust me, you do not want me to rent you out to one of them, because unlike the rest, their secret fantasy isn't based on you enjoying what they do. Hopefully these past few weeks have toughened you up a little, so if you can't enjoy it, at least fake it. And yes, fake enjoyment if you have to, but don't fake orgasms... you girls won't know how to do it right and it'll piss them off. Whores and porn stars fake orgasms. Good, wholesome teen girls either haven't had one yet, or come by them honestly. Not cumming will just make some of them want to keep trying, and that's good business." She took a long look around the room, and then said, "Now, I know some of you are thinking, 'Why do I care what's good business for Holly? Maybe I'll go out of my way to fuck it up!'." She looked at Winnie, and tugged at her hair. "I know this bitch is thinking it. Put that thought out of your heads. Firstly, because I will figure it out and you will pay. Second, because this one time, it's not just my business. As added incentive, for tonight, you will earn a percentage of what you bring in, as long as you hit certain benchmarks. If you do really well, I might even consider making the percentage a regular thing, like some of the older girls." She let that sink in. "So act eager and remember to smile." Her fingers went up to her face and she demonstrated how to make a winning smile.

After that, she got everybody into their costume and went girl to girl to inspect them. Naturally red-haired Karen was the Little Mermaid, with a purple seashell bra that exposed a lot of side- and under-boob, and darker-skinned Tori was Jasmine, with a blue harem girl outfit that was far more see-through than it should have been. Andrea was Sleeping Beauty, I think, although the costume wasn't really distinctive, just a pink dress, short, sexy, showing a lot of leg, but fairly modest compared to the other two outfits, and with a plastic tiara on top. Winnie was Pocahontas of course, although it looked more like Holly just bought a generic sexy Indian princess outfit than an official Disney one, and Amber and Samantha, both petite blondes, got slotted in as Tinkerbelle and Alice, from Wonderland. Kate was Snow White, and Olivia was Belle, from Beauty and the Beast. In the case of Olivia she suggested makeup, because she thought she saw bags under her eyes made her look old, but for the rest of the girls she wanted the clean look.

Not long after that, she ushered them out the door, and that was the last we saw of the feed. Although Winnie took the laptop with her, it never got set up anywhere with Wi-Fi access. Erin and I talked a little, both exchanging our worries and hopes that everything would be okay, and speculating on whether it would come back online. It didn't.

After about a half hour of waiting, Erin came into my room. "I don't want to wait and worry on my own." I knew the feeling. My stomach was a little jittery, and I was constantly checking the screen for a new message.

I was sitting in my chair, and she came up behind me and put her arms around me. I leaned back into her, figuring it was safe enough to show affection with Mom and Lawrence downstairs. It would be risky to keep it up very long, though, unless.... I hit on an idea. "This could take a while," I said. Or said again, since I'd probably already said it, or she had to me. She just nodded. "Want to watch a movie? There's probably something scary on... something a little sister might want to snuggle up with her big brother in order to watch.

Her eyes lit up. "And they say I'm the genius," she joked. She hoped onto bed while I found a movie on. I decided on Dawn of the Dead, kind of an old movie but still good and I still jumped a little when the zombies come sprinting after people.

That's how we spent the evening, watching a zombie movie under the covers with my sister. We kept an eye on the screen for any updates, but none happened, and soon we got into the movie. We didn't do anything sexual besides me holding her and kisses, and the occasional hand slipped into her pants or around her breast, or her grinding her ass into my erection... it was risking too much to hope that moans and screams of passion would be covered by moans of zombies and screams of terror.

It was a good thing we didn't, because Lawrence found his way upstairs. We heard him coming, although I thought it would be Mom, and at the time I did have a boner and my hands were in Erin's panties, but before anyone could see us I took my hands aware from her entirely and we shifted apart ever so slightly.

Even so, he peeked in the door and his eyes widened just a bit seeing us in bed together, under the covers. "I didn't expect to see the two of you... together." That pause on the last word made me wonder if he suspected.

"We're watching a scary movie," Erin said. "'Tis the season and all." She put her hands to her eyes and scooted back against me as another violent bit happened on screen. "Oh my god, I can't watch." That was for his benefit, she'd never done that when we were alone.

"Oh," he said. He asked which movie we were watching, I told him, and he just nodded, then revealed why he was here. "Your mother wanted me to ask if you were interested in some popcorn. She's making some up right now." She makes it on the frying pan, old-school way. It is pretty good. "Maybe you'd want to come down and watch a movie with us."

"We've got a movie thanks," Erin said. "And I don't feel like popcorn right now. Do you feel like popcorn Andrew?"

Well, now that it was mentioned, I kind of did. I thought I could even smell it. But I knew it wasn't the right answer. "Not really. Maybe later."

Again he gave us a look that made me wonder if he suspected, or if I was just paranoid. "Okay, well, if you ever get sick of watching blood and guts and zombies, and you feel like watching something fun, you're always welcome to come down..."

"We'll keep it in mind." He nodded, and retreated downstairs.

"I bet if there were a real zombie plague," she whispered to me after he left, and she was sure he was all the way downstairs. "He'd be one of the first ones eaten."

I gave a little snort of amusement. "Bet we'd survive," I said.

"Hell yeah we'd survive. We'd set up a little survivor enclave, dedicated to not doing stupid things like risk everyone's lives for a dog. We could probably be a couple openly there. Who'd know the truth? Who'd care?"

"Mom," I pointed out. "Unless you think she'd be dead too." Which is kind of a depressing thought.

She was quiet for a few seconds, I guess trying to rationalize her way around it. "In my end of the world fantasy, I prefer to think of her away and out of touch. Like, it happens when she leaves us alone for the weekend to visit relatives, or we're at college. She's somewhere safe but it's too dangerous to try and reach each other, too many zombies to fight through."

"Yeah." I wasn't going to ask, but it was nagging at me. "Did you get a vibe about Lawrence there... like, he might suspect something?"

"Lawrence? He'd have to have a brain to suspect something." It was a flip answer, but then she got serious about it. "I really don't think so. Even if he did... it's not the kind of thing he's going to bring up to his girlfriend unless he's sure. 'Hey, your kids seem awfully close and I haven't actually seen any evidence, but the conclusion I'm jumping to is that they're fucking.' She'd think he was a pervert."

I smiled. "Yeah, I guess you're right."

We watched the rest of the movie, and, when there was still no word about Holly, we actually did go down for some popcorn, but only for a few minutes. We still had to watch, just in case somebody managed to turn on a computer while things were going on and give us a good feed.

The vigilance was for nothing, though, we heard back from Winnie at about 11:30, and she uploaded the video while giving us a few details that wouldn't be on there, like the address of the site the girls were taken to.

That turned out to be valuable, Erin later used it to help her identify one of the men at the party. The girls were taken to a rental property, one which had supposedly been rented out as a private party. In fact, the property owner loaned it out, presumably in exchange for some kind of discount, and was also at the party himself.

Our view of the event was provided solely by one camera in a static location, put on some kind of coat rack or something and pointed at the area which served as a stage... which really wasn't a stage at all, but rather one corner of the room, although it did have a microphone. The hairband had been removed as not fitting in with either costume, and Amber's teddy-bear cam did record during the entire event, but, unfortunately, was focused on a wall on the side. It might have caught a few people passing by, but nothing particularly useful.

Winnie's camera got us more than enough, though. We skipped ahead the first few minutes of recording, which was the various girls standing around, getting last minute adjustments to their hair, but then men started to file in, led by Holly. They all came in at once, and Winnie confirmed my guess later - they were already there, but were waiting in another area for the girls to be ready. I counted twenty of them in all, and all of them wore masks, sometimes whole costumes. Some were simple ones, just a mask, either a domino mask or something more elaborate. The V for Vendetta mask were surprisingly popular, a few people wore those. There was a man in a devil's costume, with a red cape and a plastic mask that covered almost his whole head except his eyes. Another had a wolf snout. A rather large man had a business suit and his only costume piece was a clown mask that looked too small for his face and would have creeped me out if he wasn't facing away most of the time. Two men that we came to call 'the brothers', one a bit of a large oaf, the other smaller, who wore the classic Comedy and Tragedy masks (or, as I'd always called them, 'Happy Face' and 'Sad Face'). There was even an Obama.

"Damn," Erin texted me. "I hope they take those off, otherwise it's going to be hard to identify these guys..." And she was right, although we later figured out a surprising number... or Erin, did anyway. Much of this was sifting through Holly's correspondences, though, not from seeing faces, although we saw some of those.

"Okay everybody," Holly said cheerfully. "Just in case I forgot to say it while everybody was being checked out, I'm glad to see all of you here. I hope this year will be even more of a success than last year. First, let me reintroduce the girls some of you already know... and know very well." She listed off the names of each of the girls, and they took center stage for a second to smile, wave, and, if their costumes allowed it, show off their bodies. "I know they're not why you most of you here, but these girls will be rentable in half-hour blocks, at the usual rates. They're up for anything, and they'll do it raw. If you miss out on one of our big-ticket items, maybe a threesome will make you feel better. Or even if you do nab a virgin, maybe you want to push her boundaries a little and rent one of my more experienced girls to do their best to turn her bi. It's up to you. Share them, make them beg, administer spankings for being such bad little girls, it's all good, as long as you don't leave a permanent mark, and don't take pictures, no matter how much you want that special keepsake. Tipping is encouraged, but not mandatory." There was a little bit of laughter at that.

"Now, let me introduce our new girls. Unfortunately, the first two aren't virgins." Somebody actually booed at that. "I know, I know, but it's getting harder and harder to find virgins these days. Still, I think you'll agree, these girls are the next best thing, and they're still very fresh and practically untouched. Come on up here, Tinkerbelle."

***
Chapter Twenty-Six:

Amber, dressed as Peter Pan's little friend Tinkerbelle, stepped to Holly's side at her introduction. She was barefoot, in a short green dress, and her hair pinned up instead of left down like it normally was... she really did look like a passable, though oversized, Tinkerbelle. "Tinkerbelle's name is Amber. She's fourteen. Now, Amber, how many guys have you been with before you started working for me?" Holly stared intently at Amber for a second, and I could almost imagine her mentally saying, "Don't challenge me."

"Two," she said nervously.

"And you've never sold your pussy or ass before, have you?" She shook her head, though we knew this was a lie. Tori had been selling time with Amber that included more than just oral. "Well, show it off!"

The costume must have been tailor-made for flashing, all it required was a slight lift so the hemline raised above her waist, and her pussy was visible... to the crowd, anyway. I couldn't actually see it because many of them leaned forward and blocked that much of the view. I did see her turn around, to show her ass and bend over pretty far for them. Holly used her hands to spread the cheeks wide, exposing the puckered asshole. "Now, Amber, you've never had anybody fuck your ass at all, have you?" She shook her head. This part was true, from what I was aware of, at least. Even at Eddie's party, her ass was protected, and I'd never been comfortable with anal, so I'd never done the deed myself. "And you are willing to sell that right to the highest bidder, right?" Amber nodded.

Holly leaned forward and worked her thumb around to the asshole, then gently pressed in, sparking a low-pitched gasp from Amber. I don't know how far she wound up inserting it, but it wasn't in there long, just one stroke in and out and then Holly pulled out, slapped Amber's ass cheek once causing barely a ripple, and announced, "Well, then, we have our first auction. Amber's anal virginity, and her first ever paid fuck in the pussy. Obviously, whoever buys her ass gets first crack... no pun intended, unless you decide to purchase both, in which case, your call. But I'll start the bidding with her pussy... and the entry bid is $200." One person bid. I couldn't tell who it was. In fact, unless it was the devil guy, the clown guy, the wolf guy, or one of the brothers, I probably couldn't report who bid at any particular time, sometimes they weren't even in the frame.

In this case, I know it was just one. "Okay, how about $250. Nobody?" She looked around the room. "Okay, I probably should have told you this earlier, but Amber is a cheerleader. Isn't that right, Amber?"

"Yes," she reported, now standing up again and facing front, holding her green dress up to above her belly button. "Since middle school." We'd learned part of the reason that she was being asked to do more than Winnie, including having actual sex, was that, with cheerleading practice and other duties, she'd asked to be released from selling blowjobs more often. They told her she had to earn her right to stay on the team by being more accommodating. Here, she also seemed to be in that spirit. She was smiling brightly, and it even seemed genuine.

"Two fifty," Holly reported somebody bidding, and then looked around the room for a couple seconds before asking, "And a little wisp of a girl like you probably still fits into her middle school uniform, right?" Amber nodded. "You still have it?" Another nod, a little warier. "Well, there you go then, as a special treat, I'll throw in a two-for-one offer. Not only can you fuck her tonight, but sometime in the next month, Amber will show up for a second encounter, wearing her middle school cheerleading uniform. Get her to do a dirty cheerleading routine, fuck her in her uniform, even wipe your cock on it after, I'll personally pay for the dry-cleaning." The fat clown bid on that, as did one of the brothers. That was actually the moment they earned their name, as the skinny one asked aloud if he and his brother, while nudging him, could both double-team Amber as part of the cheerleading special. Holly agreed to allow up to two people for that one, and that sparked a bit of a bidding war that got it up to $400. The brothers lost out in the end. I think the bigger brother was relieved... he seemed to be trying to stop the other one from bidding towards the end.

The bidding for her ass was more competitive, earning bids from all around the room, and wound up at $850. "Go sit on your buyer's lap while we do the rest of the sales," Holly instructed. She waved off to the side where the girls were waiting and announced, "Now, for those of you who missed out on your last chance to poke a hot ass, next up we have... Pocahontas." There were a few groans at that, but Holly just smiled. "You're all just mad because I was the first one to say it." Winnie appeared at the edge of the camera, and Holly pulled her even closer. I never would have said it to her face, but she actually didn't look so out of place as a Pocahontas. Her complexion was a little darker than most Chinese people I knew. She might have looked more out of place as a Mulan. "Winnie here is tonight's Pocahontas. She's another non-virgin, but she can still love you long time." Winnie shot an obvious glare at that point.

"Is she an ass-virgin too?" somebody asked, and before Holly could answer, Winnie shook her head. I don't know if she was deliberately trying to screw Holly or if Holly was planning to be honest anyway. She'd lied about Amber's trading sexual favors for money, but so far she'd been pretty honest about virginities. Maybe she was afraid they could tell.

"What can I say?" Holly said. "She'll still be a good fuck and this will be her first time doing it for money." This time, Winnie didn't contradict, although I knew that wasn't true. Holly hadn't made her do it, but before Winnie and I met she'd done all sorts of thing for money, or gifts that amounted to the same thing. "We'll start the bidding at $300, and you can have her for the night. Either of her holes, as many times as you have it in you."

Holly tugged at Winnie's costume to reveal one of her tits, and then pulled at the bottom. There were no bidders right away. "Come on, I know you're saving your cash for the real virgins, but somebody must like a taste of the Orient..."

"Nothing I can't get in Thailand," somebody shouted to a chorus of knowing laughs. "And they're younger, too."

"Yeah, but you come to me for what you can't get... and that's normal, American teenage girls with a real life who are willing to get a little down and dirty. Winnie is all of that, no matter what her race. Two hundred," Holly offered.

She leaned in to whisper something to Winnie I didn't catch, and Winnie soon said, "Please somebody fuck me." But she said it so mechanically that it was hardly arousing at all. "I need it so bad."

Holly pinched her lips a little, but soon forced a smile back on her face. "Come on people."

One of the brothers, the skinny one, spoke up, offering jokingly, "If you like her so much, why don't you fuck her?"

Holly grinned, and put a finger up to Winnie's chin as though evaluating her. "Well, she's not really my type... and you know me, I don't fuck for free." A moment's pause, and then she said, "But... if you guys are willing to scrape together $300, I'll fuck her right here, to get you more in the mood."

"I'll chip in twenty," somebody said, and a few more people agreed, and before long, it seemed, Holly reached her price.

She disappeared for a minute, and then came back, holding a big purple dildo, larger than an average dick, and attached to a little black leather getup. "Okay, because you demanded it." She pulled her slit up dress aside and started to attach the strap-on and, although at one point she needed to call for help, before long, she had an artificial cock swinging along as she walked. "Come here, bitch." That got a cheer. Winnie took her place in front of Holly, who then lead her forward, instructing her to bend over and rest her arms on the shoulders of one of the men in the front row. "Since you've been such a bad little girl, I'm not even going to lube you up."

The crowd rose up, so the camera didn't capture a good view of the proceedings, but every once in a while people would shuffle aside and you'd see Holly grinning sadistically as she thrust her hips forward, or Winnie's anguished-looking face as she was pounded in the cunt by a rubber cock.

That she had that look didn't mean she was actually suffering... I've mentioned before, Winnie always looked in pain while she was having sex, even when she enjoyed it, although I don't think this particular time was very enjoyable. The large dildo might not have been a major problem (it went into her pussy, as far as I could tell), but sometimes Holly would smack her ass or pull her hair hard enough to make her head point towards the ceiling... and that's not to mention the groping from the customers who felt free to squeeze her tits during the event, sometimes quite roughly from what she said later.

At one point during this spectacle, Clownface waved towards Karen, the Little Mermaid, almost like he was hailing a cab or asking for the check in a restaurant, and she went to his side, then got on her knees and started blowing him. Some of the people watched this, but the majority were more interested in Winnie getting fucked. Here the brothers split... the skinny brother was enthusiastically watching Winnie, cheering and encouraging them to go at it harder. The bigger brother averted his eyes, mostly watching the floor, although eventually started watching the blowjob going on as he tugged his pants nervously.

There was a lot of pants tugging going on, and a lot of pricks being exposed, too, hard and stroked... nobody was whacking off with the determination of somebody who planned on cumming right away, but rather enjoying a few strokes while they watched something hot, but also hoping to save themselves for something even better.

After a few minutes of the strap-on fucking, without stopping her motion, Holly looked around and said, "So, anybody interested in renting her now?" A few hands went up, including the one who's shoulders were being used as a table, and a few voices spoke up. "Okay, the bidding starts at $300."

A few minutes later, Winnie had been sold for $500. Her buyer was the guy dressed up as the Devil. "Yeah, I thought it might be you," Holly said as she pulled out, and grabbed Winnie by one hand to drag her away and towards the devil. "Just remember, nothing that leaves a permanent mark," she said ominously.

Next up was Samantha, dressed as Alice in Wonderland, short blue dress, white stockings which were dramatically revealed to be attached to a garter belt, and a black bow in her hair. Things had settled down a little, people taking their old seats, although Clownface was still getting a blowjob. "And now, our first of the virgins!" Holly called out. She still wore the strap on, which poked out of her dress and juggled as she walked. Running her hands through the younger girl's hair, Holly gave a little bio on Samantha, focusing on how she really needed the money because her Dad was out of work, and said, "Now, she is a virgin in both holes, however, I have to warn you, she doesn't have a hymen. But I promise you, nothing other than fingers have been down her rabbit hole." Bidding was faster and more furious on this one, and the brothers took a special interest, enough to win both holes. She pulled in almost $1800.

But that was nothing compared to the two virgins with hymens, Kate, dressed as a Latina Snow White, and Olivia in the yellow dress that I guess made her Belle towards the end of the movie, although she still wore her glasses. She was probably the poorest match to the costume. They each got their moment in the spotlight, and much time was spent on the hymens... in fact, Holly held a viewing that must have been five minutes long as each girl, now stripped, spread their pussies with their fingers and allowed the men line up to look inside up close. They could even touch, although with the warning that if they broke it, they bought it, at a price Holly set. Many did touch, and one even pulled his mask aside and took a lick, but none punctured the hymen.

After that, the bidding began. Kate, who also turned out to be the youngest, got the highest price, $4000 just for her virginity and $1500 for her ass. Belle got $2000 for her pussy and another thousand for her ass. One of those was the wolf-faced guy, another was wearing the V mask. Once the auctions were complete, and money was collected, the orgy began.

***
Chapter Twenty-Seven:

Orgy is pretty well the best way to describe it. It was pretty well all public, although guests who hadn't made a purchase were instructed to keep a few feet away from those who did... many of them began renting out the older girls for a little relief... and that became a little more of a feeding frenzy too. The 'usual rates' Holly referred to, although it never was clear exactly how much that was on camera, didn't cover exclusivity... if somebody hired the Little Mermaid to suck his cock, another could hire her for the same time and fuck her. If you wanted her all to yourself, you had to pay five times as much.

The auctioned girls didn't have that problem, at least at first... there was a clear pecking order (or maybe that's peckering order?), even when multiple men had bought something off the same girl. Those who purchased the right to deflower a virgin pussy got to use her first, and, until they came, she was untouchable. After that, anal virginities were taken with the same rules. In Amber's case, because she wasn't a virgin except in her ass, she got ass-fucked before anything else.

There was one exception to those rules, and that was with the brothers, Comedy and Tragedy who had purchased Alice in Wonderland. That one was actually the easiest to watch, they were nearest to the camera. The girl was stripped first, a small body with perky little tits, although the garter belt and stockings that proved so popular during the bidding were left on. The larger brother, Tragedy, undressed except for his mask, revealing a bit of a pudgy hairy body that was quite a contrast to the girl he was going to deflower. He put on a condom, the only one I saw that night, and, to my surprise, gently stroked the girl's blonde hair. "I know this probably isn't how you pictured your first time, and I'm sorry," he said, or something like that... there was a lot of noise and even though he said it pretty loudly, much of what was said was guesswork. "I'm going to try to be as gentle as possible, okay?"

She nodded, and held her breath, and he advanced on her. He wasn't very big in the cock department... probably average size, really, but she stared at it nonetheless and instinctively started backing up. The smaller brother kept behind her, preventing her from going anywhere, and then, with surprising strength, lifted her up by her hips while the bigger one got into position. "That's it, easy does it," the big brother said as she sank down on him slowly. After that, he was the one who held her, not the little brother. He'd backed away, and in fact, a few times got right in the way of the camera, blocking the view of everything. "Is it okay? I'm not hurting you or anything, right?" he asked. Samantha didn't answer. The little brother moved out of the way and we saw him thrusting his hips upward as she locked her knees around his hips.

"Okay, come on little brother, you've had your fun, time to share." That was the smaller brother speaking, but I guess he was the older one after all. His dick was all slicked up... when he was blocking the camera he was getting lube that was provided on an unseen table. Other men stopped by the same place throughout the night. Sometimes, they would do so to grab a drink, and we'd briefly see them take off their mask.

Tragedy looked at his brother, but didn't stop the thrusting. "Don't you see this is traumatic enough for the poor girl?" She didn't seem traumatized, at least not obviously, but she didn't seem especially into it, either. Her eyes were closed through most of it, although when this conversation started, she opened them and was looking back and forth between the two masked men who'd bought her.

"She knew what she was getting into," Comedy-face said, maneuvering behind her and spreading her as-cheeks.

"Give her some time to get used to it... Damn it, do you have to barge in on everything of mine?"

"She's not yours, she's a whore. And without me, you wouldn't even have a shot at her. Now stop bouncing her around so I can get in."

Tragedy-face slowed down and his brother slowly pressed his dick into the teenager's ass. She winced at it, and pressed up against the bigger man, almost hugging him for support, while he told her it was okay, but before long, she was sandwiched in between them, and they were both thrusting into her holes at the same time. Tragedy-face was moving more slowly now, like he was afraid he might break the girl, but Comedy-face was pounding away at her ass. Alice did start groaning, either in pleasure or pain, and soon after that the trio pulled out and sank towards the floor where they continued to fuck, but out of view, until presumably they were done with her.

By the time they were done, most of the virginities were done away with, and a few minutes later, the rest of them were. Comedy-face jumped up quickly when he was done, and started looking for something more entertaining to watch. The larger, more gentle man, actually stayed with the girl he bought, helped her to her feet (where we could see them again) and said something to her. I wouldn't have heard it, but apparently she didn't either, because she asked him to repeat it. He pulled the mask, just over his mouth, and said, "Just remember, what doesn't kill us makes us stronger."

Even though there were no longer any virgins in the room, that didn't put an end to the festivities, by any means. The girls were sold again, and fucked again, and sometimes in between engagements they were forced to perform lesbian shows to get people up again and willing to pay for another round. These weren't free either, but either one person would rent two girls and tell them go at each other, or a collection would be taken up, just like when Holly used the strap-on on Winnie.

Although it happened off camera (or, rather, on camera, but too far away and with too much going on nearby to make sense of what was happening), Winnie herself was the subject of another collection. After the man in the devil costume had fucked her ass once and later throat-fucked her pretty intently from the way Winnie described it, he declared he was done with her and wanted to try somebody else, and made a deal with Holly to... I guess, subcontract is as good a way to put it as any, but it was done in a very specific way.

For the rest of that night, Winnie was designated the clean-up girl, or cumdumpster, for the whole group. Anyone could cum in her mouth, or have her lick clean another girl's pussy or asshole clean of semen. A collection was taken up among all the men, most of them chipping in for the spectacle, and although most of the money went to Holly, Winnie says some of it was kicked back to Satan.

Holly had also pointed out the guy in the wolf mask, and warned that he owned a dog-breeding facility, and that if she didn't perform her duties with a smile and no bitching, she'd let him rent her for a Saturday to be fucked by dogs.

We didn't see this threat, Winnie told us about it after, but we did see her waiting nearby while a Zorro-masked figure fucked Amber, and, with a big plastic smile on her face, first gave a quick suck and then licked the dick clean after it pulled out, still dribbling, and then went to town on Amber's pussy. The view was blocked momentarily as one of the Brothers, the Comedy-face one, actually got a drink and took off his mask for a second completely. It wasn't anybody we recognized, and he moved out of the way so we could see Amber having an orgasm from Winnie eating her out. That got a cheer, but didn't earn Winnie a respite. As soon as she was done, she responded to a whistle to run off to get on her knees for another guy. She moved pretty fast, and we didn't see her bitch once. I guess Erin was wrong, she did find dogfucking a valid threat.

It was actually only a couple minutes after this scene that the video ended, out of memory to store the events, but from what Winnie said, it went on for some time after. The only one who didn't get fucked was Holly. Many of the freshest girls got fucked six or seven times, and Winnie... well, she threw up afterwards. "I don't think I ever want to swallow cum again," she said... but of course we couldn't promise that. She was still one of Holly's whores, and we had to tell her that.

"But not for much longer," Erin assured her, as the Blackmailer. "We're very close."

We were close, but we weren't ready yet. Although it might seem like we had all we needed, we still held off on acting on our information. For one thing, we wanted to be more sure that Cassie's stories of cop partners weren't involved, even though we hadn't seen any evidence. We continued to not see any, but it was the type of thing that you could never rule out completely. For another, we wanted to get more information on the customers. We'd gotten some headway on that in the first week afterwards, where the new girls were still in high demand... when you combined the addresses the girls were sent to with Google and the knowledge that these were wealthy guys, we put together a few names, even though they were masked. The dog breeder in the wolf mask was easy, as was the clown face who owned the rental property (we found his picture on a website and even before Amber confirmed that she'd been sent to see him, his fat ugly face just seemed to look like the guy). The brothers still eluded us, even with one of them unmasked, as did the guy in the Zorro mask, and a few of the others, but for quite a few of them, we knew who they were, although we couldn't prove it yet.

The final thing that was holding us back was that we wanted something on Holly's dad, and, ideally, something incriminating on Holly that wasn't directly connected to the prostitution ring. That way, we could threaten the both of them with exposure, and even if they called our bluff, we might be able to put them in jail without exposing the girls who'd been blackmailed. They wouldn't want to expose the blackmail then, because it would mean more jail time for them.

As it turns out, I was the one who got that final piece, both at once, and it was almost entirely by accident. I was working on my game idea after school, the Foxy Squirrel one, getting a little done, and I decided to take a break and check who was online our little spy program. Mom was home early, so I didn't have a chance to have sex with Erin after school like usual, and I guess I was hoping to find something to jack off to.

I noticed Holly was on one of the school computers. That was rare enough... she didn't use them very much, except a little at school where I couldn't really spend time watching her. I guess since she had her own computer, and she assumed (rightly) that the school ones had monitoring on them, she didn't see much use in using them herself.

I figured I'd check it out just in case. She was sitting at a kitchen table, eating a prepackaged single-serve salad. A quick check at her desktop showed she was working on some kind of problem set in a science class, probably one that was assigned on the school computers and would be handed in electronically. I didn't care about that, so after a quick look I turned back to the camera view and watched her for a while.

Nothing happened at first, but I kept the window open, just in case, while I went to look up a piece of code syntax for a function I was planning to use, and it paid off. A couple minutes later, a moving shadow appeared on cam. The shadow became a person who walked into frame to get something from the kitchen. He was tall, thin, but wiry, with stubble for hair and on his chin. He was dressed in a grey t-shirt and plaid boxer shorts. It was Holly's dad.

I put on my headphones and, just in case, started recording the scream. "That late?" her father said, in response to some question I didn't hear. He rubbed his eyes. "Shouldn't you be out making money? Where's whatshername? The chink you're mother-henning."

"She's with Kingston, sort of a test run. I asked him to pay her more than usual so I can see if she's going to hold out on me. I almost hope she does, that bitch has been on my last nerve for weeks." I made a quick note to warn Winnie. I had a feeling Winnie would, on her own, fail the test and assume she was entitled to skim off the top anything that wouldn't be noticed.

"And the other girls? All working? Making enough money for us?"

"Most of them." She seemed uninterested, and the only trace of emotion, I might have imagined it. Her father came up behind her to put his hands on her shoulders, looking over the work she was doing. I thought she stiffened up as he touched her.

"The big Halloween party's over, when are you going to let Daddy get a crack at your new friends?"

She sighed. "The ex-virgins are still in pretty high demand. I could probably spare you Amber or Winnie in a few days."

He frowned. "Which ones are those again?"

"The Chinese girl and the cheerleader."

"I could be satisfied with the cheerleader... but why so long? You shouldn't work them too hard, they'll be command higher prices if you make them a little rarer."

She grit her teeth. "I wouldn't have to work them so hard if you weren't so busy smoking up our profits."

"Now that's not fair."

"It's fair and it's true. So will you let me handle this the way I need to handle this?"

They were silent for about half a minute, and he continued to look over her shoulder at the computer. "You can handle it," he said. "But that means keeping me happy, too. I've got needs too, you know."

"I can call Karen or Tori," she offered. "You like them, right?"

He leaned forward and sniffed her hair. "If all you're going to offer me is pussy I've already had, I might as well just enjoy my baby girl right now."

"I'm on my period," she said.

"That's okay, your butthole is tighter anyway. Come on. Up for daddy." He grabbed her shoulders again and pulled... no, more like directed her into a standing position.

"I do have work to do."

"I won't take long." He pulled down her pants, on camera, and then her panties, and turned her towards the countertop, which she gripped as she bent over. It was all visible on cam. He got behind her and his dick poked between her ass-cheeks.

"Christ, at least use some fucking lube." She pulled away, got her purse from the table, retrieved a small vial from it, and passed it over to him before getting back into position.

He spread it on his dick and around her ass, before pushing in again. He fucked her for only a couple minutes, but it was pretty clear Holly wasn't really into it, she was just enduring it. Her dad seemed to be into it though, twitching and making exaggerated faces of pleasure, almost like he knew he was on camera and was mugging for it. He was just energetic, though, short quick strokes, and for a while it reminded me of a dog humping somebody... somebody who found the whole thing a little humiliating but was determined not to show it.

When it was over, he just turned away like he was the one who'd lost interest, and while his daughter wiped her ass with a paper towel, the father went to the fridge where he got a beer. A few seconds later, he was left, giving Holly one last playful ruffle of the hair before moving on.

I didn't fap to it... it was kind of horrifying, really, but I did feel some satisfaction of having gotten what we wanted. As soon as Erin came upstairs, I called her into the room and showed her the video I saved.

"I almost feel sorry for her," I said.

She stared at the screen, but I had a feeling she was fighting the instinct to roll her eyes at me. "Don't let it cloud your judgment... even if she's had a fucked up life, she's still our enemy, she's still fucking with our friends, and she still needs to be taken down."

"I know," I said. "But we can do it compassionately. Maybe take the father out, and we won't have to do anything to Holly."

"Make no mistake, Holly's running it, she said it herself. If we want to take them out without harming our friends, we need to take out both of them," she said. "The good news is, I think we have enough ammunition now to do that." She bit her lip. "We just need to decide when we're ready to pull the trigger."

***
Chapter Twenty-Eight:

We put the decision off, figuring a little more time couldn't hurt, after everything we had allowed to happen already, and we wanted to be sure... Cassie's tales of Holly having police connections still loomed large in our fears, even if we hadn't seen evidence. She also said teachers, plural, at our school were involved, and so far, we'd only confirmed one... a male gym teacher. It was, like Tony and Gianna's relationship when it still wasn't confirmed, virtually impossible to rule out completely, whether it was true or not. So we decided another two weeks was fair, to see if any of evidence of secret partners presented itself. But it was only a few days after that Halloween Party scene that there was a kind of explosion of emotional chaos that forced our hand into acting early... not from Holly and Amber and Winnie or anybody in the sordid part of our lives, but from our ordinary group of friends.

Kirk and Cassie broke up. This time, it seemed, for good, and for good reason. Kirk cheated on her. I don't know exactly how he told her, but he did tell her, that much was certain, sometime after school one day. We weren't there for that, so I also don't know if there was screaming and yelling or if Cassie just told him to get out. I found out about it through Erin, ultimately, although I had just a little hint of it before... Cassie calling our home phone, because she couldn't reach Erin directly. Erin was out, working on a project with Krista... a legitimate, school project, I mean, they'd been grouped together in one of their classes and they were at Krista's place working on it. She must have turned off her phone, and so Cassie tried the house line. I could tell she was upset, but she wouldn't tell me about what... in fact she pretty much just hung up on me when I said Erin was out. Probably because she knew I was Kirk's friend.

I told Erin about the call when she got home, and then she told me, she'd already heard... Kirk had told her he'd cheated. She was pissed about it, but I didn't bother to defend him, although I did think it was at least noble of him that he fessed up about it, rather than let her find out another way. I didn't try to contact him directly... I figured if he wanted to talk about it, he'd call me.

The next day I learned what Erin must have already known but hadn't chosen to share. The girl Kirk cheated on Cassie with was Tony's little sister Gianna. And the only reason he confessed was that they got caught by Tony and Gianna's parents, coming home unexpectedly after some event they were going to got cancelled, so it was about to become public knowledge anyway. I knew Erin was especially pissed at him, not only did he cheat on her best friend, which was bad enough, but he'd also shattered one of her illusions, of another dream kinship out there, just like us. Except it wasn't a dream if Gianna was fucking somebody like Kirk on the side. Maybe it was just Kinplay, to use one of Erin's terms, experimentation, stress relief, but nothing serious.

Or maybe to Gianna that's all it was. Tony I think thought it was a little more, but I never talked to him about it. I could tell he was pissed off all day, and if Kirk even came near us he balled up his fists and looked threateningly at him. He got detention for shouting a stream of profanity at him at lunch, when Kirk dared to try to apologize to him.

Kirk looked at me for help, during that, or moral support, before fleeing the cafeteria, but I wasn't inclined to offer it, at least not right away. I didn't even follow him out. After all, I sympathized with Tony... even if he was just a protective older brother, I still knew where he was coming from. And it wasn't as though it was the first time Kirk had screwed up in that regard... he's probably the only other guy who's touched my sister in any kind of sexual way, before Erin and I got together. Even if she just stroked his cock before he dumped her for her friend when she wouldn't give him a blowjob, that image still haunts me and I try not to think about it.

After school, I saw him, sitting on a set of bleachers near the parking lot, alone, looking out forlornly, making a point of not looking directly at me. I had a feeling he was doing this on purpose, sitting alone, but where I'd notice him when I went to my car. He wanted me to go over and talk to him, but he didn't want to ask. This way, if I decided to just leave him, he could pretend I just didn't notice. "I should see how he's doing," I said to my sister.

She frowned at me, but didn't fight it. "I guess I could try to get a ride with somebody else..."

I don't think she was trying to manipulate me, but it had that effect anyway. "No, I'll drive you," I said suddenly. "I can come back and find him later."

"No, really," she said, putting a hand on my arm. "There's Anna, she owes me a favor anyway." Cassie had left midway during the day, claiming a stomach ache, and, according to Erin, had refused her offer to go hang out together after school.

I watched Erin long enough to assure she got a ride, and then sauntered over to where Kirk was sitting. He still wouldn't look at me. "You realize there's no game on or anything, right?"

"Yeah."

"I mean, you are kind of an idiot, so..."

I meant it as good natured ribbing, but I guess he'd had enough of a bad day. "So what, you planning to shun me too?" he asked, a little defensively.

"I probably should," I said mildly, shaking my head, but sat down beside him. "I mean, what the hell is it with you and your friend's sisters? You should know they're off limits." Mine especially.

"I do! It just kind of happened. It started out completely innocent. Well, not completely. Sometimes when I was over at Tony's it looked like she was pretty obviously teasing me, you know, bending over in front of us to pick stuff up. But I saw her walking a few times and gave her a ride, and we started chatting a little. I really just thought of it as just being friendly to a friend's sister at first."

"A little too friendly. You've been warned about that before." By me.

He scowled, but the scowl was more at himself than me. "I know, but it's not like it's a universal rule or anything. Some guys don't mind. And I guess... well, you know I never had a sister of my own. I guess I never really got that special bond with somebody. I've always noticed other guys sisters, like maybe I thought I could get the best of both worlds." He must have worried that I was worried about Erin, because he suddenly got a panicked look and said, "But don't worry, I've learned my lesson, I haven't even thought about that with Erin."

I wasn't really worried anymore, and although it never hurt to let him know that was dangerous territory, I figured I could let him off the hook. "Like you'd stand a chance anyway. She hates you, now. I mean, you cheated on her best friend."

"I didn't cheat," he insisted. Then, a second later. "Not really." Another second of silence followed, before he followed up with, "Well, I did, but it wasn't my fault. But we were pretty much temporarily broken up when I went all the way and actually had sex with Gianna... Cassie can't fault me for that." And yet, I knew she would have. "And then after we got back together, Gianna threatened to tell, so I figured what was the harm of keeping it going?"

"That's weak, man. And you were cheating long before you 'went all the way and actually had sex' with her."

"Just fooling around, some oral and I fingerbanged her a few times... it was all quick stuff, snuck in while I was hanging out at Tony's or giving her a ride somewhere. It was just in fun, nothing serious." I just gave him a look, like he wasn't fooling anybody. "Okay, I'm scum, but I don't really need you playing the moral high ground here, we both know you're no better."

"Huh?"

He stared at me... it felt like he was going to stare right through me. "Really? You're going to make me say it? You're not going to just admit it?"

My heart started to race. Did he know about me and Erin? All this time? "Say what?"

"I've known you, like, forever, you can't keep secrets from me. And Cassie's let a few things slip when I make jokes about you. I can put two and two together." Oh god, no. When I still didn't say anything, he added, in frustration. "Come on, I know you've been fucking around too. Everybody knows Madison doesn't do anything, and I know you haven't been going without."

I let out my breath in relief, a little too obviously, but I think it looked like I'd been caught. Still, I felt an irrational need to defend myself. "I've never cheated on Madison," I said.

"Oh, so the leader of the Chastity Club's secretly a slut like the every other girl?"

"No!" I said. Okay, yes, in some ways.

"So you're a cheat."

"No!"

"It's one or the other. She's a slut, or you're a cheat. Don't even try denying you've been getting laid, you missed your chance for that. So, who've you been slipping the meat to? Your ex-girlfriend? Somebody else at school? I'm sure it's somebody who would piss Madison off. Let's see, who does she know? Or maybe it was...."

A part of me was sure he was going to guess Erin, even just as a crass joke, and then my face would give me away. I guess that was why it just slipped out. "Madison's a lesbian, okay?!" I blurted, to keep him from guessing.

He stared at me for a second, as though it was too weird to process. "What? She's gay?" he asked.

"Oh god," I said. I wasn't supposed to say that. "You can't tell anybody."

"If she's gay, why are you dating her?"

"It's just... an arrangement we made. I play her boyfriend and don't pressure her for sex, and..." The best lies are always close to the truth. "...she stops picking on Erin."

"And what, she doesn't care if you sleep around, as long as you keep it quiet?"

"Pretty much." I looked at him. "You can't tell anybody, though."

"Why not? If it gets out Miss Holier-than-thou's a lesbo, she's not going to be in any position to pick on your sister, she'll have her own problems to deal with."

He was right... even people who didn't care if she was gay would hound her just because it was a secret and she had a lot to school. People attacked when they sensed weakness. And of course, that was without even considering her parents. "Have a little empathy, man."

He shrugged. "Hey, if you don't want me to tell anybody, I won't tell a soul. We are friends, right?" He looked at me, like he wasn't sure, since so many of his other friends had left him recently.

Kirk wasn't a great friend, and sometimes I didn't even like him much, but... he was a friend, maybe my oldest one. "Yeah. We'll always be friends." He smiled goofily, probably in relief. "As long as you stay away from my sister," I reminded him.

"Like you said, no chance of that happening, even if I wanted it to. Which I don't." He sighed. "Tony's never going to forgive me, is he?"

"I don't know," I said, but I thought the answer was no. Maybe if his relationship with his sister was more conventional, he could have gotten over it, but now jealousy was involved, and that was so much more effective at ending friendships.

"Jay's been giving me the cold shoulder too."

"To be honest, I don't think he really cares, but he's been friends with Tony longer." Just as I'd been friends with Kirk longer. That sucked, it was going to ruin our whole circle. Well, maybe. "I'm not going to stop hanging out with Tony either, by the way. And I can't exactly stop hanging around Cassie, she's my sister's best friend. So at school you might be on your own a little... but hey, we'll always have X-Box."

"Still going to help me study for my second crack at the SATs?" Mostly it was just drilling him with random questions. You didn't even have to be smart to do it... anybody could have helped, but it was quite possible he didn't have anybody.

"Yeah. I think I can manage that," I said, and then joked, to lighten the mood, "You need all the help you can get." Why is it so many of our jokes are tearing each other down?

He was quiet for a while, and for a second I thought maybe he took this particular jibe personally, but then he pressed his hands to his face firmly. "God, why did I have to go and fuck everything up?" I didn't answer. Finally, he said in a very small voice, "I loved her, you know?"

"Cassie?" I ventured. He nodded. "Then why did you..."

"I don't know! I just got horny, and there was opportunity, and it didn't seem like anything bad could happen, I just thought it would be a little fun on the side. The truth is, if I had to choose, I'd choose Cassie, even though Gianna's way hotter. Way hotter."

"You never know," I said. "Maybe she'll forgive you once she gets over being mad." Although he should probably get out of the habit of emphasizing that Gianna was 'way hotter.'

He looked up, hopeful. "You think so?"

"Stranger things have happened." Like Erin forgiving me for when I blackmailed her. Fuck, so much of my life the last few years fell into that category. A girl taking back a cheater, that was practically cliché in comparison. Of course, Kirk would probably find a way to screw it up. So, I thought I'd give him some help, even though I'd never been in the situation before. "But you can't pester her. Just tell her you love her, you're sorry, you'll do what it takes to earn her trust and if she changes her mind you'll be there. And you can't fuck Gianna while you're waiting, either. Better if you don't fuck anybody, but definitely not her." I shrugged. "There are no guarantees, but there's a slight chance. But if you don't think you can be faithful the second time, you should just let her go now."

He just said "Yeah," and seemed to be thinking it over, and a minute later he got a phone call from his Dad, and when he was done, he wanted to change the topic, and so we just talked about random bullshit, and before long we decided it was time to go our separate ways. Just before we reached our cars, he said, "You know, I should have known Madison was gay. She didn't have that simmering sexual tension with me like Angela did."

"What?"

"Hey, we never did anything, I'd never do that to you, but I could tell, underneath all that pretend dislike, she was a little into me. Who could blame her? I am, after all, an Ultraman." He flexed one of his scrawny arms into a muscle, pretty much proving he was just joking around. "But with Madison? She really just disliked me. So it makes sense she was gay. I really should have seen it sooner."

I shook my head with a smile as I got into my car. "You're delusional, man."

He grinned. "Hey, if I didn't have delusions, I'd just be stuck with reality... who the fuck wants that?" The grin faded halfway through what he said. We waved through the windows, and then I drove home.

Erin seemed in a bit of a bad mood when I saw her next, and I thought for a bit it was guilt by association, especially when she asked, "So how's the cheater doing?"

"Feels like shit."

"Good, he deserves to." She sighed. "I never should have set the two of them up."

"They were good together," I pointed out. "He says he loves her."

"If he loved her, he wouldn't have cheated."

"Things aren't always that simple."

She stiffened a little. "What, do you think you'd cheat on me?"

"No," I said quickly. "But I have hurt you, without meaning to." I put my hands on her shoulders. "I never want to, I like to think I don't do it as much anymore, but... Kirk is an idiot."

"Well, you're right about that part." She sighed. "I should have known," she said. "I should have seen it."

"You can't watch everybody. Besides, if you had... what would you do? He still cheated, and Cassie would be hurt no matter what you did."

She hummed a little, like she saw my point but didn't want to outright agree. "I haven't been a good friend to Cassie lately," she said.

That seemed to come out of nowhere. "What?"

"I've been trying to strike up this friendship with Krista, so I haven't been with Cassie as much at school... Krista hasn't really warmed to her yet... and after school, I've been pretty busy... it's been ages since I just went to her place to hang out, or did anything a friend should do."

"Everyone has their busy periods. But you've been a great friend to her, overall."

"No, I haven't. And I haven't been one to Winnie and Amber, either." She turned her chair to look at me and said, "I think it's time to take down Holly."

***
Chapter Twenty-Nine:

Taking down Holly had been a goal for so long, and yet we'd always put it off. We had a deadline, and we were comfortable with that, and now that it was about to be moved up, a little fear crept into me. "What? Are you sure?"

She nodded. "We were only waiting just to be extra careful. I think we're good."

"What about what happened with Cassie? Her Dad getting arrested?"

"I'm sure it's a bluff. We know Holly's dad's into drugs, maybe he planted something in the car, called in a tip. She doesn't actually need a cop, she just needed Cassie to THINK she has a cop. Everything's pointed to this all along."

"But he got probation, just like Holly promised."

"Cassie's dad was a first-time offender, white, and with the drugs not found on his person. Probation's probably what any judge would have given."

"So her connections are just smoke and mirrors." We'd had conversations like this, maybe even exactly like this, many times before, but it just felt to me I had to go over everything again, just to make sure we didn't miss anything.

Erin shrugged a little, realizing this. "I can't be 100% sure, but I think so, mostly. She knows people with money, but that's about it. If she had those kind of powerful friends, I'd know about it by now. I've already identified half of her high rollers, and there's just no sign. They're not even THAT rich, mostly. We already have enough to ruin her. Let's do it. For Winnie and Amber, and Cassie too, even though she'll never know about it."

I'd been wanting to end this for a while, but had always been persuaded that it wasn't the time, we needed to be sure. So it's a little strange that I still needed persuading that it was the right moment to move, that we had been as careful as we could afford to be, but by this time I'd been convinced, and soon the conversation moved from whether to do this to how it would be done.

It took a couple days to get completely set up. We arranged for all of Holly's girls to be called to an empty classroom at the end of the day. We didn't want Holly there, at least not at first. Erin thought it would be best if we started consolidating our hold over everybody else, first. So, we faked a message from one of her girls, drawing her away to the other side of the school.

Everybody except Winnie and Amber filed in to the room expecting Holly to have something to say. Winnie and Amber were already there, but the others must have expected they just happened to arrive first. One of the laptops was already set up and running, providing me my view of everything. Miranda and Tori exchanged a few words I didn't catch, but whatever it was caused Tori to grin knowingly, and then, after a quick look around the room to notice Holly wasn't there, they started looking at the door, expecting her to show up at any moment.

Almost time for me to make my debut. I was playing the role of the Blackmailer from home. I'd skipped the last class of the day for it. We needed one of us to be on call without fear of interruption. Erin watched, but from the library and with a hand ready to switch to an essay at a moment's notice. She couldn't hear anything going on, either. Pretty much, that left me in charge, which was a bit nerve-wracking.

I cracked my fingers to begin typing, but Winnie spoke first, providing an introduction. "So, thank you all for coming," she said sweetly. She was loving this... but then, why shouldn't she, given what we'd promised? "Some things have changed... big things. Holly's no longer in charge here. I wanted to introduce you to your new Master." She waved at the computer screen. That was my cue.

"Thank you, Winnie," I typed, and seconds later, the words were repeated aloud, thanks to a text-to-speech program. "The coming changes will be surprising, however you will quickly see that all of us will benefit from them. Firstly, Winnie will be in charge of the day-to-day running of this operation. You'll be giving her the Madam's share of the profits and letting her know of any problems." At this point, Erin sent me a little text message telling me Holly just stormed past her. We'd expected that, and me especially, because I saw Miranda texting while I was giving my introductory remarks.

"Secondly, you will all be making a lot more money. You see, I am not motivated by money. I have enough of that. Because of that, those girls who are making no money will now take home 80% of what the customers pay." Eyes widened at that, on all sides. The freshmen girls still weren't making anything, except for what Holly gave some of them off the Halloween party, and that wasn't much. Winnie hadn't earned anything, because Winnie said she didn't reach the benchmark. The girls who'd been doing this for more than a year and were now helping to reign in other girls, Holly had been giving them 20%. I was basically offering to quadruple their pay... or at least, that's what they thought. "The remainder will go to Winnie, from which I will take my cut." Time to disappoint the old-timers. "Those of you who have been at this longer, you will also be making more money... but not as much as you think. You will take home fifty percent at first."

"Why are we getting less?" Tori asked, suddenly offended. She was still earning more than twice as much as she used to be, but somehow the fact that she wasn't going to be making as much as others pissed her off.

"I'm glad you asked. Because before you got Winnie and Amber involved, they belonged to me. You fucked with my girls. And there is always a price to fucking with my girls. You will earn what the other girls do when you have paid that price. I suspect you can pay it back in three months of work. After that, you will earn 80%."

Holly burst into the room then, in full-on angry bitch mode. "What the fuck is going on here? What kind of game is this?"

"You're getting taken out, bitch," Winnie said smugly, forming her fingers into a gun and aiming it at her, then bending her thumb to simulate it going off.

"I'm getting taken out? I own you, bitch."

I interrupted. "That brings me to my next point." She stared at the computer in stunned confusion. "Holly has no more leverage over any of you. I have taken all the material she's used to blackmail you." This was the hardest part. It was easy to get copies of most of it, through mail accounts and other snooping, we had that early on. The tricky part was removing Holly's access to it. We deleted it from any mail account we could find, of course, but there would be copies on Holly's home computer.

At least, there were, until Erin physically broke in to her home. She didn't have my permission for that, I would have told her no, but that's Erin's most infuriating tendency... she thought it was better to just do it and not worry me with asking. Except I was worried, even when she got away with it. And I thought it was stupid, too... there was no guarantee of getting everything, Holly might even still have pictures on her phone, and it just didn't matter enough to risk herself like that. Erin justified it by saying it let her put the spy program on the other computers in Holly's house, and she made sure to do it at a time where Holly was out with customers and her father, according to his Facebook, was at sports bar.

We thought we got most of the copies, and even if we didn't, it wasn't that important. Of course, I didn't want Holly getting some illusory power by proving she had some copies squirreled away, so I added quickly. "Oh, she may still have copies, somewhere, but she won't be using them, because I have more on her than she has on you."

While that was playing, Holly didn't just sit and listen. "What the fuck is this? You guys are taking orders from a computer?" She only looked back, with some suspicion, at the last part of my speech coming through the speakers.

"No, they're taking orders from the person behind the computer. A person you can never, ever touch. But I can touch you, Holly." I queued up to play the video on the screen, the one of Holly and her father. "If you step out of line, or harass any of my girls..." That was supposed to be MY girls, but text-to-speech doesn't handle inflection well. "This goes out. That's your father there. He will go to jail, for life. And maybe you're okay with that. Maybe you think he abuses you, and you'd welcome the excuse to send him away. But that's not all I have on you." I switched to a clip of Holly at the auction selling virgin pussy. A clip of her blackmailing, from the very beginning. "You will also go to jail. So will any of your friends who helped push girls into prostitution."

I could see it then, fear on her face, genuine fear. "You can't do that..." she said. "You don't know who you're messing with here. I have friends, powerful friends."

"Your so-called powerful friends have no power over me. You didn't even know I was in your computers, all this time. I'm not even in your city. But if I detect any attempt to take me off your computers or track me down, I will immediately release what I have on you and your father. Not to mention your clients." I started naming names, just a few of the ones we identified.

Tears were now in her eyes, and I have to admit, I felt a little satisfaction. "You can't do this. You don't know what you're doing!"

"I know what I'm doing. I'm taking over. Now, you can stay on, as a whore. You could make yourself useful to me. I'm sure you've got a few clients I don't already know about. I'll even let you keep twenty percent of what you earn, until my girls get paid back every cent of what you've taken from them over the years."

"Bullshit. You're just bluffing. This is all some kind of game you're playing." It was desperate, I thought, even though it was close to the truth. I started another of the blackmail clips playing, this one of the original ones she had on Samantha. She wasn't looking much at the screen, so she must not have noticed, because she said, "Come on, girls..." to her friends. "Tomorrow Winnie gets destroyed." I guess she didn't realize Amber was part of this too. The rest of the girls, even the ones who'd been with her a long time, didn't answer her, they looked uncertainly towards the screen. "Come with me or you know the consequences."

"Any consequences will be faced by you, Holly, before anybody else. This is no bluff. I know it, they know it, and even you know it. You belong to me now, but don't worry... I am not a cruel master."

"You're going to regret this," she cried. "And that's no bluff either." She stalked towards the door, her heels clacking dramatically and being the only sound in the room.

"Holly," I typed. "Nothing you do can harm me. You are over. I'll give you a few days to get used to that fact. You know why? Because I can afford to. But I'll be watching. And you'll never know from where."

She only hesitated a moment as I spoke, and then continued walking out, slamming the door behind her. I breathed out a sigh of relief. It seemed like perfect victory, and, I really did feel like I wasn't a cruel master. I was already trying to think of ways to make it easier for Holly to accept, maybe offering to blackmail her father so that he never touched her, if indeed that bothered her. Even knowing how I loved my sister, I never felt a parent and child could have a similar relationship without it being abusive by the parent and unwanted by the kid.

But there had more important people to be magnanimous towards. "That went as expected. I knew you would all react appropriately. There is one more piece of information I have for all of you. While Holly will no longer be blackmailing you, I still am. But again, I am not a cruel master. I will of course ruin your lives if you attempt to expose me, but I don't want to. I may require you to perform for me, on camera, on occasion... but I have many girls like you, so any individual girl will not be called upon very often. Beyond that, your lives are your own." I left a pause, although they didn't seem to be reacting. "This means that no one will be forced to continue with the prostitution business. You are free. If you wish to continue for the money, you are welcome to. If not, this is your way out."

I don't know what I was expecting, but one of the girls started crying, her whole body shaking, and that started what seemed like a flood of tears around the room, some with smiles attached, some rolling down stony faces. Not every girl was crying, but enough were. It was the most uncomfortable part of the whole thing though, even worse than facing down Holly. In fact, I felt a strong urge to back away and leave them to their grief, or relief, or whatever it was they were feeling. "I have other girls to deal with," I said, to leave in their minds the idea that I was some vast internet conspiracy. "Winnie can answer any questions you have, or pass them along to me."

***
Chapter Thirty:

After that reaction, I expected we'd close up the prostitution ring entirely. Well, not entirely. Winnie, when she campaigned to take over as Madam, seemed okay with continuing, as long as it was on her own terms and with her making the money. This was no real surprise... before we started blackmailing her she was already trading sex for higher grades with her middle school teacher, and gifts from other guys. We put a stop to that with blackmailing (the teacher, too), but... I guess you can take the girl out of whoring herself, but not whoring herself out of the girl.

Amber also wanted to be in charge of the prostitution ring, but that was more about the power than the money. Not that it especially seemed to bother her... talking to Winnie she'd said she might still sell her services now and then, but much less often and being a lot more choosy... she talked about maybe only doing it with high school guys. But she really did want to be the Madam... so much that she was pretty pissed off when we finally chose Winnie, and Erin and I, as the Blackmailer, had to promise we'd find a way to make it up to her. That came sooner than we expected, and in a form I never would have guessed, but I think that was a spur of the moment decision.

Of the other girls, the ones we had no history with before this year, I thought they'd all take the way out offered, and we'd be left with a prostitution service of two. I guess that might drive up the prices, but more likely Winnie and Amber would just eventually quit it entirely. I wasn't too sad about that, though. I never wanted to run a group of whores... at least, not literal whores. I mean, the desire for power over girls, to make them do what I want, had never quite left me, even though it had waned over the years as my wishes became reality. Still, I never really wanted them to actually sell themselves to random men, it was only me that I wanted them to perform for, and I wanted them to like it.

When Winnie made her report of the aftermath, it was looking that I was mostly right. Only one of the girls came up to her after and outright said she'd continue working under the new regime. That was Miranda. She even negotiated herself to receiving 60% instead of 50%, by promising to provide clients only she and Holly knew about. However, over the next week or so, most of the girls came back offering to, at least occasionally, continue turning tricks in exchange for cash, or, in some cases, the popularity of being invited to the most popular parties, and several dates were set up. I later learned Winnie, Amber, and Miranda had been actively trying to talk them into continuing, pointing out how nobody likes sluts who suddenly turn into prudes.

In the end, two of the new girls dropped out completely and seemed to genuinely want to put the life behind them. That was Kate and Samantha. Of the older girls, the ones who'd already been doing this for a year or more, only Andrea quit for good. I felt a little disquieted by the fact that more didn't quit... it felt a little like slaves being released only to agree to work doing the same degrading jobs for the same people and only slightly higher wages. Still, at least they were doing it of their own free will, and knowing we'd done right by them as much as we could, filled me with relief, a weight off my shoulders. I felt like we could finally get back to a more or less normal life.

Holly didn't come back, and we decided not to chase her, to force her to return to whoring. Her attendance at school up until the Thanksgiving break was spotty, and the few times I saw her, she had a haunted, nervous look. We had been haunting her... we made it clear we were watching her a few times, but we had so many girls to watch, not to mention Erin's spying on the rest of the school, it was easy to lose track of her. We had our own lives to live.

In the wake of her victory, Erin was a little smug. More than a little. She didn't let it show among the others, to anybody else, she was just average Erin, who had nothing to do with any of the events other than helping them accomplish the surveillance. She didn't imply or take credit for anything, although she managed to point out to Cassie that Holly had lost her power. But knowing her as well as I did, I could tell, she got a bit full of herself for her success... our success, I guess, she always said it was both of ours, but I knew she had done most of it, and I think she did too. Which made her a little cocky in other areas the next couple weeks. She scored much higher marks than usual, not caring about how people saw it. She always said she'd stopped pretending that she was dumber than she was, but I knew that wasn't entirely true... she'd stopped pretending she was dumb, certainly, but she always held back a little, whether because she didn't want others in her class to resent her success or feel inadequate themselves, or maybe she just didn't want to intimidate me, but immediately after we took down Holly, she shone more brightly than usual academically.

That wasn't all. She decided to try to set Cassie up on a bunch of dates to increase her confidence (the dates went nowhere... this wasn't a failure to Erin, she said she didn't want Cassie to get involved in a rebound, so the dates were targeted just to make her feel better about herself but not lead to anything). She began challenging Lawrence more covertly, subtly trying to insinuate he wasn't as much of a catch as Mom thought but without directly starting anything challenging. In fact, she was more pleasant to him than she'd been before. We even had a relatively pleasant Thanksgiving at his house and Erin smiled sweetly through everything, including saying grace, without comment.

But the event that really hammered her cockiness home was when she decided to surprise me. This was shortly after Thanksgiving, and I didn't see it coming. After school, Erin asked if I'd give Krista a ride home, and I agreed. They were whispering and giggling, and I guess she'd completed her efforts at making friends with her, but I thought they were just sharing a private joke.

Erin nudged Krista with her elbow, and she spoke up. "So, did you guys have a good Thanksgiving?"

"It wasn't bad. Good food." Mom cooked, even though it was Lawrence's house. That never seemed right to me, but that's how it went. At least we still got to take home leftovers... I'd be eating turkey salad sandwiches for the rest of the week. Otherwise it was pretty dull, at least the part we were there. We watched the parade, met Lawrence's father, and watched an old movie on TV (Planes, Trains, and Automobiles). "Bit boring."

"We had to go to my Mom's boyfriend house," Erin explained, in a way that made it clear that was a bad thing. "I'd have preferred to skip all that, even the food, and just hang out at home with Andrew."

My natural instinct was to change the subject, just in case Erin let something slip. "What about you?" I asked Krista. "You have a good one?"

"Yeah, I got to go home for Thanksgiving, and that was pretty cool. It's been a while since I've seen everybody." There was a touch of sadness in her voice, and face. "We weren't all together very long, just pretty much for the dinner. I'd have liked to stay longer, but..." she left it hanging, and then brightened a little. "But at least I did get to see my brother Bobby." The one her parents caught her fucking, I thought, automatically.

"Good to see him again?" Erin asked, casually. Too casually.

"Yeah. Didn't get any alone time, really, which is a shame..." It was then that Krista leaned forward and said, very knowingly, and right in my ear, "because Bobby and I, we have a special kinship."

I stared ahead, mind racing, but I guess my mouth must have hung open or something, because they started laughing and Erin said, "You should see the look on your face."

"So, it's true then?" Krista asked, beaming. "You and your sister are really... dating?"

"I don't know that we'd call it dating," Erin said softly. "I mean, we don't really go out much. But we're in love."

I was still just making noises. Like I was trying to answer but I didn't exactly know what I was going to say, so I'd get a word or even just a syllable out before changing and starting over. I was a little angry, too... this is not the kind of shit she should be springing on me, no matter how funny she found it!

And it was clear by her grin she found it hilarious. "Wow," Krista said.

"It's okay, Andrew," Erin said, noticing my discomfort and tempering her amusement a little. "She and her brother are just like us."

"Well, not exactly like you," Krista pointed out. "You get to live with your... boyfriend?" She said the word as though she wasn't sure that was the proper term for it. And really, it wasn't, since we were so much more than boyfriend and girlfriend and always would be.

"Kinship," Erin supplied. "Or just lover." She leaned forward and kissed me on the side of the face. "Relax, Andrew."

"I'm sorry," I said, finally finding my voice. "It's just... this comes a little out of nowhere."

"You're telling me," Krista said. "At first I thought Erin didn't know what she was hinting... then I remembered some of the rumors I'd heard."

"Rumors?" I croaked out. They'd haunt us forever.

"More like jokes," she clarified. "Nobody really believes it, but people joke about, like, what if it really was true."

"Just don't... tell anybody," I burst out. I could see in the rear view mirror Erin rolling her eyes at me, not annoyed, but more amused, like she thought it was a ridiculous concern, she had it handled. Which made me more annoyed at her for springing this on me. She really should have consulted me before blowing our secret. Especially since she'd told me before that she was going to make Krista confess first.

"I won't," Krista promised. "Except my brother, and he's in another city and won't tell anybody... and I won't even use your names if you want."

I relaxed a little. "Okay."

"Believe me, I know how nobody will understand."

"Maybe someday, they will," Erin said.

Krista shrugged, less convinced. "My parents don't."

I remembered then that I wasn't supposed to have known any of this. "They know?" I asked.

"They caught us. A few times." She blushed. "That's kind of why I'm out here. They don't trust us in the same house... they don't even trust us in the same town." Her face went gloomy.

"That's awful," Erin said, putting a sympathetic hand on Krista's shoulder. "Just remember they've had their whole life to be brainwashed by society that this kind of thing is wrong. It's not easy to shake that off. But you know in your heart it's right, right?" Krista nodded, smiled a little. "One day I think people will come to accept it. They'll still think it's weird, maybe, but they won't freak out. Maybe your parents will come along once they've had time to get used to it."

"They'd better," she said. "Because once I graduate they can't tell me to keep away from him."

Erin grinned. "Good. Think for yourself." Erin used that a lot, although I sometimes teased her that what she really meant was "agree with me."

I couldn't leave it at that though, I thought Krista actually should think through some of the consequences to other people. "You might not want to rub it in their faces, though," I suggested. "Everyone might be happier if they thought this was just a phase you got over." I saw Erin's sour look, knowing she wanted Krista and her brother to be out and proud, to help further her goal of increasing acceptance, but I couldn't keep silent. "I mean, I'm not saying you should stop seeing him, but you could go back into the closet, maybe, or just enough that they can lie to themselves about what's going on." Krista nodded thoughtfully. I couldn't help it, I was curious. "So, do you mind if I ask... how did you and your brother first start..."

"Oh, well... it's kind of silly... I caught him masturbating." I stifled an involuntary giggle. But not completely. "What?"

"Nothing, it's just... Erin used to read incest stories..."

"Kinship stories," Erin corrected.

"Whatever... and she'd read ones from people claiming they were real, but she always said ones that started like that were fake."

"Well, that's what happened," Krista protested earnestly. "We were the only ones home and I caught him masturbating and... well, I was horny too. And we weren't allowed Internet that week cause of my Mom, and so we sort of... helped each other out. It didn't start as love, we started like, teaching each other, experimenting with things we weren't sure of. But the more it continued, the more I realized that wasn't all I felt. It's like... he makes me feel like he needs me, like I'm the only person he can be himself with, and... I don't know." She blushed again. "How do you really describe love, you know? You just feel it." We both nodded. "What about you guys?"

I paled again. Yet another reason Erin shouldn't spring this on me. I had no idea what she'd already told Krista, so anything I said might contradict her. And I certainly couldn't tell the truth. Luckily, although she wasn't smart enough to avoid the problem, she was smart enough to recognize it and spoke up first. "I was feeling down because of something a guy said, and Andrew was comforting me and told me I was beautiful, and how I could get any guy I wanted... I don't know, I just wanted him, so I kissed him. I always thought he was somebody special. Anyway, he freaked out a little, but I managed to convince him that it was smart, it was logical for us to experiment with each other, we could do it safely, it wouldn't mean anything. But soon we realized that we did feel more, and we talked about it." The story had only a passing acquaintance with the truth, and even where it wasn't a lie, it left out a lot, but I nodded along. "Anyway, since then we've only had eyes for each other."

"But... you have a girlfriend, don't you?" Krista asked me.

"It's just for show," Erin said. "Madison knows, she just wants a show boyfriend."

"Don't tell anybody," I advised.

"Andrew," Erin teased. "I think we can rely on Krista to keep some secrets." I didn't say that if Krista could be relied on to keep a secret, hers would still be safe. I didn't argue at all, just went with it, and soon we were at Krista's place... or her grandparents place, anyway. She thanked me for the ride and told me it was really nice meeting me, even though we'd already met.

On the way home, I scowled a little and maybe made an exasperated comment about how she should have warned me if she was going to tell somebody about us, but she gave me a cute little pout and apologized, and so, again, although her running off and doing things without telling me bothered me, I didn't make an issue of it.

There was a time I did make an issue of Erin doing thing without telling me, and we got into a bit of a fight over it. That happened right after I fucked Madison.

***
Chapter Thirty-One:

Having sex with Madison wasn't my choice, or Erin's, and definitely not Madison's, and so I wasn't mad at Erin about any of that. It was just that I happened to learn about another of Erin's manipulations that same day.

The event itself was sparked a few days earlier, when we actually had something of a double date. That one actually was Madison's idea. She suggested that she could go out with me, as far as any of her friends were concerned, while Amber and Erin hung out officially as friends, and then we'd make it a group outing, and so, in a way, we'd both actually be dating the one we loved. She actually used the word loved, then corrected herself awkwardly and saying, "You know, the people we're with." She might be Queen Bitch, but she's got a big romantic side she keeps really buried. Erin was all for the date idea, and so was I... I knew it was something she craved more of, and I liked the idea of being in public with her, with an alibi.

Amber was the hold out. She wanted to, but there were scheduling issues. I think the thing she was scheduling was time with clients, some of the high rollers that Holly had, who were more interested in younger girls, particularly a girl who could bring along a middle school cheerleader uniform and still fit into it. Her idea of only doing high school guys hadn't lasted, although she was being a bit more selective and only choosing rich guys she thought were hot. Madison didn't know any of that, of course. She just knew it was hard as hell to schedule, and was relieved when Amber did finally shuffle a few things around to agree to it.

We went to see a movie... again, one that had been out for a while and didn't get great reviews to begin with, mainly so that the theatre would be mostly empty. Madison and I sat in the middle, with our real girlfriends right beside us. We didn't actually do anything, aside from a few stolen kisses on Madison's side, but it allowed both groups of couples to hold hands without risk of ruining our reputations... because nobody was near enough to see.

The date started out pretty pleasantly, but every once in a while, Madison and Amber started sniping at each other. Part of this was because Amber brought a little flask along and started sneaking drinks from it. That was a surprise to all of us, actually, but Madison seemed to take it as a personal affront, like Amber was suggesting she had to be drunk to spend time with her. Which didn't seem to be Amber's intention at all (she claimed it was just that the movie was so bad it would be better if she was a little buzzed), but Madison also suggested that Amber shouldn't be drinking at all, that she was too young. Amber took offense to that, and the movie got very tense for a while, but then, a few minutes later, Madison laid her head on Amber's shoulder and whispered something that might have been an apology.

It wouldn't have even been worthy of notice, except this sort of thing kept happening, and the fights lasting longer and the tension not cooling off as fast. Once it was because Amber spent some time talking to a guy from school... a freshman guy, not a john as far as I know, and we all pretended that I was with Madison and Erin and Amber were hanging out, but after Amber and the guy said goodbye, and we'd gotten to a more secure location, it was clear Madison was a little jealous and asking insecure questions about how well they knew each other while Amber rolled her eyes.

The last tense moment was towards the end of the day, where Madison wanted to go over to Amber's place and make out (and maybe more). Amber couldn't, because her parents would be home, which was okay, but then Madison started pestering for a commitment on when they could get together, and Amber started to get increasingly irritable, probably because she'd rearranged her schedule to arrange the date already. "God, Madison, stop crawling up my ass!" was one comment that set off hurt feelings. Amber tried to apologize, but Madison played the martyr and decided that it was time she went home. She took the bus, which might seem like a dramatic step, but she had to anyway... I wasn't allowed to drive her home with her dad still hating me.

I did give Amber a ride home, and Erin, who never much liked Madison to begin with, made a comment about being glad she was gone. Amber picked it up. "I know! I mean, I really like her but she's been driving me crazy lately. She's like super-clingy one minute, super-bitchy the next..."

"She's always super-bitchy," Erin pointed out.

"Not to me."

"Maybe it's her time of the month," I guessed, which got me a glare from both girls that made me decide to shut up and just play chauffer.

Amber answered anyway, albeit after a few seconds. "No, it's like, while Holly was running me around, I couldn't see her when I wanted, and now I can, and it's like she thinks I somehow owe her." Her mouth opened in a half-scowl as she shook her head. "I mean, when you think of all the extra blowjobs I went through just to keep that shit from her? If anything she owes me, she owes me loads."

"Literally," Erin said.

I thought the joke was a bit in poor taste, but Amber didn't seem to get it. "What?"

"Never mind."

She was undeterred by her confusion. "It's like, she's trying to take charge of the relationship, be the guy. If anything, I'm the guy, I always have been."

"So, assert your dominance."

"How?"

She grinned. "Well, when Andrew here wants to assert his dominance, he pushes me down and gives me a deep dicking whether I like it or not." I raised my eyebrows at that... it was an exaggeration at best... although I was never shy about initiating sex it was rarely as aggressive as that, and I never thought of it as asserting my dominance. And Erin could be aggressive herself... did that mean she was asserting hers? Was she the guy in the relationship? "Obviously I don't think you can use quite that approach with her."

"Yeah," Amber said, with a nervous laugh. At the time I thought it was because of her remembering Erin and I were brother and sister, but later I'd come to think that she was getting an idea. Which I guess makes what happened Erin's fault, although she didn't intend it.

It was only a day or two later that Amber sent us a message on the Blackmailer's hotline, saying that she wanted his help to "assess her dominance with Madison". Erin couldn't help but correct her, and then asked, "Don't you do that in the bedroom quite often?" Amber really liked playing bondage games with Madison, and spanking also played a big role. Madison never complained, either, even though she was almost always the submissive. Erin has this theory that people who publicly had dominant, controlling personalities loved to be dominated themselves in the bedroom. True or not, it seemed to be true of Madison.

"Yeah, but that's just in fun. I need to mess with her head a little to regain my power. And you owe me, I should have been in charge of Holly's prostitution ring, I had to do way more stuff for them than Winnie did."

Erin didn't want to start the argument again, or rather allow any argument at all, so just said, "That discussion is closed, but if you have a request for me, just tell me."

"I want to make Madison fuck a guy. Give her a taste of what it feels like to be with somebody you don't want to." Erin and I exchanged a look on our webcam view, and a few seconds later, I was in her room in person, so we could consult more quickly. Door open, but Mom was downstairs and on the phone.

"Forcing Madison into prostitution isn't something I want," Erin typed.

"It's only prostitution if we get paid. I was thinking if you forced Andrew to fuck her. He's fucked the rest of us, it's about time she got a turn."

Erin looked at me. "You want to?"

"Not really," I said, a half-lie. Virtually every straight guy, on at least some level, wants to with every attractive girl, even ones they don't like. And Madison was very attractive. But I didn't want everything that would inevitably come along with it.

"You sure? You'd be her first guy... maybe her only guy ever." That did have a strange appeal, enough to make my cock grow despite me trying to keep it down. Erin cupped it. "You want to."

"No," I insisted. "Okay, maybe part of me wants to, but I don't want any hurt feelings."

"I don't care," she said dismissively. "I mean, if you manage to turn her straight, you'll have to dump her, but I don't think it really works like that. But really, I don't mind. Consider it an early birthday present." That was coming up in December.

It actually wasn't her feelings I was most worried about. I knew by now she didn't mind me fucking... maybe even enjoyed me fucking other girls, as long as she felt in complete control of the situation. But... as strange as it sounded, I felt bad for Madison. Maybe we'd bonded more in our fake relationship than I'd thought. "You know I always like it better when they want to than when they're not into it. And I really don't want her forced into it."

"Hmmm..." Erin said. "The thing is, considering we owe her, I don't think we can say no to Amber. At least, not entirely, and not without a good reason. And we can make it less like an order." She held up a finger, like she had an idea, and started typing: "You know, the best way to establish your dominance would be if I didn't force her, but you did. If you make her feel like she has to choose between fucking a guy and you not liking her." She sent it before I could open my mouth to object. Amber's eyes brightened at that, and a smile that was... well, downright malicious formed. "She'll probably do, it, too, just to make Amber happy," Erin said to me, aloud. "If she thinks the guy can be trusted not to tell anybody."

"I'll still need you to tell Andrew to play along," she said. "And maybe Winnie could help. Not Erin, though, I don't want her there."

"Why not?"

"Cause she can get all bitchy sometimes when we touch her guy... and I might want to force Madison to watch me fucking him, too." Another malicious smile, like she just had an idea.

Erin looked back at me, waiting for me to say something. I was surprised, I thought her deliberate exclusion would turn her off the idea. "You're not going to be there," I pointed out. Historically, that always bothered her.

She shrugged. "Sure I am. Virtually. I'll be playing the Blackmailer. It actually works better. And I'll send you a couple frantic texts in the middle to make it look like I'm freaking out. It'll make it even less likely they ever put things together." I didn't answer, so she prompted. "What do you say? I can veto her using you, but the idea's already in her head... she'll probably get some guy to fuck Madison regardless. At least you can be gentle, right?"

"Fine," I said, but my cock was warming to the idea again. It had been a while since I'd fucked anybody new, and although I didn't need it to be happy, it certainly was a lot of fun.

***
Chapter Thirty-Two:

We chose a day where Amber's mom would be gone the whole day, and Madison could clear her schedule to be there. Winnie and I were already there when Madison arrived, just waiting in Amber's room, full of cheerleading trophies I normally didn't see, because they were above the computer desk and so not visible on the monitor. I sat at the computer desk, Winnie was lying on the bed, staring at her phone... she was wearing a blue dress with a black thong underneath... I could see it on a regular basis, if she was in a position for it. When she curled her legs up in a certain way, I could see not only most of her ass, but also the edges of her pussy lips gobbling the fabric.

I heard Amber let Madison in, and the two of them talking. "I'm glad we could do this. You're always so busy, and it's really bumming me out... I'm starting to think you're avoiding me deliberately." It was said like she was only joking, and she laughed at the end, but the nervousness in the laugh suggested she feared there might be truth in it anyway.

"Don't be silly, I like you. And we'll have lots of quality time together today." She opened the door to her bedroom where we waited. "We do have a little business to take care of first, though..."

"What?" Madison glared at me, more than Winnie, like I was intruding her special lesbian space. No, that would come later. "What are you doing here?"

"Our Blackmailer," Winnie said. "He wants us to perform for him a little."

"Yes," called the synthesized voice from the computer, the voice controlled by Erin. "But don't worry, I won't keep you up for long today."

I guess she had an instinct for where things were going, because Madison focused on me right away. "But what's he doing here? You said you weren't going to make me fuck a guy. You promised." I didn't remember us actually making it a promise, but she probably felt a vague assurance amounted to the same thing.

"I have no intention of making you do anything with Andrew," the voice said. Amber and Winnie shared a grin behind her back as she relaxed. No, the Blackmailer wouldn't do it...

"Fine," she said, sounding bored. "We'll give the old perv what he wants." She looked around and asked me, "What, your sister's not here?"

"He didn't want her today."

"What I want to see first is everybody naked. We began to strip, and then heard a "Stop." We froze, waiting for the voice to continue, after Erin typed it out. "Winnie, remove the thong, but leave the dress on. The rest of you can get naked."

When all of us, except Winnie, were naked, we waited for the instructions from the computer. "Madison, you can work on Amber's pussy. Get it good and wet." Madison nodded, and went right too it... it was pretty much what she came here to do anyway, and although it might have been a little uncomfortable for her to do it with an audience, she didn't mind. I watched from behind, getting a look at her pussy, the one I'd soon be inside for the first time. I'd seen it before on video, but this was different. She actually had hair, trimmed, but there, dark brown, like her hair color. I guess shaving was the mark of a slut... even if her father never personally looked, it might get around. The inner lips themselves hung out a little, just poking out of the outer labia, but it still looked comfortable and tight, not sloppy. After taking a look, I sat back and started stroking myself, slowly, just to keep busy and hard.

After a couple minutes of this solo lesbian act, Erin moved us to the next stage by announcing, "I think I'd like to see Andrew fucking Amber, next."

"All right," Amber said cheerily, squirming away from Madison's tongue and turning over. She now rested on her bed on her hands and knees, sticking her ass in the air and wiggling it, like she was trying to entice me. Well, I was still hard from the tongue-in-crack show, and didn't need much enticing. I got up close, rubbed my cock up her crack, and pushed in... Madison's tongue work had got her pretty wet.

Amber gave an audible grunt of pleasure as I sank in all the way. I gripped her by the waist and began thrusting in and out a few times... again, Amber moaned... it was a little excessive, until I realized... it was more for Madison's benefit than mine.

"I think I'll go wait outside," Madison said, a scowl of disgust on her face. She stood up and turned towards the door.

"Don't you dare," Amber snapped. "If I have to go through this, you'd better watch." Madison didn't move towards the door. At first she didn't move at all. Finally, she sat back down in the same seat I'd been waiting on. "Go on Andrew. Fuck me... fuck me hard."

I did. I pounded into her while she moaned to break Madison's heart. After forcing her to watch for a few minutes, Erin suggested that Madison start to eat out Winnie. Winnie lay beside Amber and pulled up her dress, just enough to reveal her pussy, while Madison licked, pretty much beside me. She still had a very good view of me fucking her girlfriend, if she just slid her eyes to the side. She didn't do that very much, but she didn't seem to be able to entirely stop herself, either.

She didn't have to be watching the whole time, either, to know it was happening. Because she didn't have full Madison's visual attention, Amber stepped up her vocalizations. She started saying things like, "Oh, god, you're so good... harder... harder..."

Even though I knew it wasn't my efforts inspiring this, my body responded anyway. After a few short minutes of her pussy squeezing down on me while my balls slapped up against her clit, I stiffened and felt that buzzing rush, followed by a climax of pleasure as all my muscles tensed and I filled Amber with my cum. I emptied myself entirely into her, without guilt, knowing she was on the pill, and she started moaning even more loudly than ever... it sounded like an orgasm, but I think, perhaps, that it was merely a fake.

When I had nothing left, we rested, both of us catching our breath, and then I finally pulled out. "Wow, that was great, Andrew... I can't remember the last time I came so hard. Thanks."

"Yeah, no problem." I moved to the corner of the room, not sure what to do and started inspecting some of her trophies again. It was an excuse to keep my back to them... I never quite knew what to do when my penis shrank, at least around somebody other than Erin, who I trusted completely. It felt a little humiliating for them to watch it after it had fallen. But soon I discovered they weren't paying attention to me at all.

"Wow, he sure made a mess inside of me." Amber rolled on to her back, and squeezed the lips of her pussy until some of my seed came out, like a little white drool coming out of her slit. She grinned at Winnie. "Mind if I borrow Madison's tongue to clean me up?"

"No, go right ahead," Winnie said sweetly, and then reached forward to grab Madison by the hair and roughly direct her gaze. She pointed it to Amber's snatch. "Her now."

I could tell Madison didn't like what she was being asked to do, but she didn't fight it. She put her mouth down to Amber's snatch and began running her tongue up and down, making disgusted faces as she did. I thought she glared at me once, like it was my fault somehow that she was being forced to do this. "Good job," Amber said. "Lick up that cum. Get it all. Wouldn't want me to get pregnant, would you?"

"I hate this," she came off to say.

"I know, I don't like the taste either. But get it all and I'll give you a little reward."

"Here, I'll start on the reward right now..." Winnie said. She got off the bed and crawled behind Maddy. First she put her hand to Madison's pussy, wiggling her fingers, although from where I was watching it looked a little more like she was playing with her ass. "Up," she said, and Madison's pulled herself up from a kneeling position to something closer to standing bent over, giving easier access to her pussy. That was when Winnie began to lick her, a lesbian chain of tongue-in-slits.

Amber had another orgasm, quieter but I think this one was real, and then she looked over to me. I was hard again... it was hard not to be, watching that. Our eyes met, and I knew she was ready for what was about to come next. "Okay, Maddy. Andrew's hard again. And this time it's your turn to take care of him."

"But the Blackmailer said he's not going to..."

"He's not asking," she said. "I am. You're going to let Andrew fuck you, because I'm telling you to."

Madison said, firmly but with a little hesitation, "No."

"No? I thought you cared about me."

"I do, but..."

"I had to do it," Amber pointed out. "You think you're better than me?"

"No, but..." Madison looked around the room frantically, as though seeking help from someone. "I'm gay. You're not, not fully, so it's different."

"Yeah, but I've got no problem with everybody thinking we're dykes. I'd do that for you if you came out of the closet. But you won't even do this for me. And how do I even know you're really gay when you've never actually had the alternative? Maybe this is all just a game to you so you can have fun and still be technically a virgin when you hit eighteen and finally run off with a guy and get married."

"You know I wouldn't do that, right?"

"No I don't. Maybe I shouldn't even bother seeing you anymore, if it's all about what you want all the time. I mean, you say you care about me but you've never done anything to prove it. Not really."

Madison had a frown on her face, but she was getting no sympathy from Amber, Winnie either. I felt bad for her but I don't know if it showed on my face... I like to think it did. Finally, she said, "Okay, fine..."

I'd told myself that I wouldn't go through with it if Madison said no. The corollary to that was that if she consented, I would fuck her, even knowing she didn't really want it. Well, it wasn't very eager, but it was consent. I guess the preacher was right to be worried about me... I really was going to deflower his daughter.

***
Chapter Thirty-Three:

Madison climbed up on the bed and put her ass in the air, knees tucked in to her belly, laying her head against the mattress, meekly, submissively. But not submissively enough, apparently. "No," Amber said. "You have to do it face to face. Missionary."

"Your father would like that," Winnie piped up with, sounding proud of herself.

She repositioned herself without much complain, and I got closer, between her spread legs... which were hanging limply off the bed. "You don't have to go through with this," I said, to give her one last chance.

"Yes she does," Winnie and Amber said in unison. Amber continued with, "At least, if she wants me and her to be together after today."

"Just get it over with," Madison told me. Her eyes were focused on my dick, now dangling right over her mound. I gave her the option, so what more could I do? It's not like it was rape or anything, she just wasn't that into it.

"Wait," Winnie said, and went into her bag where she pulled out a small bottle of lube, now one of the things she carried regularly, and squirted it on her hands, and then gave a quick rub of Madison's pussy and my dick. "This'll help."

I pulled back just enough, and then moved forwards again, slipped the head in between her lips, and she twitched a little, like her instinct was to turn away, but she fought it. I gave her one last second to back out, and then pushed all the way in. The lube made it smooth and silky. She was tight, but although she was technically a virgin (as far as I knew, anyway), there was no hymen to contend with... fingers and toys had removed that long ago.

Amber squeezed Maddy's breast gently. "See? He's in, that wasn't so bad, was it?" She looked up at me. "Go on, fuck her." So I did, I pushed in and out. Madison closed her eyes and turned her head away, and mostly, just lay there a little limply, like she was trying to participate as little as possible.

This was not arousing for me at all... even worse than Winnie's sexface, which looked like she was suffering even when she was enjoying it. It didn't make me go soft, but it didn't inspire me, either. Yet I continued, trying to build up a rhythm, perhaps doing just what Madison was doing... trying to treat it as a mechanical chore.

After a couple of minutes of patient, slow-and-steady thrusting, Amber scowled and grew impatient. "Come on Madison, you're not even trying." She grabbed her by the chin and directed her to look at me. "Open your eyes and watch." Madison did open her eyes, but there was a deadness to them.

"Oh, cheer up," Winnie said. "You never know, maybe this could be the answer to all your problems. Maybe he'll fuck the gay away."

It was meant as a joke, but Amber grinned and picked it up. "Yeah. Let him fuck the gay away."

Somehow, that became a chant, like a cheer. "Fuck the gay away," was repeated, over and over again, and I found myself thrusting in time to it, in particular, aiming to hit my in-strokes on the word 'gay'. The last time I looked at her, Madison had tears running down her face, and so I stopped that so I could finish... I watched Amber's face instead. The next time I looked back at the girl I was fucking, Maddy had closed her own eyes again and kept them closed, and now Amber made no effort to force her to look again.

Maybe that's because Maddy's body was responding. Her own breathing was becoming more regular, like she was relaxing, and I thought I could feel her getting wet... the lube certainly didn't need refreshing, at any rate, and I knew Madison tended to get very wet when she was aroused by girl-on-girl action.

Amber did participate in other ways, sometimes taking a stiff nipple into her mouth and sucking on it gently, at other times kissing her cheek. At first, Winnie kept up the chant when Amber broke it off, and vice versa, although Winnie only stopped to check my phone, which had gone off as Erin sent another text asking what was going on, but then, for a while, the chant just died off suddenly. Amber kept a hand over Madison's mound, two of her fingers over her lips, between which my cock was still pounding, and, it seemed she was rubbing Madison's clit with part of the palm of her hand.

I lasted longer than I should have, and so did the whole event, I guess Madison's lack of enthusiasm and the fact that I'd just done Amber kept me from boiling over, and, although it took longer than it normally would for me to cum, Madison started making sounds when I pushed myself into her, sounds that sounded like she might be starting to enjoy it. Like moans, but ones she was deliberately trying to choke off.

The chant, the 'Fuck the gay away', that had gone silent a few minutes before, began again in earnest, whispered first by Amber, but quickly joined by Winnie, and rising in intensity and tempo. Madison's pussy began to grip me more than it ever had... outright clenching, now, whereas before it was just a tight fit that occasionally gently squeezed. She seemed to make a face like an extended wince, but as her whole body tensed up, I guess she was having an orgasm.

You can imagine that ego-boost there... I'd made a lesbian cum... I thrust in and out of her even faster as she rode it out... Erin's told me she's liked that, like it makes it more intense, and I guess the renewed effort combined with the thrill of victory started to make my shaft tingle with anticipation of ejaculation.

It was then that it occurred to me, for the first time, that Madison might not be on any kind of birth control. She was from a heavily religious family, and had taken a chastity pledge... surely she wouldn't want to risk her parents finding any pills, if she had them at all... she certainly wouldn't expect to need them. If I came inside her, there was a real risk of getting her pregnant.

With a gasp and a groan, I pulled out at the last second, thrusting my dick over Amber's hand and spilling out a dribble of milky-white cream. At least, I hoped I'd made it at the last second. When I cum two times rapid succession, the borders of the second one tend to blur a little, sometimes I start ejaculating a little before I feel the climactic orgasm. I didn't think that happened this time, but I'd spend some time fretting over the possibility in the middle of the night over the next few weeks.

Nobody else seemed to bring it up, even as a possibility. "See, there you go," Amber said after I'd finished spewing. "That wasn't so bad, was it?"

"I only did it for you," Madison said, weakly, and our eyes met, briefly, but just for a second before she slid away in shame, and I did the same, in the other direction.

I felt bad and wanted to get away from her, so I turned and got my boxers on, while Amber said, "I know, and I'm so proud of you."

"Because I love you," Madison continued. I think it might have been the first time she said it directly to her. In the past, she'd said she'd loved what they were doing, and when she was arranging our double date she'd accidentally let it slip to me, but this time she said it with purpose, to Amber.

"Uh-huh," Amber said. "That's great... and, now, we've got, like, 3 hours before my Mom gets home. I don't think our blackmailer needs us anymore? I bet he's blown his wad long ago."

"Yes, you are dismissed," came the voice from the computer. "Those of you that wish to be."

"I'd better be getting home then," I said. I pulled on my jeans. Winnie asked if she could catch a ride, and I nodded. She wanted to use the washroom first, and Amber went to wash her hand, leaving me and Madison alone for a few seconds.

She was still naked, but pulled her shirt over her and sat up, which made me instinctively want to turn away. "Look, I'm sorry about... all this." She just shrugged. "So..."

"I'm still gay," she said defiantly, like she was daring me to challenge it. "Just because I had an orgasm doesn't mean anything. I just pretended it was a girl using one of those fake dongs."

"Okay," I said.

"You can't control what your body does, you'd probably cum too if a guy was giving you a blowjob." It was as though she thought I was disagreeing. I wasn't so sure about whether I'd get off to a guy's mouth, but wasn't inclined to argue right to her face. "Your sexuality's about who you want to be with, that's all. I'm not into you like that at all."

"Okay," I repeated. "I'm not into you either." That was the truth. "I'm just asking if you're okay."

She shrugged. "I broke my chastity pledge."

That seemed an odd way to answer the question. "Didn't you kind of break that before?"

"I didn't think it counted unless it was with a guy. Do you think He did this deliberately? Because He knew I was only promising what I didn't think I was going to give anyway? So He put me in this situation where I'd fail?"

It was even more uncomfortable than anything else we'd done... I'd rarely discussed actual religion with Madison... my own feelings were pretty vague and confused. "I don't know. But they say God forgives, right? I don't think he's going to hold this against you if you're really sorry." I could hear Amber coming back. I slipped my shirt on. "I mean, if you broke a promise to me, I'd forgive you, and I'm... just some guy."

"Who broke a promise to who?" Amber asked as she came back in. I shrugged, willing to let Madison explain, and she shrugged, maybe thinking the same, but in the end neither of us said anything, and soon Winnie was back too.

I made that excuse to leave, grabbed my phone, and then said I'd wait for Winnie in the car. She didn't take long, thankfully. I was pretty ready to put the whole day behind me. As fun as it was in the moment, I felt a little dirty now.

I guess Winnie must have sensed I was in something of a mood on the ride home. "That was kind of fun," she said, to break the silence. I just shrugged. "I just hope it'll stop Amber from sulking because I got what she wanted. She's been kind of a bitch lately." She grinned. "I guess she still kind of is, but better on Madison than on me, right?"

"I think we kind of freaked Madison out," I said. It was still bothering me. It was the kind of thing I'd done too casually a few years ago, making people my playthings, but now weighed heavier and heavier on me. I was trying to put it behind me... behind me and Erin, although that seemed less and less likely now that we not only had our little Blackmail Club, but a prostitution ring as well.

"Obviously not too much... I mean, you got her to cum, right?" I didn't think that meant much... after all, I'd gotten lots of girls to cum through blackmail, and they were still pretty freaked out. She punched my arm playfully. "You got a lesbian to cum, that's like... really saying something. And you got to fuck two girls in one day, that's not bad," she joked.

I grinned a little. Okay, I wasn't immune to cheering up. "Three." I'd fucked Erin earlier that day.

"Oh, right," Winnie said. She looked at me sidelong. "Hey, wanna make it four? I was mostly watching, I didn't get a chance to get off. We don't have to tell Erin, or the Blackmailer... we can just pull off somewhere private."

I made my face go stony, mostly so I wouldn't give her the impression that I was even tempted. "No," I said firmly. "When the Blackmailer makes us do something that's one thing... for everything else, I'm loyal to Erin."

"Fine," she said with an annoyed grimace. "You're no fun at all sometimes. All guys get a little on the side. Well, almost all guys." She looked up suddenly. "Oh, that reminds me... before I forget, here..." She rooted around in her purse and seconds later, handed me a USB stick. "I thought Erin might still want the footage. I was looking it over and I thought, even though I struck out, maybe with some creative editing she could still make it work."

"Make what work?"

"Blackmailing your mom's boyfriend. I mean I was thinking, you don't actually have to have evidence, you just have to make it look good. If you take the scenes of me asking, and cut it together with one of the scenes of the blowjobs I taped for the Blackmailer, you could threaten him just as well." She shook her head. "I can't believe he didn't bite, though. I guess he must be one of those freaks who only likes older women." She looked quickly, guardedly to me and added, "No offense. I mean, I'm sure your Mom would be considered a total MILF."

"Uh-huh," I said, but I wasn't offended, or even really paying much attention to what she was saying. I was still focusing on the USB stick and the annoying fact that, once again, Erin had gone behind my back with one of her schemes. Hell, maybe she even asked Winnie to try and tempt me into cheating behind her back. On the ride home, after dropping Winnie off, the annoyance festered into actual anger. It was like a pattern with Erin, and a pattern with me to just let it slide. And maybe it was my own guilt in what had just happened with Madison that this time I took it harder and decided I couldn't do that anymore. I had to say something.

***
Chapter Thirty-Four:

Erin had her back to me when I entered her room. She glanced over briefly, said "Hi," and then looked back to the screen. She didn't bring up fucking Madison, but then she'd seen the whole thing.

"Is there something you want to tell me?" I asked.

She looked over at me. I held up the USB key. "What's that?" she asked.

"Winnie gave it to me. You tell me."

"Oh... I asked her to do me a favor." Like it was nothing.

"You got her to play... spyslut for you again."

"So what?"

"On Lawrence." I had intended not to give up any information on what I already knew, just in case she might let something slip that I didn't yet know, but I was angry. She could tell, she was cringing, very slightly.

"Yeah," she said. Now she sounded a little nervous, like she'd caught on to how mad I was.

"You didn't tell me."

"I was going to, after," she said, softly, which just made me angrier.

"You can't just do this. Run off half-cocked and manipulate people's lives and not telling me anything. This is Mom we're talking about. And you just decide you're going to screw with her life?"

I expected her to cringe a little, and in fact, that had worried me more than anything else, that to confront her I'd be hurting her feelings a little, but instead, she came back defensively, justifying herself. "Oh, come on, I'm not doing that much... we both know their relationship has to end... better sooner than later. And besides, if Winnie had succeeded in seducing him, he certainly wasn't worthy of any more time with her. I don't see what the big deal is... it's not like you like having Lawrence around any more than me."

"That's not the point. You keep doing this... you keep going out on a limb and doing things you know I wouldn't want."

She looked at me shrewdly. "Andrew, I love you... but you're not Mom, or Dad. You can't tell me what to do. I have a mind of my own, and sometimes... sometimes you're just wrong and I'm right. When I'm unsure about something, I always consult you. But sometimes I know I'm right, and I know you won't approve, so I do what needs to be done and bring you along afterwards."

That was an incredibly chilling assessment. "So, what, I have to worry about you lying to me for my own good? I can't trust you at all?"

Now she looked stricken, hurt, genuinely. "I never lie to you, Andrew. But I'm not just... an appendage of yours, either. So yeah, sometimes I don't tell you things if you don't ask about them and they'll only worry you and they don't directly involve you. This wasn't about manipulating anybody, this was about protecting Mom. And I really was going to tell you after I had the evidence."

"But you didn't get any evidence," I pointed out.

"Maybe he doesn't like Asian girls," she said. "I knew I should have gone with Amber." She said it like it was all just some kind of experiment to her, and she was wondering if changing the variables would lead to a different result, and no longer seemed contrite.

It was infuriating. "You can't keep doing this," I said. "I never wanted us to have secrets between us."

The pained look returned. "You think I do? But I don't want to fight with you, either... it hurts... so what am I supposed to do when I know I'm right and I know you're never going to agree? Just bow down to your wishes like I'm just another one of our blackmailed girls?" That hurt me, I never wanted to think of herself as having no choices again. "Or tell you what I'm planning, start a fight and have you think I'm a monster for not believing the same as you and getting so conflicted I maybe screw things up?" She took a breath. "Telling you after is the logical choice. I do what needs to be done with a clear head, you get mad for a little while, and make me feel like dying, but at least I know sometimes I can turn you around before that happens, because I've gotten results."

"Life's not about logic, Erin. We're supposed to be a partnership. I want honesty. That's not just not lying. We agreed before, no secrets."

"Maybe no secrets wasn't realistic," she said. "No couple has that. But you have to know I'd never do anything to hurt you. And you know as well as I do that sometimes you turn a blind eye deliberately."

"What?"

"Sometimes you just don't want to know what I'm doing. I don't hide it, but you don't look. Like you're afraid of what you might find if you do. I hate that you're afraid of me." Tears were starting to well up.

"I'm not afraid of you..." But I was, a little. And what she said about turning a blind eye had some truth to it too. I fell back on the old standard, the truth, but the one I hoped would make her feel better... "I love you."

"I love you too. But you can love somebody and still be afraid of them. So, seriously, what do you want? Do you want me to check with you for every little thing I do? Because I thought trust was supposed to be important in a relationship, too. But I guess you said it yourself, you can't trust me."

I had, or at least asked if I could. "I didn't mean it like that."

"Well, what did you mean?" she snapped, wiping a tear from her eye. "Because I may be a genius but I don't always understand when you don't mean what you say."

I took a breath to try and figure out a way around this. "It's just... you said you didn't like feeling like you're just an appendage of me... and I get that, but... how do you think I feel? Every time you run off and do something, like my opinion doesn't matter, like you're smarter than me anyway so you might as well call all the shots. Well, you are smarter than me...." I admitted. At least, in many ways. Flattery always helped. "But that doesn't make me useless. And I never go off and do anything that I think I need to keep secret from you. So who's really the appendage here?"

That stopped her. Tears still dripped down her face, but they seemed to have stopped flowing, like a sudden realization that she wasn't the injured one here flipped a switch and turned them off. "I never thought of it like that," she said, with a sniffle.

"I do trust you Erin, I trust that you mean well... but sometimes you miss things. Even when you think you're right. Maybe I have been turning a blind eye too much, but it's hard to keep up with everything you do. That's why I need you to tell me... and if we disagree on something... well, I don't expect you to always do as I say, but I do expect you to at least listen to me... the real me, not just what you decided in advance I'm going to say."

"Okay," she said. "You're right. I'm sorry." We stood there, watching each other. "So, is the fight over now?" she asked hopefully. "Because I really could use your arms around me..."

I smiled, a little tentatively, but came to embrace her, and we rocked together, and said our "I love yous." We moved to her bed, but not for makeup sex... I was still a little tired and although I could have gotten it up, I wasn't really as into it as I otherwise would be. Instead, we made out a little tenderly. Between kisses, Erin said, "I am sorry," again, like she was afraid I didn't believe it the first time.

"It's okay. Just promise you'll never make decisions like that without consulting me again."

She stiffened a little. "I can't promise that."

Uh-oh. "What?" She JUST said...

"I can't see the future, Andrew. I don't want to keep things from you, but there might be times I have to. What I said before, about it sometimes being the best thing to do to just tell you after.... that's still true..."

I felt my blood rising again. "Then why even apologize?"

"Because I really was wrong. I should have talked to you about getting Winnie to set up Lawrence. And I really am going to try really hard to tell you more, even when I know it'll lead to a fight. I just can't promise I'm never going to go behind your back again. Even if, right now, I really don't think I'm going to. Never's a long time." We were silent for some time. "So I guess you can't trust me. But I hope you can at least trust my intentions."

It should have pissed me off even more... and in some ways it did. But I was tired of being angry at her, it hurt me just as much as it did her... and I had to respect that she had the courage to tell me, when it would have been easier to just say she wasn't ever going to hide stuff again. That counted for something. So I stroked her hair and said, "I do, but...if you do go behind my back... you'd better have a really, really good reason."

"Fair enough."

Then I said one of those things, those things I knew was stupid the moment it was leaving my mouth, that it would come back to haunt me, but somehow my need to end the tension between us made me say it anyway. "Hey, what's life without a few surprises?"

***
Epilogue:

Despite our little fight, things quickly returned to normal, or mostly normal. Erin didn't suddenly give me a flood of new plans, but I genuinely thought it was because she just didn't have anything secret going on. Life seemed to have settled down for us again into one of those more comfortable phases, where we were almost like everybody else.

Things weren't perfect, by any means.. my group of friends was still fractured... lunch hours were usually spent either alone with Kirk, like old times, or with Tony and Jay and, occasionally, Cassie and Erin. Tony and Cassie bonded a little over both hating Kirk, and I guess they'd gotten used to hanging around each other. Not that they started dating or anything, although at times I thought maybe Cassie was hoping to. Madison and I cooled off a little, but still occasionally played fake-secret-boyfriend-and-girlfriend. We never discussed having sex or her feelings about it again. I think she was happy to pretend it had just never happened.

Winnie ran her little prostitution ring, and, I have to admit, I turned a blind eye to much of that, too. Erin kept an eye on it for me... she wouldn't run it but she wanted to make sure it wasn't getting out of hand. I only looked into the proceedings when I wanted something to turn me on. One of the changes Winnie did make was subtly start recording encounters with customers. She felt right at home in her position, especially now that Holly was looking to be suspended or expelled for not showing up to school enough. That never seemed to make much sense to me, but it did happen, and we suspected it was due any time... she hadn't been to school for a couple days in a row....

Erin was pretty happy with the whole thing, and her smugness, although it had temporarily faded after our fight, returned. She spied on people through the school computers, and thought she'd identified another kinship, this one a gay one, two brothers. I didn't believe it, considering the two guys were pretty straight seeming, but Erin was sure, and reminded me of all the times I didn't believe her and she was right.

She thought she'd pegged so much correctly, and she had, but we'd both made one big mistake, and we found that out shortly before Christmas break.

The whole school found out, in fact, at roughly the same time, as a flurry of text messages and Facebook updates were sent when the news finally broke, but only Erin and I, and maybe Winnie and Amber and a few of her other girls, realized the true significance.

It was in the morning before class when we heard about it. The news had already partly spread when we arrived and people were buzzing in conversation, theories... we could sense that something had happened, but had no idea what until Erin's own phone buzzed. "Oh my god," she said upon reading it. "Holly's dead."

It turned out that was pretty much the exact text that was sent to her (except it was actually "OMG, Holly's dead!") We stared at each other as we walked through the main hall, asking with our eyes the unspoken question... was this our fault? And we both had the same sinking feeling that, somehow, it was.

Jay met us first, shaking his head. "You hear about that girl?" he asked. Looked to Erin, "Holly? You know her? She's in your year."

Erin nodded soberly, swallowed nervously, and asked, "How did she die?" Her voice cracked as she added, "Suicide?"

"No, man, it's fucked up. Both she and her Dad, murdered. Bullet in the head... cops think her dad was mixed up in drugs or organized crime or something." Was that true, or just the fashionable rumor going around? There was no way to know... not yet, anyway.

In the first period, my teacher soberly told us the truth... yes, she had died, yes, she and her father were murdered. He didn't address the drugs rumor, but the police hadn't caught whoever did it. The actual murder had happened a few days ago, but the bodies were only discovered the previous evening.

At lunch, I saw Winnie and Amber who looked freaked out but all we could do is exchange what information everyone already had. "Do you think it was connected to what me and Winnie did to her?" Amber asked, but I couldn't give them an answer... luckily, I didn't have to, Madison came by to 'comfort' Amber. She knew Amber and Holly 'hung out' sometimes, and assumed Amber would be taking it hard to have lost a friend.

Most reactions were subdued, shocked silence, or the numbness of people who are surprised but didn't really know the girl that well. There were probably quite a few people who knew exactly what she was into and wondered if it would somehow come back on them, but they kept poker faces. And there were a lot of tears, some real... Holly made a point of being nice to lots of people. A lot probably fake, people who didn't really know her and were just trying to fit in or get attention for how broken up they were. My history teacher was one of the criers, but he seemed genuine, even though, as far as I knew, he'd never taught Holly. I never would have figured it, big guy like him, so broken up he couldn't teach.

Cassie was also one of the criers. They looked real as hell, but I could never bring myself to ask... I couldn't anyway, I guess, because I wasn't supposed to know her history, but I was reluctant to even ask Erin. Maybe, even after all Holly put her through, she still had some memory of their friendship. Maybe she was crying for relief. Or maybe she was putting on a show like so many others. Or maybe it was a combination of all of those. People are complicated. It's possible even Cassie didn't know why she was crying. I'd never even formally met her, in person, and sometimes it felt like I'd personally lost someone I cared about, for some reason.

As the day went on, police came to visit the school... not to talk to us, but to try and turn on the GPS of Holly's school computer. Apparently it, along with all the other computers in the house, were stolen.

Erin told me this bit of information in what was supposed to be last period. The school staff decided to cut the day short, although there was a gathering in the cafeteria for people who wanted to talk about their feelings about the situation. Instead, Erin and I met in a stairwell and she told me about the computers, and the fact that the GPS trick didn't work. "You know what this means?"

"We don't know what it means," I tried to say. "It doesn't necessarily mean anything."

"What else COULD it mean?" she prompted, hoping I had an answer. "Why else would they take the computers? Even Holly's?" I didn't say anything, so she said it for me. "It means we were wrong. I was wrong. Holly and her dad did have partners, maybe even cops." Erin's eyes widened and she asked, "Andrew... what if they're not done? You know who they'll be after next, right?"

Not us, thankfully, at least not right away, but it was a risk, if they had the Holly's computer, that they could eventually find us. The immediate risk wasn't to us, though. "Winnie and Amber," I said. Mostly Winnie, since she was in charge, but our actions put both of them in danger. I could see Erin panicking... literally see it, her eyes were flicking back and forth like she was afraid somebody would jump out at any time. I put my hands on her shoulders to steady her. "We don't know yet. It might be a coincidence," I repeated, but it was more of a hope, a prayer, than an actual informed opinion.

"What if it's not?"

"I don't know."

"We can protect them, right?" Erin asked, doing the same sort of wishful thinking I was. How do you protect them from men with guns? Go to the police? What if some of them were the police? I guess maybe after a few years of everything going far better than anybody had a right to ask, Karma had decided it was about time we ran into some real rivals, ones we couldn't win against easily.

I clung stubbornly to my belief that this was all just a terrible coincidence. That seemed safer, a less insane hope than that we'd be able to take care of this mess. And if I was wrong? "We'll do our best."

The End (for now)

****

The preceeding story was fantasy and I do not recommend or endorse any of the acts described within. Quite the opposite, really.

Coming eventually:

My Private Camwhore V: The Cold War

Erin and Andrew have a new enemy... but he's not coming at them directly. He knows there's a computer-savvy blackmailer out there, and is planning his moves carefully. They know he's out there, but not who he is or who he's got on his side. One thing they are aware of is that he won't hesitate to use murder to accomplish his goals. A slow game of spy vs. spy commences over the latter half of Andrew's senior year, with their blackmailed prostitutes used both as pawns and playing field. The two siblings might think they're safe, but conflict could boil over at any moment. And if there's one thing Andrew's learning in History class, it's that if a Cold War turns hot, one frighteningly realistic outcome can be Mutually Assured Destruction.
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