Page 40 of Scarlett and the Kiss Thief

“Clearly you don’t or you wouldn’t be so pissed that I showed up.”

“I’m pissed because I don’t want your one week of being grounded to turn into two weeks.”

I just stared at him. “Why does that matter?”

“Scarlett, you’ll miss my first game of the season if you’re grounded next week too.”

I swear my heart stopped beating as I stared up at him.

The corner of his mouth ticked up.

I couldn’t help but match his smile. “Really? That’s why you didn’t want me to come tonight? So I wouldn’t be grounded for longer and miss your game?”

“I’m kind of used to you cheering for me super loudly.”

God, I’d been so mad at him. But that…actually made sense. And it was nice that he wanted me there. Really nice. I was Axel’s #1 fan. I always had been. “I don’t cheer that loudly, Axel.”

He laughed. “You really do.”

I smiled up at him. And just like that…we felt like us again. But that was one of the problems. We only ever felt like us when we were alone. If anyone else was in the room with us, he acted differently. More distant. Dismissive. And it had been a really long time since we’d been alone.

He’d stopped coming over to my place as much. We used to sit on my bed doing homework together most nights. And by that, I mean eating snacks and laughing. God, he always used to make me laugh instead of cry. And I couldn’t remember the last time we’d done that. Just us. I was pretty sure it was before high school. Before he had practice after school every day.

“I would never miss your first game,” I said.

“So you’ll let me take you home?”

Honestly, him taking me home didn’t sound that bad. It would just be the two of us… But was that actually whathewanted? Because I’d waited a million years for him to ask me out. As far as I was concerned, this was the perfect opportunity. But he wasn’t asking. It still kind of just seemed like he wanted me out of the picture.

“I can do both,” I said. “Seriously, my dad will never know I was gone tonight.”

“Scarlett…”

“And even if I do get grounded again, I can sneak out. RJ cut a hole in the floor of one of the guest bedrooms. I can pretty much come and go whenever I want to now.”

Axel laughed, but stopped when he realized I wasn’t laughing too. “Wait, you’re serious?”

“Yeah. And it’s not just for sneaking out. I mean…you could sneak in if you wanted to.” I was giving him the perfect opportunity here. I was practically begging him to agree to sneak into my house to see me. “So you can see me even though I’m grounded for another few days.”

He locked eyes with me.

I wanted him to sneak into my house when everyone else was asleep. I wanted him to sneak into my bed. To steal my first kiss. To let me fall asleep in his arms. I wanted all of it with him.

His phone buzzed in his pocket and we broke eye contact. He looked down but shoved the phone back into his pocket, even though it was still buzzing.

“Who is it?” I asked.

“No one,” he said.

Well…it was obviously someone. Probably someone he didn’t want me to know about.Gigi.I pressed my lips together. Two people could play thesomeonegame. “I think I’m going to kiss someone tonight,” I said.

Axel raised his eyebrows. “Who?”

I would have responded “no one” like he just had when I asked him who was calling. But Jacob wasn’t no one. I also wasn’t about to tell him that I was planning on kissing Jacob though. It was really none of his business. “Just…someone. Sophie’s calling it Operation First Kiss.”

“She would call it that.”

That’s all he had to say? “Mhm. By the end of the night I’m going to have had my first kiss. This dress was made for a first kiss I think.”

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