I laughed. “Okay then.” I’d been joking. You couldn’t watch cooking shows with either of them. Or RJ. They all ended up dry heaving from the combinations. They had very unadventurous palates.

I grabbed the remote to turn on something less offensive.

And then I heard a giggling sound from behind us.

“Did anyone else hear that?” I asked.

“Hear what?” Sophie asked.

“I swear I heard...” I shook my head. “Never mind.” I hit the button to turn on the TV and the remote exploded in my hand, somehow shooting pudding straight into my face.

The giggling sound turned into full laughter as Uncle Rob walked around the couch.

“Uncle Rob!”

That just made him laugh harder.

I wiped the pudding out of my eyes.

“Told you that you should have borrowed a change of clothes,” Sophie said. “I knew a pudding prank was afoot.”

Yeah. I wiped the rest of the pudding out of my eyes. But I was smiling. I’d really missed coming over here.

It was easy to not be worried about kiss thieves and kissing booths when you were laughing. But as the night went on, it was a little harder not to be worried about tomorrow. The brief moments I’d had alone with Axel recently hadn’t been great. And I didn’t know what a whole night with him was going to bring.

And for some reason, when I got home and climbed into bed, I rewound the footage again. This time I watched as Axel pulled off his shirt.

I swallowed hard.

I’d been trying so hard to get him out of my system. But it was hard when he’d been in it my whole life. I stared at his six-pack. Was it his abs I’d tried to molest in that snake infested closet? Was that possible?

It didn’t seem like it. I tried to picture today’s kiss. But I couldn’t picture anything because it had been dark. And my stupid nose had only picked up the smell of cleaning supplies. Not expensive cologne or the smell of freshly cut grass.

I clicked out of the footage and pulled up the last text from my kiss thief. I wanted to believe it was Jacob. I needed it to be Jacob. I wanted to move on so my heart would stop hurting so much. I texted him back: “I wish you’d saved all your firsts for me too.”

Chapter 25 – Knight in Shining Armor

Thursday

The kiss thief hadn’t texted me back last night or today. I wanted to think of something clever or funny to text him. Or somehow trick him into admitting he was Jacob.