I laughed. Yeah, Uncle Matt had taught us how to play, sans the beer, when we were little. But there had been a big time gap between then and now. And I’d somehow gotten bad at it along the way. Where Jacob had gotten better. I’d played once freshman year and vowed to never embarrass myself again.

“Come on,” Jacob said. “It’ll be fun.”

It was really sweet of him to offer to be my partner. But... “I’ll make you lose. How about I just watch?”

It looked like he wanted to protest.

“Really, it’ll be fun,” I added.

“If you insist.” Jacob put his hand out for me.

It felt like the sea parted as we made our way through the crowd toward the people playing. Sophie always insisted that we were popular. And I always insisted that I was only popular by association. But I felt like Empire High royalty tonight with Jacob’s hand in mine and his jacket on my shoulders.

Worries about kiss thieves and lists disappeared as I cheered for him. This was what I should have been doing at the game earlier. Instead of manning an exploding kissing booth.

Jacob picked me up and twirled me around when he won.

My breath caught in my throat as he slowly lowered me down. I kept my hand on his chest. And I swear I felt his heart racing as fast as mine. “See,” I said. “Much better that I just watched.” I glanced over at the people dancing by one of the bonfires. “Do you maybe want to...”

“Miller!” his teammate yelled. “It’s winner-take-all!”

Jacob looked over his shoulder. “Nah, I’m done for the night.” He turned back to me. “What were you about to ask?”

But a few of his friends grabbed him and pulled him back to the table.

“Sorry,” he mouthed silently to me.

“It’s okay.” I pointed to my cup to show him I was going to go get a refill. I wandered over to fill my cup, but stopped at one of the bonfires. I was pretty sure I’d had enough to drink. The smoke-filled air seemed even hazier than it had earlier. I looked around for Sophie, but didn’t see her anywhere. She was probably off hooking up with Pavel or something. Liam and RJ were nowhere in sight either. And I hadn’t seen Axel since the game. I didn’t think he’d ever missed a party. But there were tons of people here. He was probably just lost in the crowd.

I was good when I was surrounded by my friends. It was when I was alone that I started panicking about my kiss thief.

I pulled out my phone. “I know who you are,” I typed out and hit send.