26 Kisses Read Online Free

back over his head and interrupting Mel’s not-so-covert inspection of his abs.
    Mel grabs our arms and pulls us closer. “Awesome. I have the best idea.” She peers over my shoulder and whispers, “Let’s come back here tonight, when it gets dark. We can watch the fireworks from the dock.”
    “Mel! What are you trying to do, get us arrested?”
    “Chill out, Vee. It’s my dad’s place; it’s not like we’d be trespassing.”
    It’s all I can do to suppress my inner attorney. “Uh, actually, it totally would be trespassing if—”
    Mel grabs my hand and squeezes hard, silencing me. “Are you in, Killian?”
    He shifts his weight from foot to foot. “I don’t know. . . .”
    “Oh, come on.” She sighs impatiently. “What’s with you two? Relax. It’ll be fun.” She crosses her arms and waits.
    Killian looks at me, his eyebrows raised in a silent question. I hesitate for a second and then nod.
    “Okay,” he says finally, taking his baseball cap off and running a hand through his hair. “I’m in.”

CHAPTER THREE
    “This is a bad idea,” I say. Mel and I are back in the Buick, lurking in the corner of the Float & Boat parking lot, waiting for everyone else to arrive, and I can barely breathe through the cloud of perfume wafting off her body. The sun is just about to go down, and clouds are racing in from the west to cover the stars. Soon the sky will be pitch-black—perfect for watching fireworks.
    “Shhh,” she says. “It’ll be fine. You’ll have fun—maybe even meet someone.”
    “What? Who am I going to meet?”
    She turns to me, her brown eyes huge in the dark. “You need a guy this summer, Vee. So I invited a few.”
    I stare at her in disbelief.
    Mel shrugs and looks away. “What? I took initiative. And it’s not like a setup; it’s just hanging out with some guys, and if you hit it off, great. If you don’t, you can continue to mourn Mark.”
    I slam back against the passenger seat, shocked at the magnitude by which Mel has misjudged where I’m at mentally in the whole breakup process. “You invited Seth, Killian, and Landon. Landon is dating Brianna, you’ve already staked your claim on Killian, and Seth is . . . Seth. Who am I supposedly going to hook up with?”
    “First of all, I have not staked my claim on Killian. I’m perfectly happy for you to jump his ripped bod this summer. But I also invited Vince and Adam. They’re both single. And hot.”
    Vince and Adam. I flip through the pages of the yearbook in my mind, trying to put faces with those names. The only people I really hung out with over the past couple of years were Mark’s cross-country friends and my teammates during the debate season—and Mel and Seth, of course, when I could find the time. But Mel seems to know everyone at Butterfield High—especially the guys, despite the fact that she has never been in a real relationship.
    I rub my temples. “Mel, I am so, so not ready to think about moving on. I’m barely functioning as it is. I still cry every morning when I wake up. I don’t have a job. I do not need a guy this summer.”
    She sighs. “Look, don’t take this the wrong way. I know you think you’re totally devastated about Mark—”
    I snort.
    “But let’s face it, Vee: you don’t even know what it would be like to date someone else.”
    I’m tempted to get out of the car and hitch a ride home rather than walk into what is apparently just a weird three-way blind date. “Yeah, yeah,” I say. “I’ve only slept with one guy—”
    “You’ve only kissed one guy.”
    I glare at her. Hearing it out loud makes it sound more pathetic than it actually is, and it’s not like she has that much more experience than I do. I’ve only kissed one guy because once Mark came along, I didn’t need anyone else, not because I’m a prude or challenged in the art of seduction. And anyway, Seth would have kissed me if I had let him—but that was all a million years ago, and Mel certainly