Summer Love by Jill Santopolo Read Free Book Online Page A

all summer, but I’m going home on Sunday night.”
    He takes another sip of soda. “Well, that’s too bad,” he says. “You’re the nicest girl I’ve run into at this country club.”
    He slides his flip-flops back on and stands up, then reaches out a hand to help you to your feet. Well, that was fast.
    â€œI can get up myself,” you tell him, as you slip your own flip-flops back on.
    â€œOf course you can,” he answers, “but I’m being a gentleman.”
    Would a gentleman cut off a conversation just because the person he’s talking to won’t be there the whole summer long? But still, you smile and reach for his hand. He’s incredibly strong and pulls you up off the ground so quickly you lose your balance and start to fall. “Maybe I can’t do it myself,” you say, as he catches you and stops you from tipping into the water.
    You’re wrapped in his arms and pressed against his killer abs, your head right under his collarbone. You tilt your head back and look up at him. “Happy to catch you,” he says.
    You think for a moment that he might kiss you. A crazy thought, an impossible thought, but once it enters your head, you decide you might like for that kiss to happen. You lock eyes, but instead of kissing you on the lips, Adam dips his head down and plants a kiss on your forehead. Somehow it feels almost as romantic. Maybe even more so. There’s something sweet about being kissed on the forehead, and you realize that no guy you’ve ever been with has ever done that to you before.
    He sighs and looks at you like he’s struggling with some sort of internal decision.
    â€œAre you free later?” he asks, after about thirty seconds of inner struggling. “Can I take you out properly? To dinner? To the jazz festival on the beach?”
    Click here if you want to go out with Adam later.
    - - - - -
    Click here if you’d rather not.
    Click here to go back to talking to Adam and the triplets.
    - - - - -
    Click here to go back to the beginning and start over.

“IS that an invitation?” you ask.
    â€œWhy, I believe it is,” Marco says, standing up.
    He holds out his hands and helps you to your feet. Adorable, dimpled, smart, and a gentleman! Though now you’re wondering if he might not exactly be the type to kiss a girl he’s just met.
    â€œIs that an answer?” he asks.
    You nod. “It is. I would love to go for a walk along the shoreline with you. Let me just text my cousin so she knows where I am when she gets back to the towels.”
    You walk over to your bag, grab your phone, and text Tasha:
    Working on your flirting challenge.
    Be back soon.
    Then Marco crooks his elbow and says, “May I escort you to the ocean?”
    You bite your lip to keep from laughing and hook your elbow around his. “Of course you may,” you answer. You can see that Marco is fighting laughter, too.
    â€œSo,” you say, as the two of you make your way to the water’s edge, “do you know what you’re going to major in at college?”
    â€œAt Columbia you can’t really declare until second semester sophomore year,” he says. “But I’m pretty sure I want to be a philosophy major.”
    â€œWhy philosophy?” you ask.
    You’re not even exactly sure what you study when you’re a philosophy major. You have a feeling it involves reading a lot of books by old Greek people, maybe old French people, too. Or maybe you’re totally off.
    â€œWell, philosophy, if you dissect the word,” Marco says, “means love of wisdom. I like the idea of debating the big questions, looking for the wisdom in sweeping ideas like truth and beauty and knowledge and reason.”
    You reach far back into your brain for a line of poetry your English teacher had written on a banner above the whiteboard. “Like, ‘Beauty is truth, truth beauty’?” you