Perfect Match Read Online Free PDF Page A

and a big grin.
    â€œWhat are you doing here?” I asked.
    â€œKidnapping you,” he said. “Come on.”
    I glanced back at the chemistry notebook on my bed, and took it as a sign that Noodles had crawled on top of it and fallen asleep. “I’ll grab my coat,” I said.
    Outside my brownstone, Alex’s driver was waiting in a town car. He opened the door for me and I slid in.
    â€œWhere are we going?” I asked—praying forScoops, my favorite ice cream store in the city. But then, we wouldn’t need the driver to go to Scoops. It was just down the block on Bleecker Street. …
    â€œYou’ll see,” Alex said, raising an eyebrow.
    The car hurtled south, through the West Village and into Chinatown, before taking a left on Canal Street. The streets were damp with slushy rain, and red and gold flags hung from storefronts, announcing the Chinese New Year. Even through the windows, the air was heavy with the scent of seafood shops lining Canal.
    When the car pulled to a stop on a quiet street below Canal, Alex said, “I felt bad about missing Chinese food with your family, so I thought I’d make it up to you with Chinese dessert.”
    Ooh, he was good. He was very good.
    â€œYou mentioned once that you were on a quest for the best mocha chip ice cream in the city,” Alex continued. “I know you think you’ve found it at Scoops, but you’d be cheating yourself if you didn’t try this version.”
    We stepped off the damp street into the old-fashioned ice cream shop, loud with a surprisingly large crowd. All the flavors were written in Chinese on a huge whiteboard. I stood on tiptoe to kiss Alex on the lips. “This is so cool and authentic,” I said. “I love it.”
    When I first met Alex, I thought he was your typical, partying bad boy. He wore designer motorcycle boots and played punk rock gigs at Hamptons parties. At first, I was impressed by the way he didn’t care about the social rules that everyone else in our scene was so obsessed with—oh, and I was also super attracted to him. But mostly, I was intimidated.
    But ever since our first date at Wollman Rink last month, I’d realized that for every thing about Alex that might paint him as a certain type of guy, he broke the rule by also being something completely opposite. Like, he wasn’t just the captain of the Dalton lacrosse team—he was also an alternate on the math team. And his goal in life was to become a screenwriter, even though his dad assumed he’d go to law school and take over the family firm. And there was a really good chance he’d do all of those things. By now I knew that I should never assume I knew everything about Alex, because he always had a surprise up his sleeve. Kinda like how I shouldn’t have assumed I knew all the good ice cream places in the city. …
    Alex took care of ordering and handed me the bowl with tidy scoops of mocha chocolate chip. I grinned and took a bite.
    â€œOmigod,” I said with my mouth full of perfectly soft ice cream. “Scoops just got some serious competition.”
    â€œSave room,” he said, snagging a spoonful. “This is not the last stop.”
    I took my to-go cup and followed Alex back to the car, excited to see what else he had planned.
    â€œSo how was dinner?” he said as we continued west along Canal Street. “What’d I miss?”
    I thought about divulging how crazy my siblings were acting over their new S.O.’s but I didn’t want to scare my still-new boyfriend, so I just said, “Oh, you know, the usual. Mom dressed in theme; Dad oversaw the passing of food; kids fought over the extra fortune cookie.”
    â€œI’m sorry I missed it,” Alex said before telling the driver to take the Brooklyn Bridge. “I hope you got your hands on that last cookie.”
    As we drove over the bridge, taking in arguably the very best view of