Bedded Bliss (Found in Oblivion #1) - Cari Quinn Page 0,31

decide to join them on his own. When he didn’t, Michael stepped back and grabbed Mal’s hand.

It was ice cold. Forget nerves. The guy must be made out of steel.

Michael lifted their joined hands and basked in the waves of applause and stomping feet. And he searched for his redhead, desperate to locate her one more time.

He found her—just in time to see her being pulled up the nearest aisle by her girlfriends. She glanced back and the strobing lights bisected her face like the Joker’s. Light and dark, known and unknown.

Fuck, she wasn’t just some beautiful girl at a concert.

So much for the mystery of why he’d been so drawn to her. She wasn’t random at all. In the chaos his life had become, he must’ve been seeking something—someone—familiar.

She was the absolute worst person for him to get involved with for a million reasons.

“Chloe,” he murmured.

Chapter 8

Chloe Adams.

Her name followed him through a quick shower and change. He grabbed a Foo Fighters shirt and a fresh pair of jeans, stuffing his feet into a different pair of boots. These were shitkickers with steel toes, perfect for fending off the spike heels of clumsy drunk girls. He grabbed his watch, shoving it back on his wrist, and beelined for the mini bar to swig back a quarter of a bottle of the whisky he’d had specially stocked.

“Priming the pump already?” Ry walked into Michael’s bedroom carting a pair of black trousers and a white button-down shirt. So far he’d spent almost as much time in Michael’s room as he did his own, though their suite was so huge they barely even had to see each other. “You know they aren’t going to let you into the Foundation Room like that, right?”

Michael smirked around the mouth of his bottle. “Let’s see them try to stop me.”

Ry shook his head. “Dude, you’re feeling it tonight. Just don’t get arrested, all right?”

Still carrying the bottle, Michael went to the nightstand and rooted through the top drawer. “Nah, I have something else in mind.” He pulled out a strip of his preferred brand of Magnum condoms and stuffed them in his back pocket.

Ry’s eyebrow climbed toward his hairline. “So much for your supposed abstinence program, huh?”

“When did I say that?”

“You didn’t, but considering you claimed to be such a good boy, so misunderstood by the masses…”

“Hey, safety first. I am a good boy.” He flashed a grin at his buddy and checked his phone. “Get a move on. I need to get upstairs.”

“Hot date?”

“You could say that.” More like he needed to find Chloe, then they’d go from there.

Obviously he had hopes for how the night would go, and the half dozen condoms he’d just shoved in his pocket were proof. But even if things didn’t progress that way, he had to find her. To hear her voice, watch her laugh, feel her rub up against him.

It was probably just the atmosphere. Something chemical that would burn off by morning. He’d definitely never felt that jolt in her direction before, although he’d pretty much steered clear of her. Understandable, since his first glimpse of Chloe had been in the photographs taken by the PI he’d hired a couple of years back.

The PI hadn’t been a real one, just a former high school friend, and Michael hadn’t been trying to get pix of Chloe. He’d been trying to get photos of Lila with Nick—back when she was still married to his father—in the hopes of showing her how indiscreet she was being. He’d only wanted to remind her what was at risk if she got caught cheating, not cause her any trouble.

Yeah, it sounded crazy even in his own head. Which was why he’d swiftly disavowed the whole thing, including Chloe. She’d become persona non grata in his mind. Any reminders of the period when he’d been so worried about Lila had been shoved to the back of his thoughts.

And that included the cute redheaded preggo girl inadvertently captured with Nick in the PI’s pictures.

Fuck, she’d been pregnant. She had a baby. So much for being just some young girl out having fun. She was somebody’s mother.

He took another long swig off the bottle and glanced around the empty hotel room. Ry had probably gone to shower.

Chloe might be showering too right now. Getting ready for the night.

For him. And wasn’t that a kick in the ass?

Talk about unbelievable.

He and Chloe had bumped into each other a few times on holidays and such, since she