He turned his ass back around returned to join Olivia, Justin, Jessica, Chris, Liam, Hilary, Jake, Lexie, Patrick, Andrew, and Sharon on the other side of the aisle. Justin, Jessica, Chris, Liam, and Hilary were standing ahead of the rest of their group, gathered in a small cluster and laughing about something. Spaced behind them, Lexie and Sharon had their heads together, allowing Sharon to pretend Jake didn’t exist, while Andrew, Olivia, and Jake were involved in a conversation and Patrick was kind of staring off into space as he stood with his arms around Lexie. He looked like a guy who had something heavily weighing on his mind, but Michael wasn’t going to ask. While he was definitely becoming friendlier with everyone in the group, he was closer to Andrew, Angel, and Leigh than any of the others. And sort of Adam and Jared by default, although Jared was a pretty quiet guy and hard to get to know, and Adam... well, it was hard for the two of them not to butt heads now and then. They did their best for Angel’s sake, but Michael had been looking out for her for a long time, and Adam felt that was his job now, so they rubbed along uncomfortably, but Michael wouldn’t call them close or anything.

As he approached, Sharon looked up at him and gave him a wink. “Good job. She’s totally staring at you now.”

Lifting her head, Lexie grinned at him too. “Please tell me you guys are finally going to hook up. Watching you two is torture.”

“We’re going to scene together,” he said, keeping his voice casual at first, and then turning it stern for the warning. “Tomorrow. But you are not going to say anything to her about it. I don’t want anyone pushing her.”

Sharon rolled her eyes. Little brat. If she were more of a masochist, he would have been interested in playing with her when he first came back. She and Ellie even resembled each other a little; both petite and curvy with dark hair. Sharon’s was much longer though and her skin was more olive than Ellie’s pale cream. “Dude, we are so much more subtle than that.”

Behind her, Jake snorted and then looked away as her head snapped around to glare at him. A small smile played on Lexie’s lips. Luckily for Jake, the line of people was finally clearing up and they started moving up the aisle towards the lobby, where Kate would come out to meet them. Sharon flounced ahead with Andrew, her nose in the air, completely oblivious to Jake checking out her ass from behind. Michael noticed, but he didn’t say anything. She did have a cute, curvy ass after all.

“Want to go get a beer after this?” Jake asked, turning his head as he asked the question to include both Patrick and Michael.

Michael shrugged. “Sure.”