Gage flashed her a smile. “Hope I’m not too early.”
“You’re perfect.” If he was any more perfect, there’d have to be a warning label on him. “Let me grab my purse.”
When she turned back around, she found Gage eyeing her like she was going to be on tonight’s menu. If any other man undressed her with his eyes like that, she would have been uncomfortable. But the heat from his molten eyes made her warm all over.
“You look beautiful,” he said as they rode down in the elevator.
“Thank you.” She smiled. “I’m just glad I picked the right one. I didn’t realize until I started getting dressed that I never asked where we were going.”
“I made reservations at Chambre Francaise. I hope that’s okay with you?”
Whoa. Mac was so surprised she teetered a little on her high heels as she stepped out of the elevator. Chambre Francaise was one very fancy restaurant, not to mention ungodly expensive. And about as far from the pizza place down the street as you could get and still be on the same planet. It definitely wasn’t the type of place she imagined Gage taking her. He seemed more like a steak-and-potatoes guy. Apparently, looks could be deceiving. She felt bad about the dent having dinner there was going to leave in Gage’s wallet, though.
“You didn’t have to do that,” she said. “I know how difficult it can be getting into that place.”
Gage opened the door of his shiny, black Dodge Charger for her—no guy had done that for her since her high school crush had taken her to the prom.
He gave her a lopsided grin. “I probably shouldn’t be telling you this, but the only reason I was able to get in the place at all is because I helped out the head chef’s son a while back. He promised me a table for two anytime I asked.”
“Now, that sounds like a story I’d be interested in hearing. But still,” she said when he’d climbed in beside her and started the engine, “Chambre Francaise is a very nice place. And expensive.”
He glanced at her as he guided the car out of the parking garage and into downtown traffic. “I’m sure it’ll be money well spent.”
That look turned up the heat between them even more. “You think?”
“I do,” he said. “Although in the interest of full disclosure, I have to tell you the table also comes with a major discount. Which is actually the only way I’m able to afford to take you there. But like they say, it’s the thought that counts.”
She couldn’t help laughing. “You really do hang out with men all day, don’t you? Little piece of advice—don’t let a woman know she’s getting dinner at a discount. It sort of ruins the gesture.”
He chuckled. “For some reason I thought a journalist like you would be fixated on the truth.”
“I am,” she said. “But just because I’m a journalist, it doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate a little chivalry now and then.”
He gave her another smoldering look. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
Five minutes in and they were already flirting. At this rate, she was going to have a hard time remembering this was supposed to be a fishing expedition. Because so far, it was feeling a lot more like a date to her. She needed to steer the conversation back into safer territory, and fast. So, she brought up the one subject sure to cool things down—the man his SWAT team had killed at the warehouse.
“I guess by now the department has told you who that thug at the warehouse was, huh?”
If Gage was caught off guard by the sudden shift in subject, he didn’t let on. In fact, his expression didn’t change at all as he took his eyes off the road to check the rearview mirror. “Actually, I didn’t know who he was until I got home and saw it on the news.”
She turned a little in her seat so she could see his face better. “Seriously? Isn’t the fact that a member of your team just killed the son of the most powerful criminal in the northern hemisphere something your boss thought he should mention?”
“The department doesn’t work like that,” he said. “Internal Affairs talked to Xander and me, but their only concern is whether it was a clean shooting or not. They rarely tell us the name of the suspect in a case like that. The shrinks think it makes it too personal for the officer and can make the post-shooting counseling session even harder.”
Huh. Considering their hard-core image, she hadn’t thought an officer in SWAT would even attend counseling like that.
“That’s all fine and good if Xander shot your average guy,” she agreed. “But this was Ryan Hardy, the son of a man most people consider pretty damn scary. Word on the street is that he’s already blaming your SWAT team for assassinating his son.”
He shrugged. “People always stir up crap when things like this happen, but they get over it—or they don’t. What’s Hardy going to do, take out a contract on the entire SWAT team?”
“That’s exactly what I would think he’s going to do.”
Gage didn’t act as if he thought that was very likely, but she noticed he spent a lot of time checking his mirrors. Dallas traffic was bad, but not that bad.
Mac opened her mouth to call him on it, but Gage asked how long she’d lived in Dallas. Guess that was his subtle way of saying he didn’t want to talk about Hardy. Okay, she wouldn’t push. For now.
“Since graduating from college,” she said in answer to his question. “I interned at the Dallas Daily Sun in the summers and loved it so much, I couldn’t turn them down when they offered me a full-time job.”
Gage gave
