Mid Life Love (Mid Life Love #1)(57)

“Claire?” His sultry voice almost made me wet all over again.

My eyes fluttered open and I realized he was staring at me. I wanted to look away from him, to pretend that I was mad for that ridiculous orgasm denial, but all I could do was stare back.

“You’re so f**king beautiful.” He pulled me up and put his arm around me, holding me against his chest.

We quickly slipped into silence, into that ‘I’m-perfectly-comfortable-with-you-silence’ that I’d only ever enjoyed with him.

I looked out the window and saw that we were still in the city; I figured that Jonathan saying “scenic route” must have meant drive around in circles because my house was a mere ten minutes away and we’d been in the car for much longer.

I started wondering about where we were going—tonight and long term. I didn’t want to think about it, but I couldn’t help it since he’d seen through my distancing attempt: What if this turned into an actual relationship? What if we did last a long time and he wanted kids in the future? Should I introduce him to Ashley and Caroline? Were we at that point yet? Did I really like him that much or was my “like” clouded by his good looks and the mind blowing sex? Was this something we were both doing to—

“Stop that.” Jonathan tilted my head up and kissed me.

“Stop what?”

“Thinking—about this, about us.” He tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. “Stop it.”

“Mr. Statham?” The driver’s voice came over the speaker.

“Yes, Greg?”

“We’ve arrived sir.”

“We’ll be right out.” Jonathan kissed me again and waited for the driver to open the door. He stepped out of the car and reached for my hand. “Does this place look familiar?”

“Yeah, it’s the Golden Gate Br—” I stopped and looked around. There were no cars coming or going in any of the six lanes, no tourists camped out on the railings, no pedestrians taking a late night stroll.

In the distance I could see a single table covered in a white tablecloth and hundreds of giant red candles surrounding it.

“You had the entire bridge blocked off?” I gasped. “I—”

“I did.” He squeezed my hand and walked me towards the table. “You mentioned liking the architecture of this bridge before. I thought you would appreciate it a lot better if you had it to yourself for a while.”

He remembered that? “I thought we agreed on no public—”

“I took care of everything.”

My mind was spinning. For one, I didn’t think he’d really been listening when I was talking about my love for the structure of bridges—I’d said that the first time we spoke on the phone. And two, I was remembering how it cost my team fifty thousand dollars to reserve a small photo-esque landing on the bridge for the sPhone blue commercial. I couldn’t fathom how much it cost to completely re-route traffic and shut down the entire bridge.

I looked up and expected to see news helicopters humming about, trying to zoom in on who or what had shut down the largest bridge on the West Coast, but there weren’t any. It was eerily calm and the only noise was coming from the sloshing waters below.

He pulled my chair out and motioned for me to take a seat. He planted a kiss on my forehead before sitting down across from me.

“Good evening, Mr. Statham, Miss Gracen.” A waiter in a white suit appeared. “What type of wine would you prefer tonight?”

“I’ll have whatever she’s having.” Jonathan looked at me as if he were waiting for me to choose.

“Do you have DeLille Chaleur Estate Blanc? 2010?” I asked.

“Yes. Excellent choice, Miss.” The waiter walked away and quickly returned with two crystal wine glasses. He filled them and handed us a menu. “This is the menu for the Michael Mina restaurant, Miss. The chef has substituted all the seafood items with his signature French and Italian dishes. I’ll return shortly to get your order.”

“Any particular reason why you chose the Michael Mina menu?” I smiled at Jonathan.

“I was stood up there once.” He sipped his wine. “I never had the chance to enjoy it with the beautiful woman I was supposed to meet.”

I looked over the menu, appreciating the fact that he’d remembered I didn’t like seafood. I decided to order the nine course option that featured baked lamb and caramelized chicken.

Jonathan ordered the same and the first course was brought out within minutes.

The presentation of the food was surreal. Every vegetable was bright and plump; every piece of meat was tender and brown. It almost looked too perfect to eat.

I took it all in once more before picking up my fork and tasting a bite of the appetizer.

This is amazing...

I tried to think of something to say, something to discuss, but I was utterly speechless. No man had ever paid so much attention to a date’s details before, not even Ryan.

“Do you like the food, Claire?” He looked into my eyes.

“I love it...Its perfect.” I smiled. “If you don’t mind me asking, how much did you have to pay to get the city to let you do this?”

“You really want to know?”

I nodded.

“Why?”

“I just want to know...It cost us fifty thousand to rent a quarter mile with traffic. Did this cost you one million? Two?”