Page 14 of Gage (Love Under the Lights 1)

He laughed dryly as he reached out and raised one of the bottles of sake, lifting an eyebrow at me in question as he gestured to the ceramic sake cup in front of me. I nodded my head as I used my index and middle finger to slide it forward so it would be easier for him to pour.

“You said you liked sushi, but we hadn’t narrowed it down to exactly what kind, so yes, I had my assistant order most of the menu.”

He set the sake bottle down after filling both of our cups. When I lifted my cup, he held his out to toast.

“To new adventures,” he said.

Taken at face value, it was a perfectly innocuous statement, but I knew he meant it in a deeper way. My pulse raced as I nodded and clinked my cup with his before I took a small sip of the tasty rice wine.

“Perfectly chilled and incredibly delicious,” I said as we set our cups down in unison. “But if I want to be functional when we leave here, I need to put something in my stomach.”

Gage nodded as he lifted one of the white boxes, took off the lid, and surveyed the contents. “We’ve got rainbow roll, dragon roll, and spider roll in this one. Any interest?”

I picked up the beautiful wooden chopsticks at my plate and started plucking pieces out. “I’m all about the spider roll, but I’m a solid no on the dragon, and I have to be in the mood for rainbow roll,” I answered.

“Funny”—he chuckled—“because that’s my stance as well. I’m not a fan of eel, so I never order the dragon roll.”

We both took a pass on the next two boxes of rolls. Although artfully presented, the eel avocado roll was an obvious no from both of us, and the firecracker, snowcorn, tataki, and spicy tuna rolls didn’t entice us, either.

I wrinkled my nose as I pinched a good amount of pickled ginger between my sticks and set it down on the corner of my plate, the only thing I’d taken out of the last two boxes. “We’re going to have so much food leftover. I feel bad,” I said.

“Next time, I’ll ask what you like so we can narrow down the field,” he answered as he opened the next container.

“Ah, this is a good one,” he said cheerfully. “California roll, Philly roll and dynamite roll.”

I nodded enthusiastically as I began plucking pieces out and setting them down on my plate. “All of these are a solid yes.”

“We’re very sushi compatible,” he noted as I scooped out a bit of wasabi and added it to my plate. Gage’s choices mirrored mine, but he took triple the amount of wasabi. I raised an eyebrow as he closed the container and set it down.

“I’m ninety percent certain your insides will melt if you eat that much wasabi paste,” I laughed.

He looked over at my plate and shook his head. “I’m the one with the normal amount on my plate. You’ve only got enough to lightly graze your food,” he teased. “Do you even taste it?”

“I’ll eat super-hot wing sauce on everything, but wasabi is a whole other beast. When I first started eating sushi, I was a little too generous with it. My eyes didn’t stop watering for almost an hour, and later that day, my nose was still burning. The four glasses of ice water I guzzled didn’t help at all. A little goes a very, very long way.”

“Ah, yes,” he chuckled as he lifted the last box. “I can see where that would certainly have put a damper on things. The knee-jerk reaction is to drink ice water, but that doesn’t help at all. Anytime you eat something too hot, drink a glass of milk. That’ll help the most.”

I grimaced. “I love ice-cold milk with a warm chocolate chip cookie, but the idea of drinking it with sushi is just wrong.”

“You’ve got me there,” he conceded. “There’s definitely a reason milk isn’t the drink of choice in sushi restaurants,” he said as he took the lid off the final and biggest box.

The tantalizing scent of tempura wafted across the table just then, dismissing all thoughts of milk. “Tempura is my downfall,” I sighed as I leaned forward.

“And now I know for sure,” he said with a chuckle, “we’re a match. I’ve got shrimp tempura, lobster tempura roll and a ton of tempura veggies.”

“All of that is a yes,” I said cheerfully as we each took what we wanted from the box.

We each prepared our sushi a little differently—meaning Gage used a heck of a lot more wasabi then the minuscule amount I waved over each piece. When I was finished, I was left with half of the amount I’d taken from the container, but Gage used all of his and went back for a little more. I chuckled as I picked a piece of shrimp tempura roll up and dipped it into the bowl of soy sauce on my plate before popping it into my mouth. The roll was perfection, the delicate tempura batter melting in my mouth as I chewed the succulent shrimp. The lanterns above us swayed gently in the breeze as we enjoyed the sushi. I was a little surprised at how comfortable I felt with Gage, all things considered. He’d been so off-putting the night before, but there was no sign of that version of him anywhere. Instead, he was relaxed and pleasant, the tension between us sensual, the anxiety of the night before gone. It was a testament to the quality of the sushi that I was able to eat as much as I did, considering I felt hot and flushed inside because of the way he focused on me.

---