Mac sat down on one of the weight benches and took out her notebook. At least they’d gotten new mirrors put in since the last time she was here.
Xander was polite, but evasive. Okay, maybe that wasn’t fair. He answered all her questions. He simply didn’t elaborate on any of his answers. She didn’t get much more than the boring stuff she’d already read in his file. He’d worked for the Kansas City Police Department for several years before Gage recruited him to join the Dallas SWAT team. Yes, he was single. No, he wasn’t seeing anyone.
She spent the next few hours interviewing the rest of the guys on Xander’s squad. Trevino and McCall were reserved like Xander, but Lowry, Delaney, and Becker were more forthcoming. Not only did they have more stories than a boatload of sailors, they were charming as hell and knew how to make a woman laugh. She took a lot of notes. If she ever wrote a human interest piece about the SWAT team, she’d have enough to write a dozen articles.
Mac skimmed her notes while she waited for Cooper to come in and noticed that none of the guys were married. Huh. How was it possible for a group of cops this hunky to all be single? That had to some kind of statistical anomaly.
Something else was odd, too. Most of them had transferred from other police departments around the country. She didn’t know enough about the subject to say for sure, but it was hard to believe no one in the Dallas PD had measured up.
While that was certainly strange, it also indicated Gage and his team were clean. If he’d schemed to fill the unit with his people so they could get away with something dirty, wouldn’t he have gotten other cops from his own department, cops he knew were dirty, too? There was no way Gage could have known officers from other departments well enough to know they were crooked.
She was investigating SWAT because she thought they were dirty, but if anything, Gage had almost gone out of his way to make it the cleanest unit possible.
Mac was scribbling some notes when Cooper walked in. He still wore that half-angry expression he’d had earlier. But then he smiled and she wondered if she hadn’t imagined things.
“I saved a donut for you,” he said as he sat down on the weight bench opposite her. “I noticed you didn’t grab one before you left and figured you’d be starving after listening to all the BS the guys were probably trying to sell you.”
She set down her notebook to take the sprinkle-covered donut he’d wrapped in a napkin. He’d even been thoughtful enough to bring her a cup of coffee with the right amount of cream. She took a sip. Artificial sweeter, too? Damn, he was good.
“Okay, bringing me a donut with sprinkles is impressive enough, but how did you know how I take my coffee?”
He chuckled. “Four years in the Army Bomb Squad, two tours in Afghanistan, one in Iraq. You learn to notice everything or you get blown into a pink mist real quick.”
Something in his tone told her he wasn’t joking. “I see. Well, thanks for thinking about me. I was getting hungry.”
He nodded and crossed his arms over his chest, emphasizing his biceps. His arms weren’t as big as Gage’s, but they were close. The perturbed look was back on his face now. What the hell was going on with him? Just yesterday, this cute guy was staring at her butt like he was in love with it. Today, he looked at her like he wanted her the hell out of here.
“Mind if I ask you a question, Ms. Stone?”
She set her coffee down on the bench and picked up her notepad. “Not at all. And call me Mac.”
“Okay then, Mac. Are you screwing with my boss’s head just to get a story?”
Mac was pretty sure her jaw dropped. And people said she was direct. “I don’t know what you mean.”
God, that sounded horribly lame.
He snorted. “Sure you do. It’s a simple question. Do you honestly care about Gage or are you planning to screw him over to get the story you’re after?”
If anyone else on the team had asked her that question, she probably would have BS’d her way through it. But she didn’t think she could do that with Cooper.
“Does it matter how I answer?” she asked. “You have no reason to believe me even if I tell you the truth.”
“Just answer the question. I’ll know if you’re telling the truth.”
Mac wasn’t sure how he could tell, but she believed him. “Yes, I honestly care about Gage.”
“So, he’s important to you?”
“Yes.”
Why the heck was she answering like she was on a witness stand? She was supposed to be the one asking questions.
“Are you in love with him?”
She didn’t know why she even hesitated. How could you fall in love with any man that you’d just met a few days ago? Even if he was as hunky, sexy, arousing, and tempting as Gage. Hell, she hadn’t even slept with him yet.
She opened her mouth to tell Cooper she wasn’t in love with his boss, not that it was any of his business, but she couldn’t get the words out. She might not know if she loved him—she was a practical woman, and practical women didn’t fall in love in three days—but she felt something for him. Something stronger than she’d ever felt for any other man.
