Cannon (A Step Brother Romance #3)

"You think maybe I wanted to decide on my own food?" I ask.

Hendrix shrugs. "Why, so you can order some low-fat egg white thing and vegetables?"

"You don't know that's what I was going to order."

He laughs. "Sure you weren't," he says. "I bet you're eating steak and eggs every morning. That's why you're skin and bones."

"You're so annoying. I'm hardly skin and bones. Two weeks ago, the tabloids said I was too fat." I glare at him.

"They're blind. You need some food."

He's so infuriating, bossing me around five seconds after showing back up in my life, but I know better than to bother arguing with him. "Why did she ask if you wanted your usual?"

"She wanted to know if I wanted the same thing I order every time I come here."

I exhale, exasperated, and throw a packet of sugar across the table at him. "Yes, I understand what 'the usual' means. You know what I'm asking. How long have you been back in Nashville?"

Hendrix gives me a long look. "Six months."

"What?" He's been back in Nashville for six months and I'm only just finding out about it now? Not that I'd want him to show up on my doorstep or anything. Not after the things he said about me right before he left. I remind myself that I hate him. But doing that is harder than I thought when he's sitting across from me, looking at me the way he is right now.

Like he's hungry and I'm what's on the menu.

"Did you miss me?" he asks, grinning.

"Oh my God, you're still as arrogant as you've always been," I note. "I've had a lot of stuff going on, in case you didn't notice. My world doesn't revolve around you."

"It used to," Hendrix says softly.

I feel my cheeks flush warm, and I open my mouth to respond, but Beatrice chooses that exact moment to set two cups of coffee down with a ker-thunk. The liquid spills over the rims of the mugs, pooling onto the table, but she's gone without a word. I soak up the mess with a napkin, grateful for the distraction. I'd forgotten what a complete and utter jackass my stepbrother used to be -- clearly, he's still just as arrogant as ever. "I don't know what you're implying," I say, my tone imperious, "But if you think my world ever revolved around you, you're completely delusional."

"That's right," he says. "You used to despise me."

"Used to?" I ask, reaching for the basket of sweetener on the table. Hendrix grabs it before I do and slides it just out of my reach. "Hey, I need one of those for my coffee."

Hendrix tosses a packet of sugar at me. "Don't tell me you're still harboring old grudges," he says.

"I'm not harboring anything," I say, sighing. Why does Hendrix have the ability to put me on edge so easily? "Will you just give me the sweetener? I don't use this sugar."

"A little sugar would do you some good, sweet cheeks," he says, giving me a long look. Why is it that everything he says sounds like an innuendo?

The truth is, a little sugar probably would do me some good. It's not like I've had any luck in that department lately. The ex-boyfriend wasn't exactly a winner when it came to sex. Probably because he was too busy getting it from other girls.

Hendrix finally relents, sliding the basket of sweeteners across the table, and I rip open a packet. "You never answered the question," he says.

"What question was that?" I ask. "The one where you asked if some sugar would do me any good?"

"No," Hendrix says. "The one where I asked if you're still harboring an old grudge."

I shrug. "Can't harbor something you never cared about to begin with."

I'm lying. Hendrix was the biggest dick ever, but especially in the months before he left for the Marines, when he apparently decided he was just too cool to hang out with the wholesome little country singer. But that didn't erase the months before that, when we became close friends. And all that time I fantasized about being more than just friends. And that one time, when he kissed me, when we were much more than just friends.

But Hendrix Cole's sugar is exactly the last thing on God's green earth I need to be thinking about now, after what just happened with the record label.

"Well, I was a dickhead," Hendrix says.

"Past tense?" I ask.

"You know, all the shit I gave you, I never --" Hendrix clears his throat and leans forward, his forearms on the table. But, with perfect timing, the waitress interrupts him again.

"Well, now, I've got your eggs and bacon and sausage and biscuits right here," she says, setting the plates down in front of us and dropping a jar of syrup on the table in the middle of the array of plates.

"You eat all of this every time you come here?" I stare at the pile of food in disbelief. "I'm not sure whether to be disgusted or impressed."

"Now, hang on," Beatrice says. "That's not all of it. I didn't have enough room on the tray for everything, so I'll be back with the pancakes and pie." She flounces off.

"Did she say pancakes and pie?"

Hendrix grins. "They have good pie," he says.

"Who eats pie for breakfast? And who eats pancakes and pie?"