toward the tray that contained the croissants and lifted one up. “This will do.”
“You need protein,” she said.
“I do the hell not. If I want to carbo-load that’s nobody’s business but mine.”
She sniffed. “Fine.”
“I’ll take some more eggs,” Alex said, smiling easily as he looked over at Lane, and looked her over a little too thoroughly. Lane filled his plate. “Thank you,” he said, charm dripping from every syllable. The bastard.
Finn’s house felt too full. Too full and too different. When he and his grandfather lived here by themselves there was no noise in the morning. They drank their coffee, they went to work. That was it. None of this conversation crap.
And Lane had certainly never let herself in to make breakfast.
Everything was turned on its side, and he didn’t like it.
His home, this place that he’d made for himself, had helped his grandfather keep alive after the rest of his family had left him by his damn self, was out of his control now. And this need for Lane, the one he’d ruthlessly tamped down for the better part of a decade, was being tested. God help him, he didn’t feel like he was in a space where he could pass those tests.
Not when she looked at him like she had yesterday. With wonder and curiosity, and like she wanted to touch him as much as he wanted to touch her.
It was one thing to push it down, to steer clear, when he thought of her as vulnerable. As someone who needed protecting from his particular brand of passion and possession.
A whole lot harder when she looked at him like a woman looked at a man.
And harder still when she looked at him like a woman looked at a man and was presenting him with croissants.
“I have to say, this is about the grumpiest I have ever seen anybody who was being gifted with pastries,” Lane remarked.
“I have a morning routine, dammit,” Finn said, taking another sip of coffee and burning himself all over again.
“Yeah,” Alex said, “this is better.”
“How?”
“She’s way better looking than you, for starters.”
Lane smiled. “Thank you, Alex. It’s nice to know that I’m appreciated. At least by somebody.”
“I appreciate you,” Finn said. “But I think it’s weird that you let yourself into my house to deliver food. And now you’re cooking.”
“First of all, Alex let me in. Second of all, it’s awfully convenient that you want food from me on your terms, but when I bring it to you without being asked it’s suddenly a problem?”
Liam and Alex exchanged glances. “I don’t think you’re going to win this one,” Alex said. “I would turn back if I were you. And anyway—” he stood up off of the stool “—we have work to do.” He winked at Lane. “See you later.” He and Liam stood and made their way out of the room.
Cain finished eating, and he didn’t seem to notice the fact that Finn was mentally boring holes through the side of his head. Or maybe he did, and he just didn’t care, because raising a teenager meant that he was immune to any and all kinds of dirty looks.
“Thank you again,” Cain said, standing up and tipping his hat. All that was missing was the ma’am.
Obnoxious Texan bastard.
Then it was his turn to walk out.
“I didn’t realize you were so grouchy in the morning,” Lane said, snatching up the dirty plates that were sitting on the counter.
“Possibly because you don’t usually see me in the morning. Because you don’t usually invade my house.”
“Why is it a problem?” She dumped the plates into the sink with no finesse, the ceramic dishes clattering against each other. If they didn’t chip, he would be surprised.
“I...” He honestly didn’t know. Except that he was still wound up from yesterday, and it all centered on her. Well, and his brothers. The fact that he felt like his entire house had been commandeered. That nothing was his anymore.
Broken down like that, it made him feel a little less crazy.
“You’re mean?” She set about washing the dishes, her movements ferocious.
“Don’t wash those,” he said.
“Why not?” She threw her sponge down into the sink and it must have knocked one glass down into another, because there was a loud, dangerous-sounding noise. “I made the mess—it seems like I should clean it up.”
“First of all, I would rather you didn’t do my dishes because it sounds like you’re going to break them. Second of all, you made breakfast—you’re not cleaning up.”
“An unappreciated breakfast,” she said, sniffing loudly.
He sighed, grabbing the back of his neck and rubbing it. “I’m tired. I’m still getting used to all of them being in my house, and I did not expect to walk in and see you too.”
She frowned. “When did I become a problem? When did I become another person who was invading your space?”
He wanted badly to tell her that she wasn’t. Except the feeling persisted. That she was just another thing that felt too difficult to handle right now. But he wasn’t going to say that. Because introducing the subject was even more impossible than just having her here.
“It’s me,” he said, gritting his teeth. “It’s not you.”
She snorted. “Now it just sounds like we’re having a bad breakup.”
“We aren’t,” he said, his tone harder than he intended. “It’s not like that. Friends don’t break up.”
That was the bottom line. Friends didn’t break up. And she was a friend. It was one of the biggest reasons she had always been a friend, and nothing more. Why he had never, ever made a move on her. Not just out of his loyalty to her brother, Mark, but also because he valued the connection between them.
Yeah, he wanted her. But there were a lot of women to want. A lot of women to have for temporary moments in time.
There was only one Lane.
He repeated that over and over in his mind while he continued to look at her. She was hurt—he could see that, her dark eyes looking a little too bright in the dim morning light.
“Good,” she said. “Because you can’t.”
“I can’t what?”
“Break up with me,” she said, a thread of genuine emotion winding around the teasing note in her voice. “I mean, I know how to get into your house. You would never be able to get rid of me. It would make things really uncomfortable. You would be like, ‘Lane, I’m
