“I heard it’s going to be in the midfifties all week,” he said, with one of his knockout grins that indicated he liked that he got under her skin. “With a thirty percent chance of rain.”
“We could use some rain.”
Heidi dropped off Shane’s breakfast and took Brandee’s order of scrambled eggs, country potatoes and bacon. A second later the waitress popped back with a cup of coffee.
“Everything tasting okay?” Heidi asked Shane, her eyes bright and flirty.
“Perfect as always.”
“That?
??s what I like to hear.”
When she walked off, Brandee commented, “You haven’t taken a single bite. How do you know it’s perfect?”
“Because I eat breakfast here twice a week and it’s always the same great food.” Shane slid his fork into his sunny-side up eggs and the bright yellow yolk ran all over the hash on his plate.
Brandee sipped her coffee and shuddered.
“What’s the matter?” Shane’s even white teeth bit into a piece of toast. He hadn’t looked at her, yet he seemed to know she was bothered.
“Nothing.” Brandee tried to keep her voice neutral. “Why?”
“You are looking more disgusted with me than usual.” His crooked smile made her pulse hiccup.
“It’s the eggs. I can’t stand them runny like that.” The same flaw in human nature that made people gawk at car accidents was drawing Brandee’s gaze back to Shane’s plate. She shuddered again.
“Really?” He pushed the yolk around as if to torment her with the sight. “But this is the only way to eat them with corn-beef hash.”
“Why corn-beef hash and not biscuits and gravy?”
“It’s a nod to my Irish roots.”
“You’re Irish?”
“On my mother’s side. She’s from Boston.”
“Oh.” She drew out her reply as understanding dawned.
“Oh, what?”
“I always wondered about your accent.”
“You thought about me?” He looked delighted.
Brandee hid her irritation. Give the man any toehold and he would storm her battlements in a single bound.
“I thought about your accent,” she corrected him. “It has a trace of East Coast in it.”
Shane nodded. “It’s my mom’s fault. Even after living in Texas for nearly forty years, she still drops her r’s most of the time.”
“How’d your mom come to live in Texas?”
Even as Brandee asked the question, it occurred to her that this was the most normal conversation she and Shane had ever had. Usually they engaged in some sort of verbal sparring or just outright arguing and rarely traded any useful information.
“She came here after college to study oil reserves and met my dad. They were married within six months and she’s been here ever since.” Shane used his toast to clean up the last of the egg. “She went back to Boston after my dad died and stayed for almost a year, but found she missed Royal.”
“I’m sure it was you that she missed.”