"Ex – excuse me?" I choke out the words.
"This apartment," he says. "You're vulnerable to a security breach. Do you know that? Has my dad had this place checked out?"
I exhale heavily. "This place is vulnerable."
"Yeah," he says, stepping back from me. He's already down the hall before I catch my breath again. "What did you think I meant?"
"I don't need security," I call after him, following him into one of the bedrooms. "I don't want security. I'm not a damn rock star. This is Nashville, not LA."
"You've had crazy fans. I remember some of them."
"That was back in the beginning, Hendrix. When I was a kid." I'd had some obsessive fans here and there, and some that were mentally ill, like the woman who showed up at our house because she swore I was her granddaughter.
"It doesn't stop because you're older, Addy," he says. His voice is softer, and he looks at me now with an expression I can't quite place. "You need to be careful. You have to stay safe."
"I'm fine. I don't want a babysitter," I say. I make my voice firm. I try to sound sure of myself. "Especially you, of all people."
Hendrix narrows his eyes, and the muscles in his face ripple as he clenches his jaw. "What the hell is that supposed to mean, me of all people?"
What was it supposed to mean? "All of this...the meeting, you as my bodyguard...was just thrown at me," I say, my voice a lot steadier now. "I don't want you here."
"Well, I've got news for you, Addison," he says, his eyes steady, trained on mine. "I didn't particularly want to be here either."
"Then why are you here, bothering me?"
Hendrix pulls one of the corners of his mouth up in a smirk. "Well, hell, I didn't realize that's all it took to bother you," he says. "But you want to really see me bothering you, I'll try a little harder."
I feel like sticking my tongue out at him, but that would be especially juvenile. Instead I roll my eyes and sigh. "Whatever."
Hendrix laughs. "Whatever," he says. "That's an awesome comeback."
"I don't know what our parents promised you, but I can tell you I don't need you."
Hendrix leans forward, his mouth close to my ear, and when he speaks, it's a whisper that sends a shiver reverberating down my body. I'm not sure if the shiver is due to anger or arousal. "Oh, let's not kid ourselves. You need me, Addy-girl," he says, using the name he used to call me. Addy-girl. It makes me feel like I'm sixteen again.
Sixteen and wide-eyed and positive, still eager and learning about the industry. Before I started feeling world-weary.
Before Hendrix left and I spent the next five years wondering if he was okay or if he was going to die in Afghanistan.
I shake off the feeling. I refuse to remember how I used to feel about Hendrix. I won't.
Hendrix's voice, low and gravelly in my ear, breaks through my thoughts. "Too bad if you think you don't," he says. "Because I'm back. And I'm not going anywhere."
It takes all the strength I have to tear myself away from Hendrix when I feel pulled toward him by a practically magnetic force. I don't say anything, because I can't think of anything to say. Instead, I take the oh-so-mature route. I just walk down the hallway and shut my bedroom door behind me. The sound reverberates through the cavernous penthouse apartment, an echoing thud that has an air of finality.
The problem is, I think as I sink onto my bed, absolutely nothing is closed between Hendrix and I. I've spent the last five years trying to convince myself it was. And now, it takes one look from him and it's reopened, as if I just saw him yesterday.
Leaning back and closing my eyes, I try to stifle the flood of memories that comes rushing back – and the more than mixed feelings I have about seeing Hendrix again.
SIX YEARS, ELEVEN MONTHS AGO
I inhale deeply, the nicotine hitting my bloodstream and immediately making me feel slightly calmer, less on edge than I was a few minutes ago. I should feel better being out of the hellhole of a school I was in before, with all the military bullshit, but somehow I'm more annoyed than ever.
"Can I bum a smoke?" The voice belongs to a guy my age, flanked by two of his friends, who join me under the bleachers by the football field.
I shrug, holding out the pack of cigarettes. "If you want."
"This is Brandon," he says. "I'm Taylor."
"Hendrix," I say.
"You're Addison Stone's stepbrother, yeah?" Taylor asks, and I roll my eyes.
"Yeah," I say, sighing. "Lucky fucking me, right?"
Brandon laughs. "She's a hot piece of ass."
"I guess," I say, casual, nonchalant, as if I hadn't noticed. You'd have to be a blind man not to notice. "For a stuck-up bitch," I add. I don't know why I add that part. She hasn't actually been a bitch to me at all. She's tried to be nice, but she's one of those people who don't understand real life. I can tell that much about her. She's coddled and spoiled, a pretty girl who gets everything she wants. I hate that, so I hate her.