Going Down Easy (Boys of the Big Easy #1)(14)

She sighed and looked up at him, pressing her lips together.

“Don’t leave.”

“I . . .” She swallowed, then lifted her chin and met his eyes. “I’m not interested in any of that. I’m sorry.”

She wasn’t really sorry. It was perfectly fine for her to not want to get married and have more kids with him. But she was sorry that this was going to be the end of Gabe and her. It was just one more way that being a mom screwed with things. She loved Stella. Her daughter was a bright, shining star full of energy and happiness and love, and she made Addison look at the world in new ways and had shown her a kind of love that Addison had never imagined before. Nine times out of ten, Addison would rather be with Stella than anyone else.

But there was that one time out of ten when Addison missed being an adult with full control over her routine and her time. Put bluntly, Stella got in the way of some things. Like moving to London. Getting a full night’s sleep if there was even the tiniest rumble of thunder. Having a kitchen table that didn’t have swipes of marker and gouges from scissors. Spending the weekend with nothing but wine and Netflix. Having a hot fling with a New Orleans bartender.

But heaven forbid Addison actually express any of that. It was the biggest parental sin to actually admit that having a kid was downright exhausting and not always fun. She’d learned that the hard way. She didn’t have many friends who were parents—that was probably part of the problem. Women who weren’t moms but wanted to be couldn’t imagine the emotions that bounced back and forth between incredible love and extreme frustration. Almost constantly. And the few women she did know who were mothers were those supermoms who had reproduced multiple times, did it all, and loved every second of it.

She really needed some new friends.

Where were all the parents who would lay down their lives for their children but who also cherished a trip to the damned grocery store alone just so they could have some time to themselves? She couldn’t be the only mom who had skipped out of work early so she could make the grocery-store trip alone while her kid was still in day care. And who grabbed her favorite box of cookies off the shelf and ate them as she shopped so she wouldn’t have to share. And had stopped just short of grabbing a bottle of wine and uncorking it in aisle four.

She needed to find those moms to hang out with.

Wasn’t it possible to love your kid with all your heart and still sometimes resent that every meal decision had to include vegetables that a five-year-old would eat without argument, that every page in her day planner included something involving a doctor’s appointment, day care, or a play date, and that every weekend had to include educational and mentally stimulating activities?

“Okay, it’s too soon to talk about marriage and twins,” Gabe said. “Fine. Let’s talk about having dinner tomorrow night. We can introduce Stella and Cooper.”

Oh my God. Her stomach dropped like she’d gone over the top of a roller coaster. She started shaking her head. “No. Definitely not. Absolutely not.”

Gabe frowned. “I’ll cook.”

Yeah, because the idea of cooking was what was sending her into a panic.

Though, yeah, the idea of cooking for two more people, one of whom was another five-year-old who, with her luck, would hate all three of the vegetables that Stella would actually touch, did actually make her feel like she could break out in hives at any moment. “I don’t want to have dinner with you and Cooper,” she said. “I don’t want to meet Cooper. I don’t want you to meet Stella.”

Clearly, being up front, straightforward, and even blunt was how she was going to handle this. Because she really needed Gabe to get this. And because the dread over dating a man who had a kid was very real and was short-circuiting her ability to be calm and reasonable.

Gabe was clenching his jaw again. The only time she’d really seem him do that before today was when he was struggling to maintain control when she had him in her mouth or was the one on top setting the pace. She loved that look on his face. Until now.

Now it was clear he was similarly struggling with control, but she didn’t really want to see him lose his cool in this case.

“Want to explain to me how come you keep showing up in my bar and spreading your legs for me, but you don’t want to meet my son or introduce me to your daughter?” he asked in a tight, low voice.

Did she? No, not really. And if she’d only showed up and spread her legs for him once, she wouldn’t. But she had kept going back to the bar. She’d had the power to end this a long time ago, and she hadn’t. So she supposed she owed him an explanation.

And that explanation might be exactly what she needed to get this let’s-live-happily-ever-after idea out of his head. Usually just the idea of Stella was enough for most guys to call it quits. But if Gabe was a devoted father who wanted to be a husband and family man, then her attitude about the whole thing would probably be enough to turn him right off.

“Okay, look, when we first got together, it was a surprise to me. I don’t do hookups. But the chemistry was off the charts and I was high on New Orleans and you were safe. You lived far away, and it didn’t seem like your first one-night thing with a girl who happened into your bar,” she told him.

She knew—then and now—that she was stereotyping the charming, southern French Quarter–bartender thing, but that was honestly part of the reason she’d stuck around when he’d asked her to, and gone upstairs with him after last call. That and his abs. And ass. And those freaking blue eyes that made her want to take her clothes off and watch them dilate with want.