Going Down Easy (Boys of the Big Easy #1)(26)

Oh boy, so Addison hadn’t made a friend in Lindsey. She opened her mouth, but Roxanne got there first.

The other woman sat forward in her chair. “Well, I signed up for it, too. In fact, it took us more than a year to get pregnant with our third. But that doesn’t mean that I have to like my kids every second of every day or that I never think they’re brats. I love them, completely. And I’ll protect them from everything—including turning into little assholes.”

Addison felt her eyes widen, and she realized that everyone else in the group seemed equally surprised. Okay, so maybe this group wasn’t about blatant honesty and they did focus more on the positive and encouraging. And maybe she’d just broken it.

But a moment later, Caleb said, “I cut Shay’s hair the other day because I can’t, no matter what I do, figure out how to do a good braid or ponytail. And every time I try, she gets mad because it looks terrible, and she cries for an hour. After I cut it, she cried for six hours. But I’m not even sorry.”

Roxanne gave him a grin, and even Lindsey laughed lightly at that.

Lexi, one of the teens, said, “I’ll teach you how to braid.”

Caleb gave her a half smile. “You braiding her hair when you babysat was what started the whole thing.”

Lexi laughed. “Sorry. Tell you what, you have me babysit this weekend, and I’ll convince her that her short hair is super cute and awesome.”

Caleb’s smile stretched, and he nodded. “Deal.”

Something squeezed in Addison’s chest, and because she couldn’t seem to help it, she looked across the circle at Gabe. Who was watching her. With a smile. He gave her a single nod that somehow she knew meant “Everything’s okay.” How she knew that’s what it meant, she couldn’t say, and how he knew that she’d been worried that things were not okay, she didn’t know, but she strongly felt that momentary connection with him.

“Okay, so in summary,” Roxanne said, allowing Addison to tear her eyes from Gabe and focus on the other woman, “all kids can be jerks sometimes, and we love them anyway, and we have to keep feeding them and brushing their hair, but we don’t have to always put up with their shit. And we don’t have to be sorry when we don’t.”

“Amen,” Bea said.

“Amen,” Austin agreed with a smile.

Lindsey and Dana didn’t add their agreement, but they also didn’t argue.

“Okay, what else?” Corey asked the group. “Anyone have anything they want to talk about?”

Gabe shifted forward on his chair, resting his forearms on his thighs. “I do.”

Everyone immediately focused on him, and Addison almost rolled her eyes. It was very obvious that everyone here loved Gabe.

“Great. What’s going on?” Corey asked.

“Well, as you know, there’s this woman I’ve been seeing.”

What? Addison felt her stomach flip. He was going to talk about her? Right now? In front of her? And “as you know” indicated he’d already talked about her with this group. Oh boy. She bit her bottom lip and vowed to just stay quiet and not react to whatever was about to come. But this was low. Really low.

“The woman from New York?” Corey asked.

They even knew where she was from? Addison tried to remember if she’d mentioned where she’d moved from when she’d introduced herself.

“Yep,” Gabe confirmed.

“You always light up when you talk about her,” Bea said with a smile. “I know you really like her. Are things going well?”

If Gabe had scripted this and given these people exactly the right words to say to hit Addison directly in the chest, those would have been them. He’d not only talked about her but lit up when he did? They could tell he really liked her? Sure, that was going to be easy to ignore. Clearly, Addison needed to stop coming to this group immediately.

Gabe nodded. “I do really like her.”

He hadn’t looked directly at her yet, and Addison was grateful for that.

“And now she’s moved here.”

“Oh, honey, that’s great,” Bea said enthusiastically. “I’m so happy for you.”

Gabe gave her a smile that was sincerely affectionate, and Addison had to swallow hard. He was such a great guy. Dammit.

“Well, it’s kind of a problem, actually,” Gabe told her.

“Come on, don’t be that guy,” Austin said. “Just let it get serious. Give it a try. What’s the worst that can happen?”

Caleb and Corey both nodded their agreement.

“Well, thanks for automatically assuming I’m the one who’s commitment phobic,” Gabe said drily.

Addison frowned. She wasn’t commitment phobic, if that’s what he was insinuating. Which, of course, he was. She was just having-another-kid phobic. Okay, so maybe that was a little commitment phobic.

Caleb gave a short laugh. “Dude, you are commitment phobic. That’s not an assumption.”

Addition looked at Caleb. Okay, that was interesting. Not only that Gabe didn’t commit easily but that it was a well-known fact. Because the guy at lunch talking about getting their kids together and kind of joking about long engagements sure as hell hadn’t seemed allergic to getting serious. Quite the opposite.

“Yeah, okay, maybe I have been. But not now. Not with her.”