Going Down Easy (Boys of the Big Easy #1)(8)

“We’re excited to see your ideas,” Logan told her. “You know that this project has been on our minds for a while.”

“And your grandmother’s,” Elena said with a laugh.

Both men nodded. “And our grandmother’s,” Logan agreed.

“Well, come on back to the conference room,” she said. “I’ll be leading the meeting with a couple of our architects sitting in. We also have Mason Gary, one of our lead contractors, coming in. He’ll be the one on-site with you. And Travis will stop in too.” Travis Monroe was Elena’s partner. He’d actually started the company about ten years before Elena had joined him straight out of school. Travis was well known in the Quarter, having done the restoration on several historic buildings. His love of the city and its unique architecture was well established.

Which meant that Gabe and Logan probably would have chosen Monroe & LeBlanc anyway. But yes, Addison’s encouragement had mattered to Gabe. As stupid as that was. He had no idea if Addison was a good architect. All he really knew was that between her legs was his favorite place to be.

And he had to remember that. All he really knew about her was sexual and physical stuff. The other stuff, the softer, sweeter, I-really-like-her stuff was mostly in his head.

Except the thing where no other woman had ever fit up against him as well as she did. And how, even though she didn’t like to cuddle, in her sleep, she always sandwiched one of his feet between hers. And how he only got grunts if he tried to talk to her before her first cup of coffee in the morning but that at night, after just one Pimm’s cup, she was exceedingly chatty.

Those seemed like intimate things. Like more-than-a-fling things.

But then he also had to remember that even when she was chatty, it was never about anything too personal. She kept all that locked down tight.

And that was beginning to irritate him more and more.

“Gabe?”

He heard Elena saying his name and focused. They were now in the conference room—he didn’t even remember the walk through the hallways—a huge room with glass all around. Three of the walls were windows looking out over New Orleans, the fourth was a glass wall between the conference room and the hallway outside.

“Sorry. Yeah?” he asked.

“Can I get you anything? Coffee? Water?”

Bourbon. He really wanted a bourbon. “Coffee would be great.”

“Black?”

The only time he drank it any other way was with milk at Café du Monde with Addison . . . “Yes. Black. Definitely black. Very black.”

Damn, he needed to get over the sweet brunette with the amazing mouth. The mouth that never told him anything personal, never asked him anything personal, never talked to him on the phone, never said anything like, “I’ll miss you.”

The sweet brunette who had just walked past the conference room.

Gabe lunged for the door as Addison passed the glass wall, her head bent over an open folder. Her long, dark hair was pulled back—because after he’d joined her in the shower, he’d been unable to help bending her over his bathroom vanity and taking her from behind while she watched in the mirror, and she hadn’t had time to style it.

“Addison!”

She was halfway down the hall, but he saw her freeze, her back going ramrod straight. She didn’t turn immediately, and Gabe frowned, stalking toward her.

“Addison,” he repeated.

She turned then, a big smile on her face. But this smile was new. He knew her oh-my-God-I’m-happy-to-see-you smile. She gave it to him one Saturday a month when she took her place at the end of his bar after not seeing him for thirty days.

This was not that smile.

“Gabe.” She didn’t, however, seem surprised to see him.

He stopped in front of her, far too close for two people who were simple acquaintances running into each other in a public hallway. “Did you get the flowers?”

Her gaze softened momentarily. “I did. They’re gorgeous.”

“Good. I was hoping to run into you.”

That did make her eyes flicker with surprise. “Really? You didn’t mention that you were coming in here today.”

“I forgot that Logan and I had a meeting scheduled with Elena. We decided to go with Monroe and LeBlanc for the restoration.”

She nodded. “Elena told me this morning. After wondering who the flowers were from. And after wondering if you’d hired them because we were sleeping together.”

He blinked at her. “Oh.”

Addison lifted an eyebrow. “Yeah, oh.”

“I . . .” He ran a hand through his hair. “I didn’t think of that. I just wanted to send you something.”

She tipped her head. “Why?”

“What do you mean, ‘why’?”

“We’ve been doing . . . this . . . for a while now,” she said. “Why are you suddenly sending me stuff today?”

“It just occurred to me.” He lifted a shoulder. He’d wanted her thinking of him. And knowing he was thinking of her. It was as simple, and as complicated, as that. And he wasn’t sure this was a good time to share that thought process with her. Then he said, “I was thinking of you and wanted you to know it,” anyway.

She looked surprised, then pleased, then annoyed. All three emotions flashed across her face within a few seconds. Gabe was kind of impressed.