“You want to ride on a boat and go out and see real alligators?” Gabe reiterated. He was all for it. It sounded like a good time to him. He’d been on an airboat on the bayou before, and it was great. And he’d love to see Cooper getting more active with things he was into.
But suddenly Cooper was looking like he was having second thoughts. “The muscles that open an alligator’s mouth are really weak,” he said. “A human can hold an alligator’s mouth shut. But they are super strong closing. Like if they close on something and don’t want to let go, no way can a human can’t get their jaw open.”
Gabe just said, “Wow, really?” knowing that Cooper was processing everything.
Cooper nodded. “They don’t usually attack humans, but they can. If they feel scared or have to protect their territory.”
“Cooper,” Gabe said. When his son looked at him, he went on. “I would never let anything happen to you. If we went on a boat ride, you would be totally safe.”
Cooper nodded. But his mental wheels were clearly still turning.
“I think it would be really fun,” Caroline said. “There are a few companies. We’d have to pick one.”
Suddenly, Logan jumped with an oomph. Then he nodded and said, “I think it sounds really cool, and I know a guy who does those kinds of tours.”
Apparently, Caroline had kicked Logan under the table on the other side. Gabe smirked, then lifted his glass of tea to hide his smile. He was going to have some bruised shins tomorrow.
“You do?” Cooper asked Logan.
“I do. His name is Sawyer. He’s a great guy.”
Cooper’s brow furrowed, and he frowned at his plate. Then he looked at Gabe. “You think I should go?”
Gabe didn’t know where Cooper’s cautious side came from. It wasn’t from him or Logan, that was for sure. They’d climbed trees, played ball, gotten dirty, had grass stains—hell, bloodstains—on their clothes regularly, and had even broken a couple of bones each. And Cooper’s mom had been wild and fun and carefree. Gabe had first been attracted to her because she’d pulled up outside the bar on a Harley.
But Cooper didn’t want to dig in the dirt or go swimming or climb up on, well, anything at all. He would jump and spin around with lightsabers or swords, depending on if he was into Star Wars or pirates at the time, but for months he’d resisted even getting on the tricycle Gabe had gotten him when he was three. Now he would ride his bike with Gabe in the evenings, but only when Gabe insisted, and even then he sometimes had to give a health-and-wellness lecture before Cooper would grudgingly head outside.
“Buddy,” Gabe said sincerely, “you don’t have to do it if you don’t want to. I think it would be cool, and I’d be happy to take you, but I don’t want you to be scared.”
Cooper twirled his fork in his potatoes, clearly pondering. Finally, he nodded. “I’ll think about it.”
Gabe shot his mother a glance. She was frowning as she chewed. “Yeah, you think about it,” Gabe told Cooper. “Let me know, okay? We can look up some information online later. I’ll bet the companies have photos of what the tours are like. Then you can get an idea.”
Cooper nodded, his frown easing a little. “Okay.”
A few minutes later, Cooper had eaten all his beans and chicken and asked to be excused. Gabe knew he’d head straight for the computer and start looking at swamp-boat tour companies. Gabe gave permission and then scooted his chair back and started gathering dishes from the table.
“Gabe,” Caroline said, halting him as Cooper disappeared into the living room.
He paused with a plate in each hand. “Yeah?”
“I really think the swamp-boat tour would be good for him.”
Gabe frowned. “Okay. We’re going to look into it.”
“But he’s going to see photos of people outside on boats, with life preservers on, touching alligators, and he’s going to change his mind,” Caroline said.
“You looked up companies already?” Gabe asked.
“I did. I wanted to know more about it before I suggested it.”
Gabe appreciated that. “And the photos include the life preservers, huh?”
“They do.”
That would freak Cooper out for sure. He wasn’t someone who looked at stuff like that and thought, Oh, good, they’re all about safety. He’d probably see that as, Well, it looks like there’s a pretty good chance we’re going to end up on the bottom of the bayou.
“And they touch the alligators?” Gabe asked.
Caroline nodded. “Baby ones. The photos show someone holding it and then kids petting it.”
“Great,” Gabe muttered. He was sure that most kids would find that exhilarating. Cooper would stare at it and try to figure out how much of his hand the baby alligator could take off in one chomp. “So I guess that’s out.”
“No,” Caroline said firmly. “That’s not what I’m saying. I’m saying that you should definitely take him. He needs to get out there and quit worrying about stuff so much.”
“You don’t think I wish he’d do that?” Gabe asked. “Don’t you know how much I wish he’d get out there and get his hands dirty and try new things?”
“Then you need to encourage it,” Caroline said.
Gabe sighed. “I can’t make him do things that scare him.”
“Yes, you can. You acknowledge that there are sometimes risks, but that you’ll keep him safe and that the people who run the swamp tours know what they’re doing. He’s never going to get over this worry and being so damned careful about everything if you, the man he looks up to the most in the world, don’t start pushing him.”
Gabe’s frown deepened. “My job is to keep him safe and make him feel secure and taken care of.”
“Your job is to teach him,” Caroline argued. “And yes, teaching him that he can depend on you and that you’ll take care of him is important, but so is teaching him that taking risks can be worth it and what to do when things do go wrong. Because they will, and if he’s never done anything, he won’t know how to handle it.”
“He’s five!” Logan suddenly exclaimed. “Why would you make him do something that you know is going to freak him out? There are plenty of things that freak him out that we’re not expecting.”
Caroline and Gabe both looked at Logan with matching surprised expressions.
“You don’t think he needs to be encouraged to be more . . . outgoing?” Caroline asked.
“I think we need to let Coop be Coop,” Logan said.
Gabe again had the niggling thought about parenting alone versus with a team. Sure, there were things that would be easier on his own. But what if he was wrong? Did Addison ever wonder about that? When she was making all the decisions, did she ever doubt herself? But now, looking from his mother, whom he loved and respected immensely, to his brother, who was actually saying what Gabe was thinking, he didn’t know how helpful this really was. Who did he listen to?
This was why he was grateful for the support group. They were all in the same boat. He’d bring it up Thursday for sure.
And again, he thought about Addison. She didn’t have a support system like he did. She didn’t think she needed or wanted one. But how could she not? He really didn’t get that.
Caroline sat back in her chair. “I don’t know what to do with him,” she said.
Gabe focused on his mother and felt his chest tighten. “What do you mean you don’t know what to do with him?” he asked. Dammit, he didn’t like that. Caroline was supposed to know exactly what to do. Gabe was counting on her to know.
She shook her head. “I just mean that he’s nothing like either of you. You were rambunctious and probably heard ‘Slow down,’ ‘Quiet, boys,’ and ‘Be careful’ from me more than any other words when you were growing up.”
Logan nodded. “That and ‘If you end up dead, don’t blame me.’”
Caroline swatted his arm, but she was smiling. “Cooper’s just so different from you boys.”
“So he’s different,”
Logan said. “It’s because he’s smarter than we were. He knows being bitten by an alligator would suck and breaking a bone would suck and getting stitches would suck before they happen. Because he’s thought about it all ahead of time. His brain works at a million miles an hour. Most kids don’t think about consequences. So they go and do stupid shit and learn the hard way not to skateboard down steep hills,” he said, pointing to a scar on his forehead that had come from hitting the side mirror of a pickup while skateboarding down a steep hill. “And not to jump out of trees without a soft spot to land,” he said, rubbing his shin where he’d broken a bone jumping out of a tree onto hard dirt.
“Or that goading your brother and underestimating his pitching arm can have bad consequences,” Gabe added, pointing at Logan’s nose. That Gabe himself had broken when Logan had called him a pussy and Gabe had thrown an orange at him.
“I’ll bet Cooper already knows that being hit in the face with an orange would fucking hurt,” Logan said, rubbing his nose.
Caroline rolled her eyes, but she was grinning. “So you’re chalking Cooper’s being careful up to his being smart, not because Gabe babies him?”
“I don’t baby him,” Gabe said, scowling at his family members.
Caroline laughed, and Logan said, “Oh, you totally baby him.”
“You just said we should let Coop be Coop,” Gabe pointed out.
“Yeah, we should,” Logan said. “But that’s not why you baby him. If you were just letting him do his thing because it was his thing, that’s fine. But you do it because you don’t want to deal with him being scared or upset or hurt or sick.”
“What?” Gabe demanded, setting the plates back down on the table.
Logan seemed totally unfazed. “You’re the fun guy. The cuddly guy. The guy who wants to play and make him laugh and who loves to listen to him go on and on about whatever he’s into now. You hate when there’s anything negative going on.”
“Well, yeah,” Gabe said, putting his hands on his hips. “It’s bad for me to want my kid to be happy and healthy?”
“Of course not,” Logan said with a frown. “But you’re phobic of anything but sunshine and rainbows. Mom deals with most of the hard stuff.”
Gabe stared at his brother. Then looked at his mom. She didn’t rush to deny it, but she did say, “Logan,” as if warning him to stop.
“Okay, so I need to take my kid on a swamp-boat tour to help him face his fears about alligators—which, by the way, is probably a really healthy fear—to prove that I can handle the negative stuff, too?” Gabe asked.
“Being scared of the real world is not a healthy fear,” Logan said.
“He’s not—” But Gabe broke off. He didn’t know that Cooper was exactly afraid of the real world, but he wasn’t that interested in it, either. Which was fine. That was just Cooper. Probably. Wasn’t it? “Whatever. I’ll talk to him about the fucking alligators.”
He grabbed the plates again and stomped into the kitchen.
And, unbidden: What would Addison do? flashed through his mind.
Fuck. That was the last thing he needed . . . to be thinking about the woman who wanted nothing to do with Cooper. And nothing to do with Gabe because of Cooper.
Shit. He had to quit thinking about her. He shouldn’t care what she would do. She’d broken things off. She’d made her feelings very clear. He didn’t have to like it, but it was her prerogative to not want to date a guy with a kid. And for all he knew, she was the world’s worst mother anyway. But that didn’t sit right the second he thought it. Because of the way she ate beignets.
Yeah, that sounded stupid even in his head. But it was true. He was basing his opinion of her parenting on how she ate beignets.
She always pulled out wet wipes and cleaned the table before she sat. She covered her lap with a napkin so that she didn’t get powdered sugar on her pants. She pulled her hair back and secured it with a clip she always had in her purse so that she could lean in over the table and not get her hair in her food. But once she had those beignets in front of her, she went for it. She cleaned up afterward, but she didn’t let a little powdered sugar get in the way of her enjoyment. And damn, watching her lick powdered sugar from her fingers was one of the hottest things he’d ever seen.
It was how she ate crawfish, too. And how she enjoyed the city. And how she had sex.
She was completely prepared, but she didn’t shy away. She twisted and sucked crawfish, just like a native. But she always put the plastic bib on first. She used lots of sunscreen and kept her purse close so it couldn’t be pickpocketed, but that didn’t keep her from roaming all over New Orleans. She took it upon herself to be in charge of the condoms during sex, along with a second form of birth control, but once she rolled that baby on, she went for it.
Yeah, that was Addison Sloan. She was smart and prepared and in charge . . . but she didn’t let it stop her from having a good time.
That had to be how she parented, too. Carefully permissive. She’d let Stella run free . . . as long as Addison could see her and get to her if there was a problem.
Gabe could definitely take a couple of lessons from her. Lessons in how to make his son feel secure while still exploring and trying new things.
He should call her.
Gabe scrubbed a hand over his face. He couldn’t call her. For one, it would sound pathetic. “Hey, Addison, I know you don’t want to date me or even fuck me anymore, but maybe you could help me be a better dad.” Yeah, that would go over well. It would also sound like an excuse to see her. Which it would be. In part. Though he really would love to know how she’d handle Cooper and the alligators . . .
But no. What he needed to do was get the hell over her. Forget about her. Move on.
So, of course, he pulled out his phone and ordered a gift basket to be delivered to her office with a special invitation on the card.
Chapter Four
She would do anything for a great praline.
She wasn’t proud of it. It wasn’t something she wanted just anyone to know, because it could be used against her. But it was true. A fresh praline from the Magnolia Praline Company was the way to her heart.
Addison bit into one and moaned. And read the card again. “Welcome to New Orleans! Join us for our weekly meeting of the Single-Parents Support Group. This week’s meeting will be on Thursday at seven p.m. at the community center on Beacon Street.”
A single-parents support group? She’d never been a part of a support group before. But then again, the words support and group weren’t really a part of her vocabulary. She didn’t do things by committee. She didn’t ask for opinions from girlfriends about her clothes, she didn’t ask for input on her designs at work, and she certainly didn’t ask for advice about parenting. She’d let someone else have a say in Stella’s life once before. And he’d fucked everything up. So she was done with that.
She didn’t even ask her parents for help.
Her parents—her father, in particular—had taught Addison and her sister from a young age all about taking care of their own business and dealing with the consequences of their actions. Addison had experienced it herself in small lessons. Like the time she’d had to write an apology note to their neighbor for picking some of her flowers. Or the time she’d had to sit and wait for an hour outside of her school because she’d been messing around with her friends and had missed her ride home. Being the CEO of the company, her father could have, of course, left immediately, but he’d waited until five o’clock to pick her up because then it could be a learning experience.
Her sister, Angela, on the other hand, had been a slower learner. Or more stubborn about learning. She’d been arrested twice—once for shoplifting and once for underage drinking—and had spent the night in jail both times before their father bailed her out. Angela had failed her freshman year of college and lost her scholarship, and their father had informed her that she would need to get a job and an apartment and would have to figure out a way to either get her deg
ree or support herself, because she’d messed up her chance at doing it all for free.
So when Addison had gotten pregnant, she’d known that, while her parents would be there to help babysit and would come to Stella’s birthday parties and would even start a college fund for her daughter, it was up to Addison to support her child and be the primary caregiver.
And that was exactly what had happened. They’d helped out with babysitting, even helped take care of her when she was sick and Addison needed to work. They’d helped pay for the swanky preschool that her father had felt was important. But not only had Addison never even considered moving in with them, they never would have offered.
Addison frowned. Where had that thought come from?
But she knew. It was Gabe. The man she couldn’t stop thinking about even a week after their lunch. It didn’t help that everything about the town she now lived in reminded her of him. From the balconies on the buildings she was working on to the magnolia trees all over town, everything made her think of Gabe.
But Gabe had a son. And lived with his mom, who helped raise that son. And Gabe thought that he and Addison would make the perfect couple because they were both single parents of five-year-olds.
Who had a really great time together.
And who had chemistry unlike anything she’d ever experienced before.
Yeah, yeah, okay, so on paper that sounded perfect. Dammit. She reached for another praline. They did have a great time together and had amazing chemistry. Minus the two kids, she’d be all over him probably.
But there was no taking the kids out of the equation. So that was that.
Still, she couldn’t help wondering what Gabe’s son was like. Was he a big blue-eyed charmer like his dad? He almost had to be. He didn’t have a mom who might lend another perspective and balance some of that I’m-a-hell-of-a-good-time vibe that Gabe exuded. Then again, he did have his grandmother. It sounded like Gabe’s mom was a constant, steady presence. And then again, Logan was also involved. Lord, if the kid’s two main male influences were Gabe and Logan Trahan, the five-year-old probably already had girls lined up around the block.
Going Down Easy (Boys of the Big Easy) Page 7