Taking It Easy: Boys of the Big Easy book two

by Erin Nicholas

  “Fifteen.”

  “Take your dress off.”

  She reached for the straps of her dress and pulled them down, revealing her skimpy, pale pink bra. “Best I can do.”

  “That’ll work.” He reached behind her for the hooks, as she reached for his fly.

  He had her bare breasts in his hands a moment later, as he felt his zipper give. He thumbed her nipples, making her arch and moan as she slid a hand into his boxers. He groaned at the contact. She had tiny hands. She had tiny everything—feet, ears, breasts. And he loved it all. He was six-one and had never felt particularly short with women, but Dana made him feel big and dominant and…dammit, manly. Cave-manly to be exact. Because he’d love nothing more than to throw her over his shoulder and carry her upstairs. He might even grunt as he did it.

  “Fourteen minutes,” she told him breathlessly.

  And she was a stickler for schedules. That was another way they were very different.

  “I could make you forget about whatever you’ve got going on,” he promised gruffly.

  “Nope.” She stroked her hand up and down his length, and he almost forgot what they were talking about. “Have to pick the girls up from school.”

  The girls. Right. Her kids. Because she was a mom. He was going to have to get better at schedules and stuff.

  “Well, then, we’d better get to it.” He reached under her dress, gripped the back of her panties and pulled them down. She kicked them off and he cupped her ass, lifting her. She wrapped her legs around his waist and he turned, walking them to his desk. The bricks of the one office wall not covered with filing cabinets and shelves were too rough for him to pin her against for what was about to happen.

  Just then, there was a knock on the door.

  Dana froze in his arms. Logan groaned. “What?” he shouted.

  It was his brother, Gabe. It had to be. He knew that Logan was in here with Dana. The bastard.

  “Logan? It’s Reagan.”

  Okay, it might not be Gabe.

  “Uh, just a second, Reagan,” he called.

  Logan looked down at Dana. Her previously unwrinkled dress was bunched below her breasts and above her thighs, her light brown hair with its perfectly applied gold highlights was wild around her shoulders, and her lips were pink, not from her never-without-it lipstick, but from his lips.

  He liked all of that. A lot.

  Of course, one of her perfect eyebrows was arched as well.

  “Our accountant,” he said.

  “She sounds pretty.”

  Reagan was, in fact, very pretty. “People can sound pretty?”

  Dana was already pushing him back and pulling her dress back into place. Without putting her bra back on first. Which meant she was in a hurry to get covered back up. Dammit.

  Okay, so he was a bit of a ladies’ man. A flirt. A playboy. But he was monogamous. And for the past nine months—he still thought that was awesomely ironic—the only woman he’d been interested in was Dana.

  Plus, Reagan wasn’t interested.

  He tucked himself back into his boxers and re-zipped, watching Dana run her hand through her hair and then a thumb over her lips. As if to wipe away his kiss.

  Yeah, well, she could do that. For now. But she was pregnant with his kid. There was no wiping that away.

  “She’s here for work,” he said.

  “Okay.” Her tone suggested that she didn’t care, but the fact that she wasn’t looking at him said otherwise.

  “Seriously. There’s no other reason for her to be here.”

  Dana snorted at that. “Okay.” That was said with a little more sarcasm at least.

  He reached out and snagged Dana’s elbow, pulling her around, and then up against him. “You have nothing to worry about.”

  She actually rolled her eyes at that. “I’m having a baby with a man I barely know, who is actually acting happy about it, who runs a bar and flirts with tourists like it’s his job.”

  “It is my job,” he said, lifting a shoulder. The women who came to New Orleans, particularly those who were checking out the bars in the French Quarter, were generally there for a good time. Part of that good time included delicious drinks and great music. Good-looking bartenders who had a Louisiana drawl and loved to flirt made it all that much better.

  Dana frowned. “It doesn’t matter.”

  It did. He could tell. She didn’t think he had it in him to take this seriously.

  But he was eighty percent sure that he could. At least seriously enough. He’d seen great parenting up close and personal. He wasn’t the same guy Gabe was, but Logan had helped out with Cooper a lot and had a great relationship with his nephew. He expected he’d have the same with his kid. “Would you prefer I was upset about the baby?” he asked.

  “I just want you to realize that this is a big deal. Huge, actually. Not something that will go away by next weekend.”

  And then he saw it. The flicker of vulnerability in her eyes. He was shocked by the streak of protectiveness he felt at the sight.

  He squeezed her arm. “It’s a huge deal,” he agreed. “A huge, happy deal.”

  She pressed her lips together and nodded. But she didn’t look convinced.

  “Look,” he said. “We’re in this together. I want to be involved, but I’ll follow your lead. I will take it seriously.” He paused. “For the next three weekends. At least.”

  That got a tiny smile from her. “You really will?” she asked. “You’ll really go along with what I think needs done?”

  “I will…definitely consider everything you think needs done,” he hedged. He dropped his hold on her. He and Dana were different people. They had different styles. That had been clear even in the limited time and circumstances he’d known her—namely at the monthly family get-together held by the single parent support group that she and Gabe were both a part of. Logan had seen her daughters. They played with Cooper and Stella at the get-togethers. He’d even handed one a cupcake once. So he knew who they were. One was named…Katie. No, Cori. No…Chloe. It was Chloe. He was pretty sure. And the other was… shit. He needed to call Addison ASAP.

  “You will consider everything I think needs done,” Dana repeated.

  “We’ll talk about all of it,” he promised. He sat back on the edge of the desk, striving for nonchalant. Something he never really needed to strive for, interestingly enough.

  “And then you’ll do what I think you should do,” she said.

  “We look at things differently,” he said. “I fully intend to help with everything, but I might do things my way once in a while.”

  “Your way?” She crossed her arms. “Do you even have a way?”

  He absolutely did. It was called “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff.” Logan had been watching Dana closely enough to know that she was firm with her daughters, but that she loved them very much. The girls were well-behaved and polite. But Dana was a smoother. She smoothed things over for people. Made things easier. But that also required effort and diligence from her. Logan didn’t do a lot of…diligence. He just did his thing and was lucky that people generally liked his way. “I’ve been around Cooper since he was born. And I’m with Stella a lot. I know what all of this is like.” And that a vast majority of things fell into the small-stuff category.

  “Being the fun uncle is different than being the father.”

  He shrugged. “It doesn’t have to be.”

  Her eyes went wide. “It does have to be. As the dad, you can’t be all fun and games all the time. And it’s full-time. It’s not just for a few hours here and there. It’s through all of it. There has to be rules and routines and—”

  “Dana,” Logan cut in, calmly but firmly. “We are doing this together. That means we both have a say.”

  She narrowed her eyes. “We can do partial custody,” she said.

  Logan felt an arrow of alarm go through him. “No. I want more than that.”

  “I don’t—”

  “Marry me.”


  Dana stopped with her mouth open. She stared at him. Yeah, well, he hadn’t been expecting to say that either, but the partial custody thing was a no-go. His mom had been a single mom. Gabe had been a single dad. They’d both done an amazing job, but it hadn’t been easy. Logan had seen his mom struggle at times. He saw how much happier Gabe was with a partner. This was going to be Dana’s third child. She wasn’t doing that alone.

  “Marry me,” he said again.

  “I’m not marrying you,” she said. She swallowed hard. “We barely know each other.”

  “We’ll get to know each other.”

  “You already pointed out that we’re very different. That will be hard enough as we parent together. If we get married, that means my girls too. Shared bank accounts, the same house. And…everything else.”

  Yes, it did. And he was okay with that. As long as he had full-time with his son or daughter, and Dana was no longer doing this alone. “It does. Let’s do it all.”

  “Logan, I can’t. It’s too much.”

  He felt panic welling up. He didn’t understand it. He didn’t know why he was suddenly feeling the need to get this all decided and her committed right now. Maybe because she was firm and rule-oriented. He was going to drive her crazy. Having a ring on her finger might make it harder for her to move and change her phone number after a few weeks outside of the bedroom with him.

  “It’s a lot,” he agreed. “But I can make it better.” Yes, there would be Cheetos’ dust, but he could make things easier for her. “Let me show you.”

  She stood, just looking at him.

  There was another knock at the door. “Logan?” Reagan called again. “Is everything okay?”

  “I’m not sure. I need another minute,” he told Reagan. He looked at Dana. Was everything okay?

  “How will you show me?” Dana asked.

  Logan felt his gut unknot slightly. “Let me be around. Let me…I’ll show you with your girls,” he said, a sudden lightbulb going on. “I’ll show you what kind of dad I can be with them.”

  “Chloe and Grace will be your guinea pigs?” she asked.

  Grace. He grinned. “I have a feeling those girls are pretty well-grounded already,” he said. “Surely I can’t screw them up too badly by helping you out a bit.”

  Dana studied him, clearly considering his words. Logan just let her process it.

  Finally, she uncrossed her arms. “Okay.”

  “Really?” Huh, that had been easier than he’d expected.

  She nodded. “Yes, really. You can help me out. With the girls. With the house. All that husband and father stuff you think you’ll be good at.”

  Okay, now they were getting somewhere. “That sounds great.”

  She nodded again. “Yeah. It actually does.”

  “And then we’ll talk about getting married in a couple of weeks.”

  She laughed. “Oh, it’s going to take a little longer than that.”

  Logan straightened from the desk and moved into her personal space. “You think so? Because there is some husband stuff I know for a fact you already think I’m good at.”

  He was gratified to see her cheeks get a little pink.

  She took a deep breath and blew it out. “Yeah, well, I’m going to consider that a perk of now having three children to take care of.”

  He gave her a slow grin. “One of many perks, babe. One of many.”

  She didn’t look impressed. “You realize I was referring to you as one of those children, right?”

  No, he hadn’t. “Does that mean you’ll be tucking me in every night?” he asked, letting his drawl deepen. She hadn’t said she liked his southern-boy sound, but her body had. He’d talked dirty to her in that slow, Louisiana, good-old-boy way, and she’d been putty in his hands. It often worked that way. He liked that Dana wasn’t an exception to every rule he knew about women.

  She swallowed but lifted her chin. “We’ll see.”

  She moved toward the door and he followed. “When do I start this audition?” he asked as she reached for the doorknob.

  “Dinner. Tomorrow night. Me and the girls. My house,” she said.

  “What can I bring?” he asked.

  “Wine,” she said, without hesitation. “A lot of wine.”

  He chuckled as she pulled the door open. Reagan was on the other side, looking worried and confused. And pretty.

  He sighed as Dana shot him a look. Yeah, yeah, okay. So his accountant was pretty. He’d actually been into her when they’d first met—as he was with most pretty women he met— but he’d stumbled over himself whenever she was around. He said stupid things, spilled drinks, dropped paperwork. He hadn’t been able to figure it out, until Reagan had told him that she was a lesbian. Suddenly his ineptness around her made sense.

  He knew three ways to relate confidently to females—seduce them, let them feed him, or play swamp boat tour captain with them. He was a huge hit with six-year-old Stella because of that last one—especially when he’d come home with three stuffed turtles that joined her congregation of stuffed alligators in her “bayou.” And yes, a group of alligators was called a congregation. Just one of the many things he’d learned from Stella and Cooper’s latest fascination.

  His mom and aunts obviously fell into the second category.

  Most other women fell into the first.

  Except Reagan. But once he knew why he couldn’t win her over, he’d stopped saying stupid things and dropping stuff. Now, with Reagan, he’d added one more way to relate to females—give her pep talks when she wanted to buy another woman a drink.

  “Turns out, everything is absolutely fine,” he told Reagan.

  “I see.” The sweet redhead was studying Dana with interest.

  “Um, mine,” he said, tapping Reagan on the top of her head.

  She turned back to him, eyes wide. “Oh?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Huh.”

  Okay, so him staking a claim on a woman was unusual. “Yeah. I even knocked her up just to be sure.”

  Reagan made a choking sound, but Dana’s heavy sigh pulled his attention away from his accountant.

  “Really?” Dana asked. “Wouldn’t it be easier to just get me a T-shirt to wear around?”

  “One that says, Most fertile woman in NOLA?” Logan asked, grinning widely. He did love her sass. And she seemed to have adjusted to the whole pregnancy thing pretty quickly.

  “I think it would be more accurate if it said, Drawls make me stupid,” she returned.

  That did nothing to lessen his grin. Or his feeling of happiness. “There are a lot of boys around here who might want to test that out,” he said, his own drawl thick. “I think Logan Trahan impregnated me would be more direct.”

  Dana rolled her eyes. “Thank you for not saying Logan Trahan’s Baby Mama.”

  “Oh, I like that a lot,” he returned.

  “I need to go.”

  “I’ll see you tomorrow night,” he said cheerfully, watching her walk away.

  Suddenly she stopped and swung around. “Dammit!”

  “What?”

  “I can’t have wine tomorrow night.”

  He started laughing. “Sorry, babe.”

  “No, you’re not.” She turned and headed out the door, slamming it behind her.

  And no, he wasn’t. Not even a little.

  2

  “So it’s okay to give him a trial run?” Dana directed the question mostly at the men in the group.

  Caleb, the firefighter who was raising his niece, nodded at her question. “Definitely okay to test things out with him.”

  “Really?” She didn’t know why, but she needed to know that it was okay to not fully trust Logan to be the perfect father right off the bat. And that it was okay to offer her daughters up as trial subjects in his quest to prove to her he could handle it.

  The fact that tonight was the night her single parent support group met was not a coincidence. She’d suspected she might be pregnant a few days ago, but she�
�d waited to take the test until that morning so she could go and tell Logan and then come here for advice right after.

  But she hadn’t expected to need advice about Logan wanting to be fully involved, however. Involved even with her girls. Or that he would have suggested they get married. She’d been expecting…well, she didn’t know. Even now. That was one of the things about getting pregnant with Logan—she didn’t know him very well.

  Predictably, however, the group had been supportive when she told them about the baby and happy for her once she convinced them that she was happy.

  And she was.

  She’d been anxious up to taking the test. She’d been irritated when the test turned positive—they’d used a condom. Every time. But now she was feeling a little sheepish actually. What grown woman, mother of two, accidentally got pregnant these days? Well, one who hadn’t worried about birth control in about eleven years. And one who thought a grown man who was one of the best tourist attractions in the French Quarter would know how to use a condom.

  She almost rolled her eyes at that. But then realized that there was no way Logan hadn’t used the condom correctly. He was, by all counts, an expert. At least, there were lots of very satisfied women leaving New Orleans because of him, and he had no other children…that she knew of.

  It seemed that this baby was meant to be.

  And a little bit of her heart had swelled at that thought. Yes, she was happy in general.

  She’d wanted more kids. Grace had only been four when Chad had been killed. Dana had assumed when he was home again, they’d get pregnant. So the idea of having three kids wasn’t something that worried her. The motherhood thing was nothing new. She’d been doing that for ten years now, pretty much. Alone. Technically, she’d been a single mom for only two, but Chad had been deployed on and off for most of their marriage, so she’d never had a full-time partner. She’d been on her own for most of both pregnancies and had even done the delivery thing alone once. She could handle that part.

  But this baby wasn’t Chad’s. It was Logan’s. And Logan was very much around and wanted to be involved.