Nice and Easy: Boys of the Big Easy book three

by Erin Nicholas

  She gave them all a dazzling smile. His dazzling smile, as a matter of fact, Caleb thought with a scowl. She gave him that smile and he’d, apparently, thought it was just for him.

  He moved forward, extricating her from the other men’s holds and pulling her away slightly.

  “I’m so happy to see you! What are you doing here?”

  And suddenly she had her arms wrapped around his waist, her cheek against his sternum, and her breasts pressed against his diaphragm. Which had to have been why he was suddenly struggling to take a deep breath.

  They never hugged. In two years of shared childcare, chores, and being in each other’s lives, and homes, several times a week, they had never hugged. They were always picking up or dropping off kids and armfuls of supplies. They spoke for a few minutes about the kids, their schedules, anything that had happened. But they didn’t linger. They didn’t have in-depth conversations. They didn’t talk about themselves other than when their next shift was. Until support group night. Thursday nights, they spent two hours together talking about the challenges of parenthood and what was going on in their lives—like finishing nursing school and the loss of one of his fellow firefighters. But they were hardly alone there, either. The support group had several other members who had become not just friends, but family.

  So yeah, he and Lexi had never hugged. He’d never felt her breasts against his chest, her hips in his hands. He’d never been close enough to bend and kiss the top of her head.

  Which he didn’t do now, either. But it was by sheer force of will.

  They needed to get back to not hugging really soon.

  “You okay?” he asked, hesitating for just another few seconds, because dammit, those breasts felt really good right where they were.

  She tipped her head back to look up at him, but she didn’t loosen her hold on him.

  Her grin was wide and infectious. And a little drunk. “I’m so good,” she told him.

  “What’s going—”

  “She’s a fucking champ,” Zach Christy, one of the residents in the ER, and one of the guys who’d been standing around Lexi like he was paying her homage, said.

  And that was saying something about Lex, because Zach pretty much thought he was a god.

  “Oh yeah?” Caleb didn’t mind keeping his hands on Lexi, and hers on him, while Zach looked on for a moment. “What happened?”

  “She stepped in, no fear and—”

  “I pulled a shish kabob skewer out of a guy’s cheek!” she said over the top of Zach’s explanation.

  With another of those bright grins that Caleb had thought were reserved for him.

  Her eyes were sparkling and wide and Caleb had to actually hold himself back from kissing her right then and there.

  Damn. This happened from time to time. Usually when she was all excited over something one of the kids had done. When Shay got her ABCs right the first time. When Jack had said, “Mama”. When Shay had told Lexi she loved her. Every time she was so fucking gorgeous, it made him ache. And when Jack had taken his first steps, Caleb had actually lifted a hand, intending to cup the back of her head and pull her in. He’d stopped himself and scratched his nose instead, but it had been really close.

  There was something about her unabashed emotions that got to him. And probably the fact that her emotions were almost always happy or excited. She made him smile. Every time he saw her.

  She also made him want to push her up against the wall and kiss her senseless, and cup one of her magnificent breasts in his hand.

  Caleb took a huge breath and let go of her. As much as he liked the way Zach’s eyes narrowed checking out how Caleb held her, he needed space. She wasn’t actually his to hold like this. And he didn’t want Lexi getting any ideas.

  She had a crush on him, but what they had, the relationship that allowed them to both raise healthy, happy kids while going to school and working demanding-but-amazing jobs, was the most important thing in his life and he could not fuck it up.

  He set her back but gave her his full attention. “A shish kabob skewer? Seriously?”

  She moved back a few inches and nodded. “Yep. Guy’s best friend stabbed him with it at a barbecue and it went right into his cheek!”

  Caleb nodded. “I could imagine doing that to some of my friends.”

  She laughed. “Liar. But yeah, it was sticking out of his face and he was yelling—so I knew that he didn’t have any nerve damage—but he wouldn’t sit still because he’s still pissed off at his friend.”

  “He left the skewer in his cheek? He didn’t try to pull it out himself?” Caleb asked.

  She nodded, clearly enjoying the story. “Because he wanted “professionals” to see what his friend did. He drove himself to the ER.”

  “No one came with him?” Caleb couldn’t help but be caught up in the story. Firefighters, cops, and ER staffs had the most outrageous stories and they loved to sit around and one-up each other with them in social settings. He’d never done this with Lexi, though. It hadn’t even occurred to him that they could do this.

  Lexi shook her head with a little laugh. “He was pissed off and just got into his truck and drove himself down. His friends showed up right behind him, but he didn’t want to talk to any of them.”

  “So somebody had to get him to sit still and let them take the thing out, and Lexi stepped right up,” Zach said.

  Caleb watched as Lexi gave Zach a pleased, sort-of shy smile. It was clear that she liked Zach’s praise, though. Caleb frowned, but smoothed his expression quickly when she looked back to him.

  “Yeah, I started telling him about the time I pulled a butcher knife out of a guy’s shoulder.”

  “You pulled a butcher knife out of a guy’s shoulder?” Caleb interrupted. He’d never heard that story. But come to think of it, he hadn’t heard any stories about her work. He knew she loved her new job, but they didn’t spend time talking about specifics.

  That was too bad. Because this girl? This excited, proud-of-herself, amused, and confident woman standing in front of him? She was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

  Lexi laughed. “Yep. Last week. But—” She glanced at Zach. “I might have embellished it a bit.”

  Zach laughed. “Or a lot.”

  Caleb shook his head. Okay.

  “So anyway,” Lexi said, turning back to Caleb. “I was talking to him and making the story really dramatic and gory, which totally shut him up, and then I just leaned in and pulled it out. The guy barely flinched!”

  Caleb felt his eyebrows rise. He looked at Zach. “Yeah?”

  “Yep.” Zach grinned at Lexi. “She leaned in with those big brown eyes, smelling like bubblegum, and the guy was in his happy place.”

  Caleb frowned. She did smell like bubblegum, but he’d always assumed it was because she’d just given Shay a bath with the bubblegum bubble bath his niece loved. Lexi smelled like that all the time?

  “You flirted with him to get him to hold still?” Caleb asked her, suddenly wanting his hands back on her.

  She tipped her head. “How is telling a guy about cut-up muscle tissue and blood, flirting?”

  Because if she leaned close again, he’d definitely forget all about blood and other unpleasant things. That was the effect Lexi had on him. Her bright smile and stories about the kids and, yeah, the bubblegum smell, took away any smoke and ash and blood from his night at work. He hadn’t realized until that moment just how much he loved going home to her. She made things brighter and happier.

  And apparently, that wasn’t all just for him, either.

  “I guess not flirting exactly,” Caleb admitted. She didn’t do any of it on purpose. She wasn’t greeting him at the door with her big smiles and bubbliness because she was trying to make his homecoming pleasant. It was just who she was.

  Even when they’d first met, her cheerfulness had been present. There seemed to always be something going on that was making her life harder—her car breaking down, changes to her hours at the
bakery where she’d worked before starting nursing school, Jack’s colic. The girl hadn’t been able to catch a break. And yet, she’d smiled and she’d made everyone in the support group feel like they were smart and impressive and doing an amazing job parenting. They all loved her.

  “We were all so grateful she just took the guy on,” Zach said. “She was calm, cool, quick-thinking and sweet.”

  And Lex freaking blushed.

  Caleb felt himself scowling. Which was fine, because at the moment, Lexi was looking at Zach with a pleased, almost disbelieving expression. Disbelieving? She acted as if no one had ever given her a compliment before.

  “We definitely want her around full-time,” Zach said.

  Who wouldn’t want her around full-time?

  “But you have to get her drunk to talk her into it?” Caleb asked.

  Lexi looked up at him then and he had to pretend he’d been joking. He gave her a little smile.

  “This is my celebration party,” she said. “They just moved me from the float pool to the ER full-time. I want to work in the ER,” she told him. “It’s so exciting!” She glanced at Zach. “I think I’ve got quick reflexes because of Jack. You have to learn to move fast with a two-year-old.”

  Zach laughed. “I’ll bet. And you have to be good at thinking fast and being sweet but firm at the same time, right?”

  She grinned and nodded. “I guess I did kind of treat that guy like a toddler.”

  Zach reached out and squeezed her upper arm and Caleb had to hold back from pulling her away.

  “I’d say 99% of the guys who come into the ER can quite effectively be treated like toddlers. If they’re not drunk, they’re in pain or sick and you know men can be huge babies when it comes to that. Especially self-inflicted pain.”

  Caleb couldn’t argue with Zach’s assessment. The fire department responded to far more medical calls than fires.

  “And,” Lexi said, looking up at Caleb. “I can make more money down there and work my way up to the helicopter.”

  He knew St. Mike’s had a medical helicopter, but he’d had no idea that Lexi was interested in that. But hell, he hadn’t even realized that Lexi wanted to work in the ER. She’d been in the float pool for the past few months, which meant she was assigned to cover whatever unit needed extra help during her shift. He’d thought she was happy with seeing a little bit of everything and getting a lot of varied experience. But, he realized, he hadn’t known that she was happy there. He’d just assumed.

  “Wouldn’t that be cool?” she asked him, her eyes bright.

  It would be kick-ass. And he was having a hard time picturing Lexi at a mass casualty event, flying in, dealing with the broken bodies and blood. He was having a hard time picturing her yanking a metal skewer out of a guy’s face, too. But that was probably because when he saw her dealing with messes, they were of the mac-and-cheese or finger-paints-on-clothes or cupcake-frosting-all-over-the-kitchen variety. The times he saw her messy were colorful and sweet and with the kids. Not out at the site of a multi-car pileup where people were hurt and scared and bloody and dirty.

  “Yeah,” he forced himself to say. “Of course that would be cool.”

  And dangerous. And not even a little bubbly.

  She grinned at him as if he’d announced she’d won some big contest. That grin. That you-are-the-best grin that she gave him was his fucking weakness.

  “I have to have two years of experience first,” she said. “But I’m moving to the ER right away.”

  “We definitely need her,” Zach said.

  Caleb shot him a look as Lexi glanced at him. Back off, Zach. It wasn’t just the idea of talking Lexi into harder, more intense, and potentially more dangerous work. It was the tone in his voice that said maybe Zach didn’t just like Lexi’s nursing skills.

  Or Caleb could have been reading all of that into the situation because he felt stupidly possessive of the petite-yet-curvy bundle of happiness.

  “Maybe we should talk about blood and helicopters when you’re sober,” Caleb told her. “Might seem less cool when your brain isn’t swimming in schnapps.”

  She turned back to him quickly and wobbled slightly on the heels she was wearing.

  That was something else he never saw, he realized. The whole Lexi package tonight was throwing him off. With her hair down and her legs bare in short shorts and her feet in high heels and her eyes outlined with some kind of black something that was making them look bigger, he was having a hard time concentrating.

  It wasn’t as if he’d never seen her legs bare before. But, again, this skewer-pulling-blood-is-cool-hair-down Lexi was a sharp contrast to the Lexi he knew. That Lexi wore shorts but they were loose cotton. They went perfectly with her loose cotton T-shirts. The kind of thing you wore around the house when you were chasing two little kids and your day consisted of peanut butter and coloring books.

  These shorts…they weren’t loose. At all. They weren’t cotton, either. They were denim. Tight denim.

  “Not schnapps,” Lexi told him. “Bubblegum shots.” Then she looked back at Zach. And wobbled a little again. “Wait, is there schnapps in those?”

  Caleb raised an eyebrow at Zach. He held his hands up. “Ask Logan. He mixes ’em. But no schnapps.”

  “And Logan just handed you a shot?” Caleb asked Lexi, who had turned back to him again.

  Lexi shrugged and giggled. “Nope. Logan handed me three shots.”

  Caleb sighed. Three shots. That wasn’t nothing, but he had a feeling it was going to hit tiny, never-drinks Lexi hard. “I think three’s enough.”

  “It was actually four,” Zach said.

  “Four is definitely enough,” Caleb decided.

  She frowned. “I’m fine.”

  “Okay. Still, probably time to go get Jack and Shay,” he said.

  “Oh my God! Caleb!”

  A woman’s voice from behind him made him turn. It was Ana, one of the women he occasionally…hung out with. He’d met her here at Trahan’s, as a matter of fact, and she lived in the Quarter, which made it convenient to…hang out after work once in a while.

  “Hey,” he greeted her warmly. Ana was a gorgeous redhead. She was sexy, independent, and smart, and he enjoyed spending time with her. Naked time. They had some laughs, but their relationship consisted of a drink or two and then an orgasm or two. It was very simple.

  Caleb liked simple.

  And now, standing between Ana and Lexi, he was struck by just how perfectly he had his life set up.

  On one side, Lexi took care of things at home. They were raising their kids together, doing laundry for one another, sharing groceries, and helping each other with things like car repairs and potty training. It was nice. And easy. Being able to share chores and the run-of-the-mill daily tasks that needed done made his home life simpler; knowing Lexi was there with Shay and that the mail would be sorted and the toilets scrubbed made it easy for him to focus at work and not worry the way he would if Shay was with a babysitter or in a typical daycare situation. It also made coming home so much nicer. Chores were done, the house was running well, and he didn’t have a to-do list to worry about.

  And he did the laundry, toilet-scrubbing, grocery thing when he was off and Lexi was at work. It was like having a spouse to share the day-to-day burdens without the fights about money or trying to carve out date nights or arguing about where they were going to spend Christmas.

  On the other side was his social life. That was simple and straightforward as well. He could spend a hot, fun, no-strings-attached hour here and there with Ana and not worry about her not giving him a blow job because she was pissed that he didn’t get the dishwasher fixed.

  Not combining his home life with his social/sex life was really quite perfect.

  Nice and easy.

  Exactly the way he liked things.

  “I didn’t know you’d be in tonight,” Ana told him, lifting on tiptoe and pressing a kiss against his cheek.

  “I didn’t, either,” he
told her. “Just got off an extra-long shift.”

  “Need a beer to unwind?” she asked. Her hand was still resting on his arm and he felt the little squeeze that he knew meant she’d be up for unwinding him three blocks over in her apartment above the art gallery she managed.

  And strangely he didn’t feel the need to unwind after his shift. That was interesting. Usually after that many extra hours, he’d want exactly what Ana was offering. But he’d nearly forgotten about the shift. He’d been too focused on Lexi and all the amazing things that were going on with her. “Actually came down to pick up a friend,” he said. He glanced at Lex. The woman who made his home life so easy and steady.

  She was watching him and Ana, her arms crossed, a frown pulling her brows together.

  That made him straighten. What was that look about? She looked annoyed. Lexi almost never looked annoyed. And never at him.

  It had never occurred to him before but it was true. She didn’t get annoyed or mad at him.

  That was part of what made their setup so great. There really wasn’t anything for her to be annoyed or mad at him about. They had a very comfortable, mutually helpful, and supportive situation. Where Lexi thought he was a superhero.

  He supposed that made him her…friend. Though that seemed like a strange term. It was more like they were co-parenting without a messy breakup or rough divorce between them.

  And without the relationship, and sex, that had created the two little people they were parenting together.

  He cleared his throat. “Um, Ana, this is Lexi.”

  “Oh, Lexi,” Ana said with a smile. She held out her hand. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”

  Lexi’s frown deepened. “You have?”

  Caleb frowned, too. She had? He’d talked about Lexi to Ana? He supposed he’d mentioned her. But…why would he have mentioned her? Ana knew he was raising Shay, but that was about it, and he’d only mentioned his niece because she was the reason he rolled out of bed and got dressed shortly after “unwinding” with Ana. So when and why would he have talked about Lexi?