The minute his hand made contact with her soft skin, the sexual tension between them, hovering beneath the surface most times, had burst free.
He’d wanted to capture her small pink tongue when it’d snaked out to lick the bottom rim of her full lips. To suckle on those lush lips of hers was a fantasy he’d had for nine long months.
Davis adjusted himself in his seat. He mentally begged his cock not to thicken any more than it already had inside the tight confines of his Levi’s.
He had to focus on his reason for coming to her, and ignore his raging lust for her. Milly had been right, he needed her help.
She was so damn young. Seemingly too young to give advice about life to teenage girls.
He was disgusted with himself. She wasn’t jailbait, but couldn’t be much older than twenty-four or twenty-five years old at the oldest. Definitely too young for his thirty-seven years.
His eye roved over her lush ass when she stood up from her chair, walked over to her trash can and placed the balled-up paper inside. He followed her movement as she picked up a watering can and sprinkled a plant on her desk.
She had a nice ATW—ass-to-waist—ratio. His friend and project manager, Rodney Adams, had said that about a woman he was dating, and Davis knew exactly what he meant.
Her waist was small and showed off her rounded hips, thighs, and ass. She didn’t have much in the way of breasts, but she had enough to be a nice mouthful.
As she watered the plant, her small, obviously unbound breasts jiggled inside her top. The hem had eased out of the waistband of her jeans. Davis caught the flash of what looked like a wing in red and black ink that spanned her lower spine.
Damn, it figured. A tattoo went with the rest of the package.
Davis stifled a groan.
“How old are you?” He blurted the question and wished he could retract it. The words sounded as lame said out loud as they did in his thoughts.
She turned and faced him and her pretty, light-brown eyes widened. When she’d turned, her long, thick braid had whipped around and now lay nestled between her plump breasts.
Her eyes were tilted in the corners and her eyelashes were thick and dark, just like her eyebrows. Although her skin was the color of smooth milk chocolate with only a hint of cream, he could see a smattering of freckles across the bridge of her short nose.
Her lips weren’t overly full, but lush enough. His imagination ran wild with thoughts of taking her full bottom lip between his lips and sucking it.
Or imagining the feel of her mouth wrapped around his cock as she slowly glided her tongue over his entire length.
She was definitely too young for him to have the thoughts he’d had lately with irritating and increasing frequency.
Thoughts about what he’d like to do to her.
Lascivious, dirty, come sit in my lap thoughts.
The type of thoughts where they were butt naked in a bed playing some twisted version of Barbie and Ken.
The way she dressed further fueled the flame of his lust.
If she wasn’t wearing jeans and an itty-bitty top, she was wearing what looked like fabric wrapped around her body.
No seams, button or zippers, just a wrap of cloth around her hot little body, coupled with a T-shirt. He imagined how it would feel to start unwrapping her.
“I’m thirty-four…why?” She finally answered, and faced him.
“No particular reason. I assumed you were—”
“Younger?” she finished for him and placed the watering can down, near the plant. She walked back to her desk to sit down. “People usually do. If they’d look beyond the outer trappings, maybe they wouldn’t make assumptions,” she said with a small bite in her tone.
“I’d think that would be a compliment. To be thought younger.”
“Maybe to some. For me, I have no problem with my age,” she sat back behind her desk. “I don’t think you came here to talk about my age, Mr. Strong. You came here to discuss Angelica.” She effectively ended that line of conversation.
“Yes, I did. Sorry I asked you a personal question. It won’t happen again, Ms. Cain,” he promised, and felt a small tic twitch in the corner of his mouth.
Davis Strong thought she was younger than she was. That shouldn’t be a surprise to her, yet a strange excitement pooled in her belly. She sat back down and looked across the desk at him.
He sat in her faux leather chair and appeared more relaxed in her presence than he’d ever seemed to be.
That was, until she’d snapped at him. Now his features had tightened, and his body lost his relaxed appearance.
“Angel thought she was too smart and when she tried it again, Mrs. Douglas realized right away it wasn’t my handwriting.”
“What are they going to do about it?”
“The truancy coupled with her behavior at school—it’s not looking good for either one of us.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“I’ve raised Angelica alone for most of her life.”
“Yes, I do know a bit of your and Angelica’s history.”
Candy knew more than a “bit.” She knew his wife had died years ago when Angel wasn’t much older than a baby and Davis had taken care of her, alone, with only the help of his aunt and sister.
She also knew Angelica wasn’t his biological child. It was no secret; everyone knew, and Davis never tried to pretend otherwise.
“I got the distinct feeling the principal—the school—hadn’t exactly looked on me favorably as a single father raising a little girl alone, before this happened,” he said.
“You’re a great father, Davis. Why would they look at you in any negative light?”
“It’s the way the system works. You know that. Typically, when a man either has custody of a child, or is raising a child alone, he has to go through a bunch of crap to prove he’s ‘worthy’ enough to raise his child by himself.”
The system wasn’t always fair; she’d had firsthand experience with her own father as he’d fought to raise her and her brother Micah by himself.
“Is there anything I can do to help?” she asked instead.
“Actually, there is. Angelica looks up to you, Candy. She talks about you a lot around the house and—”
“Angelica looks up to me? What do you mean she talks about me ‘a lot around the house’?” Candy interrupted.
The little girl was all attitude when she had any interactions with Candy at the center. So much so, Candy had determined she would need to speak with Davis soon. His coming to her saved her the phone call.
“She’s constantly telling me what Ms. Cain says a young girl should or shouldn’t say, or how funny you are, how pretty you are,” he allowed the sentence to trail off.
“She says how pretty I am?”
“Yes. You are pretty, but you know that already.”
She was slammed back into awareness of him as a man she wanted, and not the father of a truant child, with the compliment. The heat of his stare all but caught fire as his gaze roamed over her face. Candy’s nipples once again pearled beneath her top.
“I suppose I’m just a little surprised, that’s all.”
“Surprised?”
“Angel’s behavior and interactions with me leave a lot to be desired at times.”
It had gotten so bad that Candy resorted to threatening to tell her father. Angelica’s standard response to Candy had been “my daddy won’t care!” and rolling her head so hard on her little neck that Candy thought it would break off.
“I have no idea why she acts that way with you, when she clearly idolizes you.”
“Maybe she’s hearing something at home that makes her think it’s okay to do that.”
“What are you saying?”
“I think you know.”
Angelica had once repeated a conversation her father had with his sister—one obviously not meant for a child to hear—as Candy had been reprimanding her for a misdemeanor.
“Candy, I’ve apologized for
that. I had no idea Angel would overhear my conversation with my sister,” he apologized, sheepishly. “You and I haven’t always agreed or seen eye-to-eye on things in the past, but, as I said, I didn’t mean for Angel to overhear my conversation. Am I forgiven?”
“Yes. It’s over. Let’s just go on,” she agreed magnanimously and could have sworn she saw his mouth quirk. “The question now is, what do you want from me, Davis?”
4
D avis focused on Candy’s question, and not her hot little body wrapped in ass-hugging jeans.
“Angelica…what about her?” she asked, snapping him out of his thoughts and forcing him to remember the reason he came to her. It wasn’t to check out her ass, no matter how perfect it was. It was because he was worried about his child.
“Angelica and I need you. Whatever I’m doing obviously isn’t working. I’m afraid they’re going to try and take my child from me,” he admitted and felt the crush of fear weigh heavily on his heart.
“What do you mean? They can’t take Angel from you…she’s your daughter. Anyone can see how much you love her.” Davis heard the surprise and outrage in her voice, but it did little to stave off the crushing sense of failure that had been looming over his head for the last few months.
“Sometimes love isn’t enough. If someone feels she’s not being raised correctly, getting into trouble and she’s only nine…I’m at my wits’ end,” he admitted.
“I’ve been working in this industry—child welfare—for over ten years. Before I came to the center I worked with child services with the state. Davis, I know it takes a lot more than truancy for a child to be taken from a parent who takes as good care of his child as you do of Angelica.”
She rose from her seat and perched her plush bottom on the edge of her desk, her voice and the look in her eyes earnest.
“Thank you. It’s good to know you feel that way, that not everyone doubts my ability to raise Angel.”
“There’s no way that I’m the only one who thinks this way,” she chided, lightly. When she gave him a lopsided grin Davis swallowed, hard.
“No, you’re right. I’m just wallowing in self-doubt lately,” he replied. He rubbed his hands over his hair in frustration.
“That’s understandable.”
“If it was just the truancy, I wouldn’t be so worried. But it’s more than that.”
He took a deep breath, trying to gauge how much he should tell her, how much he wanted to disclose to a woman who had him hard one minute and confused about his feelings for her the next. But there was more at stake than his own tangled emotions.
Frown lines were etched deeply across his forehead.
Candy wanted to reach out and smooth them away with the tips of her fingers.
“It’s complicated,” he began, only to stop short. “Angelica isn’t my biological child.” Candy nodded her head in acknowledgment.
“Yeah, it’s no secret,” he gave a small shrug. “But I’ve always thought of her as my own child. DNA has nothing to do with that.”
Although she made no comment, didn’t ask for clarification, she was more than curious about the circumstances surrounding Angelica’s birth, or better yet her conception. Her curiosity must have shown on her face.
“Gail had just ended a relationship before we got together. I didn’t know this at the time. When she found out she was pregnant two months later, there were questions about who the biological father was.”
“And you were okay with that?”
He ran a hand through his hair, a gesture she was coming to understand meant he was either in deep thought or agitated.
“To be honest with you, I didn’t know this until after Angel was born.”
When he didn’t disclose more, and his expression closed, his mask of neutrality slipping over his handsome face, Candy felt a sharp pang of disappointment.
“Gail wanted Angelica to have good influences in her life. Strong women to help guide her. She made me promise I’d make sure it happened.”
“It is important. And your aunt and sister are wonderful influences.”
“They are, and they love Angelica nearly as much as I do. When Milly left, Angel was missing that. Mil was the main female influence in her life. I think her leaving reminded me of my promise to Gail.”
He looked away and Candy’s curiosity was piqued.
“What did she want, specifically?” she asked when it looked as though he might not continue.
“She wanted me to make sure a black woman was a part of Angel’s life.” His face flushed.
Candy carefully considered her words before she spoke. She didn’t want to offend Davis, his deceased wife or her request. It wasn’t for her to make any judgment on what the woman wanted for her child.
“I can see where that would be important for her. Particularly if she knew she wouldn’t be there for Angelica, as she grew up,” she said as gently as she could.
“She did know. That was the hardest part. For Angelica.” She heard the sadness in his voice, although his face was carefully blank. “She had very specific things she wanted for Angelica. A lot of those suggestions came from her grandmother.”
His square jaw tightened. He stood from the chair and walked over to her large window, staring out into the outdoor basketball court.
“Does Angelica have close contact with family members on her mother’s side?”
“No,” he said abruptly. “It’s complicated.” He continued staring out the window for long moments, before he turned back to face her. “Like I said, Gail was pregnant when we met, although she says she didn’t know it at the time.” Candy kept her face neutral, although she caught his slip.
“Gail was raised by her grandmother. She was a strict old woman. Her grandmother cautioned her about me raising Angel alone when she knew of her cancer. ‘That man has no business raising Angel alone’ was how it was put by a few well-meaning friends. Yet none of those well meaning friends stepped up to help raise her. Not that I wanted any of their help.”
“And her grandmother…?” she allowed the sentence to dangle.
Davis returned to his chair and sat. “Her grandmother is elderly. She doesn’t see Angel often.”
When he said nothing more, Candy dropped the subject. She was surprised he’d told her as much as he had.
“I have to meet with her principal, her teacher and the school social worker this coming Tuesday…and I don’t want to do this alone.”
“Can your sister or your aunt go with you to the school?”
“They could and would, but I think I want to go another route with this.”
“What do you have planned?”
He squinted his eyes and rubbed the back of his neck, his eyes never leaving hers. Candy sensed his unease.
“Would you consider coming with me? I think it would help the situation, if you were to be there.”
Her surprise, she knew, showed on her face. Davis mistook her shock for reluctance.
“Look, I’m sorry. This probably wasn’t a good idea. I told Milly—” he started, rising from his chair.
“No, wait. I didn’t say I wouldn’t do it—you spoke about this with your sister?” she stopped her explanation to ask.
“She thought it would be a good idea to ask you if you’d consider helping—look, I know this isn’t your problem. I shouldn’t have involved you in this.”
“No, it’s not that. I don’t mind helping. It just surprised me that you asked. That’s all. I consider it a part of my job to help any child or parent in need. You, Angel, and your family are important to Girls Unlimited. So anything I can do to help your family, I am happy to do.”
“Thank you. It means a lot.” He sat back down.
“Anything I can do to help, I will. The well-being of my girls at the center is important to me.”
“I appreciate it, Candice. I know you take your job seriously, as well as the girls, here. I admire you for that.” His steady regard roamed over her face, looking for what, she did
n’t know.
Whatever it was he must have been satisfied. His once-taut features relaxed and he sat back more easily into his chair.
“It sounds like an interdisciplinary team approach to the problem.”
“What is that?” he asked.
“Nothing major, just the way most schools and social agencies work to help resolve an issue. You said her teacher as well as her principal and social worker are coming to this meeting?”
“Yes,” he confirmed.
“Then it seems as though this has gone to the next step. Which isn’t a bad thing,” she quickly interjected when she saw the instant look of worry cross his handsome face.
“You don’t have to try and make me feel better. I know it’s not a good thing when you have to meet with your child’s entire school network,” he laughed humorlessly. “Maybe with you there they’ll see I’m trying to correct the problem.” He glanced down at his watch.
“What time is the meeting and when do you want me there?”
When he smiled widely and the slashes appeared on either side of his cheeks, Candy’s heart lurched in response.
“Tuesday after school, around three o’clock…can you make that?”
“Of course. I just hired a new assistant, Pauline Rogers. Sister Pauline is what most of us call her,” she laughed lightly, thinking of her eccentric new assistant. “She’ll be here to help the other staff. It shouldn’t be a problem.”
“That sounds great. Thank you, Candice.”
“Call me Candy. Most of the kids do.”
“I wondered if that was your real name or not. You don’t mind the kids calling you by your first name?”
“Not really. Most of them call me Miss Candy Cain, which sounds even sillier,” she laughed with self-deprecating humor.
Davis laughed a low husky laugh that sent goose bumps racing down her arms. She knew she was beyond help when even a laugh from him gave her the shivers.
“I’d better go,” he said after glancing down at his watch again. “I didn’t know it had gotten so late.”
At the same time he stood from his chair, Candy jumped down from her perched position on the desk. She lost her balance enough so that she fell against his hard body.
Just Like Candy Page 4
