Читать книгу Just Like Candy - Kimberly Kaye Terry - Страница 7

“Is it me, or does my ass look like the back side of a very large caboose in these jeans?” Candy mumbled out loud, to no one in particular. It was becoming an eccentric habit of hers, she thought. Talking to empty rooms.

Candy twisted her body this way and that, glaring at her hind end at every conceivable angle. She reached behind and tugged at the waistband of her new jeans, where material and skin met. She blew out a frustrated breath of air. There was enough space between for her to insert her entire hand inside!

The hip/waist ratio thing was a serious pain whenever she bought a new pair of jeans. Too tight in the hips and it was perfect for her waist. Too loose in the waist and they fit to a T in the thighs and butt.

With her eyes still trained on her butt, she knew she’d have to whip out her sewing machine and do some serious alterations to make these babies work.

She had given up finding a pair of jeans that would fit. The best she could do was to make sure they worked for thighs and butt and alter the waistline.

It would be nice if at least one designer would get it right for women with her body type, she thought. It wasn’t like all women were a perfect size-eight body. All they’d have to do was take a look around at the general population of everyday women, take a poll, something, she mentally griped.

Candice blew out a disgusted puff of air.

She should have altered them before deciding to wear them for the first time, she thought.

“Do you want me to answer that question, or are you just talking out loud to hear yourself speak?”

Candice nearly jumped out of her skin when the deep voice answered. She spun around and tripped, catching herself before she fell on the floor in an undignified heap.

Her eyes widened. Davis Strong stood in her doorway, a deep frown settling across his handsome face.

She stumbled again. Before she could right herself, he had crossed the room, his warm palm cupping her beneath her elbow. “Whoa—be careful.”

Her reaction to the contact was immediate. The feel of his big, warm palm on her skin caused a direct zing of electric heat to sizzle between them.

She glanced up, heart pounding. “Thank you,” she murmured and cleared her throat.

“No problem.”

Candy tried to pull away. When he held on, she turned back toward him and their gazes locked. His eyes were trained on her mouth and seemed to darken when her tongue swiped along her full bottom lip.

Her gaze traveled over his face, cataloging features that were already burned into her memory.

He’d recently returned from Florida, and had gained a light olive tan. The color contrasted vividly against his light-gray eyes.

Although he wasn’t handsome in the typical model, GQ way—no, his harsh good looks were beyond anything so tame as model perfection—he exuded raw masculine appeal that drew her in like a magnet every time she was anywhere in his vicinity.

Davis Strong had the ability, no matter how put together she thought she was, to make Candy feel like a ten-year-old naughty schoolgirl.

Although the feelings he stirred in her whenever she was in his presence weren’t the feelings a young girl would, or should, be having.

Naughty or otherwise.

Not that she wouldn’t mind playing the naughty little girl for him, if ever he was so inclined.

Despite her wayward dreams of late, where she’d cast him as the unsuspecting male lead in her very own porn flick, he had yet to ask in real life.

But heaven help her if he did. Or help him, as she knew exactly what she wanted from him.

Despite the disapproving looks he would cast her way, she knew he was attracted to her, no matter how he pretended otherwise.

But he’d yet to act on it. And she damn sure wasn’t so desperate for attention to be the one to initiate anything. No matter how fine he was, she told herself, clenching her thighs together when her body taunted her, quickly responding to his simple touch.

When he finally released her and moved away, she released a sigh, not realizing she’d been holding her breath. “I need to talk to you about Angelica,” he said, bringing her mind back to the reason he had sought her out.

“Please, have a seat.”

When he turned his head from her, his eyes surveying her messy office, she refrained from rushing into an explanation that she’d come in early to clean.

As he sat in one of the few chairs in the cluttered office not filled with papers, Candy’s gaze wandered over his big body, subtly, from the corner of her eye.

The gray T-shirt he wore clung to his broad chest. It looked as though it had been washed a thousand times at least, it was so soft-looking. The light gray color of the T-shirt was the same color as his eyes, but didn’t come close to matching the intensity.

His long legs were encased in worn jeans, his hard thighs bunching against the material as he sat.

Yet, for all his good looks, Candy was drawn to him for reasons beyond the physical. Reasons such as his love for his daughter, along with the way he treated the kids who frequented the center.

He took time out to laugh and talk with them whenever he was there. He was real with them, no pretense.

Candy longed to get to know the real Davis, the one he presented to the kids, when he thought no one was watching. She wanted to be the one responsible for making the deep slashes in his lean cheeks appear whenever he smiled or laughed at one of their jokes.

The Davis she saw was one who closed up around her, a scowl on his handsome face as he broodingly watched her, when he thought she wasn’t looking.

The Davis he presented to her made her wonder what in hell she’d done to make him so surly around her, yet gave off enough sexual sparks to cause a brush fire.

To make matters worse, whenever she was within a five-mile radius of him, she turned into a blushing, gauche, tongue-tied woman who was about as sophisticated as one of the teen girls who attended the center.

“Sorry to barge in like this. Your assistant told me you were in,” he said, after settling his large frame in the small chair.

“It’s fine. I came in early to clean.”

“Is this what you normally wear to clean?”

Candy noticed his gaze centered on her midsection, and glanced down at herself.

He would have to come today, when she’d dressed even more casually than normal.

Her plan had been to clean, not entertain one of her girls’ parents. Even if said parent was incredibly fine and sported hard chiseled muscles outlined to perfection beneath his T-shirt.

She tried to discreetly tug the skimpy top she was wearing, emblazoned with the phrase taste like butta, into the waistband of her jeans when she saw him staring at the small gemstone she wore in her belly.

Candy refused to admit, even to herself, how his attention to her body jewelry affected her. His gaze then traveled from her belly button, up the length of her body, his gaze hot and direct when he met her stare.

The intensity in his light-colored eyes caused her pulse to quicken, her breath to catch in her throat, as their gazes locked.

She folded her arms over her breasts, to hide her nipples’ reaction. After walking to her desk, she sat down. It was that, or embarrass herself and fall down.

“I’m here because of Angelica.”

When he mentioned his daughter, his somber tone made her forget her irrational, unrequited and silly obsession with him for the moment.

“Is everything okay with her? She’s not hurt, is she?”

“No, nothing like that. She’s been cutting school. Her principal called me into the office yesterday to tell me. Seems like she’s been doing it for a while,” he admitted, and ran a hand through his short, dark-blond hair in frustration.

“I’m sorry to hear that, Mr. Strong.”

“Please, Ms. Cain, call me Davis. We’ve known each other long enough to dispense with formalities,” he offered.

Candy was thrown off guard. He’d never extended the offer for her to call him by his first name.

“Thank you, Davis. And please, feel free to call me Candy,” she offered in return. “That’s my nickname. The girls like to call me that. They think it’s funny my last name is Cain.”

“Candy Cain, huh? I once wondered if that was your real name or not.”

She quickly glanced over his expression, to gauge his intent. The look in his eyes seemed more curious than condescending and Candy relaxed.

“No, I understand about unconventionality. My Aunt Mildred raised my sister and me, and, as you know, Aunt Mildred isn’t a conformist in the least,” he laughed huskily.

Mildred Davis had been one of the first women to own and operate a large construction and architectural firm in the city of Stanton. She’d also been the first female millionaire in the city.

“What’s going on with Angelica?” She guided the conversation back to the reason Davis had sought her out.

“Angel cut school on Thursday and gave the teacher a forged permission slip from me. And it wasn’t the first time it happened.” Once again, he raked a hand through his hair in frustration.

“It wasn’t the first time she skipped school, or forged a note?” Candy asked.

“Both, unfortunately. This is her second time skipping and forging a note with my signature. She had a substitute teacher the first time and the second time around she timed her absence when she knew Mrs. Douglas, her regular teacher, would be gone.”

“She missed the day Mrs. Douglas was teaching, and the day the substitute came, she returned to school?” Candy asked, seeking clarification.

“Yes.”

“At least she’s creative in her manipulation.”

The laugh he uttered was more like a snort, and his expression was sheepish at best. He reached around and rubbed the back of his neck.

“Yes, she is. She knew the sub wouldn’t know my signature and was counting on the fact the woman wouldn’t call her out about it. But what she failed to understand was the notes were kept. Mrs. Douglas would eventually see it.”

“Why wasn’t she caught the first time?”

“The sub misplaced the note but documented she’d seen it and that was it.”

“Angelica thought she’d gotten away with it and they’d been fooled by the signature and decided to try again?” Candy hazarded a guess.

“How did you guess that?” He looked at her with what she saw as suspicion, and their tentative camaraderie evaporated as though it never had been.

“I work with her age group all the time, Mr. Strong. You don’t believe I had anything to do with this, do you?”

Candy began gathering strewn paperwork on her desk, the need to keep her hands busy paramount.

It was that or jump across the desk and slap him into the middle of next week for insinuating she’d had anything to do with Angel’s truancy.

Damn, the man brought out either the need to jump his bones, or the need to throttle him.

“Yes, I know this is your area of expertise. I wasn’t trying to imply anything else, Ms. Cain. I’m at a loss and on edge.”

Davis sighed.

He was coming across as an ass to Candy. He knew it.

He hadn’t come to antagonize her. He’d come to ask for her help.

But every time they were within two feet of each other, sparks flew. He knew he was the one to blame.

It wasn’t her fault he couldn’t keep his thoughts where they should be, whenever he was around her. And her wearing that tight little top with her smooth brown belly showing, her small tits pushing against the thin material so that he could see them bead when he’d touched her, hadn’t helped matters.

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?”