Jonah, a ten–year-old whose mother owned a gift shop on the other end of Main, poked his woolen capped head into the storeroom. He beamed when he saw Callie.
“My mom needs a box of truffles for her store and she sent me over here to see if you could give me some before we open. I sure am glad you’re here or else I’d have to ride my bike all the way down here again later.” Callie suddenly saw herself through the innocent eyes of a child and she couldn’t help but feel dirty. Forcing herself to ignore Tobey’s presence in the room, she walked through the doorway on shaky legs. Laughing, the sound obviously forced, she ruffled Jonah on the head. She kept her voice light and said, “Oh no, Jonah. I’d hate for you to have to ride your bike all the way down Main Street. Again.” Callie heard the trembling behind her teasing words and hated herself for it. She was sure that Tobey could hear it too. Why, she wondered, couldn’t she be calm, cool, and collected around him? Why did she have to be so pathetically attracted to him?
On the way into the front of her shop, she grabbed her jacket from her office chair and put it back on, wishing she had stayed with her plan of keeping it on, no matter what. If she had known she was meeting with Tobey she would have worn her most chaste outfit, something from the back of closet that covered every square inch of skin from her chin to her ankles.
Callie buttoned the one button at the waist and wondered how she could have ever possibly felt stern and business-like in the suit. Wearing this suit was, she now realized, as good as wearing a sign that said, “Fuck me, please. I like sex with men I don’t know.” What she wouldn’t give for a coat of armor now.
She pulled a large chocolate box off of the shelf and handed it to Jonah. “Why don’t you pick out your favorites, honey?” she said, knowing that her hands would be shaking so hard she’d barely be able to get the truffles into the box.
Jonah gave her a look of surprise, but quickly stripped off his mittens and got to work loading up mint and dark chocolate truffles into the box. Even as she chose a lollipop for Jonah from her stash of goodies below the cash register, Callie was far too aware of Tobey’s large, hot presence behind her. Everything about him radiated power and sex, all of the stuff she had always been a sucker for.
And look what it had gotten her so far, she reminded herself harshly. She was alone and broke, with nothing but a failing candy store and a mutt to keep her company.
“Miss Callie, I’m done now,” Jonah said, snapping her out of her self-pity. “Here,” he said, putting a $20 bill in Callie’s hand.
She put the bill away in the cash register then handed the little boy his special treat.
“My favorite!” he exclaimed as he shoved the lollipop into the pocket of his down jacket. “Thanks, Miss Callie,” he added, getting on his tippy toes to give her a peck on the cheek before he ran out of the heated store into the cold and shot back down Main Street on his bike.
Callie’s heart swelled with love. What she wouldn’t give to have a child of her own.
But since that obviously wasn’t about to happen any time soon, she thought, at least she had her candy store and the joy of being with children every day.
“Cute kid,” Tobey said, walking around the front of her display counters to check out her displays.
Callie jumped. She had almost forgotten that Tobey was there, invading her sanctuary with his ungodly sexiness. And she had almost forgotten, yet again, that her beloved store was in danger.
And only The Candy King could save her.
Enough is enough, she told herself firmly, her heart fluttering just because of Tobey’s intense presence in her store. You need to focus on business, not pleasure, she insisted, trying to get the wayward slut inside of her to obey her serious dictate .
“Do you always give away candy like that?” Tobey’s tone was light, but she sensed an edge behind his words
“Of course I do,” she replied. She hated that she felt like she needed to explain herself, but she said, “Kids love getting a little surprise.” Tobey stopped his perusal of her storefront. “And you like to surprise them?” he asked, pinning her with his hot gaze.
Callie swallowed convulsively, but her mouth felt dry and her tongue refused to fit within the confines of her mouth. All she could do was nod.
The silence in Callie’s Candies was almost a live being. Callie wished she knew what happened to her when Tobey was near, that way she might have had a chance in hell at fighting it.
But when he finally said, “I like that about you, Callie. I like that a lot,” she knew she was irrevocably lost.
“Lock the door,” she said, then turned and walked back into her storeroom. She heard the lock click shut and undid the button on her jacket. Shrugging out of the pink wool, she threw it onto her desk.
She reached for the zipper on her skirt just as Tobey walked through the door. Still unable to look him in the eye, she let her skirt drop to the floor. Standing before Tobey in her see-through white silk camisole and white silk thong panties, she said, “One more time. And then we’ll take care of business.”
Chapter Four
“Remind me again,” Callie said as she stamped her feet in the snow to stay warm.
“Why are we doing this?”
Tobey laughed and put the huge cooler he had been carrying into the snow on the edge of the rink. “Ice skaters love two things,” he said, taking a moment to admire how cute Callie looked in her form fitted pink down jacket and tight black ski pants. “Perfect ice, obviously, and, even more importantly, chocolate.” Callie humphed and rubbed her mittened hands together. “If I weren’t so cold I might care.”
Tobey wanted to say, “I’ve got a surefire way to warm you up,” but he knew that given their business relationship, such obvious flirting was totally out of line. Even more than that, though, he wanted to suck that pouty lower lip of Callie’s into his mouth.
It really was too bad that after leaving Callie’s Candies on Monday, after their crazy, perfect sex on the steel kitchen island in the middle of her store’s back kitchen, Tobey felt he had to make the only decision possible under the circumstances—to back off until Callie’s Candies was back in the black and running smoothly. It was perfectly all right to fuck Callie’s brains out before they discussed business, but once the first professional word had been spoken, Tobey felt that not touching Callie was the right thing to do. Not, of course, that he would hesitate to rip all of her clothes off and keep her naked in his bed for a week once their business transaction had ended.