BZZZ. BZZZ. BZZZ

      She uttered a cry of disbelief. Her eyes flew open and she looked down between her legs hoping to see a dark blond head lying between her spread thighs, ready to give her what she needed…Lord, what she craved!

      The only thing she saw as she glanced down was one of her own hands buried deep inside her creaming opening, the other braced against her thigh.

      Well, damn!

      At that point, Candy felt like howling out loud in sheer frustration.

      “Oh damn…not again,” she groaned. She reluctantly withdrew her wet fingers from her vagina and sat straight up in bed.

      With a sinking heart she realized she’d been dreaming. Reality had reared its ugly head with a vengeance in the form of her alarm clock going off.

      She whipped her head around, almost giving herself whiplash as she searched the room.

      As though she was trying to see if anyone had witnessed what she’d been doing in bed, under the covers, lights out and all alone, she thought, completely disgusted with herself.

      She acknowledged she was a mess. Or better still, as Pauline Rogers, her new assistant at the youth center, would say…“a hot mess.”

      With a sigh of disgust at her unreasonable embarrassment, Candy reached over and slammed a hand on top of the offending apparatus. It was one of those art nouveau, old-fashioned-looking alarm clocks that friends who thought they were funny gave you for Christmas gifts.

      The type whose alarm was so shrill and long, it could wake the dead.

      With a groan, Candy flopped back down and pulled the comforter up to her chin as she snuggled deeper into the covers.

      She’d had another erotic, wake-up-with-her-panties-wetand-fingers-smelling-like-her-own-coochie, unfulfilling dream.

      Candy released a heartfelt groan, grabbed her pillow and shoved it over her face as she rolled over in the bed to lie face down.

      She stayed in that position for long moments and allowed her heartbeat to return to normal.

      Damn it.

      Just when she was ready to admit what she wanted. Just when she was ready to give her dream lover the words he needed to hear, before he’d give her what she wanted—the friggin’ alarm had to go off.

      “Oh well, guess I wasn’t exactly ready to go down that path of discovery anyway. I ought to be ashamed of myself for even wanting to, even in a dream,” she mumbled, her lips pressed into the bed.

      With forced determination she made herself climb out of the bed and start her day.

      She looked around for her slippers. She groaned when she only found the one near her bed and spied the other one clear across the room.

      “Doggone it, Rus! Leave my house shoes alone, boy!” she fussed out loud when she spied her tomcat, Russell, laying his big striped head on her slipper as though it were his pillow. The cat had an unnatural love for all things furry.

      She grumbled as she put one foot in the available slipper, grabbed the thin robe hanging from the foot rail of her bed and hopped over to retrieve the other slipper, snatching it from under the big cat’s head. She rolled her eyes at his indignant cry of anger.

      “Sorry, sugah, but Mama’s tootsies get cold on these hard wood floors. Especially this time of the year.”

      With affection she patted the top of his large head on her way out of the bedroom after she placed the matching slipper on her foot.

      Yawning deeply, Candy walked into the small bathroom at the end of the narrow hallway. She stood before the vanity and stared at her reflection.

      “Ummm. Girlfriend, you need a man. This dream lover stuff is seriously not cutting it.”

      She reached a slender arm up and opened the medicine cabinet to withdraw her toothbrush and toothpaste and began her morning ritual.

      “I mean, it’s not as though you can’t find a man, right?” she asked herself around a mouthful of white paste.

      As she brushed her teeth, she carefully examined her face. Without conceit, Candice knew she was attractive enough. Her smooth, oval, mocha-colored face was clear and free of blemishes.

      Her teeth, despite her never having had braces as a child, were fairly straight. She had a small space between her front two teeth that even if she had been able to afford to have straightened as a child, or as an adult, she wouldn’t have.

      Her father had the same gap and said it was a Cain family trait. He said it added character to her face.

      As Candy had never met any other Cain family members besides her father and her older brother, Corey, she could only take his word.

      When she was a child, other children had teased her because of the gap between her teeth, among other things.

      She remembered her father telling her the small imperfection was something to be proud of, not ashamed of. It was a part of who she was, and no matter what, she was never to be ashamed of who she was.

      As usual, his words had helped ease the sting of their cruelty.

      She smiled in remembrance and the deep dimples she’d also inherited from her father flashed in the mirror as she did so.

      She missed her dad. It had been too long since his last visit. Too long since he’d breezed into town and made her couch his bed.

      But she knew it was only a matter of time before he’d come around. When he grew bored with his current job or he got fired. Either way, she knew she’d see him soon.

      It wasn’t that he wasn’t a hard worker. It was just…hard for him to stay in one place for too long. As a child she’d seen it all as one big adventure, she remembered with a melancholy smile.

      She grabbed the washcloth from the bar attached to the wicker shelf and ran warm water over it. She added a bar of her favorite homemade rosemary-scented castile soap and got a good lather going. She gently wiped her face clean. The warm water and pleasant smell helped to invigorate her, fully waking her up.

      After she finished, she draped the washcloth over the side of her vintage, cream-colored porcelain pedestal sink in order to tackle her hair.

      She deftly unbraided the thick French braid and allowed her kinky mass of hair free rein. She eased her fingers into the thick tresses and massaged her scalp and moaned.

      It always felt good when she unbraided her hair and allowed it to breathe.

      Candy loved wearing her hair natural and chemical-free. She enjoyed the sense of completeness, of wholeness, she’d gotten when she’d kicked her creamy crack pusher, formerly known as the relaxer, to the curb.

      Within moments her hair