Free Seduced by Moonlight by Janice Sims

had lost his house to foreclosure five years ago, and that was when he was a highly paid professional football player. He was retired from the game now. She imagined he was in even greater financial straits.
    â€œYes?” she croaked.
    Danielle smiled. “It’s nothing horrible. Dad told me that since he retired he’s been going to Gamblers Anonymous. He has his gambling under control, and he was recently offered a recruiting job with the University of Colorado at Denver. You know, his being a hometown boy and all. He accepted. Dad’s moving back to Denver!”
    Cherisse couldn’t help it, her eyes stretched in horror. “Denver! Charlie?! What would possess him to do that?”
    Danielle laughed. “Grandma was right, you’re not happy about Dad moving back home.”
    â€œYou told Ma about this before you told me?” Cherisse said incredulously.
    â€œI was trying to find the right time,” Danielle explained.
    â€œAnd you chose now?”
    â€œIt made you stop obsessing about Harry Payne,” Danielle pointed out after which she took another bite of her burger. Chewing and talking out of the corner of her mouth, she said, “Grandma also said you wouldn’t agree to Dad staying with us until he found a place.”
    â€œStaying with us?” Cherisse shouted and immediately lowered her voice. “That man has some nerve.”
    â€œHe didn’t suggest it, I did,” said Danielle. She wiped the smile off her face and sighed. “He hasn’t got anybody else in Denver, just you and me.”
    â€œYou,” Cherisse corrected her. “He’s got you.”
    Danielle acknowledged her mother’s comment with a nod. “Okay, he’s got only me. And I wanted to spend some time with him before I started going away practically every weekend to compete in the preliminary rounds for the Olympics. I missed him a lot while I was growing up.”
    Cherisse couldn’t help feeling a twinge of guilt at her daughter’s statement. It wasn’t that she had tried to keep Danielle and Charlie apart after the divorce. Charlie had his priorities: football, gambling and women. Cherisse got tired of reminding him to send Danielle a gift on her birthday, or to phone her on major holidays like Christmas and Thanksgiving if he were not able to come see her.
    She looked Danielle straight in the eyes. “You and I have had this talk before. I never did anything to prevent Charlie from seeing you. Never! Now, all of a sudden, I’m supposed to bend over backwards to accommodate him because he has seen the light and wants to be in your life more? You’re seventeen, practically a woman. Now he wants to be a father?”
    â€œYou told me when Granddaddy died four years ago that a woman will always need her father. Remember that?”
    Chagrined, Cherisse had to think quickly to get out of this one. She could say that her father had been a loving, responsible parent, unlike Charlie, who visited Danielle once or twice a year and sent her checks whenever he won big at the gaming tables.
    That wasn’t parenting!
    However, looking into her daughter’s face, which held a hangdog expression, Cherisse was unable to utter those words without feeling extremely selfish. Danielle wanted to be closer to her father. How could she fault her for that?
    Living with Charlie was quite another matter, though. “How long?” she asked.
    Danielle immediately brightened. “Not long, a few weeks at the most. He’s going to look for a place near the university.”
    Cherisse shook her head in astonishment. “I can’t believe Ma is okay with this.”
    â€œShe said you and Dad got married too young and that’s why your marriage didn’t work out. She said you were always more mature than Dad. But now that he’s trying to get himself together and do what’s right, she didn’t want to stand in his