Anna DeStefano - A Family For Daniel

He grinned when he found Amy still stretched out on the floor. “Comfy down there?” he asked.

“Seems I have a knack for sending Daniel running.” She struggled to her feet, struggled not to need the reassurance she got just from being close to him.

Facing the world alone was something she was getting good at. What she’d told herself she wanted. But the world was tougher to handle by the hour. And being around Josh so much was making alone feel a lot more lonely.

He offered his hand, and nothing could have kept her from taking it.

“You’re a miracle worker.” The warmth radiating from his touch held her captive. “I’ve been trying to get Daniel out of here for an hour.”

The professional principal and the friend from her youth were nowhere to be found at the moment. All Amy could see was the ruggedly handsome man before her. A concerned, caring man who’d do anything to help his nephew. The man she’d forced herself to turn away from just hours earlier.

What would it feel like to have those strong arms wrapped around her?

It would feel like a really bad idea, she warned herself.

Dear Reader,

Through programs like Stephen Ministries and Rainbows, I’ve been privileged over the years to walk alongside parents and children struggling to rebuild their lives after a family has come undone. What is lost when a marriage fails or a parent dies is not just the family that was known, but also the future that was dreamed of. And what’s left behind are single parents and children who are grieving, and who are often overwhelmed by the simple question, What do I do now?

Single parents are some of the strongest, most courageous people I’ve ever met. Their lives are filled with private battles, daily failures and victories that the outside world rarely sees. And yet they keep fighting, conquering one day at a time until they’ve made a new life for themselves and the children they cherish.

While the challenges facing my hero and heroine as they create A Family for Daniel are fictional, I pray I’ve done justice to the real single mothers and fathers out there who are fighting daily for the special kids in their lives. God bless you all!

Anna DeStefano

www.millsandboon.co.uk

To Jan, Brenda and Julie, who’ve shown me the everyday sacrifice, courage and strength required to be a single working mother.

And to Dianna Love Snell and the power of road-trip brainstorming. I thank you, and Daniel thanks you.

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

EPILOGUE

LIFE JUST SUCKED sometimes.

That’s what Daniel’s psy…psychol… That’s what the stupid doctor his uncle made him talk to said. Life could suck, for kids most of all. But when you get through the bad stuff, Dr. Steve said, there’s a world of good things waiting on the other side.

Just wait and see.

Life will get better.

Trudging down the hallway of White Elementary School, headed for the principal’s office for the second time that week, Daniel rolled his eyes. Dr. Steve didn’t have a clue.

Daniel had to get out of this place. But where? Where did he have to go? Back to his uncle’s home? There was only there or here, which left Daniel exactly where he’d been for the last four months.

Nowhere.

Forget Dr. Steve.

There was no bright side just around the corner.

Daniel’s mother was dead. His chest heaved from the sharp pain that came, even as he shoved the memory aside. His dad had split years ago, never to be heard from again. Living in Sweetbrook, South Carolina, with his uncle wasn’t working, no matter how hard Daniel tried.

Life just sucked. Period.

He turned left at the end of the hall and shuffled into the bustling school office. His sneaker caught as he stepped from the tiled floor onto carpet. Arms and legs flailing, he managed not to fall on his face. Barely. But now every person in the room was staring at him, when what he really wanted was to be invisible.

“Have a seat.” Mrs. Lyons pointed to the ugly couch the kids called death row. “Principal White’s expecting you, but he’s on the phone.”

Mrs. Lyons had worked here for over forty years, he’d heard. She’d worked here when his uncle was in elementary school. Rumor had it his uncle had done his own time on death row. Maybe she’d pointed that same bony finger at him. Maybe she’d stared him down like he was trouble, too.

Probably not. What could his perfect, by-the-book uncle have done to match the mess Daniel made out of school every day?

He dropped onto the couch and gave Mrs. Lyons his best glare. He kept right on staring, until she looked away. He knew exactly what she was thinking. What they were all thinking—the teachers and everyone. He’d heard them talking when they didn’t think he was listening. He’d seen the looks on their faces, just like the one on Mrs. Lyons’s now. And he hated them all. Hated their nosey questions, the way they pretended to understand….

He’s always been such an angry little boy…. But he could be such a good student. Before his mother’s accident, he was starting to settle in…. It’s just so sad! And his poor uncle…can you imagine trying to deal with a troubled child he barely knows on top of everything else?

What did they know?

What did he care?

“Daniel.” The door to the principal’s office opened. As usual, the man was wearing freshly pressed dress clothes, plus the frown he didn’t even try to hide from Daniel anymore. “Ready to step inside?”

Daniel decided staring at his shoes was a better plan. Not because he was afraid. He wasn’t afraid of anything in this nowhere town. Adults found unresponsive kids annoying, Dr. Steve had told him, and being annoying suited Daniel just fine today. He reached a finger down to tug at the hole in the trashed sneakers his uncle had forbidden him to wear to school.

“Daniel? In my office. Now.”

PRINCIPAL JOSHUA WHITE shut the office door as ten-year-old Daniel threw himself into the guest chair that was practically his second home.

Shrugging off a wave of discouragement he couldn’t afford, Josh rounded his desk, giving the scared, defiant kid dressed in jeans and a dirt-smudged T-shirt his space. Josh remained standing as he reread his notes from the phone call he’d just concluded with Becky Reese’s grandmother, Gwen Loar.

Becky and Daniel had mixed it up in class again today, and according to their fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Cole, Becky had instigated their latest tussle. Then Daniel had taken things way too far, as usual. Before Mrs. Cole could intervene, the confrontation had escalated into classroom warfare, complete with the kids throwing anything they could lay their hands on at each other.

Josh and the girl’s grandmother had discussed Becky’s role in the altercation, trying to formulate a plan for better settling her into her new school. For compensating for the fact that a month ago Amy Loar had shipped the little girl off to live with Grandma, so Mom could dedicate 24/7 to her career in Atlanta.

Amy Loar.

Josh’s memory produced an image of his childhood friend. Dazzling in white, her auburn hair a soft cloud of tousled curls, she was smiling at him from across the dance floor at their senior prom. Somehow she’d blossomed from his pal since kindergarten into the most beautiful girl in the room. A girl he’d suddenly wished he hadn’t wasted so many years being just friends with.