Janelle Taylor (6 page)

No. He had to stop thinking that way. What was done was done. There was no turning back, no bargaining, no chance that he would wake up tomorrow and find that it had all been the cruelest of nightmares.

“Where is your boat?” Spencer was asking.

“It’s down in Louisiana, where I used to live.”

“Oh. My dad’s boat is in Philadelphia, where we live.”

“You live with your dad?” He was surprised. He had assumed that Jordan had custody.

Spencer nodded. “And my mom.”

“You share custody?” Beau asked Jordan.

She looked flustered. Maybe it was too forward a question for him to have asked.

“What’s custody?” Spencer asked.

Now Beau was flustered.

“Your mom can explain it,” he said.

“I’ll ask her … when I see her again.”

That was when it hit him. No wonder she didn’t have jelly in her cabinet. No wonder he didn’t sense any natural, easygoing warmth between Jordan and Spencer. No wonder Spencer called her by her first name.

They weren’t mother and son.

Spencer didn’t belong to her after all.

Beau didn’t know whether he was relieved at the simple explanation, or disappointed.

Disappointed? Why would you be disappointed? an
accusing inner voice demanded.

He knew the answer, and he didn’t like it.

He was disappointed because, just for a fleeting moment, he had allowed himself to indulge in a fantasy. About himself, and Jordan, and Spencer. He had mentally inserted himself into what he thought was their
little family—a family that was missing a husband, a daddy.

He had just for a moment imagined himself stepping into those roles again….

But it was wrong.

They
were wrong.

Jordan was the wrong woman.

Spencer was the wrong child.

His fantasy shattered, Beau looked from the child to the woman who wasn’t his mother.

“I thought he was yours,” he said simply.

Jordan shook her head. She didn’t offer an explanation. Spencer was intent on his sandwich, unaware of the look that passed between the adults.

That was when Beau realized that the tension wasn’t just on his end. He had his baggage, yes. But clearly, something was going on with Jordan. There was some-thing about the way she nervously twisted one hand around the fingertips of the other; about the way she checked her watch—almost as though she was waiting for something.

Waiting for him to leave, maybe, Beau decided, when he saw her look across the room at the jacket he’d draped over the doorknob.

“You probably have things to do,” he said, standing.

“You probably do, too,” she agreed, also getting to her feet.

Disappointment was blatant in Spencer’s eyes. “Do you have to leave?”

“I do,” Beau said, conscious of a painful twinge somewhere deep inside him. “So… I’ll be seeing you guys.”

“You will?”

Beau was startled by the flicker of interest in the little boy’s expression.

He hadn’t meant it literally. It was just something you said when you left.
I’ll be seeing you.

He had no intention of seeing either of them again.

“Sure,” he said, with a glance at Jordan. He couldn’t read her expression. “I mean, I guess I will.”

“When? Because I’ll be going back home soon,” Spencer said.

“When are you going back home?”

“When my mom comes back for me. She’s—”

“She’ll be back for him soon,” Jordan cut in. “But maybe before Spencer leaves, we’ll run into you again. Right, Spencer?”

He knew she didn’t mean it. He recognized her tone. It was the manner an adult used to pacify a child making an unrealistic request.

He found himself annoyed by Jordan’s attitude. Maybe he was being irrational, since he was the one who didn’t want to extend this relationship. But she seemed to assume that they wouldn’t be getting together again. That if they saw him again, it would be purely by accident. By “running into” each other. For some reason, that bothered him.

“Maybe, before you leave and after I get back from my vacation next week, we can go to the zoo or something,” Beau heard himself tell Spencer.

“All of us?” he sounded disappointed.

Beau glanced at Jordan. “Or just the two of us, if Jordan is busy,” he said.

She shook her head. “I don’t think that would be a good idea. I mean…” She faltered. “You know what? Why don’t you just give me a call and we’ll see?”

He had clearly been dismissed. “That’s fine,” he said, picking up his plate and carrying it over to the sink.

“Oh, you don’t have to do that,” she said hastily. “Just set it there and I’ll put it into the dishwasher.”

It seemed as though she wanted him out of here as soon as possible. Well, okay, he was going. But he found himself wondering why she suddenly seemed so cagey. The way she was acting, you’d think she thought he was going to kidnap the kid or something.

“I’ll let myself out. Good-bye, fella,” Beau said, chucking Spencer under the chin on his way to the door. To Jordan, he said merely, “Thanks for the meal.”

Whatever she murmured in reply was lost as he firmly closed the door behind him.

On Sunday afternoon, Jordan ventured out into the world with Spencer for the first time. She had to. They had run out of bread and eggs. Besides, she thought she’d better pick up some kid-friendly groceries. Juice boxes, jelly…

Oh, and macaroni-and-cheese mix.

To think she had been so relieved when Spencer asked her for macaroni and cheese for lunch! That she could make. She even happened to have all the ingredients on hand.

She should have known better.

Her recipe called for tricolor shell pasta, gruyere and mascarpone cheeses, and crushed toasted walnuts.

Apparently, Spencer’s recipe called for a familiar blue-and-orange box containing elbow macaroni and a powdery orange substance.

“How come we have to drive so far to go to a grocery
store?” Spencer asked from the backseat as she headed out to the Virginia suburbs.

Because I don’t want to run into anybody I know while you’re with me,
she thought grimly, steering into an unfamiliar neighborhood filled with familiar stores and restaurants. Target, Wal-Mart, Applebee’s, Burger King. There had to be a supermarket around here somewhere.

Sure enough, she found a sprawling grocery superstore and pulled into the parking lot. It was crowded, but most likely every car here belonged to a stranger, unlike in her Georgetown neighborhood, where she recognized the store clerks and often bumped into clients and neighbors.

They climbed out of the car. The sun beamed onto the blacktop, so hot that it shimmered in waves. Jordan wiped a trickle of sweat from her brow and wished she dared to take Spencer over to her health club to go swimming.

Nobody can know he’s here.

Phoebe’s words came back to haunt her yet again, bringing with them an increasingly familiar chill.

What was going on? Why hadn’t Jordan been able to reach her friend since she left Friday night?

She had tried Pheobe’s number again several times last night and today, but each time there was only an answering machine.

Wouldn’t Phoebe want to check on her son? Wouldn’t she want to talk to him, to reassure him that she would be back?

What else had she said?

Jordan had gone over everything repeatedly in her mind, searching for some clue.

I’m so sorry to drag you into this …

Into what? Phoebe’s words made it sound as though
there were something huge going on. Something scary. Dangerous. Life-threatening.

Jordan glanced warily around the parking lot, almost expecting to see strangers’ eyes probing her.

But there was nothing disconcerting about the scene.

Nobody in this supermarket parking lot on this sunny Sunday afternoon was paying the least bit of attention to her and Spencer. They must look like just another mother and small child out getting groceries.

She reached down for his hand, but he pulled it away. She tried not to be hurt, yet she couldn’t help remembering how quickly Spencer had warmed up to Beau last night.

Jordan had to remind herself to walk slowly through the parking lot so that Spencer’s short little legs wouldn’t have to run to keep up. Her usual pace was briskly efficient, and when she shopped, she was usually buying ingredients for her catering business, or staple items for her own cupboards. This, she decided, should be an interesting—and enlightening—experience.

“Now, if you see something you like, you have to tell me,” she told Spencer as she pushed a cart through the electronic doors and into a refreshing blast of arctic air.

“I like that,” he said promptly, pointing at a display of chocolate bars as Jordan plucked two bags of gourmet coffee from a large sale bin.

She grinned. “You like chocolate? Who doesn’t? Okay, sweetie, go ahead. Grab a couple.”

He grabbed enough to hand out to a horde of trick-or-treaters on Halloween night and deposited them in a heap beside the two bags of coffee. Jordan looked dubiously at the contents of her cart. “Does your mom let you eat chocolate?”

“Sure. All the time. Sometimes I have candy bars for breakfast,” he said, looking her in the eye.

She fought back another smile. Smart kid. “Okay, whatever you say, Spencer. Let’s move on.”

As they moved through the store, she learned that a four-year-old’s diet consists mainly of prepackaged, preservative-filled convenience foods. At least, if Spencer was telling the truth about his usual diet.

He probably wasn’t, she conceded as he tried to convince her that he always had an ice-cream sundae topped with M&M’s and a can of cream soda as a bedtime snack.

But she bought the ice cream, the M&M’s, the cream soda.

She bought the boxed, kid-targeted kits containing miniature rounds of dough and packets of tomato sauce, cheese, and pepperoni, even though she could make delicious homemade pizza with fresh tomatoes and basil.

She bought the canned franks and beans, casting a wistful glance at the packages of navy beans that she could soak overnight and simmer all day with molasses and mustard and thick slabs of bacon.

She bought the boxed macaroni and cheese, the grape jelly, the juice boxes whose ingredients seemed to be all sugar and water and very little, if any, actual fruit juice.

In the checkout line, she allowed Spencer to choose several kinds of Pez and packages of bubble gum from the conveniently placed display. He told her that his mom always let him do that.

When she and Phoebe were little girls, they always talked about the kind of parents they would be. They decided they would let their kids eat candy for dinner and pizza for breakfast, wear shorts in March if the
weather was freakishly warm, and stay up as late as they wanted. They wouldn’t make the mistakes their parents did, and they wouldn’t have a bunch of meaningless rules.

Well, Jordan thought, placing the groceries on the conveyer belt, either Spencer was lying about what his mom let him eat, or Phoebe really had followed through on their plan.

Jordan suspected the latter was too far-fetched to be true. But she had to admit, it was fun to spoil the kid a little. This was the first time he hadn’t been sad or sulking since…

Well, since Beau Somerville left yesterday.

She felt her face grow flushed at the mere thought of the man. When he left, she was annoyed with herself for having invited him to stay in the first place. But when she finally climbed into bed, exhausted from lack of sleep the night before, she was transported swiftly off to dreamland—and Beau was waiting there.

In her dreams, they were alone together, making love. When she awakened abruptly, it was as though she could still taste his kisses, still feel his warm hands on her bare flesh.

Then reality crashed back in—and she realized what had awakened her.

It was Spencer, and he was screaming in the guest bedroom across the hall. Apparently he was having some kind of nightmare. By the time she rushed in, he was already sinking back into a fitful sleep. She sat by his bed in the dark for a long time, not sure whether her heart was pounding because she was haunted by his screams—or by her dream about Beau.

“Jordan, can I have one of those comic books?” Spencer asked, interrupting her thoughts. “Please?”

She glanced up to see the little boy gesturing at the display of newspapers and magazines, also conveniently placed beside the register.

“Does your mom—” she started to ask, but he was already nodding vehemently, and anyway, what was the point?

It didn’t matter what Phoebe let him read, or eat, or do, because Phoebe wasn’t here. Jordan was in charge. She had to find something for the kid to do for the rest of the day, since they couldn’t go anywhere or see anyone.

“Go ahead,” she told Spencer. “Get a couple. We can go back home and read.”

She picked up a couple of papers for herself: the hefty
Washington Post,
the heftier
New York Times.

She used to have the Sunday paper delivered, but finally realized that she never had time to read it. She worked weekends, after all, and by the time she dragged herself in the door in the evening, the last thing she wanted to do was face a newspaper thicker than the metro phone book. She would keep the thing around all week, telling herself that she would get around to reading it, but invariably tossed it into the recycling bin on Saturday, just in time for a new paper to arrive.

Well, today she would certainly have time to read. Heck, she could probably get through both papers word for word while Spencer leafed his way through the pile of comic books he had just dumped into the brimming cart.

After she had paid for their purchases, they left the store.

“It feels like a furnace out here,” Spencer complained, shading his eyes against the sun’s dazzle.

“I know, sweetie. We’ll turn on the air in the car. And the house is cool, too.”

“We’re just going back to your place?” he asked, sounding disappointed.

“What else did you have in mind?”

“The zoo. Beau said—”

“But Beau isn’t here today,” Jordan pointed out. “And he’s going away on vacation, I think. Didn’t he say something about that?”

“He said he would take me to the zoo.”

“Maybe I can take you to the zoo,” Jordan offered.

“Today?”

She glanced at the cart full of groceries, newspapers, and comic books. “I thought we could go home and read today.”

“Read?” he echoed, as though she had suggested that they go home and scrub the floor with a toothbrush.

“Don’t you want to read your new comic books?”

“No. I want to go to the zoo.”

“But Spencer—”

“With Beau.”

“Spencer…” She sighed.

He was just a little boy. He was bored out of his mind. She had to get his mind off Beau and the zoo—and off his missing mother, too. He had frequently asked about Phoebe this morning, wanting to know when she was coming back and why she had left him here.

“How about the movies?” Jordan said suddenly, on a whim.

“The movies?”

“Sure. We can bring the groceries home—we have to put the cold stuff away—and then we’ll go see something.”

“What?”

“We’ll check and see what’s playing.”

“I don’t want to see anything with pirates,” he said quickly.

“That’s okay. I’m not crazy about pirate movies, either. You can pick.”

He seemed to be mulling it over.

She did the same.

It would be dark inside a movie theater. Dark enough so that they wouldn’t be seen.

Again with the secret agent stuff. Why did she feel this unnerving sense that danger was dogging their every move?

Because Phoebe made it sound that way,
she reminded herself.

Or had she?

Had Jordan read too much into her friend’s words?

Had Phoebe literally meant that Jordan’s taking Spencer was a matter of life and death?

Remembering Phoebe’s haggard appearance and the haunted expression in her eyes, Jordan was able to answer her own questions.

No, and yes—in that order.

Late Sunday afternoon, Beau settled in front of the television on the burgundy leather couch in his living room. The air conditioner was running full blast, but it still felt warm in here. Maybe he should call the building super.

He was renting a furnished two-bedroom apartment in a four-story brick building not far from DuPont Circle. The place was perfectly functional—clean, roomy, and efficient.

Everything about it was rectangular, Beau had
noticed. The rooms, the windows, the furniture—even the draperies in every window fell in geometric precision, with nary a ruffle or tieback in sight.

There was a lot of chrome and glass, mirrors, and lacquer in the modern decor. Beau couldn’t help contrasting the look to his collection of antiques back home, with their flowing, graceful, curved lines and rich, polished finishes. The upholstered pieces he had were overstuffed and warm in color, rather than the navy-and-maroon color scheme in this place.

No, this certainly wasn’t his kind of apartment—but then, the situation was only temporary. Sooner or later, he would buy a place of his own and move all his stuff up from Louisiana. He just hadn’t had the time or energy to go house hunting yet.

Beau leaned back against the couch cushions, his neck muscles aching from working in front of the computer screen at his office all day. Now all he wanted was to relax. In one hand was the television remote; in the other, a sandwich he’d picked up at a mini-mart on the way home when he’d stopped for the Sunday papers.

Taking a bite, he channel-surfed past a wrestling match, a home improvement show, and a couple of tearjerker movies. Coming across a golf game, he watched for a few minutes. He hadn’t played in a while, he realized. Maybe he should bring his clubs along on his vacation. The beach house he was renting wasn’t far from one of the finest golf courses on the East Coast.

Taking another bite of the sandwich, he decided that he should have got the ham instead of the turkey. This was pretty flavorless.

Then again, everything he had eaten today tasted flavorless compared to that amazing meal Jordan had
whipped up last night. Andrea MacDuffwas right about one thing: the lady was some cook.

Andrea. That reminded him. He had promised to call her today and let her know whether he’d be able to have her plans ready to file for a building permit before he left for North Carolina.

He had worked exclusively on her project all day, and it looked as though the plans would be ready to go to the zoning board by Tuesday morning. Thank goodness. Andrea MacDuff wasn’t the kind of woman who tolerated delays very well.

After finishing his sandwich, Beau reached for the cordless telephone on the rectangular—of course—glass coffee table beside the couch. Might as well call Andrea now, since the news he had for her was good.

He dialed her number, wondering whether she would even be home, but she picked up on the first ring.

“Beau! How wonderful to hear from you,” she drawled. “How is every little thing?”

“Every little thing is great, Andrea, and so is the big thing,” he said easily. “Meaning, I’ll have everything ready to file for the building permit before I go away this week.”