Janelle Taylor

by Night Moves

  “It wasn’t that. She died suddenly one day when she was only in her early sixties. Just keeled over and had a massive stroke. None of us saw it coming. We all thought she had years of cooking left.”

  “That’s terrible. I’m sorry about your loss.”

  “Tragedies happen.” His eyes were shadowed. “It was a long time ago. I just wish she had told us her secret ingredient.”

  “Well, I’ll tell you one thing. Her recipe sounds an awful lot like mine. You named every ingredient I use, except one.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Beer. I use a whole bottle. It gives the greens a nice flavor.”

  He shook his head, smiling. “Nope. Mama wouldn’t allow liquor in the house. She was a strict Southern Baptist. It must’ve been something else.”

  “Maybe it was hot pepper flakes,” she said conversationally. “I’ve seen recipes that call for that.”

  “I don’t think so. Grammy’s greens weren’t spicy. They just had a very distinct flavor that I’ve never tasted since, and believe me, I’ve had lots of greens. I’m a Southern boy at heart.”

  He watched Jordan heap his plate with golden chicken, mashed potatoes, and greens. As she carried it over to him, he looked down at the little boy seated beside him.

  “So what’s up, Spence?” he asked. “You don’t like blue chicken, but what about the rest of this stuff?”

  “Guess,” Spencer invited.

  “Well, I’d say you don’t like those little green things in the mashed potatoes.”

  “She said they’re like onions,” Spencer said, with unpleasant emphasis on the she.

  “Most kids don’t like onions,” Beau agreed. “Especially green ones. Because most kids don’t like anything that’s green. Least of all something that’s called ‘greens.’ Right?”

  “Right!” Spencer nodded, and the expression on his face officially ordained Beau a superhero.

  “When I was a kid, I liked onions, and green vegetables, and greens,” Jordan said, setting the heaping plate down in front of Beau.

  “Yeah, but you were a girl,” Beau said, as though that explained everything. To Spencer he said, “I bet you would’a rather had a peanut-butter-andjelly sandwich, huh?”

  Spencer nodded emphatically.

  Jordan seemed to consider that. “I have peanut butter,” she volunteered. “And I think there’s a jar of marmalade in the pantry cupboard…”

  “Marmalade?” Beau and Spencer echoed in unison.

  “What’s marmalade?” Spencer asked, wrinkling his nose.

  “You don’t have regular jelly?” Beau studied Jordan as though she had just whipped up a batch of eyeball soup.

  Didn’t all moms keep jelly on hand? Didn’t all moms know that marmalade didn’t qualify as jelly? Jelly was purple and sticky, and these days, it came in a plastic squeeze bottle.

  “How about honey?” Beau asked. “Got any of that?”

  “Yes! I have honey!” She looked as though she had successfully answered a $32,000 question on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire.

  “Ever have a peanut-butter-and-honey sandwich, Spence?”

  “Nope.”

  “Want to try one?”

  “Yup,” the little boy told Beau, who promptly pushed back his stool.

  “I’ll make it for you,” he said.

  “I can do it,” Jordan said. “You eat.”

  “Nah, I have a special way of making peanut-butter-and-honey sandwiches. You got any pretzel rods?”

  “Pretzel rods?”

  “I didn’t think you did. Well, got anything that looks like a pretzel rod?”

  “I have sesame-garlic bread sticks,” she said from the pantry cabinet, from which she removed peanut butter and a jar of honey. Not the plastic bear-shaped kind of honey jar, Beau noticed. A pricey glass jar with a fancy brand name.

  Well, better that it wasn’t the familiar bear jar, Beau told himself. The bear jar would have brought back memories that were better left buried.

  The trouble was, they refused to stay buried.

  He distracted himself by saying to Jordan, “Sesamegarlic bread sticks? Can I see them?”

  She held up the package. He peered at the contents, then shrugged. “That’ll do it.”

  “You’re going to make a sandwich on bread sticks?”

  “I’m going to make the sandwich on bread,” he said, draping his blazer over a nearby doorknob and rolling up his shirtsleeves. “The bread sticks are for something else. Stand aside.”

  She threw up her hands in a whatever-you-say gesture, then took a seat beside Spencer.

  “Where’s the bread?” Beau asked.

  “Top drawer on your left.”

  “Knives and spoons?”

  “Top drawer on your right.”

  He retrieved the bread—a fancy whole-grain kind, of course, but it would do—from the metal-lined bin and took two butter knives and a teaspoon from the drawer. He used one to spread the bread with peanut butter, then drizzled honey over it with a spoon.

  As he worked, he forced his thoughts not to stray from the project at hand. Not to venture away from the here and now—from this Georgetown kitchen and this little boy, a world and so many years away from another kitchen, another little boy, another peanut-butter sandwich….

  “What do you think he’s going to do with the bread sticks, Jordan?” he heard Spencer ask.

  “I have no idea. Let’s wait and see,” she replied.

  Jordan? Beau was surprised to hear the child call his mother by her first name. Some families did that, he knew. Maybe that was “in” up north here, but the old-fashioned Southerner in Beau found it disrespectful.

  He found himself wondering about the little boy’s dad. Andrea hadn’t mentioned whether Jordan was divorced, or a widow. Nor had she mentioned that Jordan had a son. Beau figured that she must have assumed it would turn him off to date a woman who came with that kind of baggage.

  Truth be told, if he had known about Spencer, he probably wouldn’t have gone along with the date in the first place. It was hard enough to see little boys in his everyday life—playing on swings when he drove by the park, eating fast food when he picked up his lunch, clinging to their parents’ hands in crosswalks when he stopped at lights.

  It seemed that there were children everywhere he looked, and all those little boys were reminders of the one who had left an aching void in Beau’s heart that could never be filled.

  He was caught off guard when he’d spotted Spencer standing in the doorway tonight behind Jordan. But something about the child drew him in. There was a desolate aura about him that touched Beau’s heart, made him want to help. Instead of turning and fleeing, he’d found himself reaching out, venturing inside.

  And now, here he was.

  And here was the sandwich. He carried the plate over to Spencer and set it in front of him.

  “Whoa! A sailboat!”

  “Like it?”

  “It’s great!”

  “It is great,” Jordan said with a smile, studying his handiwork.

  He had cut the square sandwich diagonally in half, then cut the point off one of the halves, which gave him a large and small triangle, which he arranged side-to-side on the plate as a sail, with the bread stick in between as the mast. The remaining piece of bread was shaped like a boat, and he positioned it beneath the sails.

  “How’d you learn to do that?” Spencer asked, taking a big bite of the mast.

  He shrugged, a lump in his throat.

  “Beau’s an architect,” Jordan told the little boy. “I bet he knows how to design all kinds of neat things. Now let’s let him eat his dinner. I hope it hasn’t grown cold.”

  “I’m sure it’s fine.” He sat down again, his appetite diminished by the wave of emotion that had washed over him. How well he remembered those days of peanut-butter sandwich sculptures, and shared jokes, and being part of a cozy threesome….

  “I can warm it in the microwave for you,” Jordan offered.<
br />
  “That’s okay.” He raised a forkfull of greens to his mouth and chewed mechanically at first.

  Then his eyes widened in surprise. “I can’t believe it. This tastes just like Grammy’s recipe.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “I’m positive. The flavor is identical. Delicious. I haven’t had anything this good since she passed away.”

  Jordan grinned. “I think she was holding out on your Southern Baptist mama, Beau.”

  He considered that. It wouldn’t be so far-fetched for Grammy to have had a stash of beer somewhere. Come to think of it, he half remembered Mama accusing her of spiking the Christmas eggnog with bourbon one year.

  Beau gobbled down the food, the best he’d tasted in years. Well, how long had it been since he’d had a home-cooked meal? Lisa didn’t cook. Mama did, but she sure didn’t have a flair for it.

  Only Jeanette had cooked for him in the years since Grammy died. She made all his favorite foods: fried catfish, sausage gravy over biscuits, cornbread. She teased him that she was going to make him fat, and he was well on his way….

  And then she was gone, and there were no more home-cooked meals, and even if there had been, Beau had lost his appetite. Permanently, it seemed. For food, anyway. Liquor went down easy. It dulled the pain. The booze and lack of food had whittled his once-expanding waistline until none of his clothes fit and he was a shadow of the man he used to be.

  It was Lisa who turned him around. Got him off the booze, and into salads and sprouts—and a gym. Lisa was a health nut.

  Well, at least one of her healthy habits had stayed with him. He didn’t care if he never saw another sprout or tasted tofu ice cream again, but he was hooked on his daily workouts.

  “My dad has a boat on the river,” Spencer commented, munching on one of the sandwich-sails. “But it’s not this kind. It’s a yacht.”

  Startled back to the present, Beau glanced down at the little boy, then at Jordan. “Is that so?”

  She shrugged, her eyes clouded, expression veiled. It didn’t take a genius to figure out why. Spencer had referred to his dad in the present tense, so clearly his parents were divorced. Maybe Jordan’s ex was one of those playboy types with a yacht—and a female first mate in every port.

  “Does he take you sailing on his yacht?” Beau asked, setting his fork down and pushing away his empty plate.

  “Yup. But my mom doesn’t like it when we do that. She says I should learn how to swim first.”

  “That’s probably a good idea.” Again he looked at Jordan. “I’m sure your dad makes sure you have a life jacket on when you’re out on the water.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “That’s good.”

  “Do you have a boat?” Spencer asked.

  “Actually, I do.” Truth be told, he had a few boats. But he wasn’t about to elaborate. Knowing Andrea, who was from Louisiana and had to be well aware of the vast Somerville fortune, Jordan had been duly informed that Beau was a wealthy man. That didn’t mean he had to go into detail about his sailboats, speedboats, his yacht— or any of the other trappings that no longer meant anything to him. He would trade all of it…

  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. “J
ust 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.

  Chapter Four

  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.