Free Janelle Taylor by Night Moves Page A

single mom.
    No—you couldn’t hide a thing like that. Besides, she had said he wasn’t hers, Beau reminded himself. And Spencer had talked about his parents and his home in Philadelphia.
    Well, whatever the case, something told Beau that there was more to the situation with Spencer than Jordan had told him—or her business partner.
    Oh, well. None of this had anything to do with Beau. He planned on keeping his distance from Jordan Curry … no matter what he had promised Spencer when he left.
    Spencer…
    No.
    Maybe you can tell a woman you’ll call when you have no intention of doing so, but you can’t do that to a little kid, he scolded himself. You told him you’d take him to the zoo. You can’t just vanish off the face of the earth.
    He still didn’t know why he had blurted out the invitation as he was leaving. Now he was stuck.
    Well, maybe he could call over there before he left for North Carolina. He would make up some excuse about why he couldn’t go to the zoo after all.
    A prickle of guilt threatened to push its way forward, but he shoved it away from his consciousness.
    By the time he got back from vacation, Spencer would no doubt be back home in Philadelphia, and Beau would have put Jordan Curry’s charms out of his mind for good.
    He hoped.
    The movie was actually enjoyable, to Jordan’s surprise. Naturally, on her own she would never have chosen an animated Grated comedy about a talking piano’s journey to another galaxy, but she found herself laughing at the slapstick mishaps along with a genuinely amused Spencer.
    They sat in the back row of the crowded theater and shared a big tub of buttered popcorn and a box of Snowcaps. She timed it so that they would arrive during the previews of coming attractions—meaning the lights were down in the theater—and she made sure they were the first ones out of their seats when the credits started rolling. That was fine with Spencer—he had to go to the bathroom so badly that he was practically doubled over.
    Which presented a problem.
    Should she let him go into the men’s room alone? Or take him into the ladies’ room with her? Jordan pondered the dilemma as she led him hurriedly toward the rest rooms over by the exit door. She had no idea what the mom of a young son did in a situation like this, but realized she really had no alternative. She couldn’t let him out of her sight.
    She hurried him into the ladies’ room and parked herself outside the stall, wanting to hustle him in andout of here before the throng from the theater flooded the place. She had chosen a suburban Cineplex that was a good twenty-minute drive from Georgetown, and she doubted that she’d run into anyone she knew at a kiddie matinee, but she didn’t want to take any chances.
    If only she knew what was going on with Phoebe.
    “Spencer? Are you okay in there?” she called, rapping on the door as a line formed in front of the three stalls.
    “Uh-huh. I’m coming out”
    She heard him fumble with the lock.
    The door didn’t open.
    “Uh-oh,” his voice said. The lock rattled again.
    “Spencer? Can’t you open the door?”
    “I’m trying.”
    “How old is your son?” one of the women in line asked her.
    She opened her mouth to correct the mistake, then realized that would only draw more attention to them. “He’s four,” she said simply, and put her mouth close to the crack in the stall. “Spencer, slide the metal bar to the side, okay?”
    “I’m trying. It’s hard to move it”
    Jordan looked down, figuring that she could probably crawl under the space beneath the stall door. She was about to do so when she heard a click and the door opened.
    “Thank goodness. I was just about to rescue you.” She bent toward Spencer to hug him, but he flinched.
    The woman who had asked about his age said in a confidential tone as Jordan led Spencer past, “My son is four, too, and he doesn’t like it when I hug him in public lately, either.”
    Jordan smiled