Blessed Vows. Jillian Hart

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      Jake watched her with serious eyes

      It was as if in that brief moment he could see right through her to the places that mattered and held the greatest truths. Rachel’s heart skipped a beat, and her soul brightened the way sunshine did after passing clouds.

      The earth seemed to still and she saw the man he was, beyond the warrior and her brother’s friend and Sally’s uncle. Jake was no longer a stranger. She couldn’t say exactly why; it was only something she could feel. Like faith. Or like hope.

      She could sense the heart of the man, his integrity and character and strength. And his goodness.

      He folded his strong arms over his broad chest. “Come join me.”

      That sounded like the best idea ever.

      JILLIAN HART

      makes her home in Washington State, where she has lived most of her life. When Jillian is not hard at work on her next story, she loves to read, go to lunch with her friends and spend quiet evenings with her family.

      Blessed Vows

      Jillian Hart

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      My purpose is that they may be encouraged

       in heart and united in love.

      —Colossians 2:2

      Dear Reader,

      THE McKASLIN CLAN continues when Rachel meets her brother’s best friend. Jake is on temporary leave from active duty in the Middle East so that he can take guardianship of his orphaned niece. Rachel falls in love with both the man and the little girl, and forsakes the life she knows in Montana to move across the country to where Jake is stationed. Always a romantic, Rachel marries her knight in shining armor and means her wedding vows with every bit of her heart and soul. Love, like faith, takes great belief and trust. But will her love be strong enough to open Jake’s battle weary heart?

      Thank you for choosing Blessed Vows. I hope you enjoy Rachel’s story as much as I’ve enjoyed writing it.

      I wish you joy and the sweetest of blessings,

      Contents

      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 One

      How did she get talked into this? Rachel McKaslin asked herself as she peered into the basement’s deep-box freezer. The answer was easy—because she had a teeny-weeny problem saying no. Especially when it came to saying no to any member of her family.

      Which was why she was hanging nearly upside down in the freezer and freezing. Her fingertips were numb from shoving packages around. There was a roast in here somewhere. She knew it was in here. But could she find it? No. She did manage to find everything else, though: packages of hot dogs, boxes of frozen fish fillets, bags of frozen vegetables and a big sack of ice pops. The Popsicles she’d been looking for the last time she’d been searching through this freezer.

      Wasn’t that just her luck?

      She grabbed a couple of grape Popsicles and heaved herself over the edge of the freezer. Her feet hit the ground—yes, she loved being short—and she rubbed the small of her back. A home-cooked meal, that’s what her brother Ben had requested for his military buddy, who’d apparently been eating more MREs than real food for the last few years.

      Okay. Frozen fish fingers probably didn’t exactly qualify as the main course of an old-fashioned home-cooked meal.

      It would have helped if Ben had called while she’d still been at work at the diner. She could have made up something right there to bring home. Or she could have stopped by the store and bought a roast like the one she couldn’t manage to find now.

      Maybe it was time to call in reinforcements. Maybe her sister Paige could send someone over from the diner with a to-go box. And after putting in a twelve-hour day on her feet, she’d be more than glad to give that a try.

      It wasn’t as if she could cook a roast that wasn’t here. Ben would understand. But would his best friend?

      She sighed. Well, with her luck, probably not.

      She closed the freezer lid, flicked out the overhead light and at the base of the narrow stairs rising up out of the basement, she could hear the briiing of the phone.

      Great, how long had it been ringing? She imagined Paige calling, worrying about why Rachel hadn’t answered after the twenty-seventh ring. Paige was a worrier. Or maybe it was her sister Amy checking in from her latest househunting quest. Or Ben—if it was Ben, then she could explain about the failed roast recovery mission.

      She tried to dash up the stairs, but her bunny slippers on the narrow steps slowed her down. By the time she flew up and into the kitchen and wrapped her hand around the receiver, the ringing died. The dial tone droned in her ear. And she didn’t have caller ID.

      Her cell phone began to chime the opening bars to “Ode to Joy.” Excellent! Whoever had called was trying her other phone. Except, where was it? As the electronic music grew louder and louder, she followed the sound into the kitchen and to the round oak table where her duffel bag sat, still zipped. She dug around until she found it.

      And it was still ringing. Whew. She flipped it open. “Hello?”

      “Ah, is this Rachel McKaslin?” a man’s gravelly voice asked, as if uncertain he had the right number.

      A man’s voice she didn’t recognize. I think I know who this is. “Yep, that’s me.” She yanked open the freezer door on the fridge. “Is this Jake, by chance?”

      “That would be me. Your brother told you I was comin’, but did he warn you about me?” There was a smile to Jake’s voice.

      Without a doubt a very handsome smile, she thought as she tossed the ice pops into the freezer section of the fridge for later consumption. “Yep, he sure did. The question is, did Ben warn you about me?”

      His warm, easy chuckle came across the line. “He did. Ben said that you are the generous and lovely soul who agreed to look after us at the last minute and on a Friday night. I take that to mean you cancelled a date?”

      “Who, me? Date?” She bit her bottom lip to keep in the snicker.

      “Well, it is a date night, and I understand you’re a single attractive lady.”

      Yeah, right. Not since high school. There were a lot of great men in the world, good and decent men. She firmly believed that, but they never seemed to be interested in her. Maybe it was because she was always so busy, and that didn’t leave a lot of time to date. But that didn’t explain why no one ever asked her out. Most men were looking for a more worldly woman and, as she looked down at her fuzzy pink bunny slippers, she was anything but worldly.

      “I thought I’d sacrifice