The Baby Promise. Carolyne Aarsen

had no son and here they were together.

      Bob cleared his throat. “Let’s go sit in the living room.” He nodded toward Nick. “We always have devotions there after supper. Do you have time to join us?”

      Nick held his gaze as a trace of his former life drifted into his thoughts. His parents always had devotions after supper, as well. They would read the Bible and pray sincere prayers, believing God heard them.

      “You don’t have to join us if you don’t want to. Beth never has,” Ellen said quietly, misunderstanding his silence as she tacked her card back on the refrigerator. “If you have plans for tonight, I understand.”

      He faltered, wishing he could simply say no. But he was their guest and even though he and God hadn’t spent much time together lately, he didn’t have to deny their faith. Joining them was the least he could do for his buddy’s parents.

      Besides, he didn’t have anything else to do. Go back to Cochrane to a hotel and from there…

      He put the thought aside as Ellen tucked her arm through his.

      “You know, I feel as if we know you beyond the few letters Jim would send,” she said as they walked to the living room. “When Jim told us your parents had died when you were just a teenager, we started praying for you, too.”

      “Thank you,” he said. The thought that they remembered him in their prayers warmed some forgotten part of his soul. Sure, he didn’t believe in prayers anymore, and the fact that Nick was here, and not the son they had also prayed for, proved that.

      But yet…

      As Nick entered the living room his steps slowed. While the kitchen was cozy and comfortable, this room looked like part of a movie set. The log walls soared up a story and a half. Windows covered one entire wall. Though they were just dark rectangles and triangles now, Nick suspected, given the orientation of the house, that in the daytime one had an unsurpassed view of the mountains.

      The room created a sense of space and, at the same time, peace and warmth. For the smallest moment he regretted not deciding to stay here longer.

      As Nick looked around he noticed a group of pictures.

      “Are those pictures of Jim?” he asked Ellen. “Can I have a look?”

      “Of course. Our home is your home.” She made the offer as easily as offering him another piece of pie.

      His eyes flicked over the pictures. Jim flashing a gaptoothed grin. Jim holding up a fish. Jim wearing a football uniform in high school. Jim in a tuxedo, his arms slung over the shoulders of two attractive women, one of them with dark brown hair, the other a redhead, but neither of them blonde Beth. Looked like high-school graduation.

      Beside the gallery a shelf held a formal photograph of Jim in uniform looking more solemn than Nick ever remembered him to be. And beside that, a wedding picture of Beth and Jim.

      He leaned forward to get a better look.

      Nick recognized the grin on Jim’s face. The same one he often saw when Jim would beat Nick in a video game. The same one he saw on Jim’s face just before—

      Nick pushed the memory aside, turning his attention to Beth in the photo.

      The veil, the white dress and her long, curly hair all combined to give her an otherworldly air. Though she looked stunningly pretty in this picture, the Beth he had just met had a mature beauty that this picture gave only hints of.

      He thought of the picture of her that Jim always carried around. She looked as serious in that picture as she did in this one—as serious as she had this evening. He wondered if he would ever see her smile.

      “That’s the trouble with having only one child—one does tend to take a lot of pictures,” Ellen said, coming to stand beside him.

      “I’m sure you’re glad you did now,” Nick said.

      Ellen adjusted Jim and Beth’s wedding picture. “I just wish we had a few more of Beth, but Jim isn’t…wasn’t one to take many photographs.” She sighed, then brightened. “But now we have a grandchild coming, so I have another reason to take pictures.”

      “You must be thrilled about that,” Nick said.

      “I’ve been knitting and sewing all winter,” Ellen said with a note of pride. “Beth doesn’t know it, though. I want the gifts to be a surprise.”

      Beth was lucky to have so much help.

      So she doesn’t really need yours.

      The insidious voice twisted through his mind and he sighed. He had promised.

      And what can you possibly do for her? What can you offer her that this family can’t? She doesn’t even want you around.

      Nick gave his head a light shake. He knew that promising Jim he would look out for Beth seemed a vague idea at best. He had come to Alberta with no clear plan other than to see her and to make sure she was okay.

      But the trouble was now that he’d spent an evening with her, other emotions worked themselves through his soul.

      Attraction and appeal and a desire to protect that had little to do with Jim’s promise and more to do with the fact that he’d been intrigued by Beth from the first moment he saw her picture.

      Don’t kid yourself. You can’t take care of anybody. She’s not for you.

      Nick clenched his hands as his thoughts hammered at his composure.

      He turned away from the pictures.

      Ellen curled up in a chair on one side of the woodstove while Bob threw another log on the crackling fire. With a heavy sigh, Bob settled into a worn leather recliner opposite Ellen, pulled a book off an end table beside his chair and leaned back.

      Nick took this as a hint that they were ready. So he dropped onto the leather couch facing them, leaning forward, his hands clasped together. He felt the way he did whenever he had to talk to his commanding officer. Unsure of the reception, but unwilling to let his uncertainty show.

      Bob opened the book, the crackling of the pages the only sound in the easy quiet filling the room.

      “I thought I would read Psalm 46,” Bob said, pulling out a pair of reading glasses from his pocket and perching them on his nose. “Jim had to memorize this Psalm for one of his Sunday school classes.” He took a wavering breath. “I thought it was appropriate, considering the circumstances.” He cleared his throat and began. “‘God is our refuge and strength. An ever-present help in times of trouble. Therefore we will not fear though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea…’”

      As he read, his voice rose and fell. The words and images they brought to mind seemed to ease the tension that had gripped Nick since he stepped out of the cab.

      He hadn’t wanted to come here and when Beth had told him that she absolved him of his responsibility to Jim, he felt a sense of relief.

      Yet he couldn’t shake the feeling that he wasn’t finished here.

      “‘…He makes wars cease to the ends of the earth; He breaks the bow and shatters the spear, He burns the shields with fire. Be still and know that I am God…’”

      Nick felt the words settle into his soul and, in spite of the cynicism and bitterness that had been his constant companion, here with Bob and Ellen in their home, he felt God’s presence and comfort.

      “‘…the God of Jacob is our fortress.’” Bob paused at the end, the words a gentle echo in the silence that wrapped around them.

      Bob kept his gaze on the Bible, his hand resting on the page, as if drawing strength from it. “Ellen and I prayed every day for Jim and for his safety.” He sighed and shook his head. “We hoped Jim would come home and eventually come to stay here in the mountains of Alberta, and not die in the mountains across the ocean.” He paused, gathering himself. “But God’s ways