The Baby Promise. Carolyne Aarsen

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      “Thanks for bringing me here.

      For…for being there.”

      “It’s okay. Of course I would bring you. And as for staying…” Nick shrugged. He didn’t quite know what to think of his fierce desire to protect Beth that had less to do with Jim’s request than his own need to be at her side.

      “It meant a lot,” Beth said quietly, her eyes holding his.

      Nick felt an urge to touch her. To connect with her. His hand twitched at his side and as he lifted it the doors to the NICU swished open. Reality intruded into the moment in the form of Beth’s mother-in-law, Ellen.

      Ellen glanced at Nick and he got the hint that she wanted to be alone with Beth for a moment.

      “I’ll be waiting in the lobby,” he said to Ellen. Then he glanced at Beth. “Congratulations, Beth.”

      But as he walked away, he wished he could stay.

      He dismissed the thought. He wasn’t Beth’s husband and he had no right to be at her side.

      In spite of his growing feelings toward her.

      CAROLYNE AARSEN

      and her husband, Richard, live on a small ranch in northern Alberta, where they have raised four children and numerous foster children and are still raising cattle. Carolyne crafts her stories in an office with a large west-facing window through which she can watch the changing seasons while struggling to make her words obey.

      The Baby Promise

      Carolyne Aarsen

      I lift up my eyes to the hills—

      where does my help come from?

      My help comes from the LORD,

      the Maker of heaven and earth.

      —Psalms 121: 1–2

      I’d like to dedicate this book to all our soldiers serving overseas both in the battlefield and in peace-keeping missions. We may never know the extent of your sacrifice but we hope that you understand our appreciation of your dedication and heroism.

      Acknowledgments

      I’d like to thank Nita Rudmik for all her help with the neonatal questions.

      I’d also like to thank Janelle and Mark Schneider both for the sacrifices they have made respectively as a soldier and wife of a soldier and for the information they gave me about the troops in Afghanistan. I only used the tiniest part of all they gave me and any mistakes or misrepresentation is mine and mine alone.

      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

      Epilogue

      Letter to Reader

      Questions for Discussion

      Chapter One

      He wasn’t supposed to be here, Nick Colter thought, his eyes looking over the log house nestled in a copse of pine trees, smoke curling out of the stone chimney.

      The utter peace of the place eased away memories of dust, pain, brokenness and war, but behind that came the guilt.

      “Can I help you?”

      A melodic voice broke the quiet of the winter morning and Nick spun around, his hand reaching for the rifle he no longer carried.

      He caught himself and flexed his tightening fingers, forcing himself to relax as he watched the petite woman walking toward him through the pine trees dusted with snow. These were the friendly mountains of Cochrane, Alberta, not the mountains of Afghanistan.

      He wasn’t a soldier anymore and the woman with the curly blond hair pulled loosely back from a heart-shaped face, cheeks rosy from the cold, wasn’t an enemy.

      “Sorry to startle you,” she said as she walked toward him, choosing her steps carefully on the snow-packed driveway. “I just saw the cab leave.”

      “Yeah, I just got here.” Nick poked his thumb over his shoulder at the car that was spinning out of the driveway, struggling to gain traction on the snow. He dropped his duffel on the ground as he watched the young woman come closer to him. She wore a pale blue woolen jacket straining over a rounded belly and black pants tucked into leather boots. In spite of the cold, she wore nothing on her head and her bare hands clutched the handle of a large black briefcase.

      Beth Carruthers. Jim’s widow. Looking even more beautiful than she did in the pictures his soldier buddy had shown him.

      And pregnant with the child his friend had talked about so often and now would never see.

      Nick walked toward her, pulling off his hat as he did. She stopped a few feet away from him, her expression guarded and cautious, her violet eyes narrowed.

      “Hello, Beth. I don’t know if you remember me. I’m Nick Colter. I was stationed with Jim in Afghanistan. He always told me I should come visit his family, and when Jim’s parents, Bob and Ellen, asked me to come…well…I said I would.”

      As he spoke, sorrow blanketed her features and she took a faltering step away. Her small action sent a myriad of emotions coursing through him.

      Grief, anger, sadness, but lying beneath all that, a deep well of guilt at being the one standing here instead of her beloved husband, Jim. He, who had little to live for, had survived and Jim, who had so much to live for, had not.

      This is wrong, he wanted to tell her. And I know it is. I shouldn’t be here.

      He shook his head and shifted his weight, wincing as the movement resurrected pain from an injury that had given him a one-way ticket back home.

      Behind the pain came the thought that he needed to be back with his unit, doing the job he’d trained for and had done since he was eighteen.

      But he had a medical discharge he couldn’t work around, and a promise to keep.

      Beth wrapped one arm around herself as if trying to hold in her sorrow, her eyes flitting away from him. “I remember you now.” She spoke quietly, grief softening her voice. “I saw you at the funeral.”

      Nick wanted to say something to ease her pain, but any words he might have were too small for the moment. So he stood in front of her, hat in hand, letting his silence say what his mouth couldn’t.

      Sometimes words couldn’t say it all.

      “What…what are you doing here?” she asked, still looking away from him.

      He was here because as Jim lay dying in his arms, he pleaded with Nick to keep an eye on his wife, to watch over her and make sure she was okay. While Jim’s life seeped out of him into the desert sand, his eyes held Nick’s with an intensity that branded itself into Nick’s very soul as he pleaded with Nick to take care of his family.

      But when Nick looked into Beth’s eyes, he wondered if this was the time to say all that.

      “Mr.