Carolyne Aarsen - The Baby Promise

Then, once he got used to the idea, a sense of freedom overtook him. He had possibilities and a chance to start over. A chance to put what happened in Afghanistan behind him.

Staying with Bob and Ellen would be a constant reminder of the accident.

And seeing Beth regularly?

Bob leaned forward, his eyes holding Nick’s. “We’re lonely, too. And losing Jim…” His voice faltered again.

Nick hesitated, digging through his confusion for the right words. “I’m really thankful for the offer…but I don’t think I can—”

Ellen held up her hand, a smile tinged with sorrow lifting her mouth. “We don’t want you to feel any obligation and we certainly don’t want to put any pressure on you, so please don’t feel like you have to say yes. We thought it would be good for all of us to spend time together.”

His mind skipped back to the ranch he grew up on. The security of his home life and the love of his parents.

Then he thought of facing Beth every day for the next few days and he shook his head. “I appreciate your very generous offer, but I’m sorry.”

Ellen’s smile faltered but she nodded. “Of course. You have things to do. I understand. And I’m sure Beth will, too.”

Nick thought back to his brief conversation with Beth. How she had “absolved” him of his obligation. He had a feeling that, in her opinion, there was nothing to understand or care about.

“Would you be willing to at least stay the night?” Bob asked, leaning forward, hope in his voice.

Nick bit his lip, then a sigh eased out of him. “Sure. I’ll stay the night,” he said.

How hard could it be to spare these people one evening of his time?

“Are you sure you only need two weeks here?” Beth’s brother asked as Beth shifted the phone to her other ear, plumping a pillow and adjusting a plant while she listened.

Though Art had told her clearly that she had to call at 7:30 p.m. on the dot, when she’d dutifully made the call he wasn’t home. Nor was he home at eight or nine.

So she’d called him first thing this morning and as a result, had woken him up. Not the wisest move, but Beth forced herself to put up with Art’s early-morning surliness because he had something she wanted.

A room and a bed in a town house in Vancouver.

“I’m not due for another five weeks,” Beth said, forcing herself to speak quietly as she walked around her house, tidying an already achingly neat living room. “I only need two to three weeks to find my own place so I can settle in before the baby is born.”

“You sure you don’t want to move in with Curt and Denise?”

“Be realistic, Art. You saw how cramped things were when we got together there for Christmas.”

“Yeah. I guess you’re right.”

“And with Mom living there, there’s really no room.”

Their brother, Curt, and his wife, Denise, lived in a tiny mobile home in a town so small that if a person glanced sideways, they’d miss it. There were no opportunities for Beth there and, as she had told Art, no room in the trailer.

“Okay. You can come. As long as it’s only a couple of weeks and it’s just you, and no kid. I’ve got another guy coming after you and I can’t have you around if you have a kid.”

Beth clutched the phone, pressing back the words threatening to spill out. That the “kid” she carried was his niece or nephew seemed lost on Art. But then, Art had never been the most tactful nor the most considerate of her brothers.

Then a tightening seized her abdomen, as if her baby also protested the situation. She laid a hand over her stomach, as if to settle the child.

“Don’t worry, Art. I won’t cramp your lifestyle.” The angry words spilled out before she could stop them.

“Hey, little sis, I didn’t mean it that way,” Art said, instantly remorseful. “It’s just, well, I’m kind of under the gun at work and things are piling up personally. Well, you know how things are with me and Abby…”

Beth made some appropriate noises even though she had a hard time feeling sorry for a man who had been putting off his wedding date for the past five years.

“So, well, that’s the deal. Uh, are you doing okay?” Art asked, giving his version of sympathy. “You know, with Jim gone and all?”

“I’m doing okay,” she said, her anger sifting away in the light of his confused concern.

“You still working?”

“Yeah. Part-time at the craft store and I—”

“Becker. Get out of there.” Art’s sudden yell made her jump. “Hey, Beth. Sorry. Gotta run. Becker’s digging in his dog food again.”

A click in her ear told Beth that the conversation and Art’s sympathy had come to an abrupt halt.

Though she should know better, Beth felt the prick of tears. Neither Art nor Curt were the storybook brothers her friends in school had thought they were. Thirteen years separated her and Art, the youngest of her two brothers. By the time Beth had come into the family, the boys were in their teens, interested in cars, women and anything but a little sister who cried a lot and, as she grew older, loved to dress up and play with dolls. Anything she had to say to them was greeted with grunts, blank stares and commands to get out of their rooms.

And shortly after she turned six, they both moved out, leaving her with a distant father and a mother struggling to keep her marriage together. A failing proposition, as it turned out.

Beth dropped the phone on the table and glanced at the clock. She had to get going if she wanted to meet Shellie at the store this time. She started for the kitchen to prepare her bag lunch just as she heard a scraping sound outside the house.

What was going on?

She opened the door a crack.

A flurry of snow flew through the air, then another, and through it, Beth made out a man, bent over, wielding a snow shovel.

Who…?

Then he straightened and Beth’s heart dropped into her boots.

What was Nick Colter still doing here? And why was he shoveling her sidewalk?

“Excuse me. Can I help you?” The question was rhetorical, seeing as how it was he who was supposedly helping her.

Nick brushed some snow off his dark hair and gave her a quick look, his cheeks ruddy with the cold. “I don’t think so. Not in your condition.”

“So…what are you doing here?”

Nick rested his hands on the top of the shovel and shrugged as he glanced at the piles of snow he had created on either side of her walk. “I’m guessing shoveling snow, but if you want to call it something else…”

“I thought you were leaving last night.” The remark came out more bluntly than she had intended, but his unexpected presence unnerved her.

“Me, too.” Nick bent over and pushed another pile of snow up, then tossed it easily aside. “Bob and Ellen asked me to stay for a night. They wanted to hear a bit more about Jim, I guess.” Nick grunted as he cleared away another space on her sidewalk.

“You don’t need to clear my walk.” She glared at him, as if to underline her message, but he wasn’t looking at her.

“You might not think so,” he returned, intent on his work. “But I don’t think your baby would appreciate you slipping and falling.”

Beth was about to say something more, then changed her mind. She had to get ready for work. Maybe he’d be gone by the time she was done.

But when she stepped out the door the second time, briefcase in one hand, bag lunch in the other, he was cleaning snow off the sidewalk that ran along the front of the house.

He looked up as she closed the door. “The snow here is really packed,” he said. “Has it ever been shoveled?”

“I’ve never shoveled it because it just leads to the back door, which I never use.”

Nick stopped his work, his expression puzzled. “You’ve been shoveling your own sidewalk?”