Tender Vow (17 page)

At first, his mouth touched hers like a fine brush to its palette, gently flicking and skimming, almost like a whisper. Jason dared not move for fear of spooking her, so he kept his arms at his sides. But then, something happened. She made the first attempt to adjust her seating, turning to face him more squarely. He took the move as an invitation to deepen the kiss, and his lips swept over hers with fervor, like a passionate artist first putting brush to canvas. For long moments, they kissed, tasted, pressed, devoured, his arms gradually gathering her to him, his hands tenderly kneading the hollows of her back, tracing over her shoulder blades, exploring the sweet indentations of her spine. He knew that the moment she retreated, he would respect her by stopping, but she astounded him by wrapping her arms around his back and locking her hands.

Jesus, I love her. I love her!
he exclaimed in the depths of his soul, extending the kiss all the more, willing it to go on forever.

I make all things beautiful in My time.

The inner voice spoke precious truth into his spirit, but with it came a silent yet unmistakable nudge to end the kiss.

Oh, he wanted to ignore that still, small tapping at his conscience, but he knew that if he did, he’d almost certainly face regrets. He’d been down that road and learned some valued lessons. Gently, he pulled away, and they stared at each other for what felt like hours, both of them taking in short, exhilarating breaths.

“Well, now.” In rather slow motion, Rachel stood, her brow furrowed in confusion, her mouth, puffy from the pressure of his kisses, slightly agape. “That was—um—a little inappropriate, don’t you think?”

***

Rachel’s erratic pulse set her in a state of momentary panic. She ran a hand through her hair, then put it to her throat and swallowed.
Dear God, forgive me. I didn’t mean to let that happen.
“You need to go,” she stated simply.

Jason slowly rose, his steady, assuring gaze impaling her like an arrow to the heart.
What have I done? My brother-in-law just kissed me, and, oh, God, I kissed him back.
Her brain went into immediate tumult, and she spun her body around while trying to get her bearings.
Coat. Jason’s coat. I must get it and then push him out the door.

As if reading her thoughts, he clutched her by the arm and stopped her midway to the closet. “Settle down, would you, Rach? We did nothing inappropriate—maybe a little premature, but not inappropriate.” His hand was locked loosely around her forearm and seemed to sear the skin beneath her sweater sleeve, and his voice, soothing enough to calm a skittish cat, nearly made her cave. Yet she recovered in an instant and withdrew, looking down at the floor. “Just go. Now. Your coat’s in the closet.”

“I know, and I’m going. But, listen—I want you to know, I’m starting to feel—”

“Don’t!” she pleaded. “You feel nothing, you hear me? Nothing.” She said this with such fierce conviction that she barely recognized her own voice.

He gave a light chuckle and touched her cheek. She took a giant step back and wrapped herself in a tight hug, biting down on her lip and blinking back the sudden urge to cry.

“Aw, Rachel, don’t do that. I’m sorry if I’ve—no, I’m not sorry. Sheesh, I wanted to kiss you—and I think you wanted it, too. And now you’re having this inner battle about thoughts you don’t particularly enjoy entertaining.” He dared to come close again, then bent down to her level, his piercing, dark eyes searching her face. “Am I right?”

“I am not entertaining any thoughts about you, Jason Evans, nor will I. Now, please go.”

“If it makes any difference, I’m scared, too, Rach. But I’m not about to let it keep me from pursuing what I think is right. What if the Lord is telling us to consider this—this—”

“He’s not!” she exclaimed with certainty. “He would never do that. You’re my brother-in-law.”

“Yes, so that makes me the enemy?”

“It makes you…untouchable.”

“Does it? Think about it. We’ve always been great friends. This is just taking our friendship to the next level.”

“John would hate that!” One stray tear found a path down her cheek. He reached up and brushed it away with his thumb.

“John’s not here, honey, and I think he’d be glad to know I was taking care of you.”

“I don’t need you feeling sorry for me…or feeling responsible.”

“I don’t,” he whispered in haste. “I feel a lot more than that.”

She bit hard on her lower lip, hoping the pain would distract her from this sudden surge of emotions. More tears threatened, but she chased them back, raising her chin now to look him square-on. “You—can’t. It would be wrong because, well, because he knew.”

This tiny declaration had him squinting down at her and giving his head a mild shake of confusion. “What are you talking about? Knew what?”

She swallowed down what felt like a jagged rock. “I told him about the kiss—our kiss—before you left on your ski trip.”

“You what?” he whispered in a disbelieving tone. “Why would you do that? He didn’t need to know.”

“We had a fight about money—a big fight.”

“He told me that much, that you’d had a fight.”

“And during our arguing I blurted out how we’d kissed. It was awful of me, I know.” She covered her face and dropped her chin to her chest. “I told him that you and I had at one time…felt things for each other.”

“What? But we—that was way before, Rachel. I mean, yeah, John and I both had crushes on you all through school, but once you settled on John, that sealed it for me—except for that stupid kiss in the barn.” He let a mild curse slip off his tongue, and she looked at him. He winced and looked away, his eyes coming to rest on something across the room. “I wish you hadn’t told him. Man.”

“I was pregnant and irrational,” she cried. “And he made some thoughtless remark about my being fat or something, I don’t know. It hurt, and I just wanted to lash out, so I did—in the worst way.”

At that admission, his brows flickered a little. “I thought you made a very radiant pregnant lady.”

“Pssh. On the best of days, maybe.”

His slight smile faded as he grew thoughtful. “That day—out on the slopes—he made a rash remark, and it made me so stinking mad.”

A chill shot down her spine as she searched his eyes. “What did he say? Tell me, Jay.”

“He had the gall to accuse me of trying to steal you away from him, claiming that I’d always loved you.” He creased his brow and looked close to tears himself. “It all makes sense now. I nearly slugged him in the gut for making that ridiculous accusation, Rach, but if you had told him we kissed just before his wedding day…well, he probably thought—I’m not sure—that you weren’t fully committed to the marriage in the beginning, maybe, or that you hadn’t even taken your wedding vows seriously.” His gaze dropped. “The guy had to be hurting.”

Unstoppable tears started flowing, and she let them come. “I’m such a fool. If only—”

He touched her elbow. “Shh. Don’t punish yourself over something you can’t do anything about. It’s done. If anything, it’s my fault. I should have forced him off that mountain and made him come back to the lodge with me so we could talk it out. Maybe I could have gotten him to tell me what had him so hell-bent on thinking you and I still harbored feelings for each other.” He shook his head. “Not that he would’ve listened. Shoot, he wasn’t even thinking straight that day. When we got to the top of Devil’s Run and realized how bad the conditions were, I wanted to take the lift back down, but he wouldn’t listen. He got it in his head to challenge me, and I wouldn’t accept the challenge.”

“And so you argued about it.” Tears clogged her throat. “Witnesses overheard you quarrelling. Down deep, Jay, you knew you’d win that challenge.”

“I didn’t feel like competing against him. For crying out loud, all we ever did our entire lives was compete, and I got tired of it. That was not the day for sibling rivalry. His anger freaked me out, and I didn’t get it at the time. He never told me you made that confession. Man, why didn’t I dig deeper for answers?” He fisted one hand and frowned so deeply that his eyes nearly disappeared in the crinkles. “If only he’d told me. I could have assured him that kiss was all my selfish doing, that in no way did you initiate it. It might have stopped him from going down that icy slope in a fit of anger, as if he had something to prove to me.”

She couldn’t let him take full responsibility. Several jagged sighs slipped out. “It takes two willing parties to kiss, Jay. Looking back, I don’t know why I let you do it, but I did. And afterward, I felt ashamed and embarrassed. But I also knew I still loved John with all my heart.” She looked at him, yearning for answers. “Does that make sense?”

He tilted his head to the side, studying her face, and gave a slow nod. The fact that he made no further move to touch her didn’t escape her notice. “Yeah. It satisfied a curiosity in both of us. We had to know before you married John that you were doing the right thing. And you were.”

Her thoughts tangled into a firm knot, one she couldn’t loosen or sort through. But she did know one thing. “So….” She closed her eyes and raked her fingers through her hair, then looked at him with newfound resolve. “That is why we cannot entertain any further notions of kissing or going any deeper with our feelings. It is simply not an option, Jay. Not for me, anyway. To do so would be to dishonor my husband’s memory.”

“Is that so?” The clock on the wall struck eleven gongs. “I’ll respect you for that—for now, anyway. I think we both have some things to ponder and pray about.”

“Bye, Jay.”

He stared at her for all of ten seconds, and she could hear the slow intake and release of each breath. “I’ll see you at Johnny’s birthday party—how’s that?” he said.

“I suppose we’ll have to see each other on occasion.”

He touched the tip of her nose and chuckled low in his throat. “We can’t avoid each other entirely, Rachel.”

Just before he turned to head for his car, he murmured, “Kiss the kids for me.”

On Sunday morning, Rachel sat in a pew near the back of Harvest Community Church’s sanctuary and tried to focus as Pastor Eddie Turnwall delivered his message. Distractions were more demanding, though, so rather than try to memorize the major sermon points, she allowed her eyes to drop to the open Bible in her lap, and she read the first verse her eyes settled on, Psalm 139:17: “
How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God. How great is the sum of them! If I should count them, they would be more in number than the sand; when I awake, I am still with You.
”

The words breathed truth into the very fibers of her soul, sending a river of comfort straight to her heart. Still, she couldn’t shake the stream of despair that ran alongside it.
Why did I tell John, Lord?
she berated herself for the hundredth time since talking to Jason on Thanksgiving.
Will I ever be able to forgive myself?
Fresh twinges of guilt trickled through her veins. Sniffing, she opened her purse and fished for a tissue.

“Are you all right, hon?” whispered her friend, Laura King, who was seated next to her. Rachel usually sat with her parents or in-laws, but she’d been running late this morning, and so, after taking Meagan to Sunday school and Johnny to the nursery, she’d snuck in at the back of the sanctuary, where Laura had snagged her before she sat down. Having just gone through a bitter divorce, Laura was alone, too, and dealing with her own set of problems. In the past several months, the newfound friendship between the two women had been good for both of them.

Rachel smiled and nodded. “I’m good.”

Of course, saying it and meaning it were altogether different. She blew her nose and dabbed at the corners of her eyes, wanting desperately to keep her eye shadow, liner, and mascara intact.

“Jesus provides abundant life,” Pastor Eddie said from the front, catching her attention. “Abundance, you ask? Are we talking health and wealth, pastor? No, no, we’re talking abundance of the Spirit. He wants us living beyond mediocrity. That’s not to say we won’t encounter trials and hardships along the way, but
in
them we can experience the peace, rest, and joy of Christ. That is abundance, my friends.”

Rachel took hold of his words and mentally filed them deep within her heart, planning to pull them out later for further contemplation. Could she find peace and rest in the shadow of an unresolved conflict? Additional questions haunted her: Had John carried his pain and anger to the grave? Had he been picturing her with Jason as his skis had hit that steep slope of death and he’d lost control, slamming into a tree?

She looked down at her Bible again and read an earlier passage from the same psalm:

Where can I go from Your Spirit? Or where can I flee from Your presence? If I ascend into heaven, You are there; if I make my bed in hell, behold, You are there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there Your hand shall lead me, and Your right hand shall hold me. If I say, “Surely the darkness shall fall on me,” even the night shall be light about me; indeed, the darkness shall not hide me from You, but the night shines as the day; the darkness and the light are both alike to You.

Those words, along with the bits and pieces she gathered from Pastor Eddie’s sermon, filled the empty places of her heart, at least for the moment. Now, if she could just find a way to make them last.

That Thursday, exactly one week after Thanksgiving, Rachel took up the task of cleaning and organizing drawers and closets, a job she’d put off for well over a year. With Meagan at preschool and Johnny spending the day with Tanna, who had the day off from school, it provided her the opportunity to concentrate on her chore.

After John’s death, she’d taken several items of his clothing to the nearest charity organization, but there still remained a good share of his things—stuff she simply couldn’t part with yet, like his everyday shoes, a rack of his favorite ties, and the cozy robe she still slipped on at night if she needed to feel his nearness. And then, there was that large plastic tub of his keepsakes. She had never taken it down from the high shelf where it was stored, in part because it was too cumbersome, but also because lifting the lid might very well wreak emotional havoc. So, she left the box alone and straightened the lower closet shelves, disposed of some of her old jeans and shirts, and sorted through her large collection of shoes.