Free Tender Vow by Sharlene MacLaren Page B

planned to evade her question about Candace, did he? “Yeah, and I believed you.” He gave a hearty chuckle that rumbled through the air. Again, their sides bumped lightly. “I must have been in sixth or seventh grade. You and John were always feeding me some line or another, probably laughing behind my back when I swallowed it, too.”
    “No. Us?”
    She giggled at the memory, finding the feeling euphoric if not refreshing.
    Wading back out of the water, she resumed walking through the dry, shifting sands. He followed, matching her steps. Their hands accidentally touched, so she quickly clasped hers behind her back, her sandals dangling by their straps from her fingers.
    “You didn’t answer my earlier question…about Candace. That is her name, isn’t it? Are you guys serious?”
    “Yeah, her name’s Candace. Um, I guess we are…serious, that is.”
    When he didn’t elaborate, she glanced up at his well-defined profile—straight nose, square jaw, and thick brows and lashes shading his deep brown eyes.
    So different from John , she thought, and yet still handsome in his own right . John was classically striking with his neat-as-a-pin appearance, and he possessed a narrower, slightly shorter physique than Jason, with lighter hair and skin tone. Jason, on the other hand, had chocolate-colored hair and a tawny complexion, the result of hours spent in the sun. In addition to his rugged appeal, his distinctive air of self-confidence had set him apart from John, and people had often mistaken the boys for friends rather than brothers.
    Rachel tried to lay aside all those observances and concentrate on the present.
    “You guess? Why so cagey about the whole thing?”
    He turned his gaze on her, but she couldn’t make out his downward expression because of the shadow across his face. “Cagey?”
    “You know—guarded, evasive. Haven’t you been seeing her for a couple years? It seems by now you should be talking marriage.”
    She stepped in a hole a child had apparently dug while building a sand castle and started to go down, but he caught her with a strong hand, as if he’d been waiting for her to trip. “She’d like to think we are,” he answered without missing a beat, dropping his hand back to his side again.
    “So, you’re dragging your feet, then?”
    He chuckled and nudged her playfully. “You think you’re pretty smart, don’t you?”
    For the first time, it occurred to her she’d begun to relax, even enjoy their banter.
    “I’m pretty intuitive, but then, most women are.”
    “Yeah. Uncanny.”
    “So, what’s the problem?” she prodded. How had she come from not wanting to talk at all to suddenly wanting the full scoop on his relationship with his girlfriend?
    He released a light groan. “I just want to be sure God’s the one directing us, that’s all. If He’s not, then I don’t feel comfortable moving forward with marriage—or the relationship, for that matter. When I bring that up to her, though, she about has a coronary and thinks I’m breaking up with her right then.”
    She took a moment to digest that revelation. “You sure have changed, Jason Evans. There was a time when God didn’t play a very big part in your life. In fact, you used to poke fun at John’s faith.”
    He kicked up some sand, making it fly several feet. “I regret that now something terrible.”
    She smiled in spite of the memory. “I’m sure he forgives you.”
    “I apologized for my stupidity one time when we were out on the slopes—not that last time, but….” The sentence hung suspended between them. “John and I always got along great. Well, most of the time. We had our spats, like most brothers do.”
    “He thought the world of you.”
    “The feeling was mutual.”
    They came to a fence that marked the end of the public park and decided to turn around. The moonlight shimmered even more brightly on the lake as they made their way back in the direction of Jason’s Jeep, letting the silence