The Wonder of Now Read online

  PRAISE FOR IN THE CARDS

  “Infused with . . . fresh detail. Between the sweetness of the relationship and the summery beach setting, romance fans will find this a warming winter read.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “Fans will love the frank honesty of her characters. [Beck’s] scenery is richly detailed and the story engaging.”

  —RT Book Reviews

  “[A] realistic and heartwarming story of redemption and love . . . Beck’s understanding of interpersonal relationships and her flawless prose make for a believable romance and an entertaining read.”

  —Booklist

  PRAISE FOR WORTH THE WAIT

  “[A] poignant and heartwarming story of young love and redemption and will literally make your heart ache . . . Jamie Beck has a real talent for making the reader feel the sorrow, regret, and yearning of this young character.”

  —Fresh Fiction

  PRAISE FOR WORTH THE TROUBLE

  “Beck takes readers on a journey of self-reinvention and risky investments, in love and in life . . . With strong family ties, loyalty, playful banter, and sexual tension, Beck has crafted a beautiful second-chances story.”

  —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

  PRAISE FOR SECRETLY HERS

  “[I]n Beck’s ambitious, uplifting second Sterling Canyon contemporary . . . [c]onflicting views and family drama lay the foundation for emotional development in this strong Colorado-set contemporary.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “Witty banter and the deepening of the characters and their relationship, along with some unexpected plot twists and a lovable supporting cast . . . will keep the reader hooked . . . A smart, fun, sexy, and very contemporary romance.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  PRAISE FOR WORTH THE RISK

  “An emotional read that will leave you reeling at times and hopeful at others.”

  —Books and Boys Book Blog

  PRAISE FOR UNEXPECTEDLY HERS

  “Character-driven, sweet, and chock-full of interesting secondary characters.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  PRAISE FOR BEFORE I KNEW

  “A tender romance rises from the tragedy of two families—a must read!”

  —Robyn Carr, #1 New York Times bestselling author

  “Jamie Beck’s deeply felt novel hits all the right notes, celebrating the power of forgiveness, the sweetness of second chances, and the heady joy of reaching for a dream. Don’t miss this one!”

  —Susan Wiggs, #1 New York Times bestselling author

  “Before I Knew kept me totally enthralled as two compassionate, relatable characters, each in search of forgiveness and fulfillment, turn a recipe for heartache into a story of love, hope, and some really good menus!”

  —Shelley Noble, New York Times bestselling author of Whisper Beach

  PRAISE FOR ALL WE KNEW

  “A moving story about the flux of life and the steadfastness of family.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “An impressively crafted and deftly entertaining read from first page to last.”

  —Midwest Book Review

  “All We Knew is compelling, heartbreaking, and emotional.”

  —Harlequin Junkie

  PRAISE FOR JOYFULLY HIS

  “A quick and sweet read that is perfect for the holidays.”

  —Harlequin Junkie

  PRAISE FOR WHEN YOU KNEW

  “[A]n opposites-attract romance with heart.”

  —Harlequin Junkie

  PRAISE FOR THE MEMORY OF YOU

  “[Beck] deepens a typical story about first loves reuniting by exploring the aftermath of a violent act. Readers will root for an ending that repairs this couple’s past hurt.”

  —Booklist

  “Beck’s portrayals of divorce and trauma are keen . . . Readers will be caught up in their journey toward healing and romance.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “The Memory of You is heartbreaking, emotional, entertaining, and a unique second-chance romance.”

  —Harlequin Junkie

  PRAISE FOR THE PROMISE OF US

  “Beck’s depiction of trauma, loss, friendship, and family resonates deeply. A low-key small-town romance unflinching in its portrayal of the complexities of friendship and family, and the joys and sorrows they bring.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  “A fully absorbing and unfailingly entertaining read from an author with a genuine flair for originality and an engaging narrative storytelling style, Jamie Beck’s The Promise of Us is an extraordinary and highly recommended addition to community library Contemporary Romance Fiction collections.”

  —Midwest Book Review

  ALSO BY JAMIE BECK

  In the Cards

  The St. James Novels

  Worth the Wait

  Worth the Trouble

  Worth the Risk

  The Sterling Canyon Novels

  Accidentally Hers

  Secretly Hers

  Unexpectedly Hers

  Joyfully His

  The Cabot Novels

  Before I Knew

  All We Knew

  When You Knew

  The Sanctuary Sound Novels

  The Memory of You

  The Promise of Us

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Text copyright © 2019 by Jamie Beck

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Montlake Romance, Seattle

  www.apub.com

  Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Montlake Romance are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

  ISBN-13: 9781542044325

  ISBN-10: 1542044324

  Cover design by Emily Mahon

  Cover photography by Regina Wamba of MaelDesign.com

  This one is for my Fiction From The Heart sisters: Tracy Brogan, Sonali Dev, K. M. Jackson, Virginia Kantra, Donna Kauffman, Sally Kilpatrick, Falguni Kothari, Priscilla Oliveras, Barbara O’Neal, Hope Ramsay, and Liz Talley, for the friendship, support, and advice that flow from their generous hearts.

  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

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Epilogue

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  EXCERPT: IF YOU MUST KNOW

  Chapter One

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Chapter One

  Om Namah Shivaya.

  “Let me photograph the treatment,” he’d begged.

  Om Namah Shivaya.

  “We’ll make art, raise money,” he’d promised.

  Om Namah Shivaya.

  Dammit.

  Peyton opened one eye and stared across the undulating surface of Long Island Sound, which glittered all the way to the horizon. Six hundred thirty-two attempts at meditation in as many days and she still couldn’t master her own mind.

  Dwelling for months in a decaying body had forced an existenti
al dread that produced few answers, but she’d never been a quitter. In her darkest moments, she’d habitually forced herself to look for silver linings. By thirty-one, she’d mastered that ritual. Last year, she’d even found two for chemo, like the way she could blame it for all kinds of personal failings. Its other plus? A handy excuse for opting out of her mother’s endless list of social and philanthropic invitations. Of course, those benefits didn’t outweigh the weight gain, skin discoloration, nausea, mouth ulcers, and hair loss she’d experienced while undergoing breast cancer treatment.

  Peyton curled a jaw-length strand of newly wavy hair around her finger. Still short, but progress nonetheless.

  She uncrossed her legs while taking a deep breath of briny air and then stretched them out, digging her toes into the warm sand. Growing up, she and her brother, Logan, and their friends had played tag here, built sandcastles, lit bonfires while camping out. They’d drifted on rafts and sailed around the Sound, carefree and certain of a future that would always be easy and full of adventure. Now her gaze fixed on the line where earth met sky. These past few months, she’d often stared at that distant place, contemplating her life and purpose and other things she’d never before given much thought to.

  Those lazy hours, bookended by the rush of midday and the lonesome stretches of night, had become her favorite part of each day. Stolen moments of peace and presence were probably the closest she’d ever get to nirvana or zen or wherever one is supposed to arrive through meditation.

  “Peyton!” Logan called from the flagstone patio. When she glanced over her shoulder, he waved her toward their family’s historic shingle-style mansion. Sunlight and water reflected in its dozens of windows, making them look as if they were winking. “They’re here. Come see!”

  A day or so after her initial diagnosis nearly two years ago, Logan had cornered her with his camera and his big idea. He’d always been able to talk her into anything, and until now, she’d relished his schemes. If she didn’t love him so much, she’d seriously consider lining his shower with shaving cream later.

  Logan turned and disappeared through the french doors without waiting for her. She hugged her legs to her chest, pressing her forehead to her knees. Why bother with meditation? She had no time for serenity. Not with her brother and Mitchell Mathis—PR pain in the butt—always coming at her with to-do lists.

  Peyton pushed herself up and brushed the sand from her bottom, slipped on her sandals, and strolled up the lawn of the rambling estate. Only recently had she come to understand why her great-grandfather had built Arcadia House, and why he’d hidden here—away from most of the world—to write. She barely remembered Duck, as Logan had nicknamed him, but his legendary literature and name lived on—not just here, but all around the world.

  She hadn’t even closed the doors before Logan bellowed from the vicinity of their father’s office, “Back here.”

  She found him standing at Duck’s antique walnut writing desk, surrounded by overstuffed bookshelves that emitted the faintest hint of tobacco, with his hands gripping a sizable cardboard box. When Peyton was a child, this room had been off-limits and, consequently, a place she’d snuck into time and again, tempting fate. Funny how, back then, she’d perceived fate and consequence as a game. Checkmate.

  “Aren’t you blown away?” His smile, warmer and more promising than a summer sunrise on the Sound, settled her. Then he lifted a copy of A Journey through Shadows from the open carton.

  Her gaze skittered away from the cover image and landed on her metallic-toned Birkenstocks. Before cancer, she wouldn’t have been caught dead in such footwear or without a pedicure. Lots had changed since her Joie-sandal days. Some for the better and—she wiggled her unpainted toes—some for the worse.

  “Yes,” came her dry reply. Blown away, all right, just not the way he meant it.

  But like any little sister who ever worshipped her older brother would, she’d agreed to his plan. After all, she’d had little to lose when she thought she was dying.

  The result? The memoir in his hands. A combination of his work—including the austere black-and-white midchemo cover photo she now avoided—alongside her most personal fears and naked emotions. The sight of it reminded her that, in a matter of days, people around the world would have access to every nook and cranny of her soul.

  And to think, just before her diagnosis, few had believed she still had one.

  “Come on.” He waved the book in front of her. “Have a look.”

  She reluctantly accepted the hardcover tome and then sat in a well-worn leather chair opposite the desk. Duck’s framed Pulitzer hung on the paneled wall beside her, in its antique walnut frame with blackened edges and ripple moldings, mocking the hubris of his great-grandkids’ latest undertaking.

  In contrast to her desire to hide from the spotlight, soft light filtered through the large open windows behind Logan, setting him aglow. He removed another copy from the box while shaking his head in amazement.

  “This image was totally the right choice for the cover.” His green eyes twinkled, no longer burdened by the alarm they’d reflected when first learning of her illness. “Talk about arresting.”

  He began leafing through the pages, pausing to stare at his own work. She couldn’t blame him. Every person she knew, including herself, became self-absorbed from time to time. But while he marveled at his work, she shivered at the memory of the morning he’d caught her crying in private and shot the cover image.

  His palpable excitement about their work stopped her from explaining how much she dreaded revisiting the most terrifying, sickly moments of her life. Or describing how rereading the passages and seeing his photos of her double mastectomy and the patient friends who’d since died made her stomach cramp.

  If she had her choice, she’d never again look at their book. She’d even give up her share of the proceeds if others would promote it and leave her free to focus on looking forward instead of backward.

  It took two minutes for him to notice her utter stillness.

  Logan placed his copy back in the box and then pressed his fingertips on the desk, bowing forward a bit—a pose he struck often, putting his lean build and casual elegance on full display. “What’s wrong? We should be celebrating, but you look like you want to kill somebody. Me, in fact.”

  Peyton shifted beneath the weight of the book on her thighs. “Nothing you’d understand.”

  He pushed away from the desk and came to sit in the chair beside her, running one hand through his hair. His burnished-gold locks would take another few months to grow back to the eight-inch length he’d sported before shearing it off last year in a show of moral support. She still had the gorgeous wig made from his hair in her closet.

  “Is it the public response? Don’t worry. Early reviews have been stellar.” He offered a reassuring nod. “You’re a fantastic writer.”

  Travel writer, she thought wryly. Not an author. Not like Duck.

  She’d never aspired, nor could she ever hope, to live up to her great-grandfather’s legacy. Writing witty pieces about hotels, restaurants, and tourist spots around the world had never forced a comparison to his contemplative body of work. Venturing into true author territory would invite it, though. Especially after she let the publisher talk her into playing off her great-grandfather’s most famous book, A Shadow on Sand, with her memoir’s title. Not that that was her biggest concern.

  “Thanks, but this isn’t fiction. It’s my life—my heart—on display for others to judge.” She pressed her hand to her stomach and drew a yoga breath. This sick pit in her gut was trepidation, not self-pity. Until her diagnosis, she’d relied on her beauty, money, and wit as weapons used to disarm and charm. To entertain and seduce. To explore. The mental, physical, and emotional mutations she’d undergone had upended everything she’d understood about herself and her place in the world. The book’s release would erase the last vestiges of her former self, which, while she was still figuring out how to be the “new” Peyton, felt
like being tossed from a plane without a parachute.

  Her brother shot her a wry look. “A quick scroll through your Insta posts proves you’ve never been shy.”

  He didn’t get it. To him and others, she was better now. Time to move on and celebrate. No one had noticed how she’d yet to share the collective sigh of relief that allowed her family and friends to return to normal. Cancer cells could be sneaky bitches—traveling, hiding, and replicating like bunnies. Her once playful journal now cataloged every cough, ache, rash, and other symptom so she wouldn’t forget to report anything to the doctor. She had no idea if or when she would relax and celebrate, but it wouldn’t be today.

  “I never flashed my boobs—or lack thereof—before.” Joking kept the onslaught of panic at bay, but Logan’s silence proved her attempt had fallen flat. No pun intended. Social media accounts gave the public an illusion of her life, but her memoir described personal things she’d never before shared—nor particularly wanted to.

  When most people learn of another’s misfortune, they offer a quick thanks to God for their own safety and then ponder what they would do if handed a worst-case scenario. She’d drawn the short straw and now knew exactly how she would respond—with motionlessness caused by the bitter combination of disbelief, panic, and prayer that had pushed through her veins like arctic slush.

  Chances were good that the frigid sensation would remain her occasional companion until—if—she reached the five-year cancer-free milestone. As it stood, her next exam was less than a month away.

  Peyton knew another truth about bad news. After getting one bit, she could no longer skirt the fray. No longer feel safe. She expected more bad news at every turn and shuddered anytime she projected ahead to that appointment. Knowing that she could be handed another round of bad news made her resent having to spend time doing anything she didn’t want to do, and she couldn’t think of anything she’d rather do less than chase after book sales.

  This whole thing had snowballed too far, too fast. The process of writing and working with her brother had been cathartic, but publishing? She honestly could not recall what she’d been thinking when she agreed to sign that contract. Now she couldn’t let Logan down, or abandon the pledge they’d made to donate half the proceeds to the National Breast Cancer Foundation, or piss all over the big advance they’d received.