The Promise of Us (Sanctuary Sound #2) - Jamie Beck Page 0,21

anew when he and Peyton finally took off again, like when they’d all left home after college.

“Claire, are you even listening?” Betsy snapped her fingers right in front of Claire’s nose.

“Sorry.” Claire puckered her lips.

“If we’re seriously going to plan a trip together, let’s choose a book set in Italy or Greece or some other warm Mediterranean location. Why spend a week of summer vacation being cold in Alaska?” Betsy shook her head.

“Didn’t this book strike a chord with your sense of adventure? I kept picturing the vastness of Alaska. It seemed so freeing.” Pat drummed her fingers on the book cover. “I really want to visit.”

“I’d go,” Naomi said. “Assuming we could get a reasonable cruise package.”

“Well, I have read that men outnumber women by a lot in Alaska. Maybe it’d be worth a visit,” Betsy conceded.

Everyone looked at Claire, who’d remained silent. “Sorry. I can’t go.”

“Why not?” Pat asked.

“I need every spare penny for my business this year.”

“Unless you take that job with Logan.” Pat shot her a pointed look.

“Even if I do”—Claire couldn’t believe she was even contemplating that—“I can’t take that kind of trip. Hiking? No. Even being on a ship . . . I wouldn’t feel safe.” She slid a glance at Rosie.

“Honey, life isn’t about being safe.” Pat filled her plate with a second slice of the galette and more cream. “One of these days I really hope you spread your wings again. Don’t you miss taking flight?”

“That’s what books are for. I got to know Alaska well enough. I walked in Leni’s shoes and experienced her courage.” She opened the book to her first tabbed page. “And I think we should read Tara Westover’s memoir, Educated, next. We’ll get to ‘visit’ Idaho in that one.”

“When do we get to go to the Mediterranean?” Betsy whined.

Logan paced the living room floor while Peyton sifted through the batch of photographs he’d taken of her after the doctor removed her bandages. She’d looked right into the camera, but he could see the wall she’d put between herself and the lens. He couldn’t blame her. She’d shown remarkable bravery and vulnerability by even letting him shoot the pictures. Still, he’d wanted her to drop her guard.

Now she’d spread them out on the Aubusson rug, beneath the rows she’d created from the best of his earlier work. All around them lay pictorial evidence of her battle, from the first appointments through the most recent. The past six months had been a blur, yet these photos forced him to recall particular moments in excruciating detail.

Light flooded the spacious room through its oversize windows and reflected off the shiny surfaces of the polished wood and mirrors. The brightness imbued the images with a sort of starkness that made him restless and uncomfortable. Apt, since nothing in the living room was comfortable. Antique, fussy furnishings with hard, tufted cushions. The opposite of welcoming . . . or of “living.”

He missed the sweet, smoky scent of Duck’s cigar and the sound of his rumbly voice reading aloud. Missed the way his aging eyes lit with delight whenever Logan had shown him something he’d built or drawn or written. Once he died, this house had become a war zone between Logan’s father and Grandpa, with his dad emerging as the victor.

Logan shook his head and refocused on his sister, whose gaze lingered longer on certain photos than on others. Her mouth remained slightly downturned, her eyes distant and muddied.

“What are you thinking?” He crouched beside her.

She covered her face with her trembling hands. “I’m not sure I can do this.”

He laid a hand on her back. “Why not?”

“Look!” She gestured across the floor. “If we publish this memoir, I’ll be showing these to the world. Hideous images. Images of me, weak and ill, I’ll never escape or forget, and neither will anyone else.”

He held her shoulders and kissed the top of her head. “When I look at these pictures, I see a beautiful fighter. A woman who’s brave enough to share her truth to help others.”

“You need glasses.” She elbowed his hip. Her head scarf started to fall back, so she tightened it.

She didn’t meet his eyes. He didn’t quite know what else to say to her. Having never faced his own mortality, he had no experience to draw on. No real words of wisdom. Only love.

“You’re feeling stronger lately. We’ll keep taking new photographs to add as you improve and your hair grows back, so that you and everyone else will see