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  It took me all of five minutes to change my clothes and throw a few things into a duffel bag. It took me a little longer than that to catch and cage Euphoria and Sox for an unexpected journey.

  Then I was gunning the old Jag up Addison Street, heading toward I-94 North. The ’96 Jaguar Vanden Plas is a midnight blue sedan that was our pride and joy, Danny’s and mine. It’s a handsome thing with a quirky detail; the car has dual gas tanks.

  I was trying to think about everything but Sam. My grandmother was the only one I had left now, the only family.

  Sam was my best friend after my mother died when I was twelve. Her own marriage to Grandpa Charles made me and everyone else want whatever it was that they had. My grandfather wasn’t the easiest guy to get to know, but once you broke through to him, he was great. Danny and I had toasted and roasted them at their fiftieth-anniversary gala at the Drake. Two hundred friends stood to applaud when my seventy-one-year-old grandfather dipped Sam low and kissed her passionately on the dance floor.

  When Grandpa Charles retired from his legal practice, he and Sam stayed at Lake Geneva more than in Chicago. After a while, they didn’t get so many visitors. Even fewer came after my grandfather died four years ago and she moved to the lake full-time. When that happened, people said that Sam would die soon, too.

  But she didn’t. She’d been doing fine—until now.

  At about 8:15 I got on Route 50 West and took it to 12, a local two-laner that skirts Lake Geneva—the BPOE, “best place on earth.” After three miles, I turned off 12 onto Route NN. Lakeland Medical Center was just a couple of minutes away and I tried to prepare myself.

  “We’re close, Sam,” I whispered.

  Three

  REALLY BAD THINGS happen in threes, I was thinking as I arrived at the Lakeland Medical Center. Then I tried to banish the thought from my mind. Don’t go there, Jennifer.

  I got out of the car and started uphill to the main entrance. I remembered that many years before, I had been there to have a fishing hook removed from just above my eyebrow. I was seven at the time, and it was Sam who brought me.

  Once I was inside, I tried to get my bearings, taking in the horseshoe-shaped ICU with patients’ rooms on three sides. The head nurse, a thin, forty-ish woman with pink-framed glasses, pointed out my grandmother’s room. “We’re so glad you’re here,” she said. “I enjoy your column, by the way. We all do.”

  “Thank you,” I said, and smiled. “You’re very kind. That’s nice to hear.”

  I walked quickly down the corridor to Sam’s room. I slid the door open and entered. “Oh, Sam,” I whispered the second I saw her. “What happened to you?”

  It was so awful to see the tubes in her arms and the banks of beeping medical equipment. But at least Sam was alive. Though she looked diminished and gray, and as fragile as a dream.

  “It’s Jennifer,” I whispered. “I’m here now. I’m right here.” I took her hand in mine. “I know you can hear me. I’ll do the talking for now. I’m going to keep talking until you open your eyes.”

  After a few minutes, I heard the door slide open behind me. I turned to see the Reverend John Farley. His thick white hair was askew, his smile tremulous. He was still a handsome man, though stooped now. “Hello, Jennifer,” he whispered, and welcomed me with a warm hug.

  We walked out into the hallway and suddenly I was remembering how close he had been to my grandparents.

  “It’s so good to see you. What have you heard about Sam?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “Well, she hasn’t opened her eyes, and that’s not a good sign, Jennifer. I’m sure Dr. Weisberg will have more to tell you tomorrow. I’ve been here most of the day, ever since I heard.”

  Then he handed me a key. “This is for you. Your grandmother’s house.”

  He hugged me again, whispering that he had to get some sleep before he wound up there as a patient. Then he left and I slipped back into Sam’s room. I still couldn’t believe this had happened.

  She had always been so strong, almost never sick, always the one who took care of everybody else—especially me. I sat for a long while just listening to her breathe, looking at her beautiful face, remembering all the times I’d come to Lake Geneva. Sam had always reminded me a little of Katharine Hepburn, and we’d seen all her movies together, though she vehemently denied there was any resemblance.

  I felt so scared. How could I lose Sam now? It seemed as if I had just lost Danny. Tears began to stream down my cheeks again. “Shit,” I whispered under my breath.

  I waited until I got back some control and then I moved close to her. I kissed both of her cheeks and stared at her face. I kept expecting Sam’s eyes to open, for her to speak. But she didn’t. Oh, why was this happening?

  “I’m going back to the house. Pancakes for breakfast,” I whispered. “I’ll see you in the morning. You hear me? I’ll see you in the morning. First thing, bright and early.”

  One of my tears fell onto Sam’s cheek, but it just trickled down her face.

  “Good night, Sam,” I said.

  Four

  I HAVE LITTLE or no memory of the drive from Lakeland Medical to Knollwood Road on Lake Geneva. I was just suddenly there at my grandmother’s house, and it felt incredibly familiar and safe.

  A century of parked cars had worn away the grass under an ancient oak in the side yard, and that’s where I brought the Jag to a stop. I shut off the ignition and just sat for a minute or two, hoping to gather myself before I went inside.

  To my left, the lawn flowed downhill to the shoreline. I could see the long white dock jutting out onto the moonlit and glassy surface of Lake Geneva. The water was a mirror for the star-pricked sky.

  To my right was the old white clapboard lake house, porches all around, rising up to two asymmetrical stories of added-on dormered rooms. My grandparents’ home sweet home. I knew every curve and angle of the house and the view from every porch and window.

  I released my seat belt and stepped out of the car into the humid summer air. And that was when the fragrance of the casa blanca lilies hit me. They were Sam’s and my favorites—the prize of the garden, where we had spent many a night sitting on the stone bench, smelling the flowers, gazing up at the sky.

  It was here that she’d tell me stories about Lake Geneva—how it freezes east to west, how when they were digging ground for the golf course at Geneva National they unearthed a cemetery.

  Sam had stories about everything, and no one told them the way she could. This was where I became a writer. Right here at this house, and Sam was my inspiration.

  I was suddenly overwhelmed. Tears I’d been holding in broke free. I dropped down to my knees on the hardpan parking area. I whispered Sam’s name. I had the terrible thought that she might not ever come back to this house. I couldn’t stand it.

  I had always thought of myself as strong—and now this. Somebody was trying to break me. Well, it wasn’t going to happen.

  I don’t know how long I stayed there in the parking area. Eventually I stood, opened the trunk, shouldered my duffel bag, and started inside with the cats. They were vocalizing from their cages and I was about to liberate them when I saw a light go on in a house a hundred yards or so down the shoreline. A second later the light winked out.

  I got the feeling that somebody was watching me. But who knew I was there?

  Not even Sam.

  Four

  SAM’S HOUSE was my favorite place in the world, the sanest, and always the safest—until tonight anyway.

  Now everything seemed off-kilter. The kitchen was dark, so I threw on the light switch. Then I put down the cats and opened their cage doors.

  The girls sprang forward like little racehorses out of the gate. Sox is three-quarters alley cat, one-quarter loudmouth Siamese. Euphoria is an all-white longhair with green eyes and a smoochy nature. My hands were still shaking from stress as I fed the two of them.

  Then I walked from room to room, and it all looked exactly the same.

&n
bsp; An old burnished hardwood floor secured with square-headed nails. A chaotic mass of houseplants crowding the bay window in the dining room. An astonishing view of the lake. Books spread everywhere. Bel Canto. Queen Noor’s memoir. A Short History of Nearly Everything.

  And the artifacts that Sam and I loved: antique ice tongs from the days when blocks of ice were shipped by horse teams to Milwaukee and Chicago; old snowshoes; paintings of the round pink crab apple trees along the lake and of the old train depot.

  I heaved a big sigh. This really was home to me, more than anywhere else, especially now that Danny was gone from our apartment in Chicago.

  I took my duffel bag upstairs to “my room,” with its views down onto the lake.

  I was about to drop the bag on the vanity table when I saw that it was already occupied.

  What is this?

  There were a dozen banded packets of envelopes, probably a hundred envelopes in all, maybe more. Each was numbered and addressed to me.

  My heart started thudding as I guessed about the letters. For years, I had been asking Sam to tell me her story. I wanted to hear it, and record it for my own children to hear. And now here it was. Had she known what was going to happen to her? Had she been feeling sick?

  I didn’t bother to undress. I just slid into the soft folds of bedcovers and took a stack of the letters into my lap.

  I stared at my name written in blue-inked script. Sam’s familiar handwriting. Then I turned over the first envelope and carefully peeled open the flap.

  The letter inside was written on beautiful white linen paper.

  I took a deep breath, and noticed I was trembling as I began to read.

  Table of Contents

  FRONT COVER IMAGE

  WELCOME

  BELIEVE THE IMPOSSIBLE

  EPIGRAPH

  PROLOGUE

  PART ONE: Once Upon a Time in New York

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  PART TWO: Twenty-three Years Older, but Not Necessarily That Much Smarter

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-one

  Twenty-two

  Twenty-three

  Twenty-four

  Twenty-five

  Twenty-six

  Twenty-seven

  Twenty-eight

  Twenty-nine

  Thirty

  Thirty-one

  Thirty-two

  Thirty-three

  Thirty-four

  Thirty-five

  Thirty-six

  Thirty-seven

  Thirty-eight

  Thirty-nine

  Forty

  Forty-one

  Forty-two

  Forty-three

  Forty-four

  Forty-five

  Forty-six

  Forty-seven

  Forty-eight

  Forty-nine

  Fifty

  Fifty-one

  Fifty-two

  Fifty-three

  Fifty-four

  Fifty-five

  Fifty-six

  PART THREE: Candles in the Wind

  Fifty-seven

  Fifty-eight

  Fifty-nine

  Sixty

  Sixty-one

  Sixty-two

  Sixty-three

  Sixty-four

  Sixty-five

  Sixty-six

  Sixty-seven

  Sixty-eight

  Sixty-nine

  Seventy

  Seventy-one

  Seventy-two

  Seventy-three

  Seventy-four

  Seventy-five

  Seventy-six

  Seventy-seven

  Seventy-eight

  Seventy-nine

  Eighty

  Eighty-one

  Eighty-two

  EPILOGUE: Strawberries with Whipped Cream

  Eighty-three

  Bonus Material

  READING GROUP GUIDE

  A Preview of WITCH & WIZARD: THE GIFT

  A Preview of SUZANNE’S DIARY FOR NICHOLAS

  A Preview of SAM’S LETTERS TO JENNIFER

  ABOUT THE AUTHORS

  BOOKS BY JAMES PATTERSON

  COPYRIGHT

  About the Authors

  JAMES PATTERSON has had more New York Times bestsellers than any other writer, ever, according to Guinness World Records. Since his first novel won the Edgar Award in 1976, James Patterson’s books have sold more than 205 million copies. He is the author of the Alex Cross novels, the most popular detective series of the past twenty-five years, including Kiss the Girls and Along Came a Spider. Mr. Patterson also writes the bestselling Women’s Murder Club novels, set in San Francisco, and the top-selling New York detective series of all time, featuring Detective Michael Bennett.

  James Patterson also writes books for young readers, including the award-winning Maximum Ride, Daniel X, and Witch and Wizard series. In total, these books have spent more than 200 weeks on national bestseller lists, and all three series are in Hollywood development.

  His lifelong passion for books and reading led James Patterson to launch a new website, ReadKiddoRead.com, to give adults an easy way to locate the very best books for kids. He writes full-time and lives in Florida with his family.

  GABRIELLE CHARBONNET is the coauthor of Witch & Wizard with James Patterson and has also written many books for young readers. She lives in North Carolina.

  BOOKS BY JAMES PATTERSON

  FEATURING ALEX CROSS

  Cross Fire

  I. Alex Cross

  Alex Cross’s Trial (with Richard DiLallo)

  Cross Country

  Double Cross

  Cross

  Mary, Mary

  London Bridges

  The Big Bad Wolf

  Four Blind Mice

  Violets Are Blue

  Roses Are Red

  Pop Goes the Weasel

  Cat & Mouse

  Jack & Jill

  Kiss the Girls

  Along Came a Spider

  THE WOMEN’S MURDER CLUB

  The 9th Judgment (with Maxine Paetro)

  The 8th Confession (with Maxine Paetro)

  7th Heaven (with Maxine Paetro)

  The 6th Target (with Maxine Paetro)

  The 5th Horseman (with Maxine Paetro)

  4th of July (with Maxine Paetro)

  3rd Degree (with Andrew Gross)

  2nd Chance (with Andrew Gross)

  1st to Die

  FEATURING MICHAEL BENNETT

  Worst Case (with Maxine Ledwidge)

  Run for Your Life (with Maxine Ledwidge)

  Step on a Crack (with Maxine Ledwidge)

  FOR READERS OF ALL AGES

  Daniel X: The Manga 1

  Maximum Ride: The Manga 3 (with NaRae Lee)

  Daniel X: Demons and Druids (with Adam Sadler)

  FANG: A Maximum Ride Novel

  Witch & Wizard (with Gabrielle Charbonnet)

  Maximum Ride: The Manga 2 (with NaRae Lee)

  Daniel X: Watch the Skies (with Ned Rust)

  MAX: A Maximum Ride Novel

  Maximum Ride: The Manga 1 (with NaRae Lee)

  Daniel X: Alien Hunter (graphic novel; with Leopoldo Gout)

  The Dangerous Days of Daniel X (with Michael Ledwidge)

  The Final Warning: A Maximum Ride Novel

  Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports: A Maximum Ride Novel

  School’s Out—Forever: A Maximum Ride Novel

  Maximum Ride: The Angel Experiment

  OTHER BOOKS

  Don’t Blink (with Howard Roughan)

  The Postcard Killers (with Liza Marklund)

  Pri
vate (with Maxine Paetro)

  The Murder of King Tut (with Martin Dugard)

  Swimsuit (with Maxine Paetro)

  Against Medical Advice (with Hal Friedman)

  Sail (with Howard Roughan)

  Sundays at Tiffany’s (with Gabrielle Charbonnet)

  You’ve Been Warned (with Howard Roughan)

  The Quickie (with Michael Ledwidge)

  Judge & Jury (with Andrew Gross)

  Beach Road (with Peter de Jonge)

  Lifeguard (with Andrew Gross)

  Honeymoon (with Howard Roughan)

  santaKid

  Sam’s Letters to Jennifer

  The Lake House

  The Jester (with Andrew Gross)

  The Beach House (with Peter de Jonge)

  Suzanne’s Diary for Nicholas

  Cradle and All

  When the Wind Blows

  Miracle on the 17th Green (with Peter de Jonge)

  Hide & Seek

  The Midnight Club

  Black Friday (originally published as Black Market)

  See How They Run (originally published as

  The Jericho Commandment)

  Season of the Machete

  The Thomas Berryman Number

  For previews of upcoming books by James Patterson and more information about the author, visit www.JamesPatterson.com.

  Sundays at Tiffany’s

  JAMES PATTERSON and

  GABRIELLE CHARBONNET

  NEW YORK BOSTON

  Copyright

  The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Grand Central Publishing Edition

  Reading Group Guide Copyright © 2009 by Hachette Book Group

  Excerpt from Witch & Wizard: The Gift Copyright © 2010 Excerpt from by James Patterson

  Copyright © 2008 by James Patterson

  All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.