Or not. She could just as easily sweep them away under a mental rug somewhere with all the other pesky emotions she’d prefer not to entertain.

Louisa swung her legs around to the side of the sofa and put her feet on the ground. “You ready for this?”

He seemed to not want to speak to her, but that would be rude, and she knew he hadn’t been raised to be rude.

“I’ll be fine.” He stopped beside the couch and reached out a hand in her direction.

She stared at it like it was a foreign object, then realized he meant to help her up. He was still thinking of her as an invalid, as a person who’d nearly drowned.

Little did he know that if her legs were wobbly and her heart gave out, it would have nothing to do with her accident that morning and everything to do with him. She’d keep that to herself.

She slipped her hand in his and allowed him to help her up. It didn’t escape her, the way it felt to touch his skin, to feel the warmth of him so close to her.

But once she’d found her footing, he took a step away, to let her go in front of him. It was politeness that caused him to offer her his hand—of course it was.

Yet the simplicity of it made her wish it had been something more.

That was something she had no right to feel, and she knew it.

CHAPTER SEVEN

CODY DIDN’T WANT TO SIT across the table from Louisa and smile and eat lobster rolls and pretend everything was fine.

But here he was.

Maggie bustled around the table the same way he always remembered her doing. It seemed impossible for the woman to sit still. She poured drinks. She fetched extra napkins. She piled freshly made potato chips onto their plates even though nobody was asking for seconds. She mothered. It was what she did.

Maybe that’s why his insides had twisted into a tight knot. He didn’t want to be mothered. Not by his own mother and certainly not by Maggie. Cody had become the one who took care of things. That was his role. He didn’t need anyone else looking after him.

Louisa’s hair had darkened to a deep auburn, a color you didn’t see often and one that only made her blue eyes look bluer. If he sat here too long, he’d get lost in them and convince himself everything really could go back to the way it used to be, back when he was young and foolish and impulsive.

He’d been so stupid.