She did as she was told and felt suddenly self-conscious about the plan she’d concocted for this fundraiser. Maybe she should scrap the whole thing and start over. Go home. Work on the final details of the Timmons anniversary party. Come back to this with a clear head.

“So?”

She found him watching her, which would be off-putting if it wasn’t so nice.

“Louisa?”

She drew in a breath. “Sorry. It’s odd, right? Being in the same room again?”

“It’s just business,” he said.

Right. Business. So why did it feel like something else entirely? Why did it feel like an audition to earn a spot back in his good graces? Or a reality show gone terribly wrong?

“I have another meeting in half an hour,” he said.

“Are you this sweet to everyone, or did you save the sugar for me?” she asked without thinking. Sometimes she really wished she had better control over her mouth.

His eyebrows shot up.

“Sorry, forget I said that.”

“Forgotten.”

“Right.” She took out the small folder she’d put together outlining her plans. “I have three ideas, but there’s one that I think is the strongest.”

“XPO Boggs” leaned back in the chair, and the expression on his face seemed to say, Impress me.

She wasn’t sure anything she had to say at this point would impress him. Odds were, he was going to hate this idea. He was a guy, so he wouldn’t understand it. And that made her job that much more difficult. She not only had to execute the fundraiser; she had to convince him to let her.

It would be easier if he wasn’t staring at her like that.

She told herself to calm down. He was just a guy.

A guy who’d saved her life. A guy who’d stolen her heart a whole lot of years ago. A guy she couldn’t stop thinking about, no matter how mean he was to her. A guy she desperately wanted to win over and also desperately wanted to kiss.

“You’re zoning out.”

She blinked three times, quickly, and tried to focus, aware that she’d never felt this strongly about Eric in the entire eighteen months they’d been together.

She set the papers on the desk and fixed her gaze on him. “I don’t make a habit of going on the ocean without checking the weather,” she said without thinking. “I’m usually very good about it, in fact. I try to do something active every day—it helps my business if I have firsthand experience of things to do on the island.”

“That sort of backfired on you.” Now he was just being smug.

“Obviously.”

“I’m thankful we were there when we were,” he said with the sort of finality meant to end the conversation.

“Yeah, me too,” she said. “I wasn’t too keen on the whole dying thing.”