can’t do much to help her heal. That’s a battle she’ll have to fight on her own. But at least I can make it easier for her to be in her own home, where she feels best.”
“It’s brilliant. I never even thought about the logistics of helping her up and down the steps.”
In truth, she hadn’t really given much thought to Juliet’s return, other than clearing a few pieces of furniture out of her bedroom so the wheelchair could move more easily.
“She should be set now. But if you think of anything else I can do, you know where to find me.”
“Thank you.”
Henry and Juliet.
The idea still boggled the mind. She knew his late wife had been one of Juliet’s dearest friends and that her mother had grieved deeply when cancer had taken Lilianne three or four years earlier.
Should she say something? No. She had to wait for Juliet or Henry to broach the subject.
She couldn’t stop thinking about his hand just inches from Juliet’s in sleep and how he had colored so tellingly when she had caught him.
Did Caitlin know?
“What other help will you need to care for her at home?”
All the help. She had no idea where to start.
She forced a smile. “I think Cait and I can handle most things. It will mostly be getting Mom up and down, making sure she does her physical therapy exercises, taking her to doctor appointments. We will probably have to figure out most things as we go along.”
A hint of a dimple appeared in Henry’s cheek. “That seems to be a common trait in the Harper family.”
“More like our family motto. Jump and the net will appear, grasshopper.”
He smiled but Olivia didn’t feel much like smiling back.
She was terrified at the idea of caring for Juliet. Her mother had a broken hip and broken ribs and would be able to do very little for herself.
What if Olivia made everything worse? If she messed up her mother’s medication or stumbled when she was trying to help Juliet transfer positions or mismanaged the garden center into the ground?
She could feel a panic attack starting and tried to breathe through it until it faded. One stress at a time. Right now, she had to focus on helping her mother go home from the hospital. She could panic about the rest later.
“It’s so good that you were able to come home, Olivia. I know it couldn’t have been an easy decision to pick up and leave, even for the few weeks that you’ll be here, but I hope you know how lost your mom would have been without you. I know she’s hurting, but she still seems happier now that you’re home.”
She seriously doubted that. And now she was doubting her own suspicions about what she had seen. Maybe she had misunderstood that moment of tenderness she had witnessed. Henry and her mother couldn’t be together if he was that clueless about the tangled, difficult relationship she so carefully navigated with Juliet.
While she was busy trying to do everything else to keep the family business running and take care of Juliet, why couldn’t she try to heal the subtle rift in the relationship with her mother?
The seductive question made something ache in her chest. How could she do that when she still wasn’t sure why it felt so broken? Every time she tried to analyze it, she felt as if she were chasing ghosts.
She loved her mother and admired her. On the one hand, she wanted to be close to Juliet, to feel as if she could confide her troubles and weaknesses. On the other, Olivia couldn’t seem to shake the habits developed after her father died and Natalie began getting into trouble.
During those difficult years, her mother had too much to handle with the struggling business, the house, Natalie’s wild behavior. Olivia hadn’t wanted to give her mother one more thing to worry about. She had developed strange, magical thinking, afraid that if she wasn’t the perfect daughter, her mother would crack apart and the entire fragile family structure they were both clinging to would collapse.
Could she be vulnerable enough to admit to Juliet that everything wasn’t ideal in her life? She had fears and weaknesses, worries and stresses.
She would try, she told herself. She had to. She was trying to find more courage, to become not perfect but someone she could admire.
Sometimes being brave wasn’t about confronting an armed man in a coffee shop as much as finding the strength to be