Page 15 of Hitched to my Boss (Viva Las… Oh, Sh!t #2)

JASON

S omething's wrong.

I know it the moment I walk through my front door after three weeks away and find Natalia sitting at the dining table with her laptop closed, and her hands folded in front of her like she's preparing for a termination meeting.

The cabin looks different somehow, less lived-in despite the personal touches she'd added.

More like a space someone's preparing to leave.

"You're back," she says, not moving from her chair.

"I'm back." I set my gear by the door, studying her face for clues about what's shifted in my absence. "The Hartwell project is complete. Successfully."

"Congratulations."

The single word carries none of the warmth or enthusiasm I'd expected.

No questions about the details, no interest in how the complex pack dynamics had required innovative relocation strategies that exceeded even Hartwell's expectations.

Just polite acknowledgment, like I'm a stranger reporting news she's obligated to hear.

"Natalia, what's going on?"

"We need to talk." She gestures to the chair across from her. "About our situation."

Situation. Not marriage, not relationship, not the future we'd started building before I left. The clinical terminology sets off every alarm I've developed over four years of careful isolation.

"All right." I sit, maintaining the distance she's obviously established between us. "What about our situation?"

"I've been thinking about what we're doing here. About what I've given up to make this work." Her voice is controlled, clipped. "I think I need to go back to Atlanta."

The words hit like a sucker punch. "Go back to Atlanta."

"I've been neglecting my career, my clients, my entire professional life for the past month.

I lost a major client this week because I wasn't available when she needed me.

Another potential client dismissed me because I'm 'dealing with personal complications.

'" She meets my eyes directly, and I can see the walls she's rebuilt in my absence.

"I can't continue to sacrifice my professional identity for a relationship that started as an accident. "

"Is that all you think this is? An accident we're dragging out?"

"Isn't it?" She opens a folder beside her laptop, pulling out what looks like a printout of flight information.

"Jason, we got drunk and married someone we barely knew.

We decided to make it work because it was convenient for your business and because we're attracted to each other.

But that's not enough to build a sustainable relationship on. "

"What about what we decided before I left? What about making this real?"

"I got caught up in the moment. In the romance of it all.

" She folds her hands again, the gesture so controlled it screams of practiced composure.

"But the reality is that I've abandoned everything I worked for to play house with a man I've known for a month.

That's not healthy. That's not who I am. "

"According to who?"

Something flickers in her expression, gone so quickly I almost miss it. "According to me. According to the career I've spent ten years building. According to the professional reputation I've damaged because I was too distracted by my husband to do my job properly."

"And going back to Atlanta fixes that?"

"Going back to Atlanta lets me rebuild what I've lost. Let’s me prove to myself and my industry that I'm still the professional I used to be, not just someone who disappeared into a relationship the moment things got intense."

"So this is about fear."

"This is about being realistic instead of living in a fantasy." She stands, moving toward the kitchen with her back to me. "Jason, what we have is chemistry and circumstance. That's not enough to sustain a marriage."

"What about trust? What about partnership? What about the fact that we work better together than either of us works alone?"

"We work well together professionally. That doesn't mean we should be married."

"Bullshit." I stand, my frustration finally boiling over. "You're running, Natalia. You're scared of how real this got, and you're looking for any excuse to bolt."

Her eyes flash with anger. "I'm being practical. Something one of us has to be."

"Practical? You're willing to throw away the best thing either of us has ever found because some client couldn't reach you for three weeks?" I move closer, refusing to let her retreat. "That's not practical. That's cowardice."

"Don't you dare call me a coward for protecting my career."

"I'm calling you a coward for sabotaging yourself.

" I close the distance between us, seeing the flicker of uncertainty she's trying to hide.

"You're terrified that if you stay here, if you really commit to this, you might have to depend on someone else.

You might have to trust that I won't disappear the way everyone else in your life has. "

"That's not?—"

"Isn't it? Tell me about your family, Natalia. Tell me about the people who were supposed to take care of you and didn't. Tell me why the idea of needing someone scares you more than being alone."

She goes pale, and I know I've hit a nerve. "My family has nothing to do with this."

"Your family has everything to do with this.

You've built your entire identity around not needing anyone because everyone you ever needed let you down.

" I reach for her hands, noting how she doesn't pull away even though she wants to.

"But I'm not them. I came back, Natalia.

I finished my job, and I came home to you. "

"For three weeks, Jason. You were gone for three weeks while I sat here like some 1950s housewife waiting for her husband to come home." Her voice breaks slightly. "Do you have any idea what that felt like? How much of myself I lost just sitting in this cabin?"

"Then we fix it. We figure out how to make this work for both of us instead of you running away the first time it gets complicated."

"How? How do we fix the fact that my career requires me to be where the opportunities are, and your life is here? How do we fix the fact that I've already lost professional credibility that took me years to build?"

"We get creative. We compromise. We fight for what we want instead of giving up when it gets hard." I cup her face in my hands, forcing her to look at me. "Natalia, I love you. I'm in love with you. I've never said that to another woman and meant it, but I mean it with you."

Tears shine in her eyes, but her expression doesn't soften. "Love isn't enough, Jason."

"Then what is? What would it take for you to stay and fight for this with me?"

"It would take you understanding that I can't be the only one making sacrifices." She steps back, breaking our connection. "It would take you being willing to leave this mountain and build a life somewhere that works for both our careers, not just yours."

"You want me to leave Whisper Vale?"

"I want you to want more than just your comfortable isolation. I want you to want a life with me that's bigger than this cabin." Her voice grows stronger. "But you won't, will you? Because that would require you to step outside your comfort zone and risk something for love."

The challenge hits hard because she's right. I am asking her to sacrifice everything while I risk nothing. I'm asking her to disappear into my world while I remain safely isolated in the life I've built to protect myself from exactly this kind of vulnerability.

"You don't know what you're asking."

"I'm asking for what every woman has the right to ask for. A partner who's willing to meet me halfway." She moves toward the stairs again. "But you can't do that, can you? You want me to fit into your life exactly as it is, with no changes, no challenges, no growth required on your part."

"That's not true."

"Isn't it? When was the last time you left this mountain for something other than work? When was the last time you took a risk that wasn't calculated and controlled and completely on your terms?"

I open my mouth to argue, then close it because I can't. She's right. I've built my entire adult life around avoiding risk, around controlling my environment, around never having to depend on anyone or anything that could be taken away.

"I went to Vegas for you."

"You went to Vegas for your business. I just happened to be part of the package.

" She pauses on the bottom stair, looking back at me with something that might be pity.

"Jason, I'm not asking you to change who you are.

I'm asking you to grow into who you could be.

But that's not something you want, is it? "

"I want you."

"You want the version of me that fits into your life without disrupting it. But that's not who I am, and it's not who I can be." She takes a step up the stairs. "I need to be with someone who wants to build something new together, not someone who wants me to disappear into something old."

"So that's it? You've made up your mind, and nothing I say matters?"

"Nothing you've said so far has convinced me you're willing to do anything differently." She looks at me with sad certainty. "I'm leaving tomorrow morning, Jason. If you want to change my mind, you'll have to do more than ask me to sacrifice everything while you sacrifice nothing."

"What would it take?"

"It would take you proving that you value us more than your comfort zone. It would take you showing me that you're willing to fight for this relationship instead of expecting me to do all the fighting." She starts up the stairs again. "But we both know that's not who you are."

The dismissal stings because it's partially true.

I have been expecting her to do all the adapting, all the compromising, all the risk-taking.

I've been asking her to love me enough to give up everything while offering nothing in return except the privilege of sharing my carefully controlled existence.

But she's wrong about one thing. She's wrong about who I am when it comes to her.

"Natalia," I call after her.

She stops but doesn't turn around.

"What if you leave then remember that you were happier here? That we were building something worth keeping?"

"Then I'll deal with that when it happens. But right now, I need to prioritize saving my career over saving a marriage that might have been a mistake from the start."

She disappears upstairs, leaving me alone in the cabin that suddenly feels as empty as it did before she arrived. But worse, because now I know what it feels like to have someone's presence fill the spaces I didn't even know were hollow.

I sink into the chair she'd vacated, staring at the flight information she'd left on the table. Atlanta. Tomorrow morning. Back to the life that makes sense, the career that defines her, the identity she had before Jason Wallace complicated everything.

I want to follow her upstairs, to argue and fight and convince her that what we have is worth more than any career. But I can hear her moving around in our bedroom, the sound of drawers opening and closing, the quiet efficiency of someone who's made a decision and is determined to stick with it.

And maybe she's right. Maybe I am asking too much, expecting her to reshape her entire life around mine while I continue exactly as I was before. Maybe the smart thing is to let her go, to chalk this up to a Vegas mistake that we tried to make work but couldn't.

But as I sit in the cabin that she's turned into a home, surrounded by the small touches that made it feel like our space instead of just mine, I know I'm not ready to give up on what we built together.

The question is whether I'm brave enough to fight for it, or whether I'll do what I've always done when things get complicated and retreat behind walls until the problem goes away.