Adison’s POV
I'm sitting in my father's study at lunch trying to read the same quarterly report I've been staring at for twenty minutes, and the words keep rearranging themselves into meaningless patterns.
Grief doesn't care about productivity. Doesn't care that I've been weaponizing work against my own exhaustion for a week. Doesn't care that these numbers should matter more than the ache in my chest that won't go away.
The leather chair still smells like his cologne—something expensive and subtle that I used to associate with power and distance. Now it just smells like absence.
I close my eyes and wonder what Richard would say about all of this. His daughter is pregnant by his best friend. Fighting a corporate war he started while Jake hides in Texas like distance solves anything.
The irony tastes bitter—I spent my whole life wanting his approval, and now I'm making choices he never lived to judge.
I've constructed elaborate conversations in my head where my father offers wisdom he never actually possessed. In these fantasies he's kind and understanding, tells me everything's going to be okay, gives me permission to stop being strong all the time.
The fantasy feels pathetic even as I cling to it.
The door opens without warning.
I look up, irritation already forming on my tongue, and Jake walks in like he's entitled to interrupt my carefully maintained composure.
For one suspended heartbeat I can't process his presence. Can't reconcile Manhattan with cowboy. Reality with the hope I've been strangling for one week straight.
"Jake." His name comes out strangled.
"I'm a fool." He says it plainly, without the defensive justifications I expected. "A complete fucking fool."
The simplicity of the admission cracks something open in my chest.
"You left." My voice shakes despite my best efforts. "You left me here pregnant and alone and I had to—"
"I know." He moves closer, and there's something raw in his expression that makes my throat tight. "I ran when I should have stayed. I hid behind the ranch like it was a valid excuse instead of just cowardice wearing responsibility's clothes."
I stand up because sitting feels like weakness. "What are you doing here?"
"Agreeing to raise our son in New York." The words come out steady, certain. "To build whatever impossible life that requires. To stop running from the terrifying fact that I love you more than I love my comfort."
My hands are shaking. I grip the edge of my father's desk to hide it.
"I pushed too hard." The confession scrapes out raw. "I made it an ultimatum when it should have been a conversation. I was so focused on winning that I forgot we're supposed to be on the same side."
"You pushed exactly as hard as someone who knows what she wants." Jake closes the distance between us. "I'm the one who couldn't handle that strength. Couldn't handle being with someone who demands I show up fully or not at all."
"Fear makes cowards of even the bravest people." I force the words through the tightness in my chest. "We're both guilty of that."
"Yeah." His voice carries resignation and hope in equal measure. "We are."
I collapse into him before I consciously decide to move. Just close the space between us and let myself break against his chest with a relief so profound it feels like structural failure.
His arms wrap around me, solid and real, and I'm crying into his shirt like I'm someone who does that. Someone who falls apart instead of holding everything together through sheer force of will.
"I've got you." His voice is rough against my hair. "I've got you, Adison."
His mouth finds mine with the desperation of someone who's spent weeks remembering what this felt like and discovering memory is a terrible substitute for reality. I kiss him back with everything I've been holding hostage—all the fear and loneliness and rage at being abandoned when I needed him most.
"I've been overworking." I pull back just enough to look at him, and the words taste like confession. "Destroying myself through sheer refusal to feel your absence. If I stayed busy enough, if I pushed hard enough, maybe it wouldn't hurt so much that you chose Texas over me."
His face does something complicated. "Book a massage. Today. Right now."
"Jake—"
"I'm serious." His hands frame my face, thumbs brushing away tears I didn't realize were still falling. "You're carrying my son. That means you take care of yourself. You stop treating your body like it's expendable just because your heart feels broken."
The immediate practicality of his concern undoes me all over again.
"I missed you." The admission comes out small, vulnerable in ways I don't usually allow myself to be. "So much it physically hurt."
"I know." He kisses my forehead, gentle and devastating. "I'm sorry. I'm so fucking sorry."
"You're here now." I press closer, letting myself believe it. "That's what matters."
"I'm here." His arms tighten around me. "I'm staying. Whatever that looks like, whatever compromises we have to make, I'm choosing you. Choosing our son. Choosing the terrifying possibility that maybe I can be enough for both of you."
A knock interrupts before I can respond.
Maria opens the door without waiting for permission, takes one look at us tangled together, and breaks into a smile that transforms her entire face.
"I'm glad you're finally home." She says it like a benediction, like she's been waiting for this exact moment to arrive. "Both of you."
The simple declaration lands like validation. He is home. We are home.
And maybe geography was never actually the problem. Maybe the problem was fear wearing logic's clothes, and what we needed all along was the courage to choose each other despite every rational objection.
"Thank you, Maria." My voice comes out steadier than I feel. "For everything."
She nods once and disappears, leaving us standing in my father's study with Manhattan spreading out below us and a future that finally looks possible instead of fractured.
"I love you." Jake says it quietly, like he's testing the words. "I should have said it sooner. Should have said it before I got on that plane."
"I love you too." The truth tastes like relief and terror combined. "Even when you're being a coward. Even when you run. Even when loving you feels impossible."
"Especially then." His smile is soft, genuine. "That's when it matters most."
I kiss him again because words feel insufficient.
This is what it looks like when two terrified people choose each other anyway. When love becomes braver than fear. When showing up matters more than being comfortable.
It's messy and complicated and nothing like the fantasy I constructed in my head. It's better.