Jane burst out laughing again and I sighed but backed off. Clearly, this girl’s lips were sealed. Whoever she was to Nate or whatever she knew about him, she wasn’t going to share it with me.
After Zara finally left, the house went quiet in a way that felt earned rather than empty. Jane locked the door behind her, leaned back against it for a second, and let out a breath. “I love her, but she’s a lot.”
I smiled, collecting abandoned wineglasses from the coffee table. “I gathered.”
We didn’t bother clearing much beyond that. Jane kicked off her shoes, curled up on the couch with a blanket, and put on an old movie she said she’d seen a dozen times but never got tired of. I poured us more wine and sat beside her but not close at first.
Eventually though, we’d inched so close together that her feet ended up in my lap like we’d done this every night for a dozen years. Once the credits rolled, she gestured at the screen, the couch, and me as she shot me a smile.
“This feels like a vacation. I can’t even remember the last time I took one of those.”
I glanced at her. “You don’t take vacations?”
She chuckled. “I went to school forever. That was pretty much the whole of my twenties.”
“I know you have a PhD,” I said. “But I don’t actually know what that looked like for you.”
Her mouth tipped into a thoughtful smile. “Long days. Longer nights. Teaching classes I barely had time to prep for, grading until my eyes crossed, writing and rewriting my dissertation like it was a living thing that hated me and refused to fall in line.”
“How was it being an adjunct professor?” I asked.
“The worst,” she said. “There was no job security. No benefits. Just pressure to publish, teach, be available, and not to complain about any of it. I loved it, though.”
I nodded slowly. “This might sound crazy, but that actually sounds pretty familiar.”
She turned her head toward me. “Yeah?”
“My early days as CEO were brutal,” I said. “Seventeen-hour days. Every decision felt like it could break something. Or someone. I slept in my office more than I slept at home.”
“Did you want it?” she asked.
“More than anything,” I said without hesitation. “I still do. I just want to do things differently now.”
“Different how?”
“Trent and I have been working together,” I explained. “He wants his beef in more states than just Texas. I want into shipping, real infrastructure, and not just domestic. There’s overlap there. Opportunity to expand.”
Her eyes lit up with understanding. “Logistics. You have to keep that meat cold when you ship it.”
“Exactly.” I grinned. “See? This is why I meant it when I said I have ideas for your company, too. Big ones. Especially if you work with Trent too.”
She raised an eyebrow at me. “You’re already plotting again, aren’t you?”
“I can’t help it,” I said. “It’s how my brain works.”
She leaned back, considering before nodding slowly. “It’s strange to have someone talk about my company like it’s allowed to get bigger.”
“It is,” I said. “So are you.”
Another movie started playing, but we mostly ignored it, just talking about nothing and everything. Professors who had changed her life. My first boardroom coup and how terrified I’d been to walk into that meeting.
At some point, her head ended up on my shoulder, my arm around her without either of us acknowledging when it happened. It struck me then, how easy it felt with her, the intimacy, the talking, and even the quiet companionship.
If this was what marriage was, I liked it. I wanted it like this every day, but tomorrow, we’d drive back to Chicago.
Back to separate houses. Separate routines and that careful, strange dance we’d been doing since the wedding.
And the one thing I couldn’t stop thinking about, the one thing I couldn’t fix, was her sense of responsibility. Her family that she carried like an invisible weight.
