He blew out a breath and stood, realizing for the first time that I was serious. “I know you don’t want to hear this.” He walked toward me. “But it’s the reality, Jess. Love isn’t a feeling,” he said evenly. “It’s a partnership. A shared vision. Stability. A future. What’s wrong with that?”
Nothing. But also…everything.
“I need more, Trevor.” I handed him my ring, but he refused to take it. “I need to feel chosen.”
“You are chosen, Jess,” he said quickly. “I’m here. I chose you.”
“As a business partner.”
“No,” he said. “As apartner.”
He didn’t sound angry. Or upset at all. Instead, he looked like a man negotiating terms when he said, “Look, this doesn’t have to end. We can still move forward together.”
“What?”
There was no way I was hearing this. No way he was saying what I thought he was saying.
“At least until this project is finalized,” Trevor continued. “I wasn’t trying to mislead you, Jess, and I am sorry if I did in any way. I truly thought we were on the same page.”
I shook my head.
“I guess I can understand if you want the storybook fantasy of a relationship.”
I gritted my teeth when he used air quotes again.
“But I hope you’re reasonable enough to understand what’s at stake if you call things off right now. This town trusts you and your vision for this project. If we break up now, we’ll lose credibility.”
“I’m just supposed to?—”
“Look, I didn’t want to tell you this, but it’s bigger than that, Jess.”
Something in the way his voice changed caught me. I froze and waited.
“Some of our biggest investors bought into the wholepartnershipangle. They liked the whole small-town girl falls in love with a big-city guy and wants to do right for her hometown angle.”
I blinked slowly. “You sold our relationship as an investmentstrategy?” I didn’t wait for an answer. I didn’t need to. “So what are you saying exactly, Trevor?”
“If the wedding’s off, the whole thing is off,” he said plainly. “The investors will pull out. You’ll lose your investment and we’ll?—”
I stopped listening. My mind locked on four simple words.
You’ll lose your investment.
No. I wouldn’t just lose my investment. I’d lose everything. And it wasn’t just about me. My parents’ retirement savings. Gone.
The room spun. I was going to be sick. I needed to get out of there.
I backed away, my hand fumbling for the door handle as my chest tightened. The room felt too small. The air too thick.
“Jess—”
“I can’t,” I said, the words coming out thin and shaky. “I can’t be here right now.”
I stepped outside and let the door shut behind me, the click of it sounding final in a way I wasn’t ready to face. I didn’t look back. I didn’t go to my car. I just started to walk.
The pavement blurred beneath my feet until it gave way to gravel, the familiar crunching ground under me as the trees closed in around me, and the trailhead appeared in front of me.
The air was cool, sharp with pine. I tipped my head back, closed my eyes, and breathed in, slow and deep, like I was reminding my body how to exist.
