A Secretive Deal with My Billionaire Boss (by Gregory Ellington) novel Chapter 473

Madison

"Just like that." She picked up her mug again. "Look, I know you're scared. I know you have trust issues with him. I know there's history and complications and all that messy shit. But you love him. He loves you. You have a kid together. Stop overthinking it."

"It's not that simple."

"It is that simple. You're just making it complicated." She pointed at me with her free hand. "What do you want? Forget about what happened five years ago. Forget about Katherine. Forget about all the bullshit. What do you actually want right now?"

"Him." The word came out before I could stop it. "I want him. I want us to be a family."

"Then do it."

"But—"

"No buts." Hazel cut me off. "You want him, he wants you. The rest is just details you'll figure out along the way."

I took another sip of tea, letting her words sink in. "You make it sound easy."

"It's not easy. But it's simple. The hard part isn't deciding to be together. The hard part is working through all the shit that comes with it. Communication. Trust. Building a life together. That's the real work."

"Which is why I need time to clear my head."

"Exactly. Go home. Get some perspective. But also, Madison, talk to him. Like really talk. Open conversations about what you both want, what you're afraid of, what you need from each other."

"We have talked."

"About logistics and schedules and where you're going to live. I'm talking about the deep shit. Your fears. His fears. What happened before and how to make sure it doesn't happen again."

"That sounds terrifying."

"It is terrifying. But necessary." Hazel set her mug down again. "You can't build a future with someone if you're both avoiding the hard conversations. Trust me on that. Oliver and I almost imploded because we kept skirting around the difficult topics."

"But you worked through it."

"We did. Because we finally sat down and had those uncomfortable conversations. We talked about money, about kids, about careers, about all the shit that scared us." She smiled. "And yeah, some of those conversations were brutal. But we came out stronger on the other side."

I finished my tea, setting the empty mug on the nightstand beside hers. "So you're saying I should go home, clear my head, and then have brutally honest conversations with Alexander about everything?"

"That's exactly what I'm saying." She reached over and squeezed my hand. "Stop protecting yourself so much. Stop waiting for him to fuck up again. Either trust him or don't, but make the choice consciously instead of just floating in this limbo."

"What if I trust him and he breaks that trust?"

"Then you deal with it. But what if you don't trust him and you miss out on something amazing? What if you spend so much time protecting yourself that you lose the chance to actually be happy?"

"That's a risk either way."

"Life's a risk." Hazel shrugged. "But the biggest risk is never taking any risks at all. You deserve to be happy. Stop sabotaging yourself."

"I'm not sabotaging myself."

"You absolutely are. You're so busy waiting for the other shoe to drop that you can't enjoy what's happening right now." She poked my arm. "The man ended his engagement for you. He's buying dinosaur sets for your son. He's driving to Connecticut in two days just to spend time with you. Those are not the actions of someone who's going to fuck you over."

"I know."

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