Corner Office Confessions

Chapter 15: Distance

Nathan kept his word, and it was worse than any argument could have been.

For a week, he was nothing but professional — clipped emails, formal meetings, eyes that no longer lingered when she walked into a room. Nerisa told herself it didn't matter. She'd survived worse than a man with more walls than a fortress.

But it mattered. It mattered every time she caught him watching her from across the office before looking away too fast, every time his voice softened for half a second before he caught himself and pulled it back to something businesslike and cold.

She found him alone on the rooftop one evening, the place he'd once called his.

"You can't even look at me anymore," she said, joining him at the railing.

"I look at you plenty. That's the problem." His hands tightened on the railing. "Vivian isn't wrong. Investors talk. The board talks. One rumor about the CEO and an intern, and everything I've built could unravel."

"So that's it? You're choosing the company."

"I'm trying to protect what I have left." His voice cracked slightly, the first real emotion he'd shown all week. "Everyone who's gotten close to me has used it against me eventually. My father. Vivian. I don't know how not to expect that from you too."

The admission landed like a blow, honest and raw and unfair all at once.

"I'm not them," Nerisa said quietly. "But I can't keep proving that to someone who's already decided I will be."

She turned to leave, and this time, he didn't stop her — though the way his jaw clenched, the way his hand twitched at his side like he wanted to reach for her, told her the battle wasn't over.

It was just beginning.