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She sucked in a breath, his accusation hurting her. “How?”
“You’re shutting me out, and pushing me away, instead of letting me fight for this. For you. You told me you regret your first marriage. What about this? Do you not think you’ll regret the way you’ve shut me out of your life?”
Indignation swirled through her. “What choice did I have?”
“Plenty,” he promised. “You could have listened to me, you could have let me explain. You could have stayed, long enough for me to show you that what I feel for you is love – the strongest, most meaningful love in the world. You could have stayed long enough to calm down. To breathe and think.”
“I’ve been breathing,” she whispered. “And thinking.”
“And?” He prompted, the word gruff.
“I don’t know,” she said, so softly, so faintly, it was almost impossible to decipher. “I’m so angry with you.”
“Yes,” he agreed, as though it hardly mattered. “Have you spoken to your mother?”
Heat flushed her cheeks. She shook her head, before remembering he couldn’t see her. “No.” A husky admission.
“Then you do not know she’s gone into therapy?”
“Therapy?” This had Bella standing up straight, a frown on her face. “No.”
“She wants to make her marriage work. And God knows, I don’t love her.”
“But you did?”
“No.” He said the word with absolute vehemence. “I was captivated by her, and flattered by the attention. But think about it, Bella. It’s been many years since your father died, many years of both your mother and me being available. If I loved her, would I have let anything stop me from being with her?”
She was quiet, letting his words filter through her mind. “It was too complicated,” she said, wearily. “I guess it stopped you…”
“It was complicated, but no. Nothing would have stopped me acting on what I wanted, if it was what I wanted. Our situation, yours and mine, was also complex and yet I begged you to marry me, because even then, I couldn’t imagine my life without you in it.”
“Because of the baby,” she said, putting her hand over her stomach, thinking of their daughter, growing inside of her.
“Yes, at first. But looking back, it was more than that. You were the most fascinating woman I’ve ever known, and I was terrified of that. Initially, I wanted to walk right away from you, I wanted to avoid this because you’re Andrew’s daughter and God, as if I hadn’t already done enough to him.”
She felt his guilt and self-recriminations and fought an urgent wave to reassure him. “I have hated myself for … I don’t even know. Your mother and I have never been together, Bella. I would never betray my friend like that. But I knew, I knew a line had been crossed. Ten years ago, as a twenty five year old, I let a married woman tell me she loved me, and I was flattered when I should have been outraged.”
She swept her eyes shut, hurting for the young man he’d been, knowing it was a million miles from who he was now.
“And when your father died, I wanted to be there for Kat, as a friend. I wanted to support her, and, yes, I liked how her adoration made me feel. I told myself I was sleeping with other woman to stop me from going to her, but the truth is, I didn’t want her. I didn’t. Never.”
She sucked in a shaking breath, but couldn’t speak.
“I told her that, the night Lorenzo came to you in Athens. I told Kat, bluntly, that nothing would have ever happened between us. I told her I loved you, that you’re the first woman I have ever loved – that our meeting and being together feels like the strangest kind of fate. I’d lived thirty five years before that night, Bella, but now I cannot imagine my life without you in it.”
Tears squeezed out of her eyes.
“I fell in lust with you, first, but I think it was only a day or two after you being on the island when I knew my heart was taking over. And now, you have it all, for always and ever, Mrs Katrakis.”
Her chest felt heavy and light, she was at the end of a cliff, darkness and an abyss beyond her. “Why didn’t you tell me any of this?”
“I was terrified of losing you,” he said, honestly. “I knew I should have. I felt like I was suffocating, every time I thought of you discovering all of this and believing the worst. I couldn’t bear the thought of hurting you, I couldn’t bear the thought of losing you, so I did just about the stupidest thing I could do and buried my head in the sand.”
Her heart trembled. “Not quite,” she said, after a moment. “You spoke to mom without knowing Lorenzo had come to me. Were you going to tell me, next?”
She waited, and then, he said, quietly. “No, agape. I would never have told you this, if I’d had the choice. Your mother did not wish you to know – and I would always have wished to spare you the pain. Besides, having realized what love is, having felt it with you, I know that I have never loved another woman – there was, in some ways, nothing for you to know.”
“She left daddy for you,” Bella pointed out.
