I was in love with him, and wanted him to love me back.
My infatuation with Jason had been nothing, a schoolgirl crush, compared to what I felt for Edward, the man I’d healed, the man I’d shared a home with, the man who’d teased me and encouraged me and demanded I follow my dreams. The man who’d taken my virginity and shown me what physical love could be. The man whose child I now carried deep inside me.
I was in love with Edward.
Desperately.
Stupidly.
“Diana?”
I took a deep breath. “I was just curious, that’s all.” I gave him a weak smile. “After hearing Victoria talk about her. What made Lena so different?”
“Different?” Moonlight from the window caught the edge of his face, leaving his eyes in shadow. “Lena wasn’t different. She was ordinary, really. But she acted helpless, as if I were the only one who could save her. She made me think...I could be her hero.” His cruel, sensual lips twisted up at the edges. “Me. Isn’t that hilarious? But I almost believed it. I took care of her for months, asking nothing in return. Until she suddenly left me for the Spanish bastard who’d abandoned and betrayed her.”
“That’s it? She acted helpless?” I could be helpless, I thought wildly. I felt helpless right now, looking at him, fearing there was nothing I could do to make him love me or want our baby.
He shrugged. “I thought I deserved her. That I’d earned her.”
I blinked. “You can’t earn someone’s love. That’s not how it works.”
He gave a harsh laugh. “I’ve heard the words I love you from so many women...”
“You have?” I whispered. No one had ever spoken those words to me, except for my family.
“...but words are meaningless. Cheap. Women have said it after they’ve only known me a few hours—in bed. They barely knew me at all. They were just trying to trap me, to make me do something I didn’t want to do. To own me.”
“You mean, make you commit?”
“Exactly.” He gave me a crooked grin, then looked away. “But I always imagined love to be an action, not a word. If I loved someone, I wouldn’t say it, I’d show it. I’d take care of her, putting her needs ahead of my own. I’d put my whole soul into making her happy....” He cut himself off with a harsh laugh, clawing back his hair. “But what the hell do I know? I’ve never found love like that. So I gave up on it. And I’ve been happier ever since.”
“I don’t believe that,” I said softly, looking at the stark emotion in his eyes. “I’m sorry that woman hurt you, but you can’t live the rest of your life closed off from love.”
“You’re wrong,” he said flatly.
Clutching my hands into fists at my sides, I whispered, “Do you still love her?”
He choked out a laugh. “Love her? No. It all seems a million years ago. I was a different person then. I’m leaving them to it. The Duke and Duchess of Alzacar are happy together, with their fat, happy baby, happily married in their big castle in happy, happy Spain. I wish them every happiness.”
His voice had an edge to it. A darkness. I searched his handsome face. “You’re sorry you tried to kidnap her...Aren’t you?”
“I’m sorry I ever let myself care in the first place,” he said coldly. “I should have known better than to think I could be any woman’s hero. It’s not in my nature. Now...I know who I am. Selfish to the core. And glad. My life is completely within my control.”
Looking up at him, my glass heart broke into a thousand shards, each of them sharp as ice. “So you’ll never have a wife—no child—no family of any kind?”