I closed my eyes, pained.
“How do you really see this working?” he asked. “You’re gonna have a life with him? Completely separate for your family? Do you expect him to ask Dad’s permission to marry you? And do you expect Dad to give you the answer you want to hear?”
New tears emerged, but for a different reason.
“You deserve better than him. So much better.”
“So…you’re just going to ostracize me from the family? I have to choose—him or my family?”
He was quiet for a long time, staring at me with a cold gaze. “I would never cut you out of my life—for any reason. You’re my sister. But he’ll never be welcome at Christmas, dinners, birthday parties. If you have kids with him, I’ll spend time with them because they’re my nieces and nephews, but I’ll never spend time with their father. And you can’t change the way I feel about that, Catalina.”
I’d never imagined a future with Heath. My mind hadn’t even entertained the idea. “Damien, I never said I was going to marry the guy—”
“Then why would you risk everything to be with him?” he countered.
I was speechless.
“Why would you have a relationship with someone that goes against everything you believe in if there wasn’t an endgame?”
“I just…want to be with him. And see where it goes…”
“Well, it can never go anywhere.”
I hadn’t thought that far ahead. Maybe I was living in a false reality.
He leaned forward with his elbows on the table. “You can see whoever you want. You’re a grown woman who can make her own decisions. If you want to be with him, I won’t stop you. But you will never really be happy. Don’t you see that?”
Not until now.
He continued to watch me, his eyes softening when he saw the devastated look on my face. “You’re so smart. You’re so beautiful. You’re so damn perfect. You can have any man you want. So why want him?”
I finally forced myself out of the painful haze. “He’s the only man I’ll ever love…”
“I think you’re too young to say something like that.”
I considered telling him about the prophecy, but that seemed moot. She’d said he would always be an enemy to my family…and that was true. I could be with him for the rest of my life, but it would change my relationship with my family, pull me away from them. Heath would never be an addition to our family, always an outsider. We would be broken…forever. That wasn’t what I wanted.
I wanted a husband who could bring us closer together. I wanted a husband who could be friends with my brother. I wanted a husband who would call my father Dad. I wanted…more.
I would never fall deeply in love with someone else, never have this unbelievable connection with anyone else, but was that enough to lose everything else? Lust would fade as our bodies aged.
What would we be left with?
Damien reached across the table and rested his hand on mine. “I’m not trying to hurt you. You know I would do anything to make you happy. I just want you to understand what you’re signing up for. If I could feel differently about him, I would, because I would do anything for you. But…I just can’t. It’s not possible.”
I stared at our joined hands, tears slowly dripping down my cheeks.
“I’m sorry…”
“I know you are,” I whispered.
He placed his other hand on mine, surrounding my hand with both of his. Then he held it there, his head slightly bowed. “You can’t choose who you love, so I know this is hard. But you also can’t choose who you hate.”