Nero shrugged and grinned back. ‘I couldn’t possibly comment.’
‘So Ignacio has played a really crucial role in your life.’
‘Ignacio and my grandmother were my formative influences. Everything I am, I owe to them. And that’s enough of me,’ he said. ‘I want to hear more about you. I want to know if you mean to live up to your Ice Maiden tag for the rest of your life, Bella.’
‘Maybe.’ Bella shrugged. ‘It hasn’t done me any harm so far.’
‘Hasn’t it?’ Nero challenged. ‘Why would you choose to be that way, Bella, when there’s so much life to live?’
She thought about it for a moment, ‘Because I feel safer.’
‘Safer?’ Nero demanded. ‘What happened to make you feel unsafe?’
‘It was nothing,’ she insisted with a flippant gesture.
‘Nothing? There must be something to make you so defensive.’
‘It’s just so stupid,’ Bella exclaimed with frustration, not wanting to talk about it. ‘And the more time goes by, the harder it is to get past it.’
‘Try me,’ Nero said.
‘It’s not that easy,’ Bella said wryly, twisting with embarrassment.
‘It’s never easy to open up and share things you hide deep inside. And if you’ve held on to something for a long time you can’t expect it to come pouring out. Everyone fears they’ll be judged, Bella, or that they’re making too much of what happened, but that can’t be the case with you, because you’re so strong in every other area of your life except this.’
‘All right,’ she blurted suddenly, as if he’d lanced a wound. ‘If you must know, when I was a teenager one of my father’s friends made a pass at me.’
‘And you kept it quiet all these years?’
‘No one likes to be made a fool of twice. I didn’t think anyone would believe me.’
‘Why not?’
She shrugged unhappily, forced to remember. ‘He had status. I had none.’
‘Status?’ Nero demanded as if the word had burned his tongue.
‘I was just a kid around the stables back then. I’d always thought of myself as one of the boys. I grew up with brothers, remember, and so all that girlie stuff passed me by. I wasn’t sure how to dress or to put make-up on without feeling silly, so my confidence wasn’t exactly sky-high to start with.’
‘What you’re telling me sounds more serious than make-up and clothes, or even an acute lack of self-confidence. This sounds more like a breach of trust with long-reaching consequences,’ Nero argued firmly.
‘Anyway,’ Bella continued offhandedly, ‘when he left me he spread a rumour around the polo club that I was frigid. People started laughing at me. I didn’t know why at first, but when it finally dawned on me…’
Nero cursed viciously beneath his breath. ‘Forget him. Forget all those people. They’re not worth remembering, Bella.’
‘How can I forget them when that’s my world?’
‘That’s your workplace. Your world is something different. At least,’ Nero added wryly, ‘I hope it is. What happened wasn’t your fault, Bella. You were young and naïve, but you got over it. You’re a survivor and you’re strong. You built something wonderful with the legacy your father left you. I think you can afford to give yourself some credit for that.’
‘You make it all sound so romantic—so excusable, but I must have led that man on for him to try in the first place.’
Nero interrupted her with a vicious curse. ‘How did you lead him on?’ he demanded. ‘With your youth? With your innocence? The man who did this to you isn’t worthy of being called a man. His behaviour is not excusable. And being strong isn’t romantic, Bella, it’s a necessity. Being strong is what life requires and demands of you. When you’re pushed to the limit you grow stronger and, whether you know it or not, that is what has happened to you, so instead of letting the past drag you down, take a look at what you have learned from it, and how it has lifted you up.’
‘I couldn’t fight him,’ she said, lost in the past now. ‘He was so much stronger than I was…’
‘You don’t need to tell me any more.’
‘In the end he gave up.’