Please Be Mine

Chapter Fifty Eight

As the door slammed shut between them, Selena flopped back onto the pillows, emotionally shattered.

How had such a perfect evening ended so badly?

Why should her simple declaration of love have such a dramatic effect on his mood?

She thought back to his dismissive comments about fairy stories, love and happy endings.

Yes, he'd lost his fiancee, but even extreme grief shouldn't lead to that degree of cynicism should it?

And what had he meant when he said he couldn't love?

Was he saying that he believed that a person could only love once in their lives?

Was that what was going on in his head?

Or was he saying that he couldn't love her?

Frustrated and desperately upset, Selena slipped out of bed, slipped her arms into a silk robe and walked across the bedroom. She stood for a moment with her hands on the door, wanting to follow him but afraid of further rejection.

Her hand dropped to her side and she stared at the door, her head a whirlpool of indecision.

She wanted him to talk, and yet she was afraid of hearing what he had to say.

She didn't want to hear that loving and losing another woman had prevented him from ever loving again.

Because that would mean that there was no hope for them.

And yet, not talking about it wasn't going to change things, was it?

Hoping that she was doing the right thing, Selena slowly opened the door, realizing that she had no idea where he'd gone.

What if he left the Palazzo?

And then she saw a chink of light under the door to the library that was shown to them when they'd arrived earlier.

Taking a deep breath, she tapped lightly on the door and opened it.

Nick stood with his back to her, staring out the window.

Selena closed the door carefully, "Please don't walk away from me," she said quietly. "If we need to have a difficult conversation, then lets have it. But don't avoid it. We don't stand any chance if you don't talk to me." She knew from the sudden tension in his shoulders that he heard her, but it seemed like ages before he responded.

"I can't give you want you want, Selena. Love wasn't part of our deal."

"Stop talking about it as a dreal!" She stared at his back helplessly "Could you please at least look at me? This is hard enough without being able to see your face."

He turned and she froze in shock, because his handsome face look as though it had been chiseled from white marble. His eyes were blank of expression and yet the depth of his pain was evident in the very stillness of his body.

"Talk to me, Nick." Forgetting her own misery, she walked across to him. "Why can't you love? Is it because of Demi? Is that it? Is this still about your grief?" And then she saw something in his face—a hardness—and everything fell into place? His comments. His beliefs. His cynicism. Suddenly she just knew. "Oh God—she did something dreadful to you, didn't she?"

"Selena—"

Ignoring his warning tone, she slid her hand into his much larger one. "All this time i've been assuming that you were madly in love with her, and perhaps you were once." Her eyes were on his rigid profile. "But she let you down, didn't she? That's the reason you're so cynical about my motives. Thats the reason you say that you can't love again. You don't want to let yourself love. Because you loved once before ands she hurt you so badly. She did something. I know she did. Tell me about it."

"Selena," his voice thickened, and he turned on her. "Just leave it."

"No, I won't leave it." She tightened her grip on his hand, refusing to let him withdraw. "I want to know. I deserve to know." Tears clogged her throat. "What did she do?"

A muscle worked in his lean jaw, and he stared at her, his eyes empty of emotion. "She was sleeping with my brother."