A frown flashed across his face and he dipped his head forward in silent response. ‘Soon.’
Great. A time limit. She toyed with her hands and then stopped, sucking in a deep breath and searching for courage. She loved him and, whatever happened, he deserved to know that. She couldn’t live in a world where he didn’t know how she felt. But the fear of being rejected by him was enormous. She braced for it, straightening her spine, her eyes awash with deep, raw emotions.
‘How’s Cameron?’
His face tightened, his eyes stormy. ‘He’s—a work in progress.’
‘What does that mean?’ For a moment, thoughts of her own misery were driven from her head.
Santos compressed his lips, a muscle throbbing at the base of his jaw. ‘Did you come to speak about my son?’
Her heart squeezed. He was being so cold! Her stomach looped in on itself. ‘No.’ She shook her head, closing her eyes. This was a disaster. But she’d come all this way; she had to do it. Whatever fine beam of hope she’d had when she’d boarded the flight in London was now flickering to darkness inside her.
‘But I’d be lying if I said I haven’t been thinking about him since I left.’ She swallowed. ‘And about you.’
The sharp intake of air, signalled by the rising of his chest, was the only indication that her words had any impact on him. His features were blanked of emotion but there was agony in his eyes, a torment that made her heart ache.
‘Come in.’ It was a command, short and sharp. Hope lifted through her. She looked beyond him but memories flooded her, memories that would eat her alive if she wasn’t careful. She shook her head. Whatever he said, being out here felt like a tether to her real world and like a slipstream to escape, if she needed it.
‘This won’t take long.’
He nodded. Was that relief she saw on his face? Her heart dropped.
‘You were so specific, Santos. Right at the start of all this, you were abundantly clear about how you felt and what you wanted. I know that you intended for us—what we were—to be a physical affair that ended when I left.’
His eyes seemed to be tied to hers by some unseen force. He stared at her and she felt as though he were touching her. Butterflies shifted through her belly. Finally, he moved his head, just a tiny mark of agreement. ‘We both agreed to that.’
‘Yes.’ She sighed. ‘But it turns out you were right. It’s hard to separate emotions from sex. I thought I could do it but, God, Santos...’ She shook her head, a dreaded film of tears filling her eyes so she closed them for a second, blinking furiously.
He was tense. She could feel it emanating off him in waves, slamming into her. ‘What are you saying?’
‘What do you think?’ She shook her head and a hysterical laugh bubbled out of her. ‘I fell in love with you, just like you said I would.’
His face paled, his jaw tightened. ‘Amelia.’ He shook his head and then reached for her, putting a hand around her arm. ‘No. You can’t have.’
Another laugh, completely humourless. ‘Well, I did.’ She drew in another breath, waiting for it to fill her with some kind of courage. ‘And I don’t think I’m the only one.’
If it was possible, his face paled even more. ‘I was so honest about this.’ He groaned, reaching down and squeezing her hand. He took a step out onto the landing, his body closer to hers, as though he wanted to touch her but also knew it would be too complicated. ‘This is the last thing I wanted.’
Her throat felt as though it were lined with blades. ‘Are you sure about that?’
He ground his teeth. ‘Absolutely.’ His eyes shuttered closed for a minute. ‘I don’t love you, Amelia. I’m sorry if I did anything to confuse you, anything to lead you on. I wanted what we shared but I always knew and accepted that it would end.’ The words slashed her insides, tearing her to ribbons.
‘I don’t believe you.’ She held his gaze even when her courage was faltering. ‘Tell me you haven’t thought about me.’
He hesitated for a moment.
‘Tell me you haven’t missed me.’
He was completely silent.
‘Tell me you don’t love me.’ Her voice cracked but it was so important to hear him say those words.
‘If I say those things, it will hurt you, and that is the last thing I want to do. Let me say this instead: I want now what I wanted then. Our relationship ran its course.’
It was, somehow, worse than if he’d just agreed with her. It was an admission that nothing about what they’d shared had affected or changed him at all. Where her heart had been blown wide open, making her not only open to the possibility of love but accepting of its inevitability, he was the same man he’d been before.
She’d come here because she’d thought it was important for him to know how she felt, but now the futility of what she’d set out to do weighed her down more than anything else.