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Well, that wasn’t happening. He was going to take her to his house and he was going to . . . to what?
Be with her?
That seemed laughable.
He shifted so he was sitting on the bed, facing her. She sat up. “You don’t know who I truly am. You deserve much better.”
Was he kidding her?
“I’ve been on the outskirts of your family for most of my life. If anyone knows who you are, it’s me. I’m not ignorant of what happens in your world, Regent Malone. I know who you truly are. And I want you. All of you.”
He studied her closely as though he didn’t believe her.
“And I hate when people tell me what I should want or what’s best for me. I’m in charge of my life. I should get to decide what I want.”
“Jilly, I’m trying to protect you.”
“I don’t need your protection, though. I’m not . . . I’m not weak and helpless!”
“Sweetheart, I’m not protecting you because I think you’re weak. I’m protecting you because you are precious. Because you matter. You matter, Jilly. More than you could ever know.”
A sob broke from her mouth and she slumped against his chest.
“You matter, sweetheart. You matter.”
She wrapped her hands up in his shirt. How did he know just what she needed to hear? That all her life, she’d been waiting for someone she loved to tell her that.
You matter.
I see you and you matter.
Her mother loved her, but it wasn’t the same because Mama had always been focused on her father. On protecting them both from him.
“I’ll say it as often as you need to hear it. You matter, Jilly. You matter to me.”
Tears slid down her face as she cried.
He held her tighter. When she started calming down, he grabbed a few tissues, he leaned her face back so he could clean her up.
It probably wasn’t the most romantic time to say it . . . but she had to tell him.
“You matter to me as well, Regent Malone. And I know this sounds crazy, and you’re probably going to tell me that I don’t know my own mind, but I love you.”
He stilled, staring down at her. Then he carefully put the tissues down.
“I love you,” she repeated. “I think I’ve loved you since the first moment I met you. I know that was just a child’s love. That grew into my first crush. But for me . . . it’s you. I now realizethat all of my other relationships were doomed to fail. Because it’s always been you.”
“I thought you would grow out of it. See that I wasn’t a man you could ever want to be with.”
“It was the opposite,” she told him. “Because I’m pretty sure the more time I spent with you . . . the more I fell in love with you. And it’s okay if you can’t feel the same.”
Uh, no, it wasn’t. But she didn’t want him to think he had to say it back. Not that he was the type of man to ever allow himself to get pressured into something. “But I just want you to know how I feel.”
“I’ve always thought of myself as cold.”
“Cold? What do you mean?” she asked.
“Like my father. He never allowed himself to feel anything. Emotions were something I couldn’t afford to have because they interfered with good business decisions. His children were pawns to be used.”
