Page 46 of Please, Forgive Me

“Yes?”

I watched her for a few seconds, weighing my words before speaking.

Why was this so damn hard?

I’d always been straightforward—a man who didn’t flinch from what he wanted to say. But with her… it was different. I cared what she thought of me, though I’d never admit it out loud.

“What am I to you?” I asked plainly. “Be honest. How do you really see me?”

It wasn’t like me to ask questions like that.

I preferred to keep people at arm’s length, professionalism always first. But I needed to understand what she truly thought of me—because, somehow, it mattered.

She blinked, hesitating for a moment. I could see her choosing her words carefully, as if deciding how much honesty I could handle.

“Well…” she began, a little uncertain, “you’re… complicated, Diego.” Her voice was steady, sincere. “You can be cold, calculating, sometimes even cruel… but at the same time, you care.” She drew a breath. “I think you care more than you want anyone to see. You try to hide it, but I notice. I can tell that underneath all of that, there’s someone who genuinely cares.”

Something in the way she said it—in the way she saw me—stirred a strange mix of vulnerability and admiration inside me.

She saw me.

Maria Gabriela looked past the façade I showed everyone else.

“So I’m a walking contradiction to you?” I asked, a faint smile tugging at my lips as I tried to lighten the moment.

She laughed softly, shaking her head.

“You’re… hard to read,” she admitted, her eyes glinting with a mix of honesty and amusement. “But yeah, I think that’s the best way to describe you. A contradiction.”

No matter how much I prided myself on control, when it came to Maria Gabriela, it always seemed to slip right through my fingers.

“That makes me curious, you know?” I said, standing and walking toward the window. “What else do you see in me that I can’t see myself?”

She smiled—this time, softer, almost intimate.

“Maybe you should start looking at yourself a little more honestly, Diego,” she said. Then, before I could respond, she stood and gathered the last of the papers. “Now, let’s finish this before we’re late for the next meeting.”

She turned to leave, and I just stood there, watching her.

Her words echoed in my mind, settling deep.

And maybe—just maybe—she was the one person who could help me see what I’d spent so long refusing to face.

CHAPTER 19

“True power lies in surrendering to love…”

DIEGO BITTENCOURT

We wrapped up the last details of the meeting, and I watched the investors file out of the room. Another deal closed. Another step forward in Amacel’s expansion.

That should’ve satisfied me. It didn’t.

My mind was somewhere else—someone else, to be exact.

Maria Gabriela, as always, was at my side, ready to adjust any point that still needed attention. She was talking about next steps, about what still had to be reviewed, but my focus wasn’t on numbers anymore. Or reports.

It was on her.