My body was rigid. As well as a verbal rebuke or physical slap, it stopped him, his hand slowing and coming to a halt inches from my arm.

Crestfallen, he allowed his hand to fall.

'Please, don't leave me.' It came out an agonized whisper.

My eyes squeezed shut; I dug my nails into the palm of my hands to stop them reaching for him, to comfort and embrace. Long-dormant instincts were rising to the fore: that this was a face to be loved and looked after; that to see this face twisted in pain, brought pain to me in turn; that this was a face most beloved.

'You don't love me any more,' he repeated dully, a vague, lost look in his ochre eyes that almost broke me, and my resolve.

Instead, I lifted my chin. 'That's right.' The cold look on my face became harder to sustain as each passing second revealed the devastation etching its way across his own. 'No! You don't get to do that!'

'What?' Edward almost jumped, taken aback by my vehemence.

'Make me feel guilty for your actions – your cruelty! You think I just capriciously stopped loving you? That it just went away? No! I worked damn hard at it – I earned it!'

Edward recoiled, then surprise rapidly gave way to anger: 'You earned it?' he repeated savagely.

'Yes!' I almost hissed. 'Everyday I made the decision to let you go. I had to stamp out my emotions and accept the truth: that it turned out to be very easy for you to walk away. I worked to break the lie you told me a hundred times over, the lie I had bought into body and soul: that we were meant to be; that we would always be "we".'

My voice had hushed with pain as I went on, my eyes lowering to the ground, arms winding round my torso, as if to hold myself erect against remembered pain. I didn't look at him, but my voice gained in strength again as I continued: 'So don't you dare – don't you dare! – stand there and imply that I was fickle. That I walked away – that I stopped loving you! I just worked to protect what was left of my heart after you shattered it.'

Edward was even paler than normal. He'd ceased to be able to meet my gaze long before I had lowered mine. Breathing unevenly as though he had been running, he swayed slightly as if he had sustained a heavy blow.

'I hurt you,' he breathed in horrified realization.

'Yes,' I acknowledged, arms still wrapped around myself.

Finally, he raised his eyes to mine again: 'I always swore I'd look after you – protect you.'

'Yes,' I said again, gulping back a sob. Allowing a flintiness to harden my gaze, I took a breath in preparation for dealing the killing blow. 'But instead you hurt me more deeply and completely than anyone has ever done before or since.' Edward flinched but I made myself push on: 'Now do you understand? Now do you understand why I stopped loving you?' I answered my own question: 'It was self-preservation. And the least you deserved.'