"It wasn't my choice, Emma," he said, feeling rather sick at the memories himself. "Once she had my heart...it was part of being her pet. And that was all I ever was to her. She was less than that to me."
She had been his captor, the one who abused him. Never more than that, although he had sought for more a great deal of the time he had been in Storybrooke, never quite understanding why he could feel nothing when he was with her. Of course, he knew that it couldn't have been entirely the curse that had done that - because even without his heart he had certainly felt something for Emma.
"Who would have?" he asked softly. "You know Regina wouldn't, and in Storybrooke everybody assumed I was perfectly capable of taking care of myself. I was Sheriff, after all. And in my other world...well, my parents left me to die when I was just a babe, and I never had a lot of faith in humans after that."