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“That was not what I asked,” Harper replied.

Marina looked at her sister.

“I do love her,” she insisted. “As though she were my own.”

“We know you do.”

“And I would never wish Ambrose to feel that he is not enough. He has suffered so much already.”

Sophia lowered herself beside Harper, until both sisters were kneeling before Marina in their elegant gowns.

“But would you like children of your own?” she asked, unusually softly.

Marina looked away.

She thought of Ambrose holding Emma. Of the tenderness in his expression when he believed no one was watching. Of what it might be like to see him holding a child who belonged to both of them.

The thought made something ache inside her.

“I do not know,” she whispered.

But even as she spoke, she realized that was not entirely true. She knew. And that frightened her almost as much as the thought of losing what she already had.

“And before you both decide this is because of my supposed obsession with having a family,” Marina added softly, her eyes filled with emotion as she looked from one sister to the other, “it is not only that. I simply hate hearing him think so poorly of himself. I wish there were some way to prove to him that he is wrong.”

Harper squeezed her hand.

“Then perhaps you must be patient with His Grace,” she advised tenderly. “The good fortune is that you are married. You have time, Marina. Enough time to teach him how to love the man you already know he is.”

“And perhaps,” Sophia added, “he needs to learn that loving someone does not mean protecting them from every possible sorrow.”

Marina stared at her, a knot loosening in her chest. Her sisters somehow always knew precisely what to say when her own thoughts became too overwhelming.

Later, after returning to the estate, Marina found herself thinking about everything her sisters had said.

She had intended to retire early, but her thoughts were far too restless. The visit to the cottage had reminded her of all the things Ambrose had done for her, and of how little he seemed to understand what those things meant.

She wanted to speak to him. Perhaps to thank him again for the progress at the glasshouse. Perhaps simply to see him.

“His Grace is in the drawing room,” Mr. Ernest informed her.

Marina found herself standing before the drawing room doors with her hand raised to knock. She was about to do so when her mother’s voice sounded from the other side of the door.

“Marina is precious to me,” Lady Dashwood said quietly from within. “She is the little healer of our family, emotionally and physically.”

Marina stopped.

Her raised hand hung in the air. For one second, she could do nothing but stand there and listen as the words made something tender move through her chest. She almost wished she had not heard them.

“And with everything she has endured,” her mother continued, her voice thickening with fondness, “I am simply grateful she is in safe hands. She appears contented and I hope it will remain that way.”

Marina pressed her palm flat against the door, as though it were the only thing holding her up.

She bent her head slowly, staring at the polished floor. Her mind had gone back to every occasion when she had smiled for her family and insisted she was perfectly content with her new life.

The eccentric woman who needed no husband, no children, no ordinary life.

She had believed it herself, for a time.