“It will be sold by the end of the year. I have two buyers interested. Mathilde thinks that one of your new lady-maids has the stuff to keep the home here and will be coming with us when the weather grows colder to get her started.”
“And you did all of this without my knowing?”
Phillip chuckled. “I suppose though I think now that I should have told you. You are sharp, Marina. Very little gets past you. And I know now that if I do not supply you with the information, you may fill in the blanks yourself. Or someone else might. It is not a mistake I will make in the future.”
“But in the morning when we were so close, you…”
Phillip fought hard not to grin as he watched Marina’s cheeks flush once more with that pretty rose color he had come to adore. Standing before him against the backdrop of a saccharine sky, the setting sun painting candy hues all around her, his feelings were undeniable. It was like looking at a painting. The image so moved him that, for a moment, Phillip could not recall what they were talking about. Not until Marina spoke again.
“Phillip?”
It made him smile. It was the first time she had used his first name since their fight, and he realized just how precious the sound was to him. “What is it?”
“I asked you a question.”
“Ah…yes.” The expression on his face became more earnest, and he stepped toward her. “You want to know why I have pushed you away since we first met.”
“Yes,” Marina breathed. “If you are not interested in me in that way, I will understand. I just want to know once and for all what to expect from…our marriage. From you.”
“Do you mean to say that you still wish to be married to me? That you still wish to make this work?”
Marina nodded her head slowly. “Of course, I do. I did not run away from our marriage. I left so that I had time to think. Now, knowing that your uncle spoke dishonestly about you, I have more conviction to make this work than ever, but I will only try if that is what you want. I do not intend to chase the affections of a man who does not want mine.”
“Marina, it is because I have an enormous amount of affection for you that I could not stand to be too close.” He stepped forward, closing the distance between them and laying one hand at her waist and using the other to brush her hair out of her face, so he could see it more clearly. “I did not wish to bring you into my battlefield. I hoped that if I remained aloof, that if I did not entertain my attraction to you, then you would never come close to learning the truth—that I lacked the claim to a title I now know is indubitably mine.”
“So, then…?”
“I can no longer run from the truth, Marina. The depth of my feelings for you knows no bounds. As you explained, today, what my uncle said—what he hoped to accomplish in driving you away from me—I must admit that I began to plot my revenge. I wanted his head for the way he tried to ruin my life. For the way he has tried to take from the first thing I have ever had of my own which makes life feel like it can be full of joy again. But as I look at you now, Marina, I know that you were right. What you said before. I cannot allow the poison from the wound he gave me to overcome me. All I want now is to seek that joy, unapologetically, at your side.”
“Do you mean that?” Marina asked, her voice hardly above a whisper. Her eyes, Phillip could tell, were filled with love. She searched for the same in his and was overwhelmed with how much she found there.
“I do, Marina. I have had eyes only for you since the moment we met. There has never been another woman. There never will be. Whether you feel the same for me or not.”
Marina felt a surge of affection hit her, waiting with bated breath as Phillip leaned down to press his lips to hers. Their first kiss was deeply passionate but equally tender, their affections yielding to one another in a delicate balance, creating a perfect harmony. When they pulled away, Marina gave a small smile and laid her head against Phillip’s chest.
“Let us go home, Phillip, and we can begin our married life as if from the beginning again.”
“I would love that.”
CHAPTER 40
The staff at Hayward Estate watched with startled and curious stares as Marina Hayward’s basket of gooseberries went sailing through the air in an arc, finally crashing against the far wall of the garden room, exploding into a spray of stray berries that found their way into every corner and crevice of the enclosed space.
The Duchess pulled herself up off the ground, giggling wildly over her fall as her staff began to clean up the mess. Her husband, having heard her crash, came running into the room to help her up. She giggled all the while, and her joy was infectious, turning every face in the room into a smiling one. Most of all, Phillip, who was beaming at her.
“Your gooseberry bushes are full of fruit at last,” he noted.
“Yes!” she exclaimed happily, holding his arm as he pulled her up to her feet. Phillip carefully inspected her dress for any tears, and she brushed the dirt off the front of it. A group of boys marched past them to the stairs with furniture in their arms totake to the second floor. “I was so worried about them the entire time we were at the winter house, but they’re absolutely full of berries!”
“You are a wonder,” Phillip laughed. “But you were wrong.”
Marina’s expression fell, and she turned to look at the Duke with an inquisitive stare. “I was wrong? I said it would not take three years for them to fruit.”
“No,” he corrected her. “You believed that they would only take one. This is our third summer in the estate.”
Marina held her hand up to her mouth as she gasped. “So it is!” She looked at her husband with wide, playful eyes. “I suppose that I was only half right, and the gardener only half wrong.”
“That is certainly one perspective,” Phillip chuckled. “Are we to expect your family this evening? I shall let the cook know.”
