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Her color deepened, and she studiously studied her palms like they contained the answers to life.

“Falling in love.”

His smile froze, and his gut clenched.

She lifted her eyes to his, and he remained immobile, unable to say anything, because really, what was there to say? At last, she was being honest about what she dreamed of—romantic love. And he loved her. Madly, desperately, and completely, and yet he’d told her, too late. He’d told her too little.

Try again.

“Marcia, I—”

“What is this?” she asked, the patent curiosity that was so hers ringing in her question. Reaching over, she picked up his notepad. She flipped through the pages, skimming as she went, before settling on the last page. And he found himself relieved by that shift away from this tumult of emotions inside.

“They are plans. This is… what I’ve been working on.”

“Plans?”

“You’ll find my estates have fallen into some disrepair.” He should have attended them far sooner, but he’d chafed at addressing the details after his inheritance had been snatched from him when he’d been a boy and held in safekeeping, as Rutland had called it. “I had the idea to invest in several ventures that have proven profitable for Rothesby.”

Marcia angled her body so they faced each other. “What type of ventures?”

Just like that, with her genuine interest and the ease with which she spoke with him, the tension melted away, and he found himself speaking with her as he always had.

And it felt so damned good.

“Steam,” he said.

She cocked her head.

“They say it is the wave of the future and that it won’t be long before the locomotive completely transforms transportation, making the carriage obsolete and becoming a major mode of travel.”

“What is a locomotive?”

“You don’t know what a locomotive is?” he asked, and she shook her head. “Oh, Marcia.” He shifted so they faced each other, and his knees touched hers. “They are magnificent. They run because of a high-pressured engine. They began by hauling coal from local mines—”

“And you think they will soon haul people?” Her voice rang with amusement and some of the same excitement that matched his.

“They already are. Men—”

“And women.”

“Men and women have been riding horses since the dawn of time, and as such, a change is long overdue.”

“And you wish to be part of that change?”

Now he could be part of that change, because it was a wager of a different sort. A wager on the future and innovation and invention. “I will be,” he said quietly. “I want to be part of… something,” he confessed, feeling her eyes upon him. He raised the cheroot to his lips and took a deep inhale, looking out at the tangle of weeds choking a rosebush. “My sister Phoebe and her husband have traveled. They’ve seen the world, the Cook Islands. As has my mother and her husband. Hell, my youngest brother, who is not even nine, has done so. And I’m left asking, what have I done? What have I done that has any meaning or value or significance?” They were thoughts he’d never before considered because he had been so consumed by his own gratifications and sinful pursuits that he’d not stopped to think about what his life had been or would become.

Unsure what to make of the way she looked at him, he said, “You think I’m being ridiculous.”

“Not at all,” she said with an rapidity that rang only of truth. “I’m thinking that you are wise to look to the future and admirable for pursuing something different than you’ve ever done.”

He heard the wistful quality in her words.

The same wistfulness that matched the time he’d found her at the side of her family’s lake, lamenting the fact that she’d never beat the young boys present in a swimming race.

“Are there any things you wish to do, Marcia? Because the world is now open to you in ways that it was previously closed as an unwed lady,” he pointed out.

She chewed at her lower lip. “I… haven’t given it much thought.”