Dignity is like morality, Mirabilis barked. Too much is as bad as too little. - M. K. Hobson

She wanted to crawl into his arms and be soothed, and soothe him in return, and forget all the grand ideas she’d ever had about true love, and the necessity for it. Because true love was a load of baloney. Finding a good friend...a good friend who trusted you...was more than enough.

“I wasn’t sure if we were still engaged.”
“After everything we’ve been through? After true love conquered all?” Emily shook her head. “Being dead had done nothing to alleviate your obtuseness, Mr. Stanton.”
“Being dead allowed me to learn the heart’s deepest secret,” he said. “That sometimes love—even true love—isn’t enough.”
”But it’s a start,” Emily said.

Emily looked at him for a long time. There were so many things she wanted to know—but she wanted not to know them even more. She didn’t want any more answers. He had been the one thing she could trust, the one person she could rely on. She wanted to beg him to be that way again. But it wasn’t him who had changed. It was her. It was her own credulity she really wanted back. And credulity, like virtue, could be lost only once.