His Secret Slave to Scandalous Queen

"So," she said, "what is this dilemma? Let us get this over with quickly," she added. "I was having a perfectly peaceful afternoon before you arrived."

"I apologise for disturbing it." Richard gestured towards the seating near the hearth.

She crossed the room and took the chair opposite his.

"It would be better if you were closer, Seraphina," Richard said.

"I thought you would appreciate the distance."

Richard let out a slow breath. It was becoming exhausting speaking to her. Why had he come here again?

"Fine," Seraphina said before he could reply. "I shall move." She crossed to the long settle beside him. Richard shifted slightly to give her room. The moment she sat, he became aware of the faint scent of her perfume.

Seraphina arranged her skirts and looked at him. "So, how may I be of service?"

"I recently stumbled upon a cause," he said at last. "Or rather, I placed myself on its path. And now, I am being asked to decide whether that cause began from a desire for revenge or from a desire for justice. The difficulty is that I cannot seem to disentangle the two. I want justice. I know I do. But I also want to hurt someone involved."

"What do you want from me exactly?" she asked.

Richard glanced sideways at her. "Do what you do."

"And what is that?"

"Talk some sense into me."

For a moment, she looked towards the fire, thinking. Richard watched her profile. She was not Livia though his father’s choice had made the resemblance impossible to ignore.

But sitting beside her now, the differences seemed louder than the similarities. Seraphina was colder where Livia was instinctive. More guarded where Livia was emotional. Her wit cut differently.

"In this case," she said, "I cannot talk sense into you." she turned towards him. "this is something you must analyse on your own. If I tell you what to do and you regret it later, there is every chance you will convince yourself I influenced you."

"Then how do I analyse it?"

Seraphina considered that. "I suppose you begin with the order of things. Your timeline. Which feeling came first?" she asked. "Did you want justice before you wanted revenge, or did revenge lead you towards this cause? Then ask which is stronger. If the person you want to hurt suffered no consequence at all, but justice was still done, would you be satisfied?"

"And if that person were destroyed," she said, "but nothing truly changed, would that be enough for you? Sometimes the path that feels best to us is not necessarily the path that is right. You have to decide whether you want to do the right thing or simply the thing that feels right for you."

"There are a great many things you have to think about," Seraphina said.

Richard inhaled slowly. "I was trying to skip the thinking. That was the whole point of coming here. I thought you could help. You have only complicated matters further."

Seraphina looked entirely untroubled by the accusation. "Naturally, you would see it that way. You have always been a spoiled man who has usually gotten his own way. You enjoy being the centre of attention. You have built this charming rake around yourself because people like him. Men envy him. Women whisper about him. Everyone knows his name, and you enjoy that far more than you pretend."

Richard stared at her. Seraphina did not retreat. There were women who softened criticism with smiles or lowered eyes. Seraphina seemed to view his title as an unfortunate condition she was expected to work around.

"I think," she said, "that this dilemma is a test of your true character."

"And what character would that be?"

She tilted her head. "Are you a good man, or are you just a noble man?"

Richard frowned. "What is the difference?"

Seraphina smiled. "That is for you to find out, Your Grace."

"Wonderful," he muttered. "Another riddle. Besides, you have no right to call me spoiled. You are just as spoiled. You have never faced a day of true hardship in your life. You were born into a great house, raised with servants, and every comfort you could reasonably want. And you think you are smarter than everyone around you."

"Your Grace," Seraphina said calmly, "I am definitely smarter than you."

Richard slowly narrowed his eyes. She genuinely believed what she had said, which somehow made it worse. "You speak to the Duke of Kingsmere."

"Your title used to impress me until I met you in person."

Shouldn’t meekness be expected of an arranged bride. Or resentment. He had not expected this. A woman who insulted him to his face, challenged every comfortable lie he told himself.

"I change my mind. I am really looking forward to marrying you. I would very much like to see how we are expected to live beneath the same roof without killing each other."

Seraphina smiled with perfect composure. "And I assure you, I can play the distraught widow excellently well,"

"Maybe I will be the widower," Richard said.

"How about we make a wager on who murders the other first?"

"I could do it right now and save us both the headache of marrying."

"You draw your weapon, I draw mine."

"You have a weapon on you?"

"At all times."

Before he could ask where, Seraphina reached into her hair and pulled out one of the long pins holding it in place.

Her hair fell over her shoulders at once. Richard forgot whatever clever answer he had been preparing.

The change was absurdly small. One pin removed, one arrangement undone, and suddenly she looked entirely different.

Seraphina held the pin between her fingers like a small dagger. He could have pointed out that a hairpin was not a sword.

Instead, something in him snapped loose. He reached for her and kissed her. It was brief. An impulse he had failed to catch in time. A question asked with his mouth.