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Seraphina sighed, still rubbing her arm.

“The Duke kissed me the other night,” she confessed, feeling her entire body slump. “At the gallery.”

“Oh, heavens,” Theo gasped, then looked at Seraphina regretfully.

“I’m so sorry I pinched you. No wonder you’ve been acting strange.”

“Are you all right?” Amelia asked, stepping closer as she lowered her voice. “Did he force you?”

“No.” The answer came out swiftly before she could stop it, and she blushed wildly. “I mean yes. I mean…I do not know!”

Theo and Amelia glanced at another in confusion.

“I did not want it at first,” Seraphina tried to explain, her body once more filling with that edgy, strange heat that made her skin prickle with excitement. “But when he touches me…I can’t explain it. My being relaxes into him. Even if I am mad at him.”

She tsked her tongue as she shook her head and rubbed her temple.

“You should have heard him that night. He wassorude to Lord Fallon. Absolutely horrific in the way he spoke to him. I despised it, and yet- yet when he kissed me I just wanted to- to-” she floundered for her words.

“Sink into him? Allow him? I do not know but it is most confusing and it is only making my frustration worse!” She burst out.

“Oh, my,” Amelia murmured, her eyes growing wide with curiosity.

“I already told him that we cannot court. My mother would not allow it in a thousand years,” Seraphina said with a sigh.

“Do you want to court him, though?” Theo asked tentatively.

Seraphina shifted on her feet. Her mind said no. But her body…her body craved the idea.

“No,” she answered. “My mother is right. I do not agree with everything she says but she is right in this. We need someone who will save our reputation, not damn it further.”

“We?” Theo asked, taking a step closer. “Your marriage should be about you, Seraphina. Not your mother.”

“I know,” Seraphina sighed, growing more agitated. “But she wants what is best for me. That is why she has done all of this. So I do not have to live the life she has.”

Amelia and Theo exchanged another long look, only adding to Seraphina’s agitation.

“What, you do not agree?” She asked.

Amelia blushed and looked away while Theo pressed her lips together and worried them.

Seraphina took a steadying breath, and reached for her friends.

“Please,” she begged, “You are my friends. I need your truth. You are the only ones will give them to me.”

“It is not that we do not agree,” Theo answered carefully. “I am sure you are right. Your mother wants what is best for you as every mother should want for her daughter…but are you sure that is the only thing she wants? The way she pushes you. Her willingness to have you caught in a scandal to trap one of the more reputable gentlemen. Are you sure your courtship is not for her?”

Theo spoke a truth Seraphina had only thought but never shared. Yes, it was something she pondered for quite some time. Her mother’s needs were so enmeshed with her own, she sometimes couldn’t tell where her wants started and her mother’s ended.

“Let me ask this,” Theo went on gently, “If your mother did approve…would you entertain the idea of courting the Duke? Despite the rumors?”

“No.”

Theo’s brow perked.

“You answered too quickly,” her friend pointed out.

“Reputation or not… I do not like the way he speaks to others,” Seraphina murmured, fiddling with her fan. “If he ever spoke to me or acted toward me in the way I have seen him with others,I think I would feel trapped in a marriage with a bully. I do not want that. I want a husband who has the patience to speak kindly to me, always.”