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with a hoe on his shoulder.
    She turned back into the room, disturbed in some way by that ordinary sight. Servants. Her host had advised that she not be seen by the servants, and she agreed. It hadn’t seemed so terrible to go to Stokeley Manor and be seen there, especially as Lord Crofton had promised that she could wear a mask. To be seen here, however, in this ordinary house by ordinary servants, struck her as shocking.
    She would stay in her room. But then she remembered that St. Raven had promised to bring breakfast himself.
    She glanced in the mirror and yelped. Her rumpled calf-length shift was no cover at all, and with her hair all over the place, she looked like a blowsy slut! She hunted through her hair, pulling out stray pins, then tried to use her fingers to comb it into some sort of order. Hopeless. She checked the drawers in the dressing table, but there was no brush or comb.
    Somewhere in the house a clock started to chime. She froze, counting. Two. Not two o’clock, surely, so half past something.
    Oh, what did it matter? She needed to be
dressed
!
    The key. She dashed over and turned the key in the lock. Now, at least, he couldn’t walk in on her before she was decent.
    Walk in on…
    The incident last night crashed back on her, so she sagged against the door. The sight of his body, the look in his eyes, the way he’d kissed her…
    The way she’d reacted!
    She sucked in a breath and blew it out again. It was as if she’d wandered into another world. Not long ago she’d woken with no greater problem than what gown to wear for morning visits, and whether to attend a fashionable ball that was bound to be a boring crush. Back in that world
shocking
meant that a man had pressed too close in a dance or tried to inveigle her apart for a mild kiss.
    She pushed away from the door, concentrating on clothing. She’d left her silk dress in a puddle on the floor, and when she picked it up it was as creased and crumpled as she feared. She shook it out and spread it on the bed, but she knew that nothing short of an iron would restore it.
    And it was the only dress she had here. That, her shift, her turban, and her corset were her sole possessions. When had she lost her shawl? It had been Norwich silk and very expensive, but that wasn’t her main concern right now—it would have been another decent layer. Her stockings and garters had been sliced, and heaven knew what had happened to her shoes.
    She sat beside her poor sad dress, feeling poor and sad herself, frightened in a way she hadn’t been before. She’d never thought that clothes could be so important to courage, but she longed to be decently covered, even in fustian.
    A servant’s clothes?
    But this was a house of men.
    One thing was sure, at this moment she was a prisoner here. Even if she decided to break her parole, she couldn’t set off to rejoin Crofton in her bare feet and shift.
    She stiffened her spine and stood up. She’d do what she could, and the first thing was to make herself as decent as possible before the duke intruded.
    As a start, she drew back the curtains, letting bright summer light lift the gloom. Then she set to getting dressed. She picked up her corset from the floor. Beneath, she found her earrings and Crofton’s money. Money would be useful. She’d tuck it back down behind her corset in a moment.
    But then she realized that she could no more tie the laces than she’d been able to untie them. She tossed it on the bed, refusing to cry. She doubtless couldn’t fasten the back of her dress, either, but if she put it on, it would be something.
    The robe! The robe he’d brought for her. Where was it?
    Struck by his thoughtfulness, she searched and found that it had slid off the far side of the bed in the night. She put it on, the heavy silk cold against her skin for a moment, that smell of sandalwood rising to torment her. She tried to gather it around her, but the sleeves were far too long.
    With a slight laugh, she set to