Move it, she thought, but she couldn’t bring herself to invite this.
“Lady Marianne?” he prompted gruffly.
“Sorry.” She scooped her hair and swept it over her shoulder.
“There are no buttons,” he said.
“Oh—right. Well, they are hooks, I believe? You’ll take up the fabric on both sides of the seam and work it together until each hook releases. There are a great many of them unfortunately. The neck on this dress is rather high. But you need only do the top half. This will loosen the bodice, and I can spin the dress and manage the rest.”
These instructions were a miracle of composure. Her ability to concentrate had drained like the water in the grate—and good riddance. She didn’t want to think, she wanted only to feel.
He puffed out a breath like a man bracing to leap over a ravine. He brought his hands to the back of her neck, just below her hair. Ryan’s heart stopped. She grabbed handfuls of her wet skirts in both hands. Her whole life, she’d been dressed and undressed by other people; fussy maids, impatient sisters, her brisk, efficient mother. The feel of his large hands was as different from these as climbing a ladder was from falling to the ground. Now Ryan fell. Every nudge and jab reminded her that he was a man and his work was with saddles and rope, not ladies’ dresses. He fumbled with the first hook, but the second and third came easily. He jostled her as he worked, listing her this way and that, holding her steady with his own body, pressing his leg against her for leverage. Ryan could feel his breath on the back of her neck. By degrees, she felt the loosening bodice droop—
“What’s this?” he said suddenly, his hands going still.
“I beg your pardon?”
His voice was alarmed, sharp. The gruffness was gone. He sounded... angry.
“You’ve an abrasion on your neck,” he said. He retracted his hands and her bodice sagged. He stepped away. A chill rose up her spine.
“The skin is broken on your neck,” he said. “It looks as if you’ve been—but has someonegarroted you, Lady Marianne?”
Ryan pressed the loosened bodice to her chest, holding it in place. “An abrasion?” she repeated, trying to comprehend. Her brain was swimming through the mist and the tingles and the closeness. She put a hand to her neck and—
—and remembered.How could she have forgotten?
“Oh,” she said. She turned to him, her cheeks burning. “Forgive me. It... it must look very gruesome indeed.”
“What’shappenedto your neck?”
She raised her eyes to his. His expression was volatile.
Ryan felt the sting of sudden tears.Hewas angry?Him?He’d brought her here, he’d lied about his identity, he’d bathed her—touched her—and now he was angry with her?
Sheshould feel the volatility. She’d not planned to tell him about the marks on her neck—or the dog bite, for that matter. She’d planned to request his help plainly, calmly, with due gratitude and self-respect. It was how she preferred to be asked for help.
“Lady Marianne,” he repeated, “what’s been done to your neck?”
“I... lost a gold chain.”
“Lost ithow?”
“It was a simple gold chain with a locket given to me by my late mother. It was... torn from me.”
“Torn?”
“Well, snapped off, I should say. It was a fine piece, in the end, because it refused to give without considerable effort. It took five or six firm yanks. The chain cut my skin.” She exhaled. “It’s healing. Like the wound on my leg, it’s healing—Iwillheal.”
“Maurice?” Prince Gabriel hissed.
She nodded, not taking her eyes from his.
“Why? Why would he tear jewelry from the body of... of his betrothed?”
“Do not sayI am his betrothed,” she corrected, blinking back tears. “If I must be betrothed, it isto you.”
Gabriel squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head, a convict refusing his sentence. He took two steps back.
