Morning came gray and reluctant, and Elaine woke on the floor where she had left herself, stiff in every joint, her cheek printed with the seam of the coverlet she had slid down against. For one blank moment she did not remember. Then she turned her head and saw the ruined dress where it had fallen across the chair, pale silk gone the color of ash in the dawn, one torn seam gaping, and it all came back with the light.
She got up slowly. Her body had opinions about the floor.
She could not leave the dress like that, torn and dropped, a confession lying in the middle of the room for anyone the woman in gray sent. She picked it up. The tear ran a hand's length along the spine where she had wrenched it, threads standing up stiff, and the single button she had popped was gone somewhere under
