What Thea Says

The fitting room at Bellamy & Vane had mirrors on three walls, which Hattie had learned within ten minutes was less about vanity than logistics: a seamstress on her knees with a mouthful of pins needed to see a hem from every angle at once, and a bride needed to see herself becoming a wife from enough angles that no single one of them could lie to her.

“Sit,” Thea said, from the little platform, not turning her head, because turning it this precisely pinned was apparently not permitted. “You can read me the second verse while Marguerite decides whether my ribs are the wrong shape for this bodice.”

“Your ribs are an excellent shape. The bodice is the one making unreasonable demands.” Marguerite, mouth full of pins, made a sound that might have been agreement or might have been a request for silence.

Hattie took the single velvet chair…