AN: This is a bit of a long chapter, but I didn't think it made sense to break the day into multiple chapters. Also, someone in the reviews asked if Anna had been raped by Green in this AU, and the answer is no - I don't have the skills to juggle both plots, so assume that did not happen.

"You're perfectly in time, your lordship," she heard Carson say. "It's still several hours before any guests will arrive."

Cora was standing on the main staircase, looking down into the entryway as Carson took Robert's coat. Here was the moment she had dreaded all morning. He was home, and she had might as well face him now.

She had stiffened overnight and had awakened sore in every bone. The fractured rib that Isobel had diagnosed that morning made her feel as though a knife were stabbing into her side with every breath she took, and her neck muscles screamed at her to lay her head down. She was trying not to turn her head, but her neck throbbed whether she moved it or not.

But of more immediate concern was the bruise that had appeared across her cheek. They had erupted all over her body, but she knew she could not hide the one on her face. Baxter had gasped when she'd seen it at breakfast and brought her a small hand mirror. "He did hit me," Cora had said softly as she'd examined it, remembering the first blow after pulling back from his kiss.

"Of course he did," her maid said with such bitterness that Cora half-expected her to spit on the ground. "The animal."

They'd agreed she would tell Robert she'd fallen, which she thought would excuse her sprained wrist and her bruises. "And your neck, ma'am?" Baxter had asked.

She'd hesitated. She did not think she could blame the strained muscles that Isobel had told her would likely ache for weeks on a simple fall. "I don't think he'll notice," she said eventually. He had not been particularly attentive lately.

"Cora!" Robert called out to her, glancing up. "I hope—" And then his eyes fell on her cheek. "Good heavens, what's happened to you?"

"It's nothing. I fell last night." She started slowly down the steps, her rib protesting the movement, but he met her halfway. "It was very silly—I just tripped on the rug in my room."

"Are you all right?" he asked, kissing her other cheek in greeting. She tried not to pull away. Nothing about his gentleness reminded her of the way Bricker had touched her, but she felt so very filthy, and as irrational as she knew it was, she could not help but think that Robert would somehow smell him on her.

He raised his hand to lightly touch her bruise. "It looks quite painful."

"Really, it isn't." She tried to arrange her face so that he could not see the pain she felt at tilting her neck to look up at him. She rested her gaze around the area of his nose—if she made eye contact with him, she was afraid he would see through to her soul.

He reached for her hands then, and his eyes fell to the bandage. "Oh—"

"Same fall." Cora forced herself to smile. "But I'm quite all right."

"Have you seen Clarkson?"

She opened her mouth to lie but then thought better of it. Suppose he mentioned it to the doctor in passing? "No, I didn't think it was worth calling the doctor. But Cousin Isobel was here this morning, and she's seen me. Everything is fine." She wanted so badly to get away from him, away from this charade, away from those eyes that she was so afraid to meet. "But please excuse me. I have quite a bit to do before the party." She pulled her hands back, turned away, and retreated up the steps.

But she could feel his eyes follow her.

"You're not looking too clever today, Miss Baxter," Mr. Molesley said when she joined him in the boot room that afternoon. Lady Grantham's dress from the night before was quite ruined, she'd decided, but her shoes were nothing more than muddy. That, at least, was fixable—the only thing that was fixable.

"I had a bit of a long night," she said vaguely as she set the shoes on the table.

"Is everything all right?"

"Yes," she lied. "Her ladyship was…unwell. She had fallen."

"Yes, I saw her face at luncheon." That was right. Of course the other staff would see her and notice. "She looked quite bruised."

"She fell," Baxter repeated, wanting the story spread securely amongst her colleagues.

"And are you all right, Miss Baxter?"

"I'm just tired." She was, but that was far from the source of her downcast eyes and demeanor. She could not shake the memory of the haunted, frightened look in Lady Grantham's eyes or the purple bruises that had spread across her body, nor could she stop the visions of the attack that crashed across her imagination.

"Take a rest," he said as he finished the men's shoes he was polishing. "She can hardly be upset if she's kept you up half the night."

"Thank you…Mr. Molesley?" He had stood to go, but he halted at her voice.

What was she thinking, asking him this? But the words poured out of her. "Mr. Molesley, if you knew a man was capable of doing great wrong, but you were afraid to say so—and you didn't think he would do anything—but then he…hurt someone, hurt them grievously, and it was someone who'd been very kind to you, someone you cared for…" She paused, taking in the confusion on his face. "Do you…do you think it would be your fault?"

He sat back down on the stool. "Well, Miss Baxter, that all seems very hypothetical."

"I'm just being silly."

"No, you're not. It was a serious question."

She could feel him studying her, but she refused to look at him.

"I don't see how whatever happened would be the fault of the person who didn't speak up. It's the fault of the man who committed the crime."

She bit her lip. "But if it could have been prevented—"

"You said you didn't think this person would harm anyone."

"No."

"And if you'd said otherwise, would you have been believed? Would you really have prevented anything?"

Baxter said nothing. It was so hard to imagine having told Lady Grantham the truth that she simply could not envision what would have happened if she had.

"Well, there's your answer then," he said, as though this were a casual conversation about the dinner menu, and she forced herself to nod as he left.

"The Lady Beaumont and the Lord Howard of Glossop," Carson said as the next couple entered the room. Cora awkwardly offered them both her left hand instead of her right, as she had been doing all afternoon. This always earned her an odd look, but she was thankful for the gloves that hid not only the bandage on her right wrist, but also the bruises up and down her arms.

But could there be anything worse to do today than a receiving line? She felt as though each party guest were staring her down, taking in every inch of her body, and she knew she must be bright red with embarrassment. Their eyes seemed to linger on her bruised cheek, and she could not convince herself that last night's events were invisible to others' eyes.

"I'd forgotten his father had died," said Robert, conversationally.

"Who? Whose father?" She tried to look at him out of the corner of her eye without having to turn her neck.

"Lord Howard's," he said, giving her a strange look.

Of course. Lord Howard of Glossop. The man who had just passed by. His father had died. Which was why he had the title now.

She could not think of one word to say in response.

"The Earl and Countess of Wooter." Two more awkward handshakes. She dropped her eyes again, ashamed that they both looked at her. If only these people would all stop looking…

"Cora, are you all right?" Robert asked softly as the Wooters moved on.

"All right?" she repeated, and her voice sounded unnaturally high even to her own ears.

"Yes, your face is flushed."

"I'm a bit warm," she said. Nothing could have been further from the truth. Bricker's touch had left her freezing from the inside out.

"Mrs. Reginald Crawley and the Lord Merton."

"Cousin Cora," Isobel said warmly, with a light touch on her arm. Isobel did not lean in to kiss her as usual, and Cora was grateful; Isobel was a bit shorter than her, and she would have had to bend her neck slightly to reciprocate. She hoped Robert did not think this odd.

Isobel's eyes lingered far longer than anyone else's had, but Cora found she did not mind this. Her gaze was warm and kind, and Cora had been truly thankful for her presence that morning. She had thought it would be strange to see Isobel again, especially in evening dress, after the state she'd been seen in earlier, but it was more of a comfort than not. She took solace in the thought that it was not only her maid who knew, that she had been able to confide in a member of the family. Dear, sweet Baxter, she thought. She had been touched at the tears that had gathered in her maid's eyes as Isobel had examined her injuries.

"How are you?" Isobel said at last. Something in her voice conveyed that it was a far deeper question than it seemed, but they both knew there could be no real answer in the presence of both Robert and Lord Merton.

"I'm quite well, Cousin Isobel. I'm quite well."

Isobel gave her a soft, sad smile. "I'll come talk with you later," she said, squeezing the offered left hand.

"Cora, you shouldn't be down here," Isobel said later, after drawing Cora to a couch on the edge of the party. "I thought you'd be upstairs resting."

"That would hardly fit with my claims to Robert that I only fell last night and am quite all right today."

"Oh Cora, you won't keep that up, will you? You can't possibly—"

"You said he wouldn't be able to tell! You said—nothing was wrong." She averted her eyes from Isobel, unable to look at her relative as she remembered the intimacy of the morning's exam.

"I didn't mean that he'd be able to tell…that way. But you can't keep this from Robert, and you shouldn't keep it from him. More important, I've been thinking…you simply mustn't let this go. This man—he must be brought to justice—"

"I don't know who he is!"

"Yes, but if you would go to the police and make a report, you don't know what they could and couldn't find. There could be other women who have been attacked, and the fact that he was near Downton last night could be the missing piece of the puzzle. Don't you want him stopped?"

"Stopped?" What a very odd question. He was finished with her now. She had wanted him to stop last night.

"Yes, before he hurts anyone else. Reporting him would be the right thing to do."

She should not have been surprised, she knew. This was typical of Isobel—a well-meaning urge to do the right thing, with no understanding of the consequences for a family placed as theirs was.

"I can't," Cora said, and she despised the pleading she heard in her voice. "It's too…shameful."

"Cora, nothing about what happened to you is shameful."

"Please, Cousin Isobel. I can't. I can't have anyone know. Please don't ask me about this again." And she stood, wincing at the pain in her side. She only wanted, as she had with Robert that morning, to get away.

Cora was seated at her dressing table, her face in her hands, Baxter rubbing her neck, as she tried to empty her mind of memories of last night. For the moment, her thoughts were a welcome blank as she concentrated on nothing beyond the soothing pressure on her aching muscles.

But at the noise of the doorknob turning they both froze, and Baxter dropped her hands.

"Cora?" Robert stepped into the room in his dressing gown. "Have you just now rung for Baxter?"

It had been quite a few minutes ago that they had retired to their rooms, after an evening of near-silence from her and concerned glances from Robert. There had been, she realized, plenty of time for him to have been undressed. She would have been in her dressing gown as well by now, but Baxter had observed her pained movements and sweetly offered to rub her neck, and she had been hurting too badly to refuse.

Slowly, she turned her body to face him, careful to twist neither her ribcage nor her neck. "I…"

"It's my fault, my lord," Baxter interrupted. "I was distracted downstairs, and it took me a bit to come up."

"Quite all right," he said, taking a seat in a chair. "There's no hurry."

Cora froze. Was he going to stay while she changed? She could no more let her maid undress her in front of her husband than in front of the whole household. Not now. Not after last night. She suppressed a shudder at the thought of Robert's eyes falling on any part of her body, and then she felt deep shame at her reluctance. He had every right to her body…and now she had ruined herself for him.

What was worse was that he would certainly want to do more than look. He'd been away for only one night, but even with his recent disinterest in her, even one night apart was still an occasion for an intimate reunion between them. But the thought of having another man—even Robert—touch her as Bricker had made her breathing grow shaky as she fought back her panic. It felt deceitful, too—surely Robert could never desire her if he knew the truth.

"Cora, are you all right?" he asked, and her cheeks burned at the mix of concern and confusion on his face.

"I–I'm not sure I am. I don't think I'm quite well. I—perhaps you should sleep in your dressing room? I'll keep you up all night in here."

"Should I send for Dr. Clarkson? You're quite pale…"

"No!" He gave her an odd look. "I mean, I'm sure I'll be all right," she amended. "But please, I'll sleep easier alone." She fought to keep the begging out of her voice.

"If you're sure." He stood, then bent to kiss her cheek, and she suppressed another shudder. "Good night, darling."

She let out the breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding as the door shut behind him. Suddenly, part of her wanted to call him back, wanted to feel his strong arms around her, protecting her.

"Do you want me to get you ready for bed yourself, my lady?" Baxter's soft voice asked. "Or would you rather I rubbed your neck a bit longer? Was it helping?"

"Just a few more minutes, please," she said, closing her eyes again. "It does help, and you're an angel." She did not wish to keep her maid up much longer after last night, but her neck was so very sore and Baxter's hands had felt so very good. Nor was she in any hurry to fall asleep herself, fearing she would see Bricker's face again in her nightmares.

She felt her tears prick her eyes again as Baxter resumed the massage, and she held back a sob.

"Shh," she heard her maid say soothingly. "You'll be all right, my lady. You'll be quite all right."

Would she? She simply could not imagine that anything would be all right, ever again.