" If it were up to me, I would have waited a year or more to even think about any planning. I wish I could postpone the wedding indefinitely. I just don’t feel ready. Sometimes I wish…”
Cass hesitated. She decided that Signor Sesti, as a tailor for both nobles and wealthy courtesans, was no stranger to gossip. Chances were that nothing she could say would make the old man’s stoic face so much as twitch.
“What?” Mada prompted her.
“I wish I were a man,” Cass burst out. “Or a courtesan, even. At least then I’d have some control over my own life.”
“A courtesan?” Mada’s voice sharpened to a screech. “You must be joking. They’re no better than common whores. Today I passed the Rialto Bridge only to see some courtesan’s stays dangling from a mooring post. I can only imagine how they got there.”
Cass turned bright red. She had assumed her stays had ended up in the canal, not looped around a post for the whole world to see. "

― Fiona Paul , Venom (Secrets of the Eternal Rose, #1)