The Girl in the Clockwork Collar (Steampunk Chronicles #2)(24)

Griffin unbuckled the belt and let himself slip to the terrace below—the rim of the lit torch. It was so bright it was almost blinding, intensifying the growing ache behind his eyes. He didn’t know why Emily hadn’t taken him to the water below. Perhaps she thought he might drown. He was only glad to be so far away from people.

He waited until the sound of the propeller faded away— Emily knew to get as far away as she could—before placing his hand on the base of the light that made the torch appear to burn. All of his focus went into that torch and its bulb.

And then he let go of all the energy inside him. The release made him throw back his head and scream. For a second, he would have sworn that he saw light come out of his own mouth as he channeled everything into the torch and outward. It always flowed outward, unable to be contained.

Then there was a huge flash, and everything went black.

The next morning, Finley opened her eyes after a fitful night. She’d gotten—at best—four hours sleep. The rest of the time had been spent thinking of Griffin, the awful things they’d said to each other, the fact that she had pushed him so far his power flared.

She shouldn’t have mocked him. She hadn’t meant to, though she wasn’t quite certain what it was she had meant to do.

Looking back at the weeks she’d spent with her new friends, there had been several shameful times when she had acted alone. She had snuck off to visit Jack Dandy—which led to a strange, flirtatious friendship. One night, she disappeared and had no recollection of where she had been. Lord Felix, the son of her former employer, died that night. Even she couldn’t say with certainty that she hadn’t killed him. Fortunately, her name had been cleared. Later, she chased after Sam without alerting anyone else, and the two of them had ended up in a battle with an automaton, which could have killed them both.

Worse, she had contrived to join last night’s fights to spite Griffin. To prove to him she could do it. And why? Just because he made her angry and happy and nervous, all at the same time. Never mind that her plan had worked, she should have shared it with the entire group, instead of just Emily. She had put the other girl at risk. She had put them both at risk.

Before, she could have blamed this sort of behavior on her darker half, but that was no longer the case. Griffin had helped her begin to unite her two sides, and now she was no longer one or the other, but both. Now it was up to her to decide what sort of person she wanted to be.

She didn’t want to go back to being alone, especially now that she had found friends. Real friends. Family. Especially Griffin. He had done so much for her, and she’d repaid him by being snide and mocking.

But she hadn’t wanted him to see that he was the one thing that frightened her. When she’d first met Griffin, he had told her that he would give her his trust, and in return, he would settle for nothing less than hers. She had been treated poorly by fellows of his station before, and part of her mind couldn’t let go of that wariness; it was the only protection her heart had.

Because if there was one person in all the world capable of breaking her heart, it was Griffin. Perhaps that was why she ran to Jack whenever she felt cagey. Jack didn’t have expectations. Jack would eventually let her down, while she’d be the one to do that to Griffin—if she hadn’t already.

This was ridiculous. She threw back the covers and slipped out of her incredibly comfortable bed. She could laze about all day wondering and thinking, but thinking always seemed to get her into trouble. Although, not thinking got her into trouble, too.

Who was she trying to kid? Trouble seemed to find her, no matter what. If trouble was going to come calling, she might as well be clean.

She bathed and dressed in pale pink knee-length trousers with a frill at the bottom, white shirt and her pink-and-blackstriped corset. She laced heavy black boots up to the hem of her trousers and wrapped the ends of the laces around each boot once before tying them. Then she brushed her hair and twisted it up onto the back of her head, securing it with two chopsticks.

The bruises on her face had faded to almost nothing overnight. Her ribs were stiff, but she could draw a deep breath without them hurting. A normal girl would be so stiff and sore, she would barely be able to move about. Then again, if she was a “normal” girl, she wouldn’t have been in the ring in the first place. This was one of those times that being a freak came in handy.

Her stomach fluttered as she left her room. Odd how she felt so anxious going to meet her friends, when Dalton hadn’t inspired half so much fuss. Last night, she’d felt triumphant, but now she felt a little … silly and self-conscious.

She stopped to knock at Emily’s door. No answer. They must have gone downstairs already. Finley said hello to the boy operating the lift and spent the rest of the trip wondering if the little box could move any slower. Seriously, she could have jumped over the railing in the stairwell and been there by now.

They were all gathered around the dining room table and looked up at her entrance when she walked in. Sam only glanced at her for a split second before turning his attention back to the mountain of food piled on his plate. Surely eating that many scrambled eggs couldn’t be healthy for a body.

“Morning, Finley,” he mumbled.

“Good morning, everyone,” she replied and winced at the cheer in her voice. Emily smiled at her from her seat beside Sam, but Finley didn’t miss the glance her friend shot in Griffin’s direction.