The Girl in the Clockwork Collar (Steampunk Chronicles #2)(45)

He touched the tips of his fingers to Finley’s face. Her cheek was soft and warm. Her thick eyelashes fluttered and opened, and when her gaze settled on him, she smiled.

“You’re still alive,” she whispered. The relief and joy in her voice made his battered chest tight. She had been afraid for him.

“So it seems,” he replied. “How long have you been here?”

Finley glanced away. Her sudden shyness seemed strange and out of character. “Since this afternoon.”

“You stayed here the whole time?” He was touched but surprised. “What about Dalton and Jasper?”

“They’ll wait. Neither one of them is going anywhere.”

“But Jasper—”

“Isn’t as high on my priority list as you are” came her sharp reply. “You let me worry about the Americans, all right?”

Griffin blinked. “You’re angry.”

Her gaze locked with his. In the moonlight, her eyes were eerily bright—almost like a cat’s. “You’re bloody right I’m angry. You could have been killed today. You read my head about how I go running off and all that rubbish, but you always have to be the big hero.”

She was really angry. “I had to do something. If the machine had blown up, it would have killed all of us—and a lot of other people, too.”

“I know Sam offered to smash it.”

“Emily wouldn’t let him,” he argued.

“You wouldn’t have let him do it, either, even though he would have been the best choice. You just had to be the one to save the day. What is wrong with you?”

Now he was getting angry. “Forgive me for wanting to prevent people from dying.”

“That’s not it, and you know it. Of course you wouldn’t want people to die—none of us would—but why do you always have to risk your life for other people? You daft git.”

“You’re a fine one to talk, Miss ‘I’ll risk getting beaten to death to infiltrate a gang.’”

She glared at him. “You said it was a good plan.”

Griffin glared back. “Sometimes good plans are also stupid plans.”

“You’re stupid.”

“Not as stupid as you.”

Silence fell between them as they stared each other down. Griffin wasn’t certain which of them broke first, and it didn’t matter. It was only a matter of seconds before they were both laughing at their childishness. Every chuckle was like a kick to the chest, but he couldn’t seem to stop. Finally they both quieted.

Finley wiped at her eyes. “We’re a bloody fine pair, aren’t we?”

“We are.” And he meant it—more than he would ever admit. “I’m sorry I scared you.”

She opened her mouth and hesitated. For a moment, he thought she might deny it. “You should be. I’m sorry for being such a cow about it.”

He grinned. “You should be.”

A brief smiled curved her lips but faded when she took his hand—the unbandaged one—in her own. “Promise me you’ll be careful from now on. We can’t lose you.”

Griffin noticed that she said we rather than I. There was something in her expression that made him ask, “What aren’t you telling me?”

She shook her head, but he pressed forward. “Finley, tell me.”

“Emily made me promise not to tell you until she was certain you were better.”

“I am better, and Emily’s not here. Tell me.”

Finley glanced down at his chest, which Griffin then remembered was naked. Embarrassed, he pulled the blankets up. She raised her gaze, and though it was too dark to tell, he was certain she was blushing.

“Emily showed me the paper from the ghost machine.”

The ghost machine? “The Aetheric transference device? You mean the writing actually made sense? I assumed it was nothing more than scribbles.”

She laughed—but it was humorless. “No, it wrote coherently, if not cryptically.”

“So tell me. What did it write?”

Her gaze locked with his, and she gripped his fingers tightly with her own. “It said, ‘I’m coming for you, Griffin King.’”





Chapter 10


Finley didn’t want to leave Griffin the following morning, especially not after Emily showed her what the ghost machine had written. There could be no doubt that it was a threat against Griffin. Except he was the only one of them who knew anything about the Aether, and all he could tell them was that the energy flowing around Tesla’s device had been dark and that it had somehow managed to injure him. He had no idea what it meant, or how such a thing had come about. One thing was for certain—nothing like this had ever happened to him before.

How was she supposed to fight something she couldn’t see or even touch?

More to the point, how was she to help him when she had to return to play Dalton’s lackey?

She was in a fine and terrible mood when she walked into the foyer of Dalton’s house wearing the same garments she had been in when she left. The heels of her boots clicked on the polished floor as she stomped toward the stairs. She needed a bath and a change of clothes and something to hit.

“Where the sweet hell have you been?” Dalton’s voice echoed in the open hall.