The Strange Case of Finley Jayne (Steampunk Chronicles 0.5)(21)

“Can you teach me to do the things you can do?” Phoebe inquired.

Finley’s head snapped up. She frowned. “You don’t want to be like me.”

“Oh, I assure you I do.”

She shrugged. “I suppose I can teach you how to throw a punch, but the other stuff I can do…that’s just me.”

“Extraordinary.” Lady Morton practically sighed the word. “What’s your favorite food, Finley? I’m going to demand Cook make it for you.”

Finley grinned. They didn’t hate her. They liked her. They thought this part of her was wonderful. Wouldn’t her goody-goody half choke on this?

“I’m partial to chocolate croissants,” she replied.

Her companions chuckled, and Phoebe offered her the paper bag that held their purchase from the chocolate shop. She reached in with her clean hand and took one out.

This being extraordinary really worked up an appetite.



Lord Vincent glared at the men who sat across from him in the cab. One had blood all around his mouth and down his front, and the other held his wrist, moaning like an imbecile.

“You mean to tell me that a slip of a girl managed to incapacitate you both?”

“She weren’t no ordinary girl,” the moaner replied. “Slip or not, she weren’t natural. Snapped me wrist like a chicken bone.”

Chicken, Lord Vincent thought, sounded like the appropriate term. He took out his purse and tossed them each several coins. “Get out. I don’t want to see or hear from either of you again, and if I hear that you’ve mentioned this little task to anyone, I’ll have your guts for garters. Am I understood?”

The men nodded and fled the cab as quickly as their bulk would allow. Lord Vincent knocked on the ceiling with his cane and the carriage lurched into motion. He almost groaned. Flesh-and-blood horses were so damn slow.

He drew a deep breath and pushed it out, trying to free himself of this frustration and rage. He never used to be an angry man. Never used to be a violent man. Before Cassandra’s death he never would have dreamed of hiring ruffians to accost a young girl, but he had to know what he was up against. He hadn’t been able to believe what she’d done to his beautiful automaton horses. He’d been too relieved that she saved Phoebe’s life, but afterward, when he’d had time to really examine the damage…well, it had been an astounding revelation.

Finley Bennet was not normal. In fact, the only thing he’d ever seen able to wreak so much damage was an automaton—a large one at that. No, she was not usual, and he’d wager his entire fortune that she was not a cousin to Lady Morton and the lovely Phoebe. He’d seen the way his future mother-in-law looked at him when she thought he wouldn’t notice. She knew his intentions were not as pure as he pretended. Not that it mattered. Lord Morton had sold the girl and signed a contract. She was his, and he would marry her, whether her mother liked it or not.

And no one was going to stop him now that he was so close to having his hopes and dreams realized, especially not a freakish little girl.





CHAPTER EIGHT




Dinner with Lord Vincent was one of the most uncomfortable situations Finley ever found herself in.

First of all, she was wearing one of the gowns that Lady Morton had insisted on buying for her. It was lovely and a gorgeous shade of plum satin, but the little sleeves were snug and didn’t allow for much movement, and Phoebe had laced her into her corset so tightly she thought her lungs might come out her nose.

Secondly, there was the fact that Lord Morton was there, as well, and he was about as pompous and self-important as she could stand. He practically ignored his wife and daughter, and had the table manners of a Newfoundland dog.

Most obviously, there was Lord Vincent himself. Oh, he was all manners and decorum, but Finley caught him looking at her several times with a gaze that was anything but polite. He looked at her like she was an insect he would like to pin to a board and dissect.

“I heard you ladies were set upon by ruffians the other day,” he remarked—rather casually.

Lady Morton’s head snapped up. “Oh? Where did you hear that, pray tell?”

The earl smiled gently. “Lord Morton informed me when he called upon me this morning.”

Finley didn’t miss the flush that crept into Lady Morton’s fair cheeks. It was obvious from the way that she looked at her husband she suspected he had called on Lord Vincent for more money.

“My valet told me,” Lord Morton explained with a sniff. “Damn fine kettle when a man has to hear about his wife being accosted from the servants.”

The most caustic and bitter smile Finley had ever seen curved the lady’s lips. “I knew how you’d worry if I told you.”

A similar expression crossed her husband’s face. “You’re always so considerate, my dear.”

Good lord, these two despised one another! Finley glanced down at her plate. Aristocrats were a queer lot—marrying for money, staying with spouses they couldn’t stand, living by all manner of foolish rules.

Selling their daughters to save their own hides.

“I also heard,” Lord Vincent continued, as though the tension between Lord and Lady Morton didn’t exist, “that it was Miss Bennet who fought the bounders off.”

Finley lifted her head and met his cool gaze. “You shouldn’t believe everything you hear, my lord. I’m hardly a heroine.”