The Girl in the Steel Corset - By Kady Cross Page 0,36
the other. He just had to figure out how to make Finley whole again.
He poured another cup of coffee—his third since sitting down—and rose from his desk. He wanted to research Thomas Sheppard on the Aether engine, as well, but before that he wanted to check in on Finley. He needed to go down into Emily’s laboratory and talk to her about the defective automatons—and about Sam, who was notably absent once again.
He also wanted to contact an acquaintance of his who ran in a different circle than he did. Jasper Renn was an American he’d met late last year. In fact, the cowboy had saved him from having his head coshed in by a band of ruffians intent on robbing a fancy toff. If not for Jasper, Griffin would have been forced to use his abilities in public, and that wouldn’t have been a good thing. Afterward, Griffin had brought Jasper back to the house for a drink and a little of Emily’s medical attention for his wounds. Since then, the two of them enjoyed a mutually beneficial friendship—helping each other out of trouble and occasionally attending a mech-boxing match together.
Jasper spent a lot of time in the gaming hells and clubs around Covent Garden and other east-end establishments. If there was talk about these automatons and their maker on the street, then he would know of it.
Griffin had to get to the bottom of these automaton attacks. He couldn’t ignore them just because Finley Jayne posed such an intriguing problem in such a pretty package.
And she was pretty—even when off her rocker. In that respect, she was every bit as dangerous as Aunt Cordelia seemed to think.
It was a good thing, then, that he enjoyed a little danger now and again.
“You look like a man in need of a drink.”
Sam looked up from his empty tankard. Leon, his friend with the mechanical hand, stood beside his table. “If I have another, I’m likely to fall asleep in a puddle of drool on this table.”
“Would that be such a bad thing?” Leon asked in his melodic accent—Italian, he’d said he was—as he sat down.
Sam smiled. “It’s a dirty table.”
His companion chuckled. “This is the second time I’ve found you here, my friend. You’re obviously troubled. Perhaps I can help.”
It was on the tip of Sam’s tongue to declare that an impossibility—that no one could possibly help him—but then his gaze fell upon Leon’s etched, metal hand.
“Do you ever regret that?”
Leon, who had at this point raised his other hand to signal for a waitress, glanced at the metallic appendage. “What, this? No. It’s not quite as good as the real thing, but you would be surprised at just how much I am able to do because of this marvel of modern science.”
Sam almost snorted, but didn’t. “You don’t mind being part machine then?”
The older man frowned—just as two tankards of ale were set on the table between them by a round-faced, ginger-haired girl. “Of course not. Does it bother you? I can wear a glove.”
“No.” Sam shook his head. Making the man wear a glove just because he couldn’t stand himself seemed stupid. “Don’t do that. It doesn’t bother me.”
Leon smiled. “You are just curious, yes? I get a lot of that. People wanting to know how I came about to have it. You have yet to ask me.”
Sam shrugged. “None of my business. I figure you’ll tell me if you want me to know.”
His companion lifted his tankard to his mouth. His dark eyes shone with something that looked like amusement. “It was an accident. I was working on a burrower automaton and my hand got caught in the gears.”
“A burrower?” Sam’s mouth went dry as he fought back memories of his own experience with a large machine. Diggers were larger as they dug into the earth rather than drilling into it as burrowers did. Still, a burrower could do a lot of damage to a man. “That’s awful.”
Leon inclined his head. “It was, but I survived. Now, I’m more careful when I work on any machine, automaton or no.”
“You still work with them? Aren’t…aren’t you afraid?”
“I was, for a bit, but the automaton did not hurt me on purpose. It was my fault, not the machine’s. I wasn’t as careful as I should have been.”
Sam lifted his tankard to his lips. He was starting to sober up. “Kind of a slap in the face, though, them giving you a metal hand.” He couldn’t help but think of