“The sleeping beauty in the fairy tale was awakened by the kiss of her prince. Finley woke up to the over-whelming and oh-so-not-delightful smell of vinegar."Bloody hell!" She cried, lurching upright.”

“Griffin!” Finley cried. She moved to attack the automaton, but Sam stopped her. “Wait. Griff’s got a plan.”“How do you know?” she demanded.Sam and Jasper both looked at her with bemused expressions. “Griff’s always got a plan,” Jasper informed her, as though it was absolute fact.”

“And then Finley seized the spindly metal arm attached to her throat. A normal human would have no hope against such strength, but Finley was not normal. She snapped the arm at the elbow joint and then ripped the offending hand from her neck.Holding the arm by the hand and wrist, she used it to beat the automaton....”

“Dandy?" Sam was full-on scowling now. "What the hell does that scoundrel want?"Finley returned his dark expression with one of her own. "You shouldn't use words you can't spell, mutton head.”

“As they walked, the subtle lamplight of a dirigible washed over them. Finley glanced up, watching the light grow closer, slowly descending from the sky in a whirl of propellers as the ship made its way into the London air dock just a few miles away. How amazing it must be to float so high, to travel so quickly.Dandy followed her gaze, but they didn’t stop walking. “I was up in one of them flyers once,” he told her. “I climbed over the rail and hung on to one of the ropes. Freeing it was. I almost let go.”She whipped her head around to gape at him. “The fall would kill you.”He smiled ever so slightly. “Not afore I flew. Worse ways to go.”

“I won't keep you from your beauty rest for long, Jack," Finley shot back as she strode into the drawing room. (...)"I should 'ope not, luv. It takes a lot of rest to be this gorgeous.”

“It would take little effort for her to hurt him right now. She could hurt him badly.But Griffin King could hurt her, as well, and he hadn’t. Instead of using force or violence against her, he used patience and understanding. She had no defense against that.When he let her go, she was shaking. Tears filled her eyes as she turned to her mother who stood staring at her in horror.“My sweet little girl,” her mother whispered. “I didn’t know. I would never…” Her words faded into a choked sob. Finley crossed the short distance between them on quivering legs and wrapped her arms around the shorter woman. She didn’t care if Griffin or his nasty aunt saw her tears. If anything was worth crying over, the discovery that her father had made her a monster had to be one.”