Scarlet Devices by Delphine Dryden Read Free Book Online Page B

each make it to the checkpoints within a reasonable range of one another. Until then, you ought to consider forming an alliance with Matthew. Help him if he needs it, let him help you. The others have already started making friends, aligning themselves together. Most of them know one another from previous races. This is an endurance test and they know that. They’ll be pacing themselves, enjoying the event and sizing things up, not cutting throats right from the start.”
    Eliza could see he was right. Even as Dexter had spoken, the French consortium driver had wandered over to the vehicle of another Englishman, a man of exceedingly short stature whose virulent green steam car had been famously custom-modified to allow him to drive it. They were chatting like old friends while the shorter man patted the glossy enamel of his car’s fender as though stroking a beloved pet. The consortium driver was opening a bottle of wine, which he apparently meant to share.
    She was startled, when the diminutive Englishman looked her way, at the appealing brilliance of his sudden grin. She allowed herself a tentative smile back before averting her eyes, trying to look demure and unassuming. Easy to underestimate. Eliza suspected he banked on that quality himself.
    â€œI suppose you’re right. I don’t know why I should trust Matthew, though, even for only part of the race. Not if he wants to win just as badly as I do.”
    â€œI never said anything about trust. You think Van der Grouten trusts the Watchmaker?” Dexter nodded toward the gruff German competitor, who was sitting in stony silence listening to the Watchmaker’s chatter. The Watchmaker’s spider-like vehicle, a gleaming brass contraption of gears and mysterious controls atop several pairs of articulated legs, loomed above the two men, and indeed above the other steam cars. Its inventor and driver, a famously eccentric maker of every type of clockwork
except
watches, would obviously have the advantage of height. But Eliza privately thought the unconventional vehicle looked unlikely to make it out of New York before falling apart.
    â€œI think Van der Grouten knows the Watchmaker is insane,” Eliza replied. “And I’ve never understood why he calls himself the Watchmaker.”
    â€œNobody knows.”
    They observed the unlikely companions a moment longer. Then Dexter tossed the wrench into the air, catching it neatly and placing it in the proper slot in the enormous tool kit he’d wheeled over to the steam car’s side. “Time to brave the press and win through to the hotel. You’ll need a proper night’s sleep before you set out.”
    Eliza didn’t think she’d sleep a wink, but she shrugged off her coverall and obligingly followed Dexter from the hangar, passing Matthew’s car along the way. He looked up as they walked by, and she caught a glimpse of something on his face that stopped her in her tracks. Concern, tension . . . and something that strongly resembled yearning. Eliza turned toward him for a moment, not sure what she planned to say, then covered her confusion by pulling her broad-brimmed hat on as if she’d meant to stop for that purpose all along. The moment flitted by, she waved with her fingertips and received a solemn nod from Matthew in return, then the open door loomed before them and she braced herself for the onslaught.
    Â â€¢Â â€¢Â â€¢Â 
    W HEN E LIZA TURNED toward him, the sun streaming into the hangar backlit her for a moment, transforming her slender figure into a silhouette of elegant curves. Her hair, which had seemed so securely battened down into its tidy chignon, revealed a nimbus of stray wisps that glowed a hot auburn in the afternoon light.
    Then the clouds shifted, the illusion faded, and it was once again Eliza standing before his sun-dazzled eyes. She blinked at him, looking as though she was going to speak, then shook her head and