If she thought about it, she wouldn’t go through with it. She strode to Toby’s table, where he watched her with a puzzled expression, and she plopped the glasses down in front of him.
He put out one finger and touched the gold frames. “What’s this?” he asked.
“Well, Master Toby, it should be quite obvious that they are the specs that you shoved into my pocket at some point.”
“It’s Toby-” he began, but she interrupted him.
“If anyone found those in my pocket, I’d be thrown out of the house quicker than a cat on a greased tin slide, and that’s the truth. So thank you very much for the present, but I cannot accept it.”
Lizzie lifted her chin, turned around, and marched to the doorway. There she realized she just couldn’t move any further. Her legs would not carry her one more step. This must be how Toby feels all the time, she thought, when he is unable to leave these rooms.
Her vision, fuzzy as usual, blurred even further. “Master Toby?” she said in a small voice.
“Well?” he said.
“Could I … that is, would you allow me the favor of climbing onto the slates one day to look through your spectacles at the gardens? Just once?” She swallowed and twisted her hands in her pockets.
There was a sudden movement behind her. “Lizzie,” he said, in a very low voice. She turned back to him and found to her horror that she could see his face perfectly clearly. In fact, he was right in front of her. Her eyes opened, her mouth parted to protest, but his firm, serious lips were already on hers.
For one, heady, whirling moment her heart thudded like an express train. She didn
’t mean to move; she meant to stay motionless, but by itself her hand stretched out to feel his arm. She felt his slim, strong muscles under the crisp cotton sleeve she had brought upstairs to him a few days earlier. His shirt trembled under the pressure of her fingers.
“It’s just as I thought. You are making just as big a fool of yourself as you say I am.” Ninna’s words echoed in her mind, and she gasped again and stepped away from Toby.
He released his hold on her waist and gave her a crooked smile. “I apologize,” he said. “I rather forgot myself for a moment.”
She gulped. Had she forgotten how to speak? Her tasks came to mind – the list of endless, pressing chores. At that thought she was actually able to speak. “Aye,” she replied. “Oh, I had better collect your doings, and the slops.”
That made him laugh. “Shakespeare himself couldn’t put it any better than that!” She laughed too, but she sobered when he asked her, “Well, will you go onto the slates with me for a bit? With these glasses?” He dangled them from one earpiece.
“I really must go and get my fires done, not to mention the sweeping, and the dusting, and then there’
s the silver to be polished.” She hesitated, however, dying to go and look at the countryside from their spot on the roof.
“Please come, Lizzie,” he said simply.
Lizzie opened her mouth again. She knew that despite her best intentions to avoid any sort of a relationship with someone who was completely out of her social circle, she would follow him up to the slates. She couldn’t resist the view from there seen with crystal clarity with the gold spectacles on her face.
And, God help her, she couldn’t resist more time with Toby.
Book One – The Night Watchman Express
An underground factory, a terrifying laboratory, and the eerie whistle of the Night Watchman Express…
Miriam has only her guardians' son for company, and she and Simon dislike each other from the start. But they must find a way to trust each other, or they will end up on the sinister Night Watchman Express.
Full of danger, suspense, betrayal, and a hint of romance, this steampunk adventure is for readers of all ages.
Book Two – Devil’s Kitchen
In The Night Watchman Express, Miriam and Simon were kidnapped and thrown on the strange train... Now in Book Two of The Crown Phoenix series, they arrive at the terrifying destination known as Devil's Kitchen.
There they will face human experiments in a laboratory known as The Infirmary.
Miriam will be forced to work in an underground factory.
Simon is held in a luxurious prison by jailers who are as beautiful as they are deadly...
And their courage will be tested to the breaking point.
Book Three – The Lamplighter’s Special
Lizzie and her sister are forced to work in a huge manor and on a steamship to support their family.
They are caught up in several mysteries:
The squire’s oldest son cannot leave the attic
An old typewriter seems to move time and space
A passenger hides in a secret room
A beautiful visitor is plotting against them
And Lizzie discovers that she has a strange, new ability.
She and her sister must discover the secrets of The Lamplighter’s Special before their enemy catches up with them.
About the author:
Alison DeLuca grew up on an organic farm in Chester County, Pennsylvania. Her parents were British, so in the summers she went to stay with her grandparents near Dublin.
There was no stereo or TV there, so Alison, her sister, and her cousins spent the summer inventing stories and plays for each other. “This gave me the ability to entertain myself with my own imagination in any situation,” she says. “We used to be taken to tea with great-aunts, and we were expected to sit on an uncomfortable couch and not move or say a word. It was possible to endure it because I was watching my own little stories play out in my mind.”
After graduating from West Chester University, Alison became a teacher of English and Spanish, teaching students from kindergarten up to college level. She loved teaching, and it was with reluctance that she left the classroom to be a fulltime mom when her daughter was born.
While she was teaching and raising her daughter, Alison took every free minute she had to write. The Night Watchman Express and The Crown Phoenix Series were the result.
She is currently working on the fourth and final book in the series, as well as several other projects.
