I PRESSED MY HANDS against the bullet wound as if that could somehow keep the life inside her. Montgomery tore free from the startled men and knelt next to me, feeling her pulse. His movements were skilled, yet there was a dazed look to his eyes.
“She’s gone,” he said, as if struggling to believe it himself.
I sank back on my heels. I couldn’t think. I couldn’t breathe. My entire body had gone numb, as if it was my blood dripping out into the mud. Gone? The girl I’d grown up with, the only friend who’d stood by me after the scandal, the daughter who’d abandoned her wealthy life for what was right?
“You did this!” Radcliffe hauled me to my feet next to Montgomery. Montgomery stood, too, and Radcliffe’s remaining men aimed their rifles at our heads. “It was supposed to be you dead, Mr. James. Lucy shouldn’t ever have been brought into this!”
“You brought her into this!” I screamed, twisting out of his hand. “She fled with us to escape you!”
He blinked. For a few terrible seconds, none of us spoke. I threw a look to where Edward’s body still lay in the puddle. Was he truly gone, like her? Had we lost them both? Had we lost everything?
“Leave,” I spat at Radcliffe. “Take your men and go. What do a few journals matter when your daughter just died by your own hands?”
He looked at me as if I were some nightmarish specter. He dragged a hand over his mouth, murmuring something to himself, refusing to believe it. “Died?” he said aloud, testing the word. “No.”
All his mad plans about acquiring the journals and selling the science seemed like an afterthought now. He turned to the courtyard wall, breathing heavily. In a way, I understood how he felt. My best friend was dead. After that, did anything matter?
“Juliet,” Montgomery whispered. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what to say.”
Radcliffe’s men still stood around us with rifles aimed. I could tell Montgomery wanted to fold me into his arms, but we dared not. Radcliffe still faced the wall, arms braced against it, shaking his head back and forth.
I couldn’t tear my eyes off Lucy’s body. So many people I loved had died. I’d buried too many of them. We’d brought Edward back, but his fate was unknown now. If he lived, I couldn’t imagine what he’d do when he learned about Lucy. I looked up at the tower where I’d brought him back at her insistence.
“The tower,” I whispered, more to myself than anyone else. “Montgomery, if I could take her to the tower . . .”
“No.” Montgomery’s eyes flickered with warning. “Don’t think like that.”
But Radcliffe had turned from the wall and was looking at me with wide eyes. He’d heard me and put together what I meant. “The tower,” he repeated, and looked toward the window that showed Elizabeth’s equipment. He swallowed. “Elizabeth’s laboratory. That’s it, isn’t it, Miss Moreau? You can bring her back with Frankenstein’s science. She doesn’t have to stay dead.”
“It’s impossible,” Montgomery said. “It’s ungodly.”
“I didn’t ask you, Mr. James.” Radcliffe’s light eyes were fixated on mine. “We understand each other, don’t we, Miss Moreau? We can both have Lucy back.”
My mouth felt dry. I pressed a hand to my head. “I don’t know.”
“I do.” He grabbed my arm, dragging me toward the house. “You will bring her back, or I’ll slaughter everyone in this household. Bring my daughter’s body,” he called to his officers. “And keep a gun on Montgomery James. Lock him in the cellar until this is done.”
I twisted to look behind me, where one of his men walked Montgomery with his hands clenched behind his head. They dragged us inside the foyer, where the electric lights stung my eyes.
“You there, housekeeper,” he ordered McKenna. “Show my associate to the cellar where we can lock up Mr. James. Miss Moreau, you and I are headed for the tower.”
He dragged me toward the stairs, while an officer carried Lucy’s lifeless body behind us.
“Juliet, wait,” Montgomery called. I paused just long enough to meet his eyes. A million things could be said between us, but he chose only one. “Remember what I told you. You aren’t your father’s daughter. You choose your own fate.”
The words sank into me more deeply with each step toward the tower. The world around me seemed dim despite the electric lights. Only my thoughts blazed. For so long I’d fought against the idea of turning into my father, only to accept it with a feeling of inevitability. Was I now to uproot all my beliefs once more?
I clutched Jack Serra’s water charm, wishing for magic when I knew none existed.
We reached the landing, where the portraits of the von Steins and the Ballentynes of old seemed to whisper to me, but what they wanted, I wasn’t certain. The only thing I was certain of was Radcliffe’s steel grip on my arm, my best friend dead, and Montgomery’s final words.