Author: Megan Shepherd

Anger curled inside me. I pressed the tips of my fingers to the burning door, letting the pain sear and stir my anger. Something caught my attention from the corner of my eye—a shadow slinking along the portico. It didn’t run. Didn’t attack. It came forward stealthily, its eyes glowing in the moonlight.

“Jaguar,” I muttered.

Maybe I should have been afraid, but I wasn’t. It wasn’t me he was after.

He stopped just paces away. This was the creature Montgomery had once called a brother. And were we really so different? We were all animals, in a sense. Even a sixteen-year-old girl needed to eat and drink and survive—and might kill to do so.

A rustling within the laboratory drew Jaguar’s attention. He glided past me, his tail flicking against my feet as he slunk toward the door. His thick paw slashed at the door latch with claws as long as my fingers. He tried a few times, cutting grooves in the door but unable to grip the latch. A growl rumbled in his throat, low and angry. His golden eyes looked back at me.

I knew what he wanted.

But twisting that latch didn’t just mean opening a door. It meant murder. Jaguar wouldn’t hesitate to slice my father into little chunks of flesh. It was exactly what he wanted—what all of them wanted. Revenge. If Jaguar could speak, he’d tell me it had to be this way. Father was brilliant. He’d escape from the burning laboratory. He’d start over. There’d be another island. Another Jaguar. Another Edward. Or worse.

My fingers dropped to the latch.

Jaguar’s hind legs tensed, ready to spring. But how could I open that door, knowing what lay on the other side? No good-bye. No reconciliation. Only a bitter, ragged end.

The barn roof cracked and splintered. A shower of sparks rained down. In another minute the whole structure would collapse. Edward would be killed, burned alive or crushed under falling beams. Even though logic told me Edward couldn’t be allowed to live, my heart said he didn’t deserve to die either. It wasn’t his fault. It was that of his maker, who hid in a locked room while his children burned alive.

Edward had said I could make things right.

Maybe I could.

My fingers felt for the latch. The flames leapt to the bunkhouse. It would catch quickly, then the salon, then my room. Beside me, Jaguar’s claws dug into the portico ground, ready to spring.

I squeezed the latch.

The door came open in my hand, almost too easily. Father’s fail-safe had accounted for the beasts’ limited dexterity, but not for deceit. He’d been too arrogant to think one of us would betray him.

I opened the door an inch—that was all it took, just an inch.

I fell back, my face burning from the heat. Jaguar slunk inside.

The barn roof collapsed with a roar. The heat singed my cheeks as I clutched the wooden box to my chest and stumbled back toward the main gate. Montgomery was there in the entryway, calling for me. Whether or not he’d seen me open the door, I didn’t know. His hand latched on to mine, and he pulled me from the flaming compound into the cool evening air, where Duke pawed at the ground, ready to bolt. Balthasar took up the reins as we clambered into the wagon and vanished into the jungle, leaving the smoldering wreckage behind us.

Forty-five

FROM THE STRIP OF sand at the ocean’s edge, we could still hear the fire’s roar. The beasts had started howling as the fire intensified, filling the night with wild screams. Montgomery held me close in the back of the wagon, hands pressed over my ears. But nothing could keep the sounds away. They’d haunted me since childhood. They would haunt me forever.

At the dock Balthasar stopped the wagon. Our blue-and-white boat waited, tethered to the pile, ready to take us to sea. Only when Balthasar climbed down from the driver’s seat and offered me his massive hand did I remember my promise. You can come with us, I’d told him. But I’d never had any intention of bringing him. Someone would find out what he was and try to replicate him. Someone would take it too far, just like my father.

Balthasar cocked his head at my hesitation. I took his hand and climbed out of the wagon. Montgomery was already carrying an armful of jars down the dock. His steps were purposeful and determined, as if he was as ready to get off the island as I was, even if it meant abandoning the place he’d called home for six years.

Would he be the one to tell Balthasar or would I? We’d never spoken of it, but I knew Montgomery felt the same way. This island was my father’s prison, his tomb, and all evidence of his work had to be buried with him. Even Balthasar.

Balthasar picked up two water jars, his tongue lolling out of his mouth, and followed Montgomery down the dock. My heart wrenched. Was I a monster for leaving him behind? Balthasar was the only innocent one of us. He hadn’t killed. I didn’t think he was capable of it.

I cradled a glass jar in the crook of my arm, watching the two of them in the moonlight. There should have been so many more of us. Alice. Edward. Their ashes tied their souls to this horrid island.

Montgomery came back to fetch a small trunk that contained an expensive china set. He glanced at me. I sensed that his resolve had hardened, as if he was steeling himself for the awful task of leaving Balthasar behind.

“We don’t have a choice,” I whispered. I shifted the weight of the glass jar to my other arm. “They were cursed as soon as they were created.”

He didn’t answer but hoisted the trunk onto one shoulder and started down the dock. Balthasar took a load and followed Montgomery like a shadow. I brushed the hair out of my eyes and looked back toward the burning compound. I couldn’t see the flames, but the column of smoke said enough.

I hugged the jar and hurried down the dock. Montgomery was already carrying another load. There was an urgency to his every move. I dreaded the moment when we would push off in the launch. I was afraid of what we would tell Balthasar, left on the dock, the last innocent being on the island.

“One more trip should do it,” Montgomery muttered. We took the last of the cargo, and Montgomery unhitched Duke and pushed against his shoulder.

“Get on, you old boy,” he chided, but his voice caught. Duke took a few steps back but didn’t leave. His ears were alert, watching his master, ready to follow him to the ends of the earth. Montgomery picked up the last of the water jars and didn’t look back at the horse.

Every step down that dock was one less I’d ever take on the island. One more toward England. Montgomery and I would make a life there with each other. Comfortable. Quiet. We’d never mention the past. If he’d seen my role in Father’s murder, he’d never say anything, just as I’d never ask if he missed Balthasar. We’d forget about Edward—no, that was impossible.

I’d never forget Edward.

One more step. And another. And then I was at the launch.

“We don’t have a choice,” I said, my vocal cords trembling. Montgomery’s eyes reflected my own tangled emotions. For a moment I studied his face in the moonlight, wondering if the tie between us would be different in London. For now, it felt as though he and I would always be bound together.

I reached for the line holding the launch, but Montgomery touched my shoulder softly. He turned me back to face him again. His features were knotted and tense, but then his lips parted. “Juliet—”

He pulled me into a deep kiss. My surprise melted and I kissed him back. My hand found the hard silhouette of his chest and pulled with trembling fingers at his shirt. I wanted to hold on to him forever. Believing in nothing except the truth of Montgomery, who for all his faults was as steady as the sea, as honest as the sun. My eyes watered with unexpected tears, and I kissed him harder, desperately. It wasn’t a happy ending. He and I would return to the real world, but there was only anguish left for Balthasar and the others.

Montgomery broke off the kiss, reluctantly. Swallowed hard. He was as afraid of the future as I was. For a moment it was only he and I and the sea and the unknown.

“All right,” he said, taking a deep breath. “It’s time.” He climbed into the boat and steadied himself. He motioned for Balthasar and me to hand him the cargo. We worked efficiently, not exchanging words. He settled the cargo carefully to prevent the boat tipping if we came across a storm. And then he climbed out and wiped his hand through his sea-blown hair.

An awful sickness roiled in my abdomen as though I’d missed an injection. But I hadn’t. It was the shame of what I had to do, knotting my insides. I couldn’t find the words to tell Balthasar we were leaving him behind.

At last Montgomery cleared his throat. “Right, then. You first, Juliet.”

I looked up in surprise. Were we just going to climb in and push off, leaving Balthasar puzzled and heartbroken as we drifted away? I searched Montgomery’s face, but it was like stone. He held out his hand, and I took it hesitantly and climbed down into the rocking boat. I settled between two trunks at the far end, trying to force back my tears.

“I wish it didn’t have to be this way,” I said, hunching into myself. I knew he would understand what I meant. Not just leaving Balthasar, but leaving all of them—Father, Edward, the bones of all those who had died so unfairly. This island—the things that happened here—should never have existed.

“So do I,” Montgomery said, his whispered voice so low the wind might have carried it off. But he kept his gaze on me, which was odd. I kept looking at Balthasar, feeling crushed by guilt, and guiltier still that Montgomery had to be the one to tell him.

“I’m afraid this is it,” he said.

I nodded, squeezing my knees in tighter. I wouldn’t look at Balthasar’s face. It might be cowardly, but I couldn’t live with the image of his heartbreak in my head forever.

“I’m so sorry, Juliet.” Montgomery suddenly crouched down to the pile, unraveling the line faster than my brain could think. Sorry? Why wasn’t he getting into the boat?

It hit me like a tidal wave. He wasn’t coming with me.

He wasn’t coming with me.

The weight of it crushed me to the bottom of the launch. I stared at him, and then at Balthasar, who was trying his best not to look at me. Balthasar had known all along. This wasn’t a farewell to Balthasar.

It was a farewell to me.

I jerked forward, crawling as the boat pitched. “Montgomery, no. Wait. . . .”

But he’d already pushed his weight against the bow and set me adrift. All that linked us now was a thin bit of line that he held so lightly, so loosely, poised to let go at any moment.

“Don’t you dare!” I screamed, crawling to the bow. “Don’t let go of that line!” My knee connected with the sharp edge of a trunk and my eyes filled with water, not just from the pain. “Don’t you dare leave me, Montgomery James!”

But as I scrambled to reach the edge of the launch, the frayed end of the line came away from his hand. Seconds. Just seconds ago Montgomery had been holding it, and now I was totally adrift. Alone. I looked at him, stunned.

“I’m so sorry,” he said, his face broken. “I can’t leave. I’ve been their only family. I have a responsibility to them.”

“What about me?” I choked as the launch drifted seaward. I reached out, grappling for a hand I knew would never come. “You have a responsibility to me!”

“You’re better off without me. You can forget all of this. I would only have tied you to this place.” His voice broke. “I don’t belong there. I’m a criminal. An aberration.”

“You’re Montgomery,” I called. “We belong together.”

He shook his head. His face was wet with sweat. “No. I belong with the island.”

The betrayal ripped me apart more than any of Father’s surgeries could have done. Montgomery looked away, just as I’d planned on looking away from Balthasar’s heartbroken face. A wave caught the launch and I glided farther toward open sea, gripping the edge of the boat as though clinging to life. “No!” I screamed, one more time. Sobs choked in my throat. Hadn’t I always known Montgomery was as wild as the creatures he’d created, unable to leave them? The smell of smoke lingered in the air, and it felt so wrong, like more than the compound was burning.