“No?” Disbelief—still feigned, still disingenuous, as if she’d somehow expected my response—laced her voice. Lou’s voice. The sound of it made me ache and rage in equal measure. “You’d have us piss down our leg? Your own wife?”

“You aren’t my wife.”

A sick wave of regret washed through me at the familiar words. At the memory. The ring I’d once given Lou, golden band and mother-of-pearl stone, weighed heavy in my pocket. Like a brick. I’d kept it with me since Léviathan, anxious to return it to her. To slide it back on her finger where it belonged. I would do just that at L’Eau Mélancolique. I would marry her right there on the beach. Just like last time, except proper now. Real.

Nicholina gave a feline grin. “No, we aren’t your wife, are we? Which makes us your . . . what, exactly?” A pause. She leaned closer, brushing her nose against mine. I jerked back. “She fought, you know,” she breathed, still grinning. My entire body went still. My entire being. “She screamed your name. You should have heard her in those last moments. Absolutely terrified. Absolutely delicious. We savored her death.”

It wasn’t true. Lou was still in there. We would free her.

“She can’t hear you, pet.” Nicholina pursed her lips in a sugar-sweet display of sympathy, and I realized I’d spoken the words aloud. “The dead don’t have ears. She won’t hear your cries, and she won’t see your tears.”

“That’s enough,” Coco said sharply. Though I could see her trying to tug the rope from me, I couldn’t feel the movement. My fist remained locked. Blood roared in my ears. “Shut the hell up, Nicholina.”

She fought, you know.

Nicholina giggled like a little girl. Shrugged. “All right.”

She screamed your name.

I took a deep breath. In through my nose. Out through my mouth. One after another. Again and again.

You should’ve heard her in those last moments. Absolutely terrified.

I should’ve been there.

It’s your fault it’s your fault it’s your fault

Beau and Célie arrived at that moment, and Coco succeeded in tugging the rope from me. Glowering at their empty hands, she snapped, “Nothing? Again?”

Célie shrugged helplessly while Beau lifted said hands in a lackadaisical gesture. “What would you like us to do, Cosette? Shit the pearls into existence? We aren’t oysters.”

Her nostrils flared. “Oysters don’t shit out pearls, you idiotic piece of—”

“Shit?” Nicholina supplied helpfully.