“You should write a book,” I said. “Memoirs covering four hundred years. That would be awesome.”

He seemed to consider, this new thought lighting his eyes. “Perhaps I will.”

* * *

WE HAD one last adventure before leaving the U.K. As promised, Caleb and part of his pack took us running in British wilderness, in the Dartmoor region in Britain’s southwest peninsula. “Hound of the Baskervilles territory,” he told us, winking.

The land was rugged, windswept, marshy, desolate. Rolling hills covered with grass and scrub, outcrops of weathered gray stone, a blustery sky overhead. It was beautiful, perfect for running, as Caleb had promised. We Changed, stretched our four legs, and ran for hours, pounding out the stress of the week. I remembered little about that time but the cleansing wind rippling through my fur.

Caleb’s pack took us in as respected guests, but Ben and I kept apart. This wasn’t home. Even the rabbits we caught tasted different. We woke up restless in the shelter of rocks that weren’t Rocky Mountain granite.

We agreed: it was time to go home.

Epilogue

IN AN ideal world, everyone who heard the speech would take me seriously, the UN would set up a supernatural task force to promote equality and understanding, and forces around the world would unite to locate and oppose Roman. It would be a new golden age. What would probably happen—everyone would ignore me, and I’d go back to being a cult talk-radio host. But then there was the worst that could happen. Torches and pitchforks, I joked with Ben. The wrong kind of people would take my speech seriously.

I hadn’t been home a week when police in Boston caught an arsonist who had burned down an apartment building because he believed vampires were living in the basement. He declared to the judge during his arraignment that he was justified because a war was coming, and he had to destroy them before they came after him. Investigators didn’t find any evidence of vampires in the wreckage—not that they would have. But a young couple whom neighbors described as goth were killed in the fire. Police theorized that the crazed young man had seen them, constantly dressed in black, and made a misguided assumption.

Commentators discussed how “polarizing influences” could only make this kind of tragedy more common. They didn’t mention me by name, but they might as well have.

* * *

I SAT in the KNOB conference room with Ozzie and Matt. They’d been my producer and sound engineer from the beginning. We’d had dozens of meetings in this room, with its timeworn walls and scuffed carpet, cheap laminate tables and stained whiteboard. I remembered sitting in on programming meetings back when I was a late-night variety DJ and not a syndicated talk-show host, before anyone knew I was a werewolf. Before any of this. The smell of a decade’s worth of spilled coffee tinged the air. It smelled safe to me. This room should have been safe, but Ozzie was regarding me with such a look of disappointment, and Matt wouldn’t look at me at all.

“We’ve only had twenty outright cancellations,” Ozzie said, looking more harried and middle-aged than usual. Only. As if that wasn’t an actual, measurable percentage of our market. “We’ll probably have more, depending on how you follow up. Do you know how you’re going to follow up?”

“I’m not going to apologize, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“I’m not looking for an apology, I’m looking for an explanation,” he said.

“I told the truth.”

He began pacing, gesturing broadly, lecturing in a tone of frustration. “You’re supposed to be the one calling bullshit on the conspiracy theories, and here you are, drinking the Kool-Aid—”

“I wouldn’t have said it if I didn’t believe it.”

Ozzie put his hands on his hips and sighed. Neither one of them would look at me now. I stared at Matt, trying to get him to glance up. He’d always been on my side. He’d seen some of this firsthand. I thought he would trust me.

They didn’t believe me. My Wolf side bristled, crouching in a figurative corner, teeth bared in challenge, growling. My body tensed, my gaze narrowed. They couldn’t read the signs.

I didn’t belong here.

Ozzie continued, oblivious. “Kitty. This show is your baby. You made it what it is, no one’s going to argue about that. No one else could have done what you’ve done with it. I’ve never told you what to do, what to talk about, how to run things. I’ve never suggested an agenda. But I’m telling you now—you have to backpedal. Get back to basics. Bring on some cream puff interviews. Because if you keep on, if you turn The Midnight Hour into a paranoid soapbox—no one will listen to you.” No one but the real crazies, he meant.

“It’s not paranoid—” I stopped. I’d been about to say, if they’re really out to get you. I thought I knew what this looked like from the outside—crazy, ranty, unbalanced. I thought if I could just convince them, if I could prove to them that I wasn’t crazy … Maybe I didn’t know what it looked like. Maybe I really had turned a corner. How would I ever know?

“I don’t know what I’m going to do,” I said finally. “I have to think about it.”

“Take a couple of weeks off if you need to,” Ozzie said. “We can always rerun old episodes.”

“That won’t look bad,” I muttered.

“Then come up with something,” he said. “Come back Friday and do something about it.” He marched out of the room, his lips pursed with pity and disappointment.

I waited for Matt to do the same. He was my age, stout, cheerful, with dark hair and faded T-shirt and jeans. He leaned back in his chair, arms crossed, and finally regarded me like he was listening to a new album and trying to decide if he hated it.

“Well?” I finally asked because I couldn’t stand it anymore.

He ducked his gaze, hiding a smile. “Kitty. I’m with you. I’ve been with you since you sat in that studio”—he pointed down the hall—“and said you were a werewolf. I can’t say I understand any of this. I can’t say I ever did. But I’m not going to quit on you now.”

If he had … I don’t know what I would have done. Found someone to replace him, I supposed, but it wouldn’t have been the same.

“Thank you,” I said, my voice cracking.

“You’re welcome.”