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Oh shit…I glance at the three naked men in my room. How the hell do I explain them? Or my ripped-up clothing? Or any of this?
“We should hide,” Theo says, already getting up.
“No. We tell the truth. Gran knows about Under.” I stand and so do they. Gerrard is tall, but perhaps he always was. Years of living in Under has made them all hard and muscled. I lick my lip, drinking in the sight of them. Joe catches my gaze, and his dicks lift.
I point at the bed. “Grab a bed sheet to wear because she’s not used to so many naked men in her granddaughter’s bedroom.”
Then I walk to the door and open it. “It’s me, Gran. I’m back.”
She stops halfway down the corridor and stares at me. “Julie!”
She hobble-runs toward me and pulls me into a fierce embrace. “I thought I’d lost you, too. You were taken?”
I nod, tears welling in my eyes. “I have been to Under. How long was I gone?”
“Three weeks.” She pulls me close again. “How did you do it?”
I step back and point at the guys sticking their heads out of the bedroom door. “I had some help…”
Epilogue
Julie
Icarry the fresh loaf of bread to the table. Joe carries the roast chicken while Theo pours everyone a glass of wine and Gerrard brings a dish of vegetables. Michael sits with Gran, talking about the changes to her leg. Her foot is almost human—but changing has been a much slower process here than it was in Under.
She has been asking them all about what they were as monsters and how they changed back and adding to her research.
“No more talk about monsters, at least while we eat.” I put the bread down near where Theo sits. He’s learned how to bake bread, as it’s still his favorite thing even though he has been enjoying rediscovering other foods.
I run my fingers over Michael’s hair and feel the nubs of horns that remain. They all carry something from their time in Under. It wasn’t me who found Michael. He found me. He came to Gran’s the day after we arrived. He crawled out from beneath the bed in his childhood home, realized a new family lived there now and had run. He’d grabbed shorts off the line, so he wasn’t naked, and then spent the next day making his way to me.
Gran called the cops and told them I’d turned up. I claimed I had no memory of the three weeks I was gone and while they didn’t like it, they let it go.
Over the last week, we’ve been trying to find out about Gerrard. Both he and Theo are regaining more memories, not all of them nice.
And Gran is no longer alone in the big old house. The guys are taming the over-grown garden and fixing up the house where it needed repairs. While we all have our own bedrooms, I think she knows that most nights I don’t use my own bed.
None of my monsters wants to sleep alone, and no one does.
While we don’t know what the future will be like, we will face it together.
* * *
