The building Detective Ayers and Sinclair escorted me in, to be described in a few short words, was a complete and total dump.

The linoleum floors were scuffed up, ceiling tiles were crumbling, a few doors here and there were hanging off their hinges, and the only source of illumination came from the bare lightbulbs hanging on wires attached to the ceiling.

My first thought was that getting into that car with Detective Ayers and Sinclair had been a total mistake, and now they were going to drag me off to some dank, dingy room and possibly murder me.

"Sorry about this place," Sinclair was saying apologetically as I edged along after him and Detective Ayers. "You'd think tax payers' money could be put to better use fixing this dump up, but the government doesn't exactly approve of what we do, so we get stuck with this shithole."

"Good to know," I said uneasily. "But, er...where is everyone else?"

They were police, weren't they? I thought police stations were busy, people always bustling everywhere, criminals being transported from place to place, phones ringing off the hook. But as far as I could see, Detective Ayers, Sinclair, and I were the only people that were on this entire floor.

The sound of my shoes squeaking on the floor was growing louder and louder as we walked, and the pounding of my heart matched its pace.

I felt another panic attack coming on. There I was, walking into some unknown building with two very burly men with no idea what was waiting for me on the other side.

How could I have been so stupid as to actually agree to go anywhere with these people? I should have never called Detective Ayers in the first place. Better yet, I should've just never gone to that damn convenience store Friday night, and then none of this would've happened.

"It's just us," Sinclair said with a shrug. "Well, me, Ayers, the lovely Gina Novak and the ever formidable Captain Henry Crowley. And together, we are the CD Divison."

"What exactly is the CD Division?" I asked, my curiosity taking over. "I've never heard of it before."

Sinclair tapped a finger to his nose and gave me a mischievous look. "All in good time, Holly. All in good time."

Detective Ayers took a sudden sharp right turn at the end of the long, blue tiled hallway we had been walking down, wrenched open a heavy metal door and then began to descend a flight of steps into a dimly lit basement.

"Oh, no. No, no, no. No." I backed up several feet, nearly tripped over my laces and fell face forward on the ground. I had a thing about enclosed spaces, and I was most certainly not about to enter one with two people I didn't even know. "I am not going down there."

Detective Ayers stopped walking and turned back to give me a hardened stare. "Sorry, Miss Eberly, but you really don't have a choice in the matter."

"Oh, I think I do," I said boldly. "And you know what? I don't have to say here, either. I think I'm just going to go home, come to think of it."

Detective Ayers and Sinclair exchanged looks with each other. When they didn't say anything, I figured they weren't opposed to my leaving. So I hitched my bag up over my shoulder, tightened my coat around me, and took off walking at a brisk pace down the hallway we'd just come from.

I'd barely made it a quarter of the way down the hallway before a hand suddenly gripped my arm, forcing me to spin around.

Detective Ayers was staring down at me with a look in his dark eyes that had me wishing I'd never met him at all.

"Look, Holly," he muttered, lowering his voice and dipping his head so Sinclair wouldn't see me or hear him. "I understand you're afraid. You have every right to be. But you don't understand what you're involved with now. Hate me all you want, but I'm not going to be letting you out of my sight anytime soon."

"But why? I don't - "

"I'll answer your questions later, I promise," he said, squeezing my arm. "But right now, you're just going to have to trust me."

That was just the thing. I didn't trust Detective Ayers. I had no reason to trust him. Why should I trust him?

But I found myself saying, "Okay," before I really had the time to think about another way out of this situation.

Detective Ayers nodded. "Good."

"It's not so bad, Holly," Sinclair said to me as I tentatively followed Detective Ayers back down the hallway to where he stood at the metal door. "You get used to the weirdness of it all."

Oh, I very much doubted that would ever be possible. From what I'd seen so far, the weirdness had barely just begun.

The dank staircase the two detectives lead me down held no light at all, save for the dim lightbulbs stuck into vents on the wall. It seemed to go on and on without a sign that it would ever stop. I'd never been afraid of the dark before, but after last Friday night...now I knew there were things in the dark that people couldn't always see.

I breathed a heavy sigh of relief, my heart finally starting to stop pounding rapidly against my chest, when the staircase leveled out into a hallway just as short as the one upstairs.

We'd barely walked two steps forward before the loud clacking of heels could be heard and somebody rounded the corner.

"Jesus Christ, there you two are. D'you know how worried I was? God, I swear, if I'm not their to watch your backs you'd be dead in a second."

The woman that approached us, hands on hips, fiery expression in her eyes, immediately made me take one huge hit on my self-confidence. She was very, very pretty. The type of pretty you only saw on the pages of a magazine or in some old black and white film. She was Asian with long, glossy black hair, delicate features, and very red lips that made them the focal point of her face.

Sneaking a glance at Sinclair, I could instantly tell that he thought she was the hottest thing to ever walk this planet from the look on his face.

And she was a police officer?

She came to an abrupt stop in front of us, and her eyes zeroed in on me, a curious expression coming over her face.

"You must be Holly," she said bluntly.

"Er...yeah," I said awkwardly.

"Head Detective Gina Novak," she said, reaching out to shake my hand. "These two jackasses' supervisor."

Sinclair gave a derisive snort of laughter. "Yeah, right, sweetheart. You just don't like being out in the field and you know it."

Gina rolled her eyes and ignored Sinclair, turning to Detective Ayers. "Were you followed?"

"Not that I can tell," he answered. "Mitcham knows about Holly, but I don't think he's assigned people to tail her yet."

"Wait, what? People have been watching me?" I squeaked in alarm. "What're you talking about? I don't - "

"And not only that," Detective Ayers continued, speaking over me. "But he made a personal appearance."

Gina's mouth thinned into a tight line and her left eye gave a small twitch. "He picks now to come out of hiding? What for?"

"That's exactly what we're trying to figure out."

Gina and Detective Ayers exchanged guarded looks for another a moment and then Gina finally sighed, jabbing her thumb over her shoulder.

"Crowley's been waiting for us," she said. "And you know how he hates to be kept waiting."

Sinclar shuddered, making a sour face. "All too well. Let's get this over with."

I hesitantly followed after the three of them, still unsure of whether or not making a dash back up those stairs and running the hell out of this place was a bad idea.

This hallway was shorter, and better lit. We only walked for a moment before Gina pushed open two heavy wooden doors to the left.

"Well, come on," Sinclair said, giving me an encouraging nudge. "Crowley doesn't bite. Hard."

My jaw dropped as I walked into the room. I couldn't help it.

This room, without a doubt, had to be the...well, coolest place I had ever seen before.

The room was wide and spacious with fluffy red carpet, gigantic velvet tapestries hanging from the ceilings that fell down to cover the windows. Overstuffed couches and chairs were everywhere, along with large bookcases filled with dust-covered, heavy texts. At the far end of the room was a massive mahogany fire place, detailed designs carved into the wood stretching from top to bottom. A fire was crackling in the grate, giving the room a warm, cozy feeling.

In front of the fireplace was a desk just as large as one of the bookcases and just as intricately built. Sitting at the desk was a man who looked as if he had just stepped out of some fantasy novel. His hair was thick and graying, gray scuff covering his jaw in a fashionable sort of way. His cheek bones were slightly sunken and he held a sort of thinness that came from staying inside too long, but his eyes were just as alight as the fire roaring merrily behind him. This was a man who missed nothing and emanated power and authority from his entire being.

"Sorry we were so late, Cap'n," Sinclair said as he strolled through the room. "Roman and I got into a little disagreement on the road."

"No matter," Crowley said with a sophisticated British accent. "So long as Miss Eberly is here and unharmed."

Physically I might have appeared unharmed. But mentally? I wasn't entirely sure that I would be able to recover from the fiasco these past few days had been.

Crowley smiled at me in an almost paternal sort of way and gestured to one of the puffy chairs in front of his desk. "Have a seat, please, Miss Eberly."

"Holly," I automatically corrected. "I mean, I - "

"Holly," Crowley said, still with his smile. "Please, sit."

I sat on the far end of the chair Crowley had gestured at and leaned forward, digging my fingernails into my jeans.

Gina sat on the edge of the desk while Sinclair dropped into the seat beside me, stretching out his legs and tipping his head back. I didn't know where Detective Ayers had gone.

"Now." Crowley leaned back in his chair and settled his clasped hands on his stomach. "Tell me what happened."

"About an hour ago, Roman got a call from Holly here, saying that Mitcham had shown up at the library and gave her a personal offer for his legal services," Sinclair told Crowley.

"And are we sure it was actually Mitcham?" Crowley said, raising his eyebrows.

I thought I detected some type of concern and alarm in Crowley's voice, but he was doing an excellent job of concealing any shred of emotion from his face.

"It was definitely Mitcham's business card." I jumped about a mile in my chair when Detective Ayers leaned past me and dropped the ivory card the very creepy man had given me on Crowley's desk. "It's been more than fifty years since he's been seen, but you know his kind. It's physically impossible to change their appearance."

"Very true," Crowley said with a nod before pulling open a drawer in his desk and coming up with a fat manilla folder.

He flipped it open and thumbed through the pages before he came up with a black-and-white photograph that he handed over to me.

"Holly, would you mind looking at this photograph and telling me if you recognize this man?"

I took the photograph cautiously, afraid of what he was asking me to look at.

The man staring back at me on the page made my skin crawl. Even through a camera lense, Stan Mitcham still looked unnatural, out-of-this-world, just downright creepy.

I thrust the photo back at Crowley and tried to keep from shuddering. "That was him."

Crowley dropped the photo back in the file and flipped it shut. "All right."

"But why?" Detective Ayers grabbed a fire poker off the side of the desk and jabbed it at a flaming log. "Why now? Ever since WWII the Gloam have kept to themselves. They don't want to be involved with Mitcham, and they'll do anything to make sure he doesn't resurface again."

Crowley sighed heavily, drumming his fingers on the desk. "Yes, but the Gloam aren't predictable, Roman."

"Why would they be?" Sinclair propped his feet up on Crowley's desk and crossed his arms. "And why wouldn't Mitcham pull underhanded moves like this? The man is a nightwalker, for Christ's sake."

None of this was making any sense.

The words gloam and nightwalker kept buzzing around in my mind, twisting my thoughts. This was a confusing situation enough as it was, and this chattering about things I didn't understand was just confirming the fact that I should not have even bothered picking up the phone and calling Detective Ayers tonight.

These four people...were completely and utterly insane.

"You people are insane." I was on my feet and marching through the room to the doors before I knew what I was doing. "I'm going home. I don't need any of this. I need to - "

"Wait a moment, Holly." A hand came down hard on my shoulder, squeezing almost painfully. "I'm afraid you won't be going anywhere."

I spun around on my heel and came face-to-face with Crowley. For someone who had almost been halfway across the room and for someone who was older, he sure did move fast.

I'd only just met the man five minutes ago, but Crowley didn't seem like the type of person to take shit from any one. Under normal circumstances, I wouldn't want to mess with someone who looked like they could verbally strike you down in ten seconds flat.

But this wasn't under normal circumstances.

"I'm leaving," I snapped, frusturated tears starting to burn my eyes. "I don't have time for any of this...whatever this is. You are all insane. Everything you're talking about is absolutely ludicrous. I have better things to be doing than listening to the bullshit coming out of your mouth. So, excuse me, but I really think I should be leaving now."

"Holly, wait."

This time it was Gina that stopped me before I made it to the door.

"Please, just let me go." I was suddenly too tired to even think about pulling my arm out of Gina's grasp. "I want to go home."

"I know you do. I know you don't want anything to do with this," Gina said, giving me a sympathetic look. "And I'm sorry. But this is something much bigger than you or me, and we need your help."

"Why?" I leaned back against the wall with a sigh. "Why do you need my help? What's so important about me?"

"Because. Not only are you a witness, but you're also one of us," Gina told me in a calm, cool voice. "What we call an Immune."

"Gina," Detective Ayers said warningly. "I don't think you should be - "

"She has to know, Roman," Gina snapped, turning a glare on him. "She's involved with this now just as much as we are."

Detective Ayers looked to Sinclair for back up, but Sinclair just held up his hands in a you're-on-your-own gesture.

"She's right, Roman," Crowley said with a resigned expression. "She's better off knowing."

"But she - "

"You know, considering you all are talking about me, don't I have a say in this, too?" I said loudly, holding up a hand.

All four of them looked to me as if they just noticed I was here in the room with them for the first time.

"Fine," Detective Ayers said, his mouth tightening into a thin line. "Fine, Holly. Go ahead and ask whatever you want."

Hundreds of questions immediately flooded my mind, and I couldn't pick which one to ask first. I was aptly convinced that whatever they were going to tell me would be absolute rubbish, but some cock-and-bull explanation was better than no explanation.

"Who...are you people?" I began hesitantly. "On Detective Ayers's business card, it said you people were the CD Divison?"

Crowley was the first to answer. He crooked a finger at me, motioning for me to follow after him. He walked back to his desk and pulled out a dusty, thick leather-bound book from some drawer. He flipped it open and started flipping through the pages until he came to a stop halfway through the book.

"CD Division," he said, tapping the page with his finger. "Stands for cloak and dagger."

The picture Crowley was pointing to was black-and-white, a small man in a top hat covering half his figure with a long cloak, a knife clutched in the hand that was not holding up the cloak to cover his face. It reminded me eerily of Jack the Ripper.

"Cloak and dagger," I repeated slowly, thinking back to my English class in high school. "Isn't that a term for something done in secrecy?"

"Correct," Crowley said with a nod. "The British used the term to describe acts of secrecey, espionage, mystery, or sometimes illegal activity. That is where our name comes from. We are the Cloak and Dagger Divison of the New York City Police Department."

The name of their division would explain why I had never heard of them before. I'd bet too if I asked someone else they would say they had never heard of the Cloak and Dagger Divison before, either. They'd probably just think I was insane for asking.

"Okay," I said, looking away from the eerie photo in the book. "And what exactly does the Cloak and Dagger Division do?"

Gina took a seat on one of the puffy chairs and clasped her hands together, readying herself for a long story. "You know mythological creatures, like ghouls and vampires and werewolves? Witches and wizards?"

"Doesn't everybody?" I said, raising my eyebrows. "Everybody knows about things that go bump in the night. They're just made up things."

And after what had happened the other night, there were most certainly things that went bump in the night.

"Well, that's where you're wrong," Sinclair said, speaking up loudly. "They're not made up things."

I was wrong. That had to have been the most insane thing I had heard tonight.

"Right," I said flatly. "Okay. So, let me get this straight. You're saying that vampires and werewolves and witches and wizards are real?"

"It's the truth," Gina said, her face and voice completely serious. "Have you ever wondered why the underground scene in New York is so dangeorus? The black markets around the world? Red Light districts? All of those shady places your parents warned you to stay away from?"

"Yeah, because there are bad people in the world," I snapped, my irritation rising. "Not because some vampire or werewolf or ghoul is behind it! Jesus, did you people all read too much Twilight or Harry Potter? These things are just myths!"

"No. They're not."

I looked at Detective Ayers with incredulity. Don't tell me he was going along with this whole thing?

"What? You believe this bullshit, too?" I demanded.

"Not bullshit," he said, shaking his head as he shrugged out of his jacket. "Hard to believe? Maybe. But not bullshit."

I took a large step back and hit Crowley's desk as Detective Ayers walked towards me, rolling up his shirt sleeves.

"Now, tell me, Holly. Do you think something human could have done this?"

I was overcome with the urge to throw up again as I looked down at Detective Ayers's arms. Or, rather, what was left of his arms. His skin was covered in large, thick gashes that were still pink and puckered, as if they had only just happened. It looked as if someone or something had...had...bitten off pieces of his flesh.

"Oh my God," I forced out, breathing heavily. "What happened to you?"

"Werewolf," he answered briskly. "Or rather, werewolves."

And he said nothing else on the subject as he rolled down his shirt sleeves, turning away from me.

I felt immensely sorry for Detective Ayers. If something that violent had happened to him, there was no way he could've come out of it without being affected by it. Those gashes and grisly scars weren't something you could just easily forget about.

"If you were attacked by werewolves, then shouldn't you technically be a werewolf?" I said without thinking. "I mean, isn't that what the lore says?"

"Technically speaking, yes," Gina answered for him. "But no, Roman isn't a werewolf. If he weren't an Immune, he would be."

"Didn't you say I am an Immune? What the hell is an Immune?"

I was starting to sound a little hysterical, but now even more questions were bubbling to my lips and I couldn't stop them.

"An Immune is someone who is born with the ability to withstand otherwise fatal attacks by creatures like werewolves and vampires, creatures known for posioning and or transforming their victims," Crowley said as he took a seat behind his desk. "Roman survived because he is an Immune. If Sinclair wasn't an Immune he would have died at the age of seven at the hands of a wraith. Gina wouldn't have made it past thirteen because of a jiangshi. We all have our stories concerning what happened to bring us to where we are today."

"And you would have died Friday night if you weren't an Immune," Detective Ayers told me without hesitation.

I lowered myself shakily into a seat and covered my face with my hands. I was trying to keep from bursting into tears or having a panic attack, but it was proving difficult.

My mind was swarming with everything Sinclair, Gina, Detective Ayers and Crowley had just told me, and I felt sick to my stomach. There was absolutely no way what they were saying could be the truth. It was just impossible.

I had just been attacked by some psycho in that alleyway. They were just spouting off nonsense. Detective Ayers probably just thought he had been attacked by some monster because his mind thought what had really happened to him was too horrific.

See? There were realistic explanations for everything they were talking about.

"And why am I supposed to believe you?" I asked, my voice sounding muffled by my hands. "Do you honestly expect me to believe everything that you're claiming is true?"

"We can't make you believe anything," Gina said. "We can only do our best to warn you of the dangers of what's out there."

"But I'm afraid we weren't kidding when we said you're involved now," Crowley interjected, making me drop my hands to stare at him. "From what we have been able to deduce, last Friday night you were attacked by one of Mitcham's men. We can only assume that this is why Mitcham has come out in the open to speak to you."

"Because one of his men tried to attack an Immune," Detective Ayers finished for him. "You'd have to be an absolute idiot to attack an Immune."

"And...what exactly was Mitcham's man?" I asked slowly, unsure.

I was still convinced that these people were all insane, but remembering that night...there was no way that thing was human.

"A vampire," Crowley said.

Oh. Of course. A vampire.

"Oh. Okay." I nodded in understanding. "A vampire. That makes sense."

"Come on, Holly." Sinclair nudged me with his elbow, making me look over at him. "There are inexplicable things in this world, that's true. But sometimes there are things you just have to accept."

I was on my feet before I knew what I was doing, gripping the sides of Sinclair's chair and getting right into his face.

"Okay, accepting the fact that I'm never going to know who my father is one thing," I said, my voice low, shaky, "but this? This? This is something I do not have to accept."

I glared down at Sinclair, just begging him to push me just a little further so I could really fly off the handle at him. But he didn't. He only looked at me with a sad expression in his eyes. I had only just met this man, but it was unusual, seeing his face not drawn into a laugh or a smile.

"Holly."

There was a gentle hand on my shoulder and I quickly turned to see Gina standing behind me.

"Come on, I'll take you home," she said, gesturing to the doors. "Let's go."

"Gina, I don't - " Detective Ayers started to say, but Crowley cut him off by holding up a hand.

"Let her go, Roman," he said with a stern look. "She'll be back."

If I had anything to say about it, I was never going to return to this place. Yet a small part of myself knew that I would be back here whether I liked it or not.

I quickly headed for the doors while Gina pulled on a coat and grabbed her bag off of one of the tables. She gave me a small smile as she walked over, opening one of the doors.

"Shall we?"

I was about to follow her out the door, but I stopped, turned back around.

"Thank you, Detective Ayers," I said awkwardly. "Sinclair. For...looking after me."

Sinclair tipped his fingers up in a casual gesture and said, "Call us anytime, babe."

I was walking beside Gina in the hallway before I heard from behind me, "Roman."

I glanced over my shoulder and saw Detective Ayers standing in the hallway, a blank look on his face.

"What?" I said.

"You can call me Roman."

"Okay..." I cleared my throat, glancing away from him. "Thank you, then, Roman."

"Well, you're certainly special," Gina said, shooting me a sly grin as we headed for the long, creepy dark staircase.

"What are you talking about?" I said, frowning.

"I'm talking about Roman," she told me, her grin widening. "He's never been call me Roman with anybody before."

"Uhm..."

"Take it as a compliment, girl." Gina laughed. "Any girl would trip over their feet to get up close with Roman."

I felt my face flooding with heat at her words and I very nearly tripped over my feet as we started walking up the dark staircase.

I had only had one serious relationship over the past couple of years. His name was Hayden O'Shea and we'd been together long enough for me to think that I was in love with him. Eventually, though, whatever spark we had in our relationship faded and we'd ended on amicable terms.

I was by no means looking for any other relationship, no matter how unbelievably gorgeous Roman Ayers was.

"Right," I said awkwardly. "I'll keep that in mind."

Gina owned a rather nice Honda Accord parked a few spots down from Detective Ayers's - Roman's - and we slid in. I gave Gina my address, and we took off.

The silence between us was actually not as awkward or uncomfortable as I was expecting. I had only just met Gina, but she seemed like the type of person I would easily become friends with. It was obvious that Roman, Crowley, and Sinclair all respected her. Out of all of them, I wouldn't mind listening to Gina speak, even if what she had to say was completely ludicrous.

"Say, Gina?" I said after we'd been driving for a few minutes. 

The quiet in the car was starting to make me feel itchy. 

"Hm?" Gina said distractedly, keeping her attention fixed on the road.

"Did you...I mean, did you ever find out who that girl was in that alleyway?" 

Gina glanced over at me with a small, sad smile. "Yeah. We did. Her name was Jessa Laurel. Seventeen. She was a senior at the Manhattan Academy."

Oh, God. She was so young. 

I leaned my head against the window and closed my eyes, just wanting to forget everything that had just occured. Vampires and werewolves and attacks, that poor girl, were making my head hurt. What I needed was sleep and to never have a conversation like that again.

Sleep made everything better, didn't it?

"Holly."

I came awake with a start and looked wildly around at Gina. "Huh?"

"We're here," Gina said, pointing a finger to the ramshackle building that served as my apartment complex.

"Oh. Thank you." I fought back a yawn as I yanked off my seatbelt, opened the door.

"No problem. Oh, and Holly?"

I glanced over my shoulder at Gina leaning towards me in her seat.

"Yeah?"

"Give it time, okay? I know it may not seem like it, but it'll all make sense eventually."

I really very much doubted that.

_______________________________________________________

And....last chapter for tonight! :D