Disclaimer: I do not own, nor claim to own any characters pertaining to the 2007-2008 TV series 'Moonlight'. All recognisable characters and texts belong to Ron Koslow and Trevor Munson.

Author's Note: If anyone wants a slight visual aid on what Robin is wearing at the beginning of this chapter, head over here: shoplook . io / outfit-preview/78690 (remove the spaces!). Unfortunately my go-to site Polyvore closed, but that is a pretty neat alternative (though I have not yet gotten the hang of it). Fortunately, the image of the dress includes the choker and the clutch that I felt she would have, so I did not have to hunt around for alternatives!

Reviews will be taken along to see Return to the Forbidden Planet.

The last event I had attended that required something a little more than 'smart-casual' attire was my graduation ceremony, closing three intense years of a degree followed by another year-long process of the PGCE course. Directly from this event, several friends had taken it upon themselves to arrange a dangerous foray in to the Brighton nightlife; several bars, and almost twice as many drinks later, we were giggling our way through a Subway as we made our merry way home. Despite the precautions I had taken – half a glass of Coca-Cola, half a glass of Red Bull and a packet of ready salted crisps – the hangover was enough to swear me off drinking for life. When I drank after that, I stuck to my limits – but standing in the foyer of the venue Julia had meticulously decorated (or, at the very least, supervised the procedure), I felt like I could down every available beverage in the vicinity.

Beside me, Lilia flourished. I had not known who to bring, in the hours of false contemplation I spent ignoring the obvious fact that I was going to go. The truth was, there were very few people I could invite; apparently, I was even more of a recluse here than I had been back home, and my steady circle of friends was limited to healthy exchanges with work colleagues and nothing more. The options, therefore, were few and far between; Guillermo, Mick, or Lilia. Since the first two were absolutely out of the question, I had text the latter a rather hurried mess of words detailing the event and even though Lilia insisted that she owed me, I pressed that I would 'very much appreciate the company'. I could have come alone, and in hindsight embracing a strange, almost-friendship with a freshie was not the best of ideas if I wanted to stay out of Josef's line of sight, even his peripheral vision if I could help it.

"I love parties," she smiled sideways as we walked in. The dubious guest of honour had not yet arrived, and after quickly taking stock of the room I felt immediate relief that neither Beth nor her cameraman were either. It was, however, Lilia's next words that lit the fire once more; we took advantage of the free welcoming champagne (I had sensibly arranged a taxi, although was slightly uneasy at the distinctive lack of a quick getaway) and moved to an empty space near the back of the room. "My boss is having one later this week, and I really do owe you for the lift the other day. Would you like to come?" Swallowing, then immediately coughing on the overly generous mouthful I had mistakenly taken, I hurriedly sought to regain my composure. Lilia looked far too engrossed at the bright lights and constant chattering to have taken much notice of my hiccup, to which I sought thanks to Lady Luck. Several times early on I attempted to steal a glance at her wrist, the one she had obsessively cradled at the supermarket, but there was nothing to suggest a vampire had sunk his fangs in to her skin; in fact, the girl was miles from her timid persona I had first encountered her with.

I did not really have much time to consider the offer, and found myself spluttering out "Yes, of course – I would love to." When, in actual fact, I would rather have been forced to watch Twilight on repeat until my eyes bled. There was absolutely no way I would be able to hide anything in that close a vicinity, and no way he would not take the opportunity to study me further. I could not be in two places at once, but between the party and making sure Beth discovered the truth, I would much rather be at home, hiding, locking the door and all the windows and barricading myself in my bedroom until morning. It certainly occurred to me that I was being ridiculously overdramatic, and that the absolute worst that could happen would be Josef sussing me out with a simple look – which was impossible, as I knew that not a single thing in the world would tempt me to revealing just how much I knew about him, about Sarah, and his entire community as a whole. I could have a single drink as to not stand out further, and then blend myself in to whatever party scene befell his home. The show had never revealed anything like it, but when I thought about it, gingerly taking another careful sip of champagne, it felt pretty perfect for the vampire. I shuddered nervously, but despite the increasing unease I straightened myself, at least attempting to look like I belonged here. In truth, I had painfully little to discuss with anyone.

"I never actually asked what you do," the freshie peered at me from under sooty lashes. Her eyes occasionally made waves of the room, as if she were looking for someone in particular. "Sorry, I'm not being very polite, am I?" She chuckled, her glossy lips stretching in to a smile behind her glass.

"I teach at LACC." I replied. Definitely needed more alcohol.

Her eyes grew like saucers. "You mean the local college with that crazy professor?" The words drew an automatic grimace as I nodded candidly. There was not a whole lot else I could offer her, there; I had a feeling that this was going to be a regular occurrence whenever someone asked me about what I did for a living. People would now care less about the joys of teaching teenagers and young adults, and more about the married Professor who was sleeping with his students, and his creepy assistant who freely endorsed killing those who got in the way. "Did you ever speak to him?"

It was not that I found her annoying – indeed, if I had, I never would have asked her to come with me. Very few people were privy to what happened at the diner, and Chloe had been unconscious at the time I had used Daniel's name. Nobody had questioned either story, but the thought of it still send shivers up my back. "A couple of times, if that. I replaced Daniel as a TA for a single class, but the rest of the time, as I am now, I was shut away in the Literature departments." She offered a low whistle – was she impressed? Or merely unnerved? Either way, she continued in earnest.

"What made you come to America? Your accent is a dead giveaway."

Balls.

"I suppose I wanted to push myself. I taught for a couple of years back home, then decided I wanted a change of scenery. That's literally it – I am fairly boring, in that respect." No whimsical tale of running from a sudden death or abusive partner; no humiliation or loss. The excuse I gave seemed the most believable, unless something terrible had happened in this universe. I had ended up dead in a river, after all.

At any rate, Lilia believed me; at least, there were no signs to the contrary. She finished her glass. Still pacing my way through my own, I took my chance.

"What do you do?"

Without missing a beat, Lilia grinned: "I'm a PA. One of many," she rolled her eyes as if to suggest she would much rather it be just her. Of that, I had no doubt. "But it's brilliant pay, my boss – Mr. Kostan – he takes good care of anyone who works for him. So long as you do your job, of course." She nodded assertively, and I swallowed another mouthful to abate my nerves. Absolute bullshit; yes, I believed from his behaviour on the show that he took immense care of anyone under his 'private' collection of freshies, or in fact any others, but she most certainly was not a personal assistant. Not in that way. She probably did do something, but no sooner had I thought that did I recall the tight harem sunbathing and playing in the pool in the background of his first introductory scene. No boss I had ever known would have allowed me to get away with that. Suspicions all but confirmed, I moved the conversation swiftly onwards – which was not hard, as one apt blonde reporter chose that moment to enter the building.

"I think I'd rather like to stay out of any media interviews," I glanced at Lilia as we trailed our way to the bar. She was still buzzing, but not in a ridiculously shameful way; she genuinely seemed at home in a social environment, and despite my teaching background I was the complete opposite. It took a lot to hold a conversation outside of the classroom, and half the time I simply wanted to resort to discussing novels and their authors.

I very nearly had heart failure when Lilia produced a crisp note from a tight wad kept firmly in her purse. She had not even asked, yet once the exchange was complete she pushed another drink in to my free hand and I felt under a strange, unspoken pressure to hurriedly finish my first. "Thank you," I answered, trying not to choke as I did. At least this one looked more like gin, I sniffed, placing my empty glass down at the bar behind us. "I'll get the next one."

"No problem! I really do owe you," and then, as if she had shamefully forgotten, "oh, I know her! She presents Buzzwire, doesn't she?" Perfectly manicured fingernails tapped at the edge of her bulbous stemmed glass, the ice rattling against the movement. "Beth… Turner?"

Oh, fantastic. I bristled. "I think so." When, in fact, I knew very well so. Beth's arrival was timed to near-perfection; somewhere in the background, there was a rouse of cheers as the guest of honour followed a prim-perfect brunette through the crowd to the centre of the room. They were inches from us, but I could feel the cold air and the hairs once again on the back of my neck; this was nothing like watching him through the safety of a screen. He had killed people. Made it look like suicide. What came incredibly close to that was his ability to read people. When he was younger, his sloppy arrogance had resulted in his capture, but years behind bars had given Lee Jay Spaulding an unwavering edge; the simple way he walked could never be mistaken for arrogance now. It was pure confidence. Like he believed his own lie – the real monster, the real culprit, was the vampire he was determined to frame. I was a terrible liar, and most of the time unless I tried particularly hard every emotion I had was painted over my face for the world to see. My 'teacher face', universally dubbed, was a mask, but I had never been able to bring that in to the real world.

"He's not bad looking, is he?" Lilia offered, craning her neck. We were both short, but he was incredibly hard to miss. "Maybe it's just that wounded hero thing, given that he never did anything wrong." Did she honestly believe…? I could not truly blame her, or indeed judge her for her opinions; Julia had done a spectacular job of influencing the public's image of Lee Jay and had almost everyone convinced that he had been framed – right down to the constant reminder of his actions towards charities in prison. She looked at me, and my face must have been a picture because she immediately laughed and patted me on the arm. "I'm kidding. Really. It's not exactly unheard of that prisoners get framed for things they didn't do. I'm just amazed this one has such a high media coverage." I glanced at her warily, noting how steadily close Julia was becoming. The only consolation for this moment when Julia's eyes locked in to us was that, in a few days, he would be dead. There was a lot of grief and damage to get through until that moment, but nobody died. Except him, and his delightful thugs. Somehow, I could not rationalise feeling bad about that.

"Thank you for coming," Julia was all smiles as she led Lee Jay to the space before us. In his arms, he held a few glossy hardbacks of his own memoir. Lilia couldn't stop looking between them, and Lee Jay's unsettling smirk hovered on us both. "I'm sorry if I was a little forward, but I really wanted Lee Jay to know how much people support him."

"Of course," I said, moving the glass to my left hand as I extended the other towards the murderer, thankfully stationed directly in front of Lilia and not myself. "I'm Robin, and this is Lilia. It's wonderful to finally meet you." Julia positively glowed at my words; she really did think I meant it. Lee Jay enclosed his hand around mine and shook it, holding it no longer than a few seconds before he let it go. Those few seconds were the single most tense I had ever felt since being here; in that moment, the air had stilled, grown cold, and the audible noise was suddenly like listening to something underwater. As soon as I had my hand back everything returned to normal, or at the very least as normal as it could be, but I could not ignore the rate in which my heart skyrocketed as he smiled down at me.

"Lee Jay Spaulding. I really do appreciate you being here." With an effortless flick of his hands he produced a pen from inside his suit pocket, flipped open the first page of a hardback and scribbled inside. The first he handed to Lilia, who, credit to her, held her head as high as it was possible to given the height difference and graciously accepted. The girl was most definitely the complete opposite to my rather frank impressions of freshies; she held herself very well. When he handed me my own, I could only briefly hold my gaze to the image on the cover, as I balanced it along with my glass.

"Thank you. I can't wait to read it." Somewhere in the background I caught sight of Mick, holding a flimsy looking folder in his hand as he spoke in an urgent hushed voice to Beth. Julia must have seen them as she turned, and positively bouncing on her feet she tapped Lee Jay's arm.

"Beth's here!" Clearly, they had discussed the matter of a film crew, and indeed who Beth was, beforehand, but there was no hiding the way the corners of his mouth grew spectacularly at the sight of the private investigator. "Please, enjoy the evening." The two of them took off towards the others, and I finally managed to breathe. It did not phase me that I had not managed to even hoarsely choke out a goodbye; they were gone, and the air was clear, but my hand still felt warm and stung irritably. I immediately felt sick, and my grip on the autobiography tightened; I did not even want to look at it.

"Is that…Mick St. John?" Lilia's soft, bright voice did not wholly break my trance, but it was enough to switch my gaze away from the tense introductions taking place a few feet away. "Ooh, what a small world." I didn't ask her what she meant; I knew, and in any case, despite her infectious friendliness, I was not entirely sure she would explain. There was understandably a certain degree of discretion to be had by freshies, otherwise they would find themselves worrying less about their jobs and more so their lives.

Quickly I finished the gin, finding the savoury raspberry aftertaste uncomfortably like fruit juice and therefore incredibly easy to digest at an alarming rate. Lilia did not notice; she was mimicking the Cheshire Cat, lips spread wide between each small mouthful of her own beverage. Between the group disbanding and Lee Jay making his way to the central podium I swiftly acquired another gin, carefully making note of just how much alcohol I was ingesting. Sensibly, I requested a water, and downed the glass in one, passing the empty tumblr back to a bewildered looking barman. With a smile I faced the podium, hoisting the book under my arm and keeping my head low enough to avoid being in Mick's line of sight. From the brief glance I took, he was far too talking to Beth anyway.

"I don't care who they are, or how tough they think they are. You look them straight in the eye and you say: 'I'm better than you. I'm stronger than you. And I'm going to win.'"

Lee Jay's words echoed in my mind as he left the podium. As had many others, I had been utterly fixated; whether he truly had been before or not, there was simply no mistaking that this man was a gifted orator. One glance to my right showed me that Lilia thought the same; her eyes were wide, her jaw lax and partially open, even though the speech had ended.

"Well," she spoke eventually; I switched my gaze between her and Mick, who was making an unmistakably dire run for the bathroom. "If this book is anything like he speaks in person, I can't wait to read it." She hesitated, taking a sip of her drink.

I swallowed nervously again as Lilia announced she was heading to the bathroom. Taking stock of the room, I temporarily relieved her of her drink and pressed my back against a pillar. It had not taken Lee Jay long to follow after Mick, leaving Julia's side for the first time all evening with a cleverly placed kiss atop her head. Something unsettling grew in the pit of my stomach. I placed Lilia's drink down on a side table and readjusted the position of my clutch and the book so they both held as comfortably as possible in my free hand. With my other, I took a long, heavy mouthful of saffron-infused gin and tried not to think about what was happening in the restrooms.

All anyone was talking about was how enigmatic he was; if there was anything else, I could not make it out, not that I was straining particularly hard to hear. I irritated myself, in that instance – wanting so bad to be a part of this universe, becoming a part of it, and then dilly-dallying on the fence about whether or not I should move across state and simply allow nature to take its course. Except, because of me, Chloe was alive, and I had to take that as a positive no matter how much guilt swelled around the memory. Seeing something and being there, however, were entirely different things. I was safer at home on the sofa with my then best friend Rosie, watching episode after episode, gushing in a humiliating fashion over who was decisively more attractive. Here, despite my flimsy knowledge on what exactly had taken place to bring me here, I was very much so in danger; even if I had woken up in a morgue it would not take a great deal to end me back there – and if that happened, it was incredibly probable I would not be afforded a second chance.

I had shaken the man's hand and allowed his eyes to bare in to mine, and even if that realistically meant nothing, paranoia wormed its way in and I felt as if he could read my mind – as if I had given something detrimental away, and he knew it, and what's worse was I felt as if I could see the cogs turning away in the back of his mind as he added me to another list of people that needed to be dealt with. None of this was true, of course, and possibly the only vampire currently in the city (that I was remotely aware of in this moment) capable of even guessing at there being something amiss was Josef, and I had rather foolishly agreed to accompany Lilia to one of his 'parties'.

Taking a shallow breath, I nodded towards the table as Lilia returned and reclaimed her drink. She spoke in a hurried tone about what she had overheard whilst in one of the cubicles; something about one of the guests, or what they had pointed out to the individual in question, and how Lilia had been trying "so, so hard" not to giggle uncontrollably. "It just reminded me of someone at work," she breathed, wiping away the tiny molecules of salty water. "So funny. Rather like being back at high school."

It felt like an exaggeration, as Lilia was barely nineteen by the look of her. I did not say anything, but it reinforced my belief that Josef had a thing for keeping younger, more vulnerable freshies around. If I asked why, I would probably be answering my own question. "I bet you have as many office stories as I do of students," I replied, eyes trained in the direction of the bathrooms. It did not take long – as Lilia moved to respond, eyes still glistening from laughter, Lee Jay's fiery tone reverberated around the room, enough to still the noise level in an instant.

"Somebody help! Please! Somebody help!"

Photographers were there in an instant, piling around frantically as Julia rushed over. Bile rose in my throat.

"Oh my God…" To my surprise, Lilia did not gravitate with the crowd towards the commotion; she remained by my side, one hand holding fast the book to her chest. My own were trembling; the tightness grew unforgivingly against my glass and I had to force myself to stay calm – or to try and calm down. Just a little; it took far too much energy to do that alone as Mick pushed past the crowd. Everyone was far too focused on them to care much about anyone else.

The noise level did not grow, but it buzzed unforgivingly, like a heavy, vibrating white noise. Every nerve in my body stood on end. I could hear my heart thudding in my chest and blood pounding in my ears; my vision blurred drastically, as if I were looking through a fish-eye lens. Breathe. Remember to breathe. Sweat beaded along my forehead and chest. Toes tingled as I tried to move. Circulate. Move. Breathe. People were pushing. I can't have eyes everywhere. Fists tightened. Breathe, Robin. Just breathe.

"Hey, Robin? Are you alright?"

I swallowed, breathing coming in short, fast bursts. Trying to focus on her line of sight was so damn hard and I couldn't stop shaking. I needed – wanted – to be sick. No, no you don't, Robin. Just breathe.

"I think I just need some fresh air." Where in the Hell that had come from I didn't know, but Lilia did not question it. She began to lead me through the crowd after abandoning our drinks, some of whom were turned in to complete strangers frantically discussing what had just happened, even after the main guests in question had departed. Breathe. Just breathe. I felt horrendously sick, even as we pushed open the doors and fled to the side of the gathering crowds. I saw Mick discussing something with Beth as Julia piled Lee Jay in to a car, saw him look up for just a fraction of a second as our eyes met for the briefest of moments. I did not hold my gaze to find out if his lingered; I needed to get some space. My palms were sweaty and it felt awkward holding the book as the sleeve slipped uncomfortably between my fingers.

"What happened?" She asked once we were clear of the crowd. I didn't want to look up; she was in front of me, but if I looked directly at her I could easily see Mick in my peripheral vision, and I knew he kept stealing me glances. Breathe. Nothing is amiss.

"I'm not sure," I replied slowly, leaning against the cold brick exterior of the building. "That hasn't happened in a while. I used to get panic attacks a lot as a teenager, but I thought I'd worked through them." Whilst I knew what had caused mine, I didn't feel as if I could tell her. I could not tell anyone. Nobody else knew what he really was in that room aside from Mick, and he could look after himself. God, I feel sick.

"I don't have work until the afternoon tomorrow, but if everyone else has gone we can too, if you like?" I don't know why I was alarmed at her understanding; she had been nothing but friendly and kind, and those were partly the reasons I had invited her in the first place.

Nodding, I pushed myself off the wall, taking time to straighten myself as blood continued to pound fiercely in my ears. "Are you okay getting home?" The freshie nodded eagerly.

"Yeah, I'm good. Besides, my boss will kill me if I show up with a hangover." She grinned sheepishly, as if she were making a joke I could not possibly understand. Naturally I did, but I offered a chuckle at best.

As I climbed in to my own taxi, leaving Lilia will a one-armed embrace and a promise from her to text me the time and place of the gathering (I swallowed another lump that threatened to expand in to a subsequent panic attack at the thought of Josef's 'party'), I resisted the urge to look forwards; I felt eyes on me, despite Lilia having grabbed the taxi behind mine, and I climbed awkwardly in to the backseat, rapidly closing the door before anything could happen; the last thing I needed was Mick questioning my attendance, or indeed any conversation with vampires at all.

You're safe. Just breathe.