I am speechless, paused with my knife held mid-air.

"I know it's a lot to take in," Zach continues. "But, we also know that you are aware of what he is. We witnessed you running away from him last night."

"Good call by the way." The one called Caleb smirks at me.

"Anyway," Zach spares him a look of disdain before turning back to me. "We have been tracking him for months, unable to get near. Henry Delgado is very smart and he knows what we look like now. Last night was the closest we have managed to get in a long time, while he was distracted in the alleyway. But then you appeared and we lost our chance."

"Well I'm sorry I ruined your murder plan," I deadpan.

"That's okay." Zach clearly doesn't understand sarcasm. "But now we have finally found a weakness of his, namely you, we can get him."

"Hold up!" I interject before my brain explodes, finally placing the knife back in the drawer. "You want me to help you kill Henry? You're vampire hunters? How many of you are there?"

The two of them exchange a look and Zach sighs in exasperation. "I should have known she would be chatty," he says to Caleb, before turning back to me. "The world as you know it may be about to change. Maybe you should sit down?"

I fold my arms across my chest and refuse to move.

"Very well, have it your way." Zach leans against the kitchen counter, clearly frustrated at my stubbornness. "Yes, we are vampire hunters. We come from an elite organization that deals in the removal of mythical creatures. These beings are extremely dangerous and need to be exterminated, something which you should have realised last night."

"Mythical creatures? As in other than vampires?"

"Yes," Caleb answers me. "Werewolves, banshees, weepers-,"

"Unicorns?" I smile, thinking how crazy this all sounds. Yesterday my life was so normal. Now the guy I'm dating is a vampire and two random men, dressed in all black combat gear, have broken into my apartment late at night.

I don't even remember auditioning for a role in one of those vampire movies.

Zach frowns at me. "Don't be ridiculous."

"Yeah, unicorns are friendly and pleasant, why would we hunt them?" Caleb smiles, I honestly can't tell if he's joking or not. I'm leaning towards the former though.

"Caleb," Zach warns. "Can we get back to the issue at hand? When are you seeing Henry again?"

"I'm not sure." I shrug, secretly hoping the answer to that is never. "I've seen him twice already this weekend."

"And so? Isn't it fairly common for a boyfriend and girlfriend to spend an entire weekend together?" The way he says it makes me think he honestly has no idea how much time is appropriate to spend with your significant other.

"He's not really my boyfriend," I mumble, slightly offended by the insinuation. "We've just been going on dates."

Caleb raises his eyebrows, clearly he doesn't believe me. "How long have you known him?"

"A few weeks,"

"And yet," Zach frowns again: I'm beginning to think it might be a permanent fixture on his face. "You didn't notice anything weird about him?"

"Well I'm sorry. I didn't realize I live in a world where things like this exist. Werewolves and banchees and what not!"

"Banshees," Caleb throws in.

"Excuse me?" I turn to him.

"They are called Banshees not banchees."

I roll my eyes, starting to get fed up with these two strange men. "Like there's a difference."

"Do you even know what they-,"

"Enough, both of you. Let's discuss a game plan," Zach gets back to business. "Peyton we don't need much from you, just a distraction. Bait, if you will."

"You want to use me as bait!" I exclaim. "What if he kills me?"

"He won't kill you," Caleb says.

"How do you know that?"

"Because despite what he is," Caleb curls his lip in disgust, "he really does love you."

"Besides," Zach adds, "if he didn't then you would already be dead by now."

Well that's reassuring.

"I think," I pause, what I had been about to say gets lost under the weight of everything I have learnt. My exhaustion kicks in, my eyes tired and itchy, my head feels sore from all this added information that I can barely believe. "I think I need to go to bed," I finish off, hoping they will take the hint and leave.

"Peyton, we need to get this plan nailed down now. There might not be another chance. Naomi could be back any minute." Zach grabs my arm, trying to stress his point. I don't even bother to ask how he knows about Naomi; these two seem to be really clued up. It would be beyond creepy under other circumstances. But right now, their knowledge of me and my roommate is pretty low on my list.

"Look Zach, in the last forty-eight hours; I have seen the guy I'm dating kill someone, realised he's a vampire, had two oddly dressed strangers in my house asking to help kill him and found out that such thing as Banshees and Reapers exist." I hold up my fingers as I list off all these events.

"Weepers," Caleb corrects me, his ever-present smirk on his face. I give him a cold look, wondering if he would still be smiling if I punched him.

"Excuse me, if I need a little time to process everything that has happened," I continue as though I wasn't so rudely interrupted. "And maybe get some much needed sleep."

"We are not oddly dressed. This is hunter's gear, specially designed material that is bullet proof, yet light as cotton." Zach sniffs, clearly unimpressed that I have criticized his sense of style.

"Whatever, man." I'm not in the mood to apologize to him. "Just let me go to bed. I become a raging bitch when I'm grumpy and trust me you don't want to deal with that."

"I can see it already," Caleb chuckles, earning himself a death stare from both me and Zach this time. "I'm going to wait in the car, I think." And with that he turns around, but instead of going to the front door, he heads into the lounge. I follow him out of the kitchen and watch as he opens the window and jumps out of it.

"Fine, Peyton," Zach sighs as though it is extremely difficult for him to be so lenient with me. "Have your rest. We will be here in the morning. Try and make sure your roommate does not catch on to any of this. It is very dangerous information to know." He begins to walk towards the same window Caleb had just disappeared through.

"In that case," I call after him. "You may want to wear normal clothes, perhaps jeans?"

The last thing I see is his scowl as he exits the apartment.

As I get into bed later I am trying to calm myself down, taking deep breaths and counting to ten. I'm attempting to be rational about all this.

Fuck rational! Vampires and Werewolves and freaking unicorns!

Okay, so I still don't know about the unicorn thing for sure. Caleb seems like the type to make a joke out of everything, the same way I try to.

Hunters showing up at my house in weird combat uniforms, asking for my help to kill Henry and then jumping out of my window.

I am far too fixated on the fact that they exited through the window instead of the front door. But, it's weird. We live on the second floor; surely they must have hurt themselves when they landed? It also makes me think that I need to get burglar bars, as first Henry and then Zach and Caleb entered my apartment through there.

I'm feeling beyond confused, my head spinning with all the new revelations. Isn't this exactly what I had wanted? Didn't I lie in this same spot last night, wanting to know more about what Henry is and how I could stop him? Now, killing him seems very extreme.

He's murdered thousands of people; he will murder thousands more if he isn't stopped. He needs to be put down.

Can't they stop him without killing him? Isn't there like a vampire jail or like a mythical creature's jail where they could lock him up?

A mythical creature's jail? You sound absurd.

Yeah well, there's an elite group of hunters, an organization that deals with killing mythical creatures. Yesterday, I would have thought that was absurd. Hell, I would have thought even the use of the word 'vampire' would be strange, now it seems to be added to every sentence of mine.

Arguing with myself isn't helping and it's certainly not calming me down. I need a good night's sleep and then tomorrow, when I am rested, I can deal with all of this.

But of course, with all these thoughts running through my brain, sleep is easier said than done.

¤

As predicted, I didn't sleep last night, tossing and turning while thoughts whirled around my head. Every time I managed to close my eyes, I saw Henry's crimson eyes watching me. I lay awake, staring at the ceiling, deciding on my next move.

I'm just preparing my third cup of coffee for the day, when I hear a voice behind me. "I will have a cup if you're making."

I scream and throw my mug in the direction it came from, my heart racing. Coffee granules go flying through the air, sprinkling to the floor. Caleb catches the cup easily with his left hand from the kitchen doorway, as though he was prepared for it.

He walks over and hands it back to me, placing it in my shaking hands. "You really need to stop throwing stuff at me, Jennings."

"You really need to stop pitching up uninvited at my house," I pause, not knowing his surname.

"Calloway," he smiles, immediately understanding. "It's Calloway."

"Your name is Caleb Calloway?" It's my turn to grin; the alliteration of his name is kind of sweet.

"Yeah, so?" The smile slips off his face for a second, and then slides straight back on. "I take mine black with two sugars. Zach just has milk. See you in the lounge." And with that he walks out of the kitchen, leaving me to grumble my way through making them coffee and cleaning the mess on the floor.

Narcissistic tool.

I walk through, carrying three mugs of coffee on a tray, to find them sprawled out in my lounge. Zach sits in the dark blue arm chair, his feet up on the coffee table, his hands folded in his lap. Caleb has taken up one of our brown leather couches, his head on the arm rest, his legs dangling over the other side. When he sees me, he adjusts his position so he is sitting up.

Just make yourselves at home why don't you?

I place the tray on the table and hand out their coffees, which they take without even a thank you.

How rude.

Even though it's petty, I'm kind of hoping they take a sip straight away and burn their mouths with the boiling liquid. Sadly, I'm disappointed to see that they both blow on it first. Looks like Karma's not on my side this time.

"Right." I stay standing, unwilling to sit next to either of them. "You want my help to kill Henry?"

They both nod their assent. Zach opens his mouth to speak but I cut him off.

"I have one condition," I tell them. I had decided on it last night when I couldn't sleep.

"Well tell us what it is and we will do our best to be accommodating," Zach says. I can tell that he really means it and will at least try to help me. Of course, he doesn't know what it is yet.

"I want to be a hunter, like you guys."