Saturday morning had come pretty quickly. David was excited and nervous for the event tonight.

Karine had followed up their last meeting with a message giving the party's details. The gathering was more like a festival with all sorts of entertainment. There were going to be stage performances, a live band, and even a exhibition mixed martial arts competition. The attire was cocktail casual.

"What the hell type of dress code is that?," David thought to himself. He understood casual attire and he understood cocktail attire. He had no idea what the two combined meant.

A quick search on the internet and the dress code was slightly less ambiguous. He needed to dress nicer than he would at work and more casual than a cocktail party. Sounds like just wearing work clothes with a nice jacket to him.

The party was going to be mostly the Carmine Family's business employees and various business associates. That said, the Carmine Corporation had over twenty subsidiary businesses and approximately ten thousand employees. This business party was expected to have an attendance of around two thousand people. David had never been to a party that big.

He had also been confused about Karine's invite. At first, he had some sort of delusional thought that she was inviting him as her date. Then, he realized that this party was just a big business entertainment event probably to promote good relationships within the corporate environment. The party was going to run all evening. It started pretty early at 5:00 p.m. Food would be provided. The party was scheduled to go on until 2:00 a.m. David was fascinated by the length of the party. A nine hour party seemed to be a bit much.

At around 3:30 p.m., David started to get ready. The party was at the Carmine Estate just outside of the city. It would take about forty minutes to get to the party. David would need to get a cab at around 4:15 p.m. in order to make it to the party on time.

David had spent most of his Friday evening trying to look up pictures and information about the Carmine's estate. He had very limited success in finding good details. All he managed to get was the general information. Even with the little details, he felt like he was a kid going to an amusement park for the first time. Everything he had read online about the place made it sound outstanding. A few hundred acres of land, a mansion that had a ridiculous number of rooms, various ponds and gardens. It sounded sensational.

David could hardly contain himself as he exited his apartment building to hail a cab. It didn't take long before he was on his way to the party. The cab driver had looked at him funny when he told him where he was going, but David has just ignored him.

David had decided to take a cab instead of driving his beat up truck to the party. It would cost a good bit for the cab ride but it would be worth it. He could drink alcohol and relax a bit. He hadn't really done something exciting since he moved to the city. David had pretty much just worked all the time.

The cab ride was uneventful until they arrived at the gate to the estate. The gate was massive and was surrounded by what seemed like an endless, tall stone fence.

The security was pretty tight with about ten guards standing around at various locations at the gate. Oddly, David didn't notice any guns as the men stood about focused on their job. He had expected them all to be wearing guns. A well dressed guard walked up to the cab, bent over and spoke to the cab driver.

David had leaned forward in the seat to catch what the guard was saying, "If you aren't on the approved list, you can't enter the gate."

"Hold on, I should be on the approved list. David Knox." David spoke from the back seat.

"Mr. Knox, I can let you in but the cab can not pass the gate. I will have one of the guys ride you up to the party. I'm sure you understand security protocols," the guard replied after pausing with his hand to his ear for a few seconds. He must have been listening to an ear piece.

"No problem", David said quickly. He took out his wallet and dropped the taxi fee money to the cabbie with an nice tip.

Stepping out of the cab, David was ushered to the side by the guards.

"Hi, Mr. Knox. My name is Gavin. If you don't mind waiting a few minutes, we will send you in the shuttle up to the house. Could you please sit off to the side until then?"

"Sure", David said. What was he going to do argue with the guards? These guys all looked like professional soldiers. He went over to the side and set in a pretty nice outdoor lounge area to the side of the guard house.

Sitting down in the chair, David couldn't help but relax a bit. Most people would get aggravated from issues like the guards stopping them. David had never been bothered by the small stuff. As he sat there watching a few limos and cars pass through the gates with ease, he had to chuckle at himself for taking a cab for a 40 minute ride.

"Jackass", David thought about himself.

While sitting in the lounge chair, he couldn't help himself from eavesdropping on the conversation between the guards.

"I hope they let me go back to the house for the fights tonight. I heard they are going to let Atkins fight tonight. He made a promise to hold back so he won't hurt the other guy and I want to watch it", a tall guard said to another shorter guard.

"Ya, even if he holds back, nobody can match his skills," the smaller guy replied.

David sat and listened to the two guys chatting for around fifteen minutes until the guard, Gavin, walked back over.

"Mr. Knox, we can take you up to the house now. Another group has arrived that also needs to be brought to the house, you can tag along with them."

David got up from the lounge seat and made his way to the shuttle. The shuttle looked like a modified golf cart that could seat six people including the driver. As David walked up, he noticed two people standing with the group of guards. A man and a woman that both appeared to be in their twenties.

The guy was quick to introduce himself and his situation.

"Hey man, I guess you are another one like us that don't have an approved driver and vehicle. They had to take our car to be searched before they would let us in. It was going to take an hour for them to get to the search so they are gonna give us a ride up to the house and then park our car. Hi, I'm Jack Sidney. This is my wife, Claire. We both work marketing for Carmine MMA"

"Cool stuff, I heard the guards talking about the upcoming fight earlier and it sounded interesting", David responded to the man's casualness.

"My name is David Knox. I work with the Carmines on the new exhibit that they are donating to the zoo," David followed up with an introduction as he stepped toward the shuttle.

Getting into brief conversation on the shuttle ride to the house, David started to feel a little better about the party. Honestly, with all the security, he had always had this weird notion that the Carmine family was like a mob family or something. The Sidney couple had put his mind at ease on the issue. They were just normal people working for a normal business. Nothing really out of the ordinary.

At around 6:00 p.m, the cart pulled up at the house. David was instantly overwhelmed. The house was huge! Probably bigger than David's entire apartment building. It wouldn't have been bad except for the crowds of people scattered around the building.

"Looks like most of the event is outside," David said to himself while staring mouth open at the scene in front of him.

He must have just been standing there like an idiot cause he was tapped on the shoulder by Jack as the couple excused themselves from his company. Now, David was left standing alone in an unfamiliar place with an enormous crowd of people he didn't know.

After thinking for a minute, David quickly developed a plan. Find some food to eat, find Karine to say hi, and get the hell out of here. He had been excite about the party but now he was just too overwhelmed. It might have been aright if he wasn't by himself. His small town mentality was starting to come out and he didn't really like the large crowd.

David started walking around. In his travels around the estate, he could overhear people talking. It wasn't surprising to hear like words, like "senator", "president", and "million dollars", coming from these conversations. Important stuff. David felt out of place.

Then, David heard the crowd getting amped up in a particular direction from one of the garden areas. He decided to walk over to see what the fuss was about.

David walked up to see a large stage with two men absolutely brawling with each other. It didn't seem like a mixed martial arts expo, it seemed like two guys just standing there beating the shit out of each other.

Surprisingly, David managed to catch sight of Sonia, Karine's younger sister, standing near the cage where the match was being held. David decided to walk over to see if he could hunt down Karine.

After making his way through the crowd, he approached Sonia. At first, she didn't see him and David reached for her shoulder to give her a tap to let her know he was there. Before his hand could touch her, he was snatched up by a security guard when his hand was about a foot away from her.

"Damn," David thought,"this guy came out of nowhere."

Hearing the commotion right behind her, Sonia turned around with a smile on her face, "David, good to see you tonight. How are you?"

The guard let go of David's arm since Sonia was familiar with him before disappearing back into the crowd.

"A little lost," David responded,"I don't know as many people as you so I was just going to tell Karine hello and get out of here." A few of the people standing at Sonia's side looked at David funny. Like they were trying to figure out who he was and why he was so familiar with the Carmines.

"Oh", Sonia whispered to David, "Karine should still be inside. She doesn't really like crowds either, so she tends to hide away. Why don't you go over by the west garden near the food, Karine will probably come out of the house over there", Sonia followed in her rapid talk manner while pointing off in some random direction.

After chatting for another minute, David decided to make his way over to the food to possibly catch a glimpse of Karine. Maybe he could get two birds with one stone: food and Karine.

He had been at the party for almost 3 hours now and hadn't really done anything but walk around. Fixing his issue of a growling stomach, he had found the food and fixed himself a plate of goodies before strolling around some more. He never saw Karine by the foods though.

He was currently walking through a garden completely lost. He was just looking for a quite place to sit and eat when he realized that he had wondered off from the party. Oddly, the crowd was pretty nonexistent once you got away from the event areas and he was by himself strolling though this one particular garden while munching on his food.

When walking, David had a particular feeling wash over him all of a sudden. The feeling gave him the shivers. It was the feeling that he gets when he is in a nightmare. David instantly became on high alert looking and listening to the empty garden around him. What the hell was going on?

David was freaking out. Wasn't he awake? Why would it feel like a dream all of a sudden? What happened? He kept asking all kinds of questions to himself, but he didn't have any answers.

He was just standing still with a plate of food in his hand trying to calm himself like he had to do in his dreams. Then, he heard some voices coming from over the hedge in the garden.