Title From Ev'ry Depth of Good and Ill Part 1/3

RatingAdult

PairingsSamOFCDean

Genre Angst, Suspense,

SpoilersThrough season 2 – all involving Henderson

Word Count 7,700

Summary Dean, Sam and a girl that turns out to be a bit psychotic.

Warnings Sex, violence, blood, gore, loose morals, knife play, child abuse, unapologetic homicide and apple pie.

Part one is SamOFC lovin', however there is some good DeanOFC smut in part two.


The Harvest moon is hanging fat, blood-red and dripping from the late fall sky. Ethne's just finished up with a task of her own, making her way through the thick, silent forest. Out of the wilderness and back into the real word. There's a steadying diatribe coursing through her head, speaking to the need for justice where there often is none. The only sound is her heartbeat, thumping in her ears, blood rushing to her cheeks in the night air. Nimble movement through brush and downed trees, dancing in the moon-drenched night with her own demons and skirting on the edge of mayhem. The satisfaction sought still elusive, leaving an itch in her gut. Emotions all together unfamiliar, the same numb, impassive thoughts on automatic replay but the need has yet to be satisfied.

It's supposed to be a easy double-back, she ran the route herself several times, dry runs just after dark making sure she'd be able to lug 200 pounds to her destination, the return, previously factored in all possible scenarios, should be uneventful. That is until she passes the desolate graveyard. It's still the early hours of the morning before the sun has even dared to think of rising. She's a couple hundreds yards out from the clearing, the smell of smoke distinct in the chilling air. She pauses, boots crunching into the thin layer of the season's first premature snow. The chance that anyone would be in the old Appalachian cemetery is so improbable she can't help but snake through the underbrush to see for herself.

She watches the two men from a distance, silent in the shadows as they stand over a grave, flames rising in licking arches up from earth. It's obvious they've dug up the body themselves, fresh piles of soil and shovels. Whatever they're up to, their committed, the ground is hard and half –frozen now, must have taken them half a night of digging to the find the prize.

The ache in her gut returns with a sharp pulse, two of them alone, in the middle of nowhere. It would be perfect if it wasn't so impulsive, but there is no plan and therefore no actions, Not tonight. She's moving forward before she stop herself, because perhaps they saw her on her first trip, maybe they've watched her in the distance at some point in the night.

She saunters between headstones, eyeing both men still oblivious to her presence. "It's a bit cold out for grave desecration isn't it?"

They both freeze, both sets of wide eyes focusing on her at the same time. The taller one of the two taking a step toward her, that in turn causes her to retreat a matching step. "We're were just…" he holds his hands out as a peace offering, but doesn't finish his sentence.

"Burning the remains of a man that died a hundred and fifty years ago?"

"We're with the wildlife service." The shorter man speaks up, "We're handling a…situation."

"I doubt that."

"What are you doing out here by yourself?"

"Hiking." She shrugs the rug sack off her shoulder, the bulk of it swinging into her hand.

It is a plausible explanation, She doesn't ask anymore questions and they don't push with anymore questions.

When she walks back into the woods, all three of them assume it's the last they'll see of each other.

--.--

How Ethne came to be with them is a tale so convoluted and elaborate that not any one of them remembers all the specifics.

Sam remembers the random details. They found a second job in the small town, keeping them there long after they'd wished to leave. He and Dean were tracking a Ker; a death spirit that was particularly nasty. It was a female, characteristically aggressive – all fangs and talons there to carry of the dead to the underworld. They'd followed it's trail to Washington, sorted out it was after a George Walker the owner of a logging company. Ethne is in the wrong place at the wrong time. The ultimate altercation happens in a diner where she's having supper and Sam knocks her to floor, a move that ends up saving her life.

She's tall, almost as tall as Dean. A sort of elegant lankiness that makes her appear fluid and purely feminine. Bright pale-blue eyes, wide and big that are out of context with her olive skin and dark hair that waves well past her shoulder blades. The perfect symmetry of her face is startling, soft nose – button slope above the lips of Angelinafucking Jolie.

When she mentions she could use a ride, Dean nearly chokes on his own tongue trying to extend the offer, because as he puts it "fucking look at her dude, I'd give my right nut to see her lips wrapped about my-"

"Dean!"

"It's true."

Sam doesn't' t put up much of a fight, deep down he really can't imagine the harm in being able to stare at her for little while, because Dean's observation is crude but he's right.

Day 2

Ethne sits across from Sam and Dean in the middle of her booth, dragging a fork through forgotten mash potatoes.

"Vampires?"

"Yup." Sam nods.

"Werewolves?"

"Yup." Sam agrees again,

"Mermaids?"

"God, I hope so." Dean shakes his head and sips at a steamy cup of coffee.

"But, real vampires, as in drinking blood and fangs vampires?"

"Well they're not actually fangs" Sam offers.

"More like this second set of teeth that comes down" Dean watches as she sits back, taking it all in. If he'd know she was this impressed with his job he would have started to share war stories two states back.

"How do you kill them? Stake to the heart?"

"Well…" Sam hesitates trying to come up with a more tactful way of putting it, but Dean jumps in first.

"Cut off their heads." Dean grins lopsided attempting his coffee again.

"No way." She blinks a few times, and sighs "That is so…incredible. What do you use? Machete, sword, razor wire?"

"Razor wire?" Dean balks momentarily "Machetes mostly, although there was this one time, there was a saw mill and-"

"Dean" Sam cuts him off, visibility irritated.

"Right, that whole incident is a sore spot for Sammy here."

"Have you ever kill one Sam?" She makes no attempt to shield the way she says his name with extra sugar in her voice.

"I don't really like to talk about it."

"That's very Vietnam veteran of you." She nods, completely serious. "I think I want to stick with you guys for a while. Would you mind?"

"Yeah right" Dean chuckles, stopping awkwardly when he realized she's serious.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. We can't just pick up girls , no matter how-"

"Sure." Sam injects loud and final, while Deans stares in confusion.

"Really?" She smiles, biting her lower lip and Sam feels the knot in his stomach.

"Yeah, if you really want to, you're more than welcome."

"She is?" Dean cocks his head, questioning in his own way.

"Well that's settled then, I think this could be the beginning of something really…interesting." Ethne pays for lunch, and a thermos full of fresh caffeine and Dean walk a little lighter.

And that's that.

--.--

Ethne is brilliant. A sort of scary-smart that fascinates Sam and unnerves Dean. Sometimes she strings words together in a kind of poetic vividness that normal speech normally doesn't tolerate.

Then there's the random knowledge, obscure tidbits that range from auto parts to philosophy. While in a diner in South Dakota, she explains in vibrant detail how one goes about performing an emergency tracheotomy with nothing but a hollowed out pen and a jackknife. By the time she gets to the 'midline vertical incision dividing strap muscles', no one finishes their supper.

In Baltimore she recites from memory a historical article from the New York Times about hanging in the Middle Ages. It had quite thoroughly covered the most gruesome details and false ideas about the practice that circulated around year 1100. Apparently, the way to go was to simply hope your neck snapped straight away, any other variation would result in a slow and drawn out death.

Ethne and Sam have in depth conversations that make Dean want to put a bullet in his brain. He'll turn up the music loud enough that he can hardly think, as a result Sam simply sits in the back seat with her, and continues talking about topics that make Dean's ears bleed.

According to scientific studies, a rat's performance in a maze can be improved by playing music written by Mozart.

Medical research has found substances in mistletoe that can slow down tumor growth.

It's illegal to own a red car in Shanghai, China.

She went to the best schools, freshman year at Harvard studying the "great American novel", a semester at the University of Michigan where she gained a new understanding of movement science, then a two year nondescript foray into archaeology somewhere over seas. In the end all it seems is that she ends up with no degree and haphazard knowledge that occasionally comes in handy.

Ethne is eccentric, or as Dean put's it after the first week "She's a fucking loony". The first month she's with them her road kill obsession surfaces it's the oddest thing either of them have ever heard of. Every time they pass a squished cat or a splattered deer she cranes her neck, something close enough to a grin passing over her face. It's enough to make them shutter.

On one of the back roads in northern Michigan they find what looks like a massacre. A deer run that crosses a winding part of the main road and there are plenty casualties littering the way. "Please Dean, can we stop…Please." Despite Dean's better judgment he does stop because the phrase please Dean is something he's always been a sucker for.

"This is a fucking joke" Dean mumbles as he pulls the impala to the side of the road.

Sam and Dean watch as she tugs a sweatshirt over her head while inspecting the rotting corpse.

"Wow, will you look at this?" She looks more to Sam, and gestures back to the mangled body.

"Yeah" Sam nods hesitantly and cringes when she hunches down to get a better look.

"See the way the neck is snapped back like that? It happened quick and head on, the skin doesn't usually split like that." She moves around the body, eyes lighting up like a kid in a candy store, it's all enough to make a guy sick.

She's makes it clear from the get go that she's only interested in Sam. Ignores Dean's lewd commentary, refuses to crack a smile at his jokes…and after enough of her steely attitude Dean stops trying, I think she's a lesbian or something - tells Sam he thinks maybe they should leave her in the next town. Sam only rolls his eyes and tells him he wouldn't say that if she was sleeping with him.

Dean can't argue with that.

--.--

She watches them for a month, playing out the situation to her advantage until her game begins a very real tug at her heart. It's unexpected, makes her lose sleep, stop eating, pull at her hair and wring her hands until she places the unidentifiable emotion; affection.

--.--

Two months after the first they meet they end back in Washington and Sam teaches her how to shoot.

He offers one day while she watches him clean their arsenal, He can't help feel an all too pull in his stomach as she traces down the barrel of his ruger, she's engrossed in some Buddhist philosophy book she picked up at a garage sale in Iowa. Sam lulls into a world his own, enthralled as she reads with her lip caught between white teeth and her index finger making it's way back and forth across the hard metal.

They walk side by side, slowly making their way deep into the woods of Washington, weave through thickets, the further they walk the bigger the trees become, colossal trunks growing old and wise up, up and away. They come across a clearing, the skirt of a logging run, nothing left but a sea of severed stumps that make Ethne comment on the nature of the industry. Sam notices the sad look she covers quickly as she slips her jacket off and rubs her hands together.

Ethne walks a few paces ahead, staring off into the distance, reaching her hands above her head and stretching her arms up, letting them sway from side to side, taking deep breaths while her head lolls to and fro.

"What cha doing?" Sam muses, an unadulterated, wide smile crosses his face for the first time in god knows how long.

"Being a tree." She replies matter-of-factly, listing in the breeze.

"I see," he walks next to her, hands on his hips and tips his face up into the sun. The warm light washes over him like a unexpected sweetness.

"Come on Sam, be a tree with me and I'll shoot things with you." Ethne opens her eyes and grins, patting him softly on the arm.

"Uh, OK" he sighs and throws both arms half heartily up into the air. Ethne catches the smirk on face and wags a finger at him.

"Don't tell me that you, Sam Winchester, are too good to be one with nature? Above it all are we?"

"Hey, I didn't say that." He drops from his stance to defend himself as she jabs him in the side. "I don't commune with the great outdoors everyday, I'm a little out of practice."

"You can do better than that, get your hands back up there and close your damn eyes." She laughs watching him do as he's told, his lips pressed to try restrain his smile.

Sam stands there feeling like a idiot until he feels her press into him, eyes popping open when she presses body into the front if him. Ethne leans forwards letting her cheek rest on his chest, her hands snaking up longs arms, finger catching his shirt just above his elbow as she holds on and murmurs, "Close you eyes"

Oh he closes his eyes alright, tries to concentrate on not letting her feel just how in tune with nature he is, because she hips are flush with his crotch when she starts to swaying again. Rubbing and stroking with movement that's just right. He has to think about freshly spilled blood and children dying and every other horrid thing he can come up with. Once he gets his impending hard on under control and relaxes a bit, his body tingling as all the blood drains from his arms, but he'll tuff it out stay like as long as she want because it's the most fun he's ever had the woods before.

"Very good," she sighs after a moment, Sam wrenches eyes open yet again to find she staring up at him. "Are you going to teach me how to use that gun now?"

Sam hands her the pistol, and watching as she mimics the grip he showed her. "Have you ever shot before?"

"No" She lies.

Sam repeats the entire blood and guts scenario when he stand at her back, flush against her backside, and clears his throat as he guides arms around her shoulders.

Ethne acts surprised at the kickback, lets the force jar her arms and push back into Sam. Misses his hand made target a good fifteen times before letting herself hit closer and closer to the mark. She can't help but feel cheated, wishes he was teaching her for the first time, wants Sam to give her something like this, something that only he would know to share with her. After the better part of an hour she tells him she's tired and sore, wants to watch him.

Sam's a good shot, astonishes even her. She lets him have a moment of pride, as he stands a little taller, wants so badly to impress her that he makes her heart feel something she's hadn't since she was a little girl. Something soft, genuine emotion instead of the faux put-on that gets her through life.

Five Months

Ethne and Sam share their first kiss sitting on a damp mound of dirt, in a freshly dug grave. She helps him dig, sinking metal into the earth until she's sweating and filthy - and Sam can't take his eyes off her. He's not sure there's ever been a more strangely appealing site than her wearing a soiled tank top, every visible muscle in her arm contracting and releasing in rhythm, sweat and grime forming a thin film over her body. Yeah, it's that good-looking

He observes her in silence, the Louisiana night air is thick, and the moon is high, making her skin a steely blue with the nighttime beams. "I love dirt." she injects casually.

"However random, I bet you do." He responds automatically. Somewhere along the way they fall into a pattern, a comfortable system that works for them both - she spouts arbitrary observations and he responds with equally benign comebacks. After the first few months her obscure rhetoric becomes part of her charm. Sam can't help but snicker as she gives her shovel a final heave.

"Dirt is so natural and clean and still so dirty…a contradiction." She's looking at him for a response, and he really wants to grab her and say just like you, but that's too cliché, even for him.

"Can't say I've ever been particularly fond of dirt before tonight." he ventures a step closer, relieved when she doesn't inch away. "It doesn't look bad on you…"

"Sam?" she opens her mouth in mock surprise, narrowing eyes. "Are you coming onto me?"

"If you want me to be." shit, he can't believe he just said that. He hangs his head, shaking back and forth, while a hot color rises in his cheeks. He prays to God it's dark enough out that she can't see him blush.

"I've been waiting for you to say something like that since Dean offered me a ride."

Sam's heart jumps straight up his throat, a forced swallow and fluttering stomach are all he can think about until she moves in, a gloved hand brushes his side, gripping his hip. For a moment he's sure it's too good to be true, because girls that look like her don't dig up graves with guys like him.

But then again girls that look like her normally don't have borderline personality disorders either.

He leans down and brushes dry lips over hers, catching her bottom lip just right, firm enough to make her head drop back and body push forward into his.

Ethne is surprised when he pushes her back against the dirt wall, teeth scraping somewhere between pleasure and pain down her jaw, over her neck and then back up to her lips, his tongue sliding easy-slow into her mouth. Definitely more forceful than she anticipated - a new confidence that's arousing. She snakes an arm around his neck, pulling her hand free from a glove to run her fingers through the hair at the back of his head, the soft skin of her hand making him jump when she brushes the nape of neck. They kiss, tangled, gritty and muddy until Sam's phone rings and Dean interrupts the moment.

--.--

Dean knows something happened between them immediately, but purposely doesn't question Sam. His suspicions are confirmed when he walks in on them after a unsuccessful night at the bar. He cracks open the bathroom just enough to catch of a glimpse of Sam's ass, pants pulled down to his thighs, fucking her on the counter, soft legs and lips parted. The images of her hands curling around his hips, and memories of little moans and pants are seared into his brain. A part of Dean that reacts in a way he refuses to acknowledge. Dean snips at Sam for the next week, snaps at him with biting remarks while his brother tries to figure out what's wrong with him.

Despite his brother's rotten attitude, Sam feels like the luckiest bastard on the face of the planet, thinks maybe he should play the lottery because he's never felt this great before. He falls for her hard, fast and unapologetic. He knows from the beginning it isn't the smartest move, having her with them is another complication they don't need, not to mention it puts her at risk, but in the end his selfish affections overrule logic.

Ethne knows who he is from the get go, no dancing around the issues, he doesn't have to make up childhood mishaps to explain his scars, or witty little antidotes to justify his knowledge of the what's hiding the dark. There's a safe quality about the way she reads him from the beginning.

After Jess, Sam never believed he would find anyone else, because she had been everything he'd ever wanted. Ethne works her way into his heart because she's utterly incomparable. She's a contradiction. From her morbid obsessions to her rambling eccentric thoughts, she's not the kind of girl he would have ever considered before he met her. She's rude, short and snippy with anyone her own age, and makes it clear on several occasions she has no tolerance anything less than exactly the standards she expects.

But at the end of the day he chalks up all her faults to endearing personality ticks - nothing he can't deal with because he's falling in love with her.

Sam can't figure out why Dean seems to have such a love-hate relationship with her. The two of them are oil and water from the day they meet. He assumes they hate each other…but he's overheard Dean talking about their father with her, drunk and irritated but non the less sharing intimate family secrets, recounting stories even Sam's never heard before.

She's the first to shoot Dean a judgmental glare when he picks a eager blonde, and never cuts him slack when he's hung over the next morning, but Dean forgets it as soon as she makes a comment about the impala. She loves the damn car almost as much as he does. She'll coo something sweet about how she adores rumble of the engine or the smell of exhaust when they're out on the road, and all is forgiven. The two of them have a unspoken respect for each other, Dean doesn't joke with her, doesn't push her buttons like he would anyone else, instead focusing all his cocky remarks on Sam.

The relationship between Sam and Ethne is bizarre and strangely intense. She's either hot or cold - barely speaking a word to him one minute and the next she can't keep her hands off him. For Sam it's a delicious combination of want and need on a level that's foreign to him. He learns she can't tell him no, she never turns him away. Once he realizes all it takes is a hand slipping under the edge of shirt, playing at the curve of her hip, there's no stopping. Sam never expected to be thattype, but with her he is. They fuck in rest stops, pressed up against the stall in the women's bathroom, Sam holding her up and rutting into her like he's just out of prison.

Dean spends all his idle time pretending not to notice.

When Sam finally comes to him in an attempt to come clean Dean just shushes him and tells his little brother he doesn't need the gruesome details, he already knows.

Ten Months

Deans looks down the battered body before him and doesn't know what the fuck to do. There's blood…a lot of blood. It's a vibrant red wash over everything in the room including him. There's a fine line between being a damn good hunter and a plain ol' murderer, and he's not sure if he's just stepped over the boundary. So he does the only thing he can think of; he calls Sam. Yeah he promised it would be a quick job, he'd be fine on his own, didn't need the help but this is one of those rare occasions Dean doesn't have a problem admitting his was wrong and asking for a little help.

There's just one problem, Ethne answers Sam's phone, crunching loudly on what he assumes is the peanut brittle she bought the day before and has been eating ever since.

"Yeah?"

"Ethne? Jesus, where's Sam?" Dean pants, feels light headed and swears to himself that if he passes out, he might as well start liking dick, because Dean Winchester does not faint.

"At the library, he left his phone here." more chewing. "What's up?"

"Left his phone? Are you fucking kidding me?" He can't imagine anything worse, of all the times for Sam to leave his cell…"I really need to talk to him."

"Why don't you tell me what's wrong. You sound like your having a moment, maybe you should take some deep breaths, controlling your breath can effect you mood…Did you know that a person can actually make themselves loose consciousness if they-"

"Shut up." Dean pleads, can't take her incessant fact-recall just now. "I need you to go get him and have him call me."

"Dean, I'd love to. If I knew where he was."

"You just said he's at the library."

"This is New York City, there's more than one."

"Son of a bitch"

"Where are you?"

An hour later Dean meets her at the front door of old factory that's been converted into makeshift housing . Watches her pay the taxi driver and jog up the steps, smiling as he pulls her inside.

"Christ, what the hell happened to you?" Her eyes go wide for a fleeting moment before she reaches for his arm, he's covered in blood "are you hurt?"

"I'm fine…"

Ethne accompanies Dean to the scene of "incident" and saunters into the living room as Dean warns her about the gruesome specifics.

"I don't think you should be here. You might not want to see this, it's pretty disgusting actually." He cocks his head, asking if she's ready.

"Boy oh boy, there not much of head left is there?" she questions calmly walking directly to the body with the same fascination she gets from the animals on the side of the road. "You shot him?"

"Yeah" Dean swallows and forces a nervous laugh. "Shape-shifter, could have been a lot worse."

"Did he do something to you?" Ethne looks back at the headless body and rubs her hands together.

"What do you mean?"

"Well you shot him with two different guns didn't you?" She's looking at him again, it makes him uncomfortable and confused. "Handgun and a shotgun?"

"Yeah actually, how'd you know that?"

"The projected blood stain patterns." She states matter-of-factly. "He pissed you off huh?"

Dean doesn't want to have the 'OK I kinda lost it and went a little overboard killing the guy'conversation with her. It takes him a couple breaths to realize she's not asking for a explanation. No, she's just asking questions like she does with everything else. It strikes him that to her this no different than when she helped him with an oil change, or the time Sam cut his leg open and she stitched him up like a torn denim. Nothing phases her. Normally it's off-putting, but in a situation like this it's reassuring, calming. She takes a few moments to looks around the room.

"You wanna know what the cops are gonna see? See that?" Ethne points to the far wall, " That's medium velocity impact spatter, the kind you got when you beat the daylights out of this guy. The swipe pattern on the floor where…he pulled himself over here didn't he?"

"Yeah, yeah he did." Dean wipes a hand across his mouth totally dumbfounded by her and slightly repulsed by himself.

"Then over here is where you shot him. See how there's two different kinds of misting, that's how you know there were two weapons involved. That kind of high velocity spatter you only get with firearms."

"I get it ok?" he's impatient now, " but what I need is your help cleaning this up."

"Right…that's why you asked me to get bleach?"

"You got it?"

"'Course I did, I said I'd help didn't I? Then all we have to worry about is finger prints, Now please tell me you haven't touched everything?"

Dean just stares at her. He's always known she's a left of center but this takes the cake.

"Lets get a move on Dean." She grins and then stop, remembering something. "Here" she reaches into her purse and pulls out a box of surgical gloves.

"You just happen to have latex gloves?" Dean shakes his head, and snaps a pair from the box, "You are by far the interesting person I've ever known."

"Don't even try to tell me you don't have a rubber in your wallet right now…probably more than one. I'm just prepared in other ways. A girl never knows what she'll need, and I like to plan for any occasion." She smiles broadly, patting him on the arm.

"You're the Martha Stewart of the macabre." He chuckles; his face turns sour when he takes another look around the room.

"I like that."

"You would. Look, I'm sorry you're in the middle of this…this kind of things doesn't usually happen."

"S'ok, I don't mind."

" I just ahh-" Dean bites his lip and rubs at the back of neck with a rubbery hand, "I was angry, and I guess I took it out on him-"

"You don't have to justify yourself to me" she cuts him off, cocking her head but looking him in the eyes. "This guy had to be ended any way you look at it right? So you went a little overboard, it's your job, the guys was evil…so on and so forth. Stop trying to legitimize, you did what you did, end of story. You're just lucky you have someone as wonderful as me to help you with the details."

"That's one perspective I guess."

"Plus," she pauses and drops her eyes to his hands, "You're kinda adorable in rubber gloves."

"Excuse me?" he cocks an eyebrow.

"You heard me."

"What's wrong?" Ethne asks gently as they stand side-by-side, washing a wall with blood, red dripping from the piece of torn flannel being used as a sponge.

"Huh" he snorts, and giving her a sideways glance, "You mean other than the fact that we're knee deep in body parts and brain splatter?"

"Yeah, I'm talking about whatever else you've knocking around in that brain of yours."

Dean is quiet, deciding how much he's willing to share, he end up divulges more than he intends "I'm enjoyed it a little." He confesses softly, afraid to confront her reaction.

"And?"

"And…that makes me pretty fucked up as conventional wisdom goes."

"What exactly about either of us screams conventional?"

"So this doesn't bother you…"

"What? The fact that you got a little perverse pleasure out of putting down a person who deserved it? It's what you do. Would you have felt any remorse if you had just put a bullet through his brain neat and clean?"

"Probably not."

"Then what's the distinction? You roughed the guy up and shot him a coupla' times." She shrugs her shoulders "It's not like you disemboweled him and played around in his intestines."

"Christ, Ethne."

"Well I'm just saying," She holds up her palms in mock defeat, blood dripping from the edge of her glove and up her wrist. "What had you that worked up anyway?"

Dean drops his hands, and takes a step back, peeling off a glove so he can run a hand over his face. "Just stuff."

"Stuff;"

"Yup"

"And he shuts down emotionally." She quips, stepping back beside and looking at the formerly red walls slowly coming clean. "We don't have to tell Sam you know."

"What?" Dean can't believe she would bring that up, it's like she's known this whole time all he's been thinking about Sam finding out he went ape shit. If there's one person he doesn't want to own up to it's his brother. From the minute he realized his 'disposal' of the shape shifter had gone wrong, all he think about was the look on his brother's face when he saw what brutality he was capable of.

"We don't have to tell Sam about this. Unless you want to, but I'm guessing from the look on your face you'd rather not."

"You're OK with lying to him?"

"It's not lying, it's omitting a few details of the afternoon. That's all."

"You don't want to though."

"Look, Sam is first person I've ever felt accountable to. I would not offer if it was anyone other than you. There's no point in telling him and watching him get upset at both of us. It's better if this is our secret."

"OK"

"It's settled then…would you like some peanut brittle?"

--.--

When they get back to the motel hours later Sam barely gets a word in before Ethne brushes past him and turns on the shower.

"So is anyone gonna tell where you two were?"

"Burgers and beer Sammy," Dean throws a McDonalds bag at him and sets six-pack on the bed. "I came back and little miss sunshine in there was starving, so we got food."

Sam nods, seemly appeased with the explanation. "Hey, how'd the things go with the shape shifter?"

"Piece a' cake." Dean smiles and turns the cap off a beer.

One Year

Ethne leans down, hips slowing to a hard, deep grind as her tits press into Sam's chest.

"You make me feel things." She confesses kissing him, all tongue, sloppy and deep making her whole body press down into his. Her mouth cracking his open, scooping at his tongue before pulling away with a breathless pop. "feel…new things" she huffs through lust with broken English.

"I hope so." he grins twisting fingers through hair, his other hand sliding down her back and over her ass, splaying fingers wide to cup a cheek, making sure she doesn't stop moving. She can fuck him as slow as she wants, just as long as she's doesn't stop.

"I don't mean like that…Jesus…Sam" She hisses. Sam watches her pause and moan in a low growl, feeling her pussy flutter around him. Tight and wet-hot where she's stretched wide around his cock. "Sam" his name, breathless, hurried from her mouth is so sweet he could never describe it if he had to.

"What do you mean then?" he huffs hot, mouthing her shoulder.

"Never mind…it's too…emotional" the last word sears off her tongue like it hurts.

Sam laughs out loud, rubbing a vigorous hand at her hip, still dancing at torturously slow pace "are you kidding me? We're making love, you get a free emotional pass."

"Making love?" Ethne smiles with momentary flash in her eyes, a moment of danger passing over her face, looks at him like he's a meal laid out for her on Christmas morning. "I thought we were fucking." she nips at the underside of his jaw, lips kiss back over the skin, followed by the tip of tongue darting out to taste him, a move that makes his dick jump inside her.

"Trust me," Sam's back arches, hands at her ass again, "you'll know when I'm fucking you." He fucks up into her, sharp and sudden, quick thrusts while he pulls her down onto him at the same time, effectively nudging deeper than she intends to take him. She arches down her own back, pressing her stomach down to his, breasts raised up like a panting goddess on display.

"Ugh" she manages a strangled moan, before dropping her face back down to the side of his head, lips lapping at the shell of his ear "point taken"

Sam smiles at her taunt, and slaps her backside playfully, not so hard as to leave a mark but enough to get her attention back to fact that she's stopped riding him and he can't have that. When she doesn't move, he worries momentarily, watching her rise above him again, bottom lip caught under her teeth, eyes racing. All he can think is;oh fuck, what the hell is this important that this can't wait until I get off.

"You make me feel, Sam Gentle and delicate and loved. Things I never wanted until I met you." She stills, hovering just above his face, looking to him wide-eyed. "All the things I'm not."

It's sweet, heartbreaking and makes Sam wonder for a moment about this side of her that she's rarely shows him. He wonders who fucked her over this badly, someone must have a done a number on her and he'd love to meet the asshole one day. It's unfathomable to him that she can second guess herself this much, because there's no one else he wants and no place else he'd rather be.

Sam makes the mistake of thinking he knows her.

"You are gentle." He nuzzles his nose into hers. "And you're delicate." hands slipping to her cheeks, framing her face "and so loved." light kiss that turns into something else, something consuming and vehement. She feels his hands in her hair again, and with the nudge of his palm at base of her spine jolts her back to the fact that they're having sex.

"No more talking" She bucks her hips, pulling away from his face, away from his eyes; too close, too much, might see. "I want you to fuck me, feel you on top of me" she urges taking his hand and bring it up to her breast while his other digits wrap around her hip.

Sam doesn't need to be told twice.

It's a silver of second before Sam has her on her back, bending her knees and sliding back into her. Pops back in with one smooth thrust, just the right angle to make the world turn white. He fucks her like that until he comes, rocking firm into the soft cradle of her body. She listens to the moans, soft words of affection that sound so different when he talk to her like this, sweet epithets take on such a different, lust-driven tone when he's inside her.

He bites into her shoulder when he comes, almost breaks the skin as he floods into her, doesn't stop pitching his hips until he's brought himself through it. Sam can still feel her gentle hands pressed into the small of his back as he rests his weight and he legs spread even wider at the urging of his hips settling, breath coming hard and heavy.

He stays like that, head dropped to the side of her head until she pulls him back to look down at her. Kisses him with swollen lips and whispers "Never felt until you came along."

Sam starts to respond, but hesitates because she looks like she might cry and his cock is still her, the combination makes him sickly conflicted.

--.--

Thomas Galler pulls at his wrists where he's bound to the chair, twisting aimlessly as the wire cuts slick into his skin. It's a quick panic that rises tight in his chest, until he can't breath, tears running freely down his cheeks, screaming in the gag that's choking him slow and strained. He thinks it's a bad dream, huffs out hot breaths trying to get his bearings through a unnatural haze. The room is dark, lit only by a single naked light bulb hanging from bare wiring someone above him. He's dead center of the large sprawling expanse, high ceilings, blacked out windows, definitely a warehouse; something straight out of a bad horror movie.

One more tug at his restraints and the pain lets him know it's all very real. Bile rises in his throat until he can taste it on the back of tongue and he gags, head lurching forward.

"Don't vomit."

He freezes; whole body goes rigid when he hears the voice, washing over him like cold vice.

"Under no circumstances will I remove your gag, If you vomit, you'll aspirate. Everything mixed together in your stomach will rise into the back of throat and then when you try and breath it's back in your lungs. You'll choke yourself to death…and neither of us wants that to happen."

The voice is low, malicious and he knows. As much as he wants to believe he might find a way out of this, he already knows what's going to happen to him. The intentions are clear as day, one doesn't end up tied to a chair just for conversations' sake. But he needs to tell his capture, explain that he has a pregnant wife and a daughter who just learned how to walk and he's a good guy with a responsibilities, a family that needs him. If he could just speak, he could reason his way out, because if there's anyone who can get out of a sticky situation, it's him.

"Do you know why you're here?" the voice is behind him, closer now, right at his ear. He shakes his head no, whimpering like a lame dog.

"I think you do." Two gloved hands slip over his shoulders, the unknown body slipping against his back. He shutters when he feel a chin resting at the crown of his head and jerks violently at the knife twisting in the air, one hand rolling the hilt back an forth. "I know what you did, so you must have it tucked somewhere is that brain of yours…if you think hard enough maybe you can remember."

Fuck. Yeah, now he knows. They are only three people in the world that know about that, there's no way any one of them would have every told – double fuck. Make the official count four, of course they didn't know that until after the fact, read it the paper. There's only one explanation now and it's horrifying.

"You have an idea now?" he shakes his head yes, crying again because this is something that he never expected to catch up with him, not all these years later, not like this. It was so long ago, an accident, a monstrous lapse in judgment. In his nightmares, he dreams about the police showing up at his door…but nothing close to this.

"Thomas, are you paying attention? I'm not losing you here, am I?" He can feel breath at the shell of his ear, lips grazing too close, and recoiling when at the accidental touch. He nods yes again, anything to placate, give him time to think. He mumbles, incoherent, eyes widening when the knife swings downward, the blade dragging over the buttons of his shirt, just enough pressure to get the point across.

"Have you ever been hunting Thomas?" the figure doesn't give him a chance to answer, continuing on. "Ever gutted a dear in the field? It was always my favorite part of the hunt. To cut through the hide, then the stomach muscle, twist the limbs, just right, so the joints pop, because it's difficult to cut through bone. You have to sort of hack at it…well you would know all about that, wouldn't you?"

He squeezes his eyes tight, his heart is beating up into his neck and mouth going bone dry.

"That's what I'm about to do to you Thomas, tear out your insides like an animal."

There's a moment of emptiness, devoid of words or movements, letting the reality sink in, letting him play around in the mess of his own fear and ultimate mortality. The black abyss of his own dread swallows him whole as his body goes limp, giving in, because it's the only option left.

"Any last words?" All he can muster is a groan, helpless and muffled, and then pisses himself just before then pain comes, sleek, dark and slow.

--.--

In Luray, Virginia, Ethne tells Sam she's going for a walk and disappears, returning four hours later with a grin and in a spring in her step. She hands Dean an apple pie, tin pan still warm. Presents it to him with both hands, adding, "I saw this and I thought of you."

Sam fiddles with the rabbit ears on the aging television until the static clears enough to watch Boris Karloff come to life in Frankenstein. She and Sam are impressed when Dean finished his entire pie in under thirty minutes. Dean sits down beside Sam, shoving he

and Ethne over and sprawling out comfortably, taking more than half of the mattress.

"Dude, don't you have your own bed?"

"Yeah, but it's lumpy and smells like cat piss."

"It does" Ethne confirms wrinkling her nose.

They watch the film, and talk about old movies and how much better black & whites are than the new teenage slasher flicks. Sam is the one who hushes when the newscaster starts in on the story of the evening.

The body of Kurt Morassi was found just hours ago, in what initial reports are calling it a brutal and sadistic murder scene. The forty-two year old father of two was found just after nine this evening. Inside sources tell us it appears he was tortured and then dismembered. Police have declined to comment…

"Jesus" Sam breaths, rubbing Ethne's arm, a move she assumes is meant for comfort. "You think we should look into that Dean? Could be something up our alley."

"Eh, it's probably some nut job."

"Yeah, you wouldn't believe the crazies out there." Ethne chimes in, smiling bright and wide and full of lies.