Mask, ch. 14

See, I am still working on it! Thank you all so much for your continued patience with the long interludes between chapters. Hoping to get things moving at a little faster pace with the semester almost over.

xxxx

Jo couldn't take it anymore.

"Hello?" Sam's voice sounded distracted.

"Sam, where are you? You said you were on your way home hours ago!" Jo was trying hard not to sound hysterical, but she wasn't sure she was succeeding.

"Oh! Crap! Jo, I'm sorry, I…"

The babbling reassurances were not making her feel any better. He'd forgotten. He and his brother were in mortal danger, and he'd left her hanging, waiting, afraid….

"Where. Are. You." She gritted it across his apology, a slow fury beginning to churn in her belly.

"I'm… I- I'm at the sheriff's office. I…"

All the anger left her in a rush. "They captured you?" she breathed. "Honey, I'm…"

"Well, no." No? Wha-…? Sam swallowed audibly on the other end of the phone. "I, uh, turned myself in."

Jo had no words.

"I figured something out," he hurried on in the stunned silence, "and we were going to need the feds help, so I just came in. I'm sorry I didn't call. I should have let you know or at least told you not to expect me. It's OK, though, alright? Don't worry. We've…"

Jo felt her mouth open and close a couple of times, unable to give voice to all the questions that were…

"Jo?"

Dean now. Were they allowing phones in the cell? Jo was having a hard time figuring out what was going on.

"Dean, what is going on?" Finally. Words.

"Well, we're kind of working with the feds."

Jo couldn't tell if he was smug or annoyed. Maybe both. "Okaaaaaay," she said. "Does Luke know that?"

"Yeah, he's here."

"May I speak to him, please?" she asked as carefully as she could.

"Oh. Sure." Mercifully he took the phone away from his mouth before he yelled. "Luke! Phone!"

Given the close quarters of the sheriff's office, Jo wasn't sure why that had been necessary.

"Hello?"

"Hello," she responded evenly. Jo waited, knowing that the tone of her voice would (should) speak for itself.

"Ooooh," he said, and she heard the recognition of his failure in his own tone. "Hey."

"Yeah," she drawled. "Hey."

"So there have been some changes."

"Seems like," she agreed pleasantly.

He didn't venture a response for a moment. Then, "How mad are you?"

"Pretty," she admitted in the same reasonable tone.

"Babe, I'm really sorry. It just got insane, and I'm still in recovery mode. I promise I would have called at some point."

She mmmm'd unforgivingly.

"Sam turned himself in!" Luke protested, unrepentantly tossing Sam under the bus.

She heard a slightly muffled, "Hey! I told you…!"

But Luke spoke over the indignant voice. "How was I supposed to remember to keep you posted in the middle of my utter shock at that particular boneheaded move?"

Sam's voice got correspondingly louder in response.

"It's true, Jo." Dean again. She could hear Luke and Sam continuing their "discussion" in the background. "Sam waltzed into the station and turned himself it. That should really buy Luke some kind of break. Plus. You know. He's old, so…" He gave an undignified yelp that was surely a reaction to some sort of smack. Probably from Luke. "Sam…," Dean tried to go on.

"Oh, stop it," she huffed. "Y'all win. I'm not mad." And miraculously, she wasn't. She closed her eyes, letting the relief flow over her. "Are you all OK?"

"Mostly." Evidently Luke had regained custody of Sam's phone. "The boys aren't completely free yet."

"Tell me what is going on," she demanded.

"Right," Luke said. "Sorry. So. Sam thinks he's found a link between the original murders and these new ones. But he didn't have the means of connecting the current suspect with the killings. The feds have a, frankly, scary level of access to credit card records and traffic cameras that he thought might be helpful. We're hoping they'll be able to tie the suspect with the different locations involved."

Jo frowned to herself. "What's the link between the murders?"

Luke paused before saying, "Possibly we're dealing with the ghost of the first killer."

Jo absorbed that. "OK," she finally said. "Was that part of the explanation to the FBI?" she asked. And wondered what the reaction to that would have been.

"It was," Luke said blandly. "They're not really sure what to make of it as a theory. But we managed to convince them that it wasn't possible for Dean or Sam to have killed Amelia, so…"

"Or any of those women!" Jo interjected.

"Well, yeah. But that's going to take some additional evidence. I suspect that they're having their tech person check up on the boys, while they're trying to trace this Gabe kid."

"Where are they? Are they with you?"

"The boys are here," he said.

Well, duh, she thought, but didn't say. "No. The FBI."

"Oh. No. They're actually on their way back to the motel. Gonna grab some dinner, I think, and maybe regroup after everything they just learned. Matt and I are fixing to see if we can't find this Gabe kid and keep an eye on him until there's something to hold him on."

"Have you eaten?"

"No, but I'm fine. I'll grab something later."

Jo tsked disapprovingly, but didn't press. "What about Sam and Dean?"

"They could probably eat," he said dryly. There were noises of agreement in the background.

"Well, send 'em home. I'll have dinner…"

"Hon," Luke interrupted her. "They can't leave. They're off the hook for Amelia right now, but they're still under arrest."

Jo huffed, not liking that at all. "Fine. I'll bring them something, then. You'll leave the key?"

"It'll be where it always is."

"OK," she sighed. "Just be careful."

She could hear the smile in his voice, "Yes, ma'am."

xxxx

When the team entered the diner, they were greeted by an unhappy-looking Jake.

"Y'all can have your usual booth," the boy said tightly before turning away.

Next to him, Hotch heard Emily mutter wearily, "Oh, this isn't going to be awkward at all."

In spite of his obvious displeasure, the kid brought them their coffees and waters promptly, sliding menus across the table to them. He walked off again without a word.

Prentiss sighed. Watched sadly as the boy stalked back to the kitchen.

"Emily," Hotch said softly.

"I know," she said, taking her eyes off Jake and looking down at her menu.

Hotch eyed his own menu without much interest. He and Morgan had eaten a late lunch, and he really wasn't that… Oh. Wait. Chicken-fried steak.

The team didn't speak much as they ordered and waited for their food.

After Jake set their plates in front of them and refilled mugs and glasses, Hotch took a bite of chicken-fried steak and just managed not to moan in pleasure. Seriously. How was it possible for something to taste this good? Fat, said the rational part of his mind. Lots and lots of fat. Hotch scowled. Oh shut up, he told that part of his brain petulantly, cutting off another piece.

Morgan raised an eyebrow at him. "Would you like to be alone with your meal, Hotch?" he asked.

"You shut up, too," he mumbled, not bothering to explain when his colleague's eyebrow went up another notch.

Morgan snorted. "So," he started. "What are we thinking about these ghost and demon stories we're getting from Sweed and Rodriguez? It seems clear to me this Potter guy was on drugs. If he was high enough on meth, I guess you might – if you were so inclined or young and naïve enough – be able to imagine he was possessed, but how they could miss the drug angle…" He didn't finish his thought, waiting to see what the others would say.

Emily poked at the scrambled eggs she'd ordered. "I don't know," she admitted. She took a moment, apparently to gather herself, and said, "But they're not stupid, Morgan. Either of them."

"Did I say that?" Morgan bit out. "I didn't say that. I'm just saying that I don't buy this ghost theory they're trying to sell."

Emily raised an eyebrow at him. "So if they're not stupid, you're saying, what? That they're delusional?"

"Are you saying you believe them?" Derek shot back.

Hotch opened his mouth to intervene. It wasn't often that the team got cross-ways with each other like this.

But Reid beat him to it. "You know, this part of the country isn't called the Bible belt for no reason. A strict interpretation of the Christian scriptures certainly supports the reality of demons and angels. I would assume that the Sweeds are fundamentalists in their beliefs, and for that reason they would be susceptible to the Winchesters' own belief in demons." He paused thoughtfully. "Though the Winchesters themselves don't seem to be religious in any particular sense of the word. Ghosts don't play a part in the Bible. Though I think I remember a …"

"Reid," Hotch interjected gently, hoping to get him back on point.

The younger man blinked and refocused. "I just mean that a belief in the supernatural doesn't necessarily mean some sort of psychological break. There's a surprisingly large portion of the population that, when asked, would say they believe in angels. Same thing, though to a lesser degree, with demons. I think probably the sheriff's acknowledgement that the family had believed before, but that they'd been shaken by finding demons to be 'really real,' is indicative of what most people would feel when faced with such a situation."

Derek was frowning at Reid. "So do you believe them or not?"

Reid tilted his head to one side as he considered. "I believe that they believe," he said. "And I see no indication that any of the Sweeds I've encountered so far or Deputy Rodriguez, for that matter, are either stupid or delusional."

Derek raised an eyebrow at him. "And?" he prodded.

Reid shrugged. "I don't know," he said, apparently unconcerned, and dug back into his chicken-fried steak.

The look Morgan gave Hotch said clearly, "Please tell me you're still sane."

Hotch put down his fork and rubbed a hand down his face. "To be honest, I'm not sure what I think either," he admitted. And they still hadn't addressed the issue of the Winchesters themselves.

Morgan's eyebrow arched. Again.

"I'm not saying I believe it," Hotch said. "Just… " He stopped. "I need to think the whole thing through." He looked at Derek, meeting his eyes soberly.

Morgan nodded, but the frustration was clear in both his expression and his tone. "Yeah. OK."

They finished the rest of their meal in silence.

There were cases that did this to them sometimes, wore them down and hollowed them out, made them question what they believed and why. Hotch wasn't sure exactly how this particular case had gotten them to this place, though. The killings were horrific, sure, and the frustration was there given how little progress they'd really made. But that wasn't uncommon for their team. Still. It was unsettling to find himself questioning the profile of an unsub and to have that same unsub sitting across the table telling him about ghosts and demons and things other than humans that go bump in the night.

Hotch sighed and focused his attention on his meal again. When the bill came, Hotch reached for it without much thought.

"Sam and Dean would never do what you think they've done."

The words were offered quietly, and Hotch looked up, startled, to see Jake watching him, fingers still holding the edge of the ticket he'd been giving to Hotch. The boy's eyes slid around the booth to each of the other agents sitting there.

"I know you don't believe me," he went on. "But it's true."

Hotch studied the boy next to him. He was reminded abruptly of Jake's reaction earlier that afternoon when Derek had been talking about putting the Winchesters away for the murder of Amelia and the other women. They'd assumed the boy's sudden clumsiness and hurried exit from the table had been grief over Amelia, but it hadn't been, Hotch realized now. It had been fear for the Winchesters.

"What makes you so sure?" Hotch asked. He was interested to see what Jake would say. And wondered if he'd mention the demon his uncle had spoken about.

The kid blinked, clearly not having expected to be asked. "Because that's not who they are," he said, uncertain, but earnest now. "They're not… They're… like, heroes, you know?"

"Heroes, huh?" Derek said archly, earning himself an angry look from Jake before the boy glanced back at Hotch. Expecting mockery from that corner as well.

But Hotch just waited, keeping his expression neutral until the kid responded, even if it was still with a scowl.

"They save people. From…" Jake stopped, biting his lip. "They saved Tommy once. Did you know that?"

"Your dad mentioned something," Hotch conceded.

"The man who took Tommy. He would have killed him." The boy's voice shook slightly at the memory. "But Sam was there. Sam protected him. Got him out. And Dean…" Jake swallowed heavily. "Dean knew what to do. He…" The boy hesitated.

"Knew what to do with a demon?" Hotch prompted quietly. There was no one around them, but Jake still started visibly, nervously casting his eyes toward the people at the front of the diner.

"Uh… I…"

"Your uncle told us," Hotch said, looking to reassure. "But he also said he didn't really see anything." He waited. "Did you?"

The boy nodded haltingly, face blanched white. "Yeah," he whispered.

"What did you see?" Emily asked softly.

Jake glanced at her and cleared his throat before he said, huskily, "Sam. Pinned to the wall. His… his feet weren't touching the ground, and he… he couldn't move. And M- Mr. Potter. He had…black eyes. Not, not like bruises, but his actual eyes were all black. And he… he wasn't…" The boy's voice had started to shake again. "He was… evil. The thing that was inside him. It was evil. You could feel it."

Hotch hesitated, not sure where he wanted to go with this conversation.

"How did Sam get free?" Reid now, brow furrowed.

Jake shook his head. "I'm not sure exactly. Dean. Dean had a…" here he blushed bright red, "a spell or something. It trapped the demon, and it screamed and… Sam fell."

"Did you see the exorcism?"

Jake shook his head again. "No. Dean made us take Sammy and get out. He didn't want us to stay, but… when we got back to the car, Sam was scared for Dean and he… he wanted us to go help. So Michael went. Michael saw it and… he exorcised it. Tommy and I got Sam in the car and…."

"Your brother exorcised it? The demon?" Hotch asked.

Jake nodded. "H- He said it was, like, loose or something and was beating up Dean, so he picked up this book Dean had and started reading what Dean had been reading. He said Dean got it pinned down and then it, it… He said all this black smoke came out of Mr. Potter's mouth and, like, rushed away. Not, dispersed like real smoke, but kind of, like zoomed off. Like it was alive."

Hotch arched an eyebrow at this. Couldn't stop himself.

"I know," Jake whispered. "I know. It sounds…. But Michael said. It was real. He…."

"How was everything?"

The whole group jumped, turning startled eyes toward Jo, who had approached without anyone noticing. Her expression was chilly as she scanned the group, but it softened noticeably when her glance landed on her nephew.

"Jake, sweetheart, will you go help Marge bus those tables? Then tell her I'm going to need you."

"'K," he agreed. He turned back toward Hotch, though, before he actually obeyed. "I…"

"Go on now, baby," Jo said. There was no room for argument in her tone, and Jake nodded jerkily as he slanted her a glance and hurried off.

"I won't have you interviewing my children," Jo said icily. The look Hotch got was as hard as any he'd encountered over the years. "Is that clear?" she asked.

"Absolutely." Hotch felt his hands coming up almost of their own accord, trying to placate. "I promise you it wasn't meant to be an interview," he said, hoping to reassure her. "I just… He said something to defend Dean and Sam, and I admit I was curious, so I asked him a couple of questions. It won't happen again."

The tightness in her face eased somewhat, and she nodded her acceptance of this. For a long moment she didn't say anything, fingers reaching out to smooth the bill and its accompanying credit card lightly before picking up both.

"Did he tell you they were heroes?" she asked quietly, eyes skimming across the room to her nephew.

"Yes," said Prentiss, just as softly. "He did."

Jo nodded, eyes coming back to meet Emily's somberly. "Good."

xxxx

"This sucks," Dean grumbled, continuing to glare at the door into the main office the same way he had for the last 45 minutes.

"Yeah," said Sam from his spot on the other end of the cot. "I think you've mentioned that."

Dean transferred his unhappy stare to Sam.

"What, man?" Sam asked. "It's not my fault."

"If you hadn't been such a dumbass and turned yourself in, you could've at least been out tracking down…."

Sam tuned Dean out as his brother went on and on and…. Sam had already heard this tonight. A couple of times.

Finally, Dean fell silent again.

Then, "When do you think Jo will get here with dinner?"

Sam shrugged. "Depends on what she's making, I guess."

Dean sighed. "Yeah." A couple of beats. "Dude, this sucks."

Miraculously, Sam managed not to reach across the bed they were slouching on and pummel his brother into silence. He gritted his teeth. "What do you think Merley's attached to?" Sam asked instead. Maybe if he could get Dean distracted….

Dean sighed irritably, recognizing the tactic, but still taking some time to think about the question. "I don't know," he admitted. "I'd say the car, but there was nowhere near the EMF activity in the Mustang that we saw on the body or at the latest dump site." He snapped his fingers in remembrance. "Sammy, there was ectoplasm in the grass around where Amelia was left."

Sam sat up. "You hadn't told me that," he said.

"Forgot."

"Huh," Sam said musingly

"Yeah. Whatever it is, it's powerful." Dean chewed thoughtfully on the inside of his cheek. "I can't figure how something that leaves ectoplasm at one place barely registers on the reader in the object we think it's actually connected to."

"Yeah," Sam agreed.

They sat in silence for awhile.

"Maybe there was something left in the car the kid is carrying around?" Sam offered.

"Maybe," Dean said. "But he was pretty creeped out by the body – tore out all the seats – seems unlikely he'd keep some other souvenir, you know?"

"Yeah."

The door from the office swung open. "Hello?"

"Hey!"

It was Jo with Jake.

"Y'all hungry?"

"Starving," Dean said dramatically.

Jo smiled, glancing back at Jake, who approached the cell with a key and a large paper bag.

"Good," she said. "We brought lots." She turned back into the main room. "We'll set up out here."

Dean grinned as he exited the cell, taking the bag from Jake, opening it to sniff appreciatively. "Awesome."

"Where's Tommy?" Sam asked, trailing after his brother.

Jo was putting plates out at Luke's desk. "Michael asked for emergency leave from camp, so he's home with him. I didn't want Tommy to…" she trailed off.

Both Sam and Dean nodded their understanding.

"It's just been so much for him," she tried to explain. "I was afraid seeing y'all in jail…"

"You don't need to apologize for trying to protect him," Sam said.

"What about Jake?" Dean asked with a wry smile and a tilt of his head toward that boy. "You not afraid of scarring him?"

Jo raised an eyebrow. "Oh, honey," she said indulgently, "We all know I don't love Jake nearly as much as I do Tommy."

Jake didn't even bother to roll his eyes. "I'm not a little kid, Dean," he said impatiently. "I can handle a lot more than y'all think I can."

"'course you can," Dean agreed carelessly. He peered into the bottom of the bag. "Are there rolls?"

After dinner they cleaned up, and Jo put what was left of the meal in a small fridge hidden the coat closet.

Sam sighed as he considered being locked back in the cell.

"I'm so sorry, y'all," Jo said, giving them both fierce hugs. "I hate having to do this, but…"

"We know," Dean said. "It's not your fault."

"I'll do it, mom," Jake said with an evil jostling of his eyebrows at the Winchesters and a noisy jingling of the keys.

Jo laughed. "OK. But try not to enjoy it so much." She turned back to the front. "Let's go check on Miss Book before we head home, OK, Jakey?" she called absently, packing up the last of the utensils.

"OK," Jake agreed. He made a show of clanging the cell door shut behind the Winchesters. Then, with a quick glance over his shoulder at his aunt, quietly unlocked the door again, propping it slightly open. "See you in the morning," he said cheerfully with another wicked grin. He didn't let the main door into the office catch either.

Dean gave Sam a serious look. "I love that kid."

Sam smiled.

The truth was, they weren't going anywhere. In fact, they didn't leave the cell. But knowing they could made all the difference.

They settled again on the cot.

"Where do you figure Gabe's staying?" Dean asked suddenly.

"What?"

Dean sat up. "Where's he staying?" Dean looked over at his brother. "He's not at the hotel. His car's at Mac's." He asked the question again pointedly. "Where's he staying?"

Sam's brow furrowed. "Huh." He thought for a second. "Is there a cot or anything at Mac's? Maybe he's letting him camp out there?"

"I don't think so," Dean said after a minute. "I'm pretty sure it's just the main office and the garage."

"How big is that lot?" Sam wondered.

Dean stood abruptly. "Big, man." He nodded, eyes lighting at the realization. "It's big. And overgrown. There may be out buildings…." He was already heading for the door.

Sam surged up after him, almost tripping on his brother's heels in his haste. "Dude, we can't just…."

"I know," Dean bit out impatiently. "Where are our phones?" He was through the cell door and into the office. "We'll call Luke." Dean was flinging open drawers in Matt's desk and then Luke's. "Where the hell…? Did the feds…?"

"Here." Sam picked up Dean's phone, which had been lying in plain sight on top of Matt's desk, and tossed it to him.

Grunting in annoyance, Dean caught it, pressing the number for Luke and putting it to his ear. "What are you doing?" he demanded.

It took Sam a beat to realize the question was for him. He didn't pause in his efforts. "Looking for city plats." He was rifling through one of the large filing cabinets in the corner. "If we can find descriptions of the lots, maybe we can…"

"Crap!" Dean's frustrated growl turned Sam toward him. "Not even voicemail for some reason."

"Try that one," Sam said in response, jerking his head toward the other filing cabinet.

It took them an agonizing 20 minutes to find what they were looking for.

"Here."

Sam winced at the sound of tearing paper as Dean jerked the map free of the drawer. "Dude," he protested.

"I got it, I got it," Dean returned gruffly, though he slowed down enough to ease the last bit of it free more carefully.

They spread the map over one of the desks.

"Where are we?"

They were both studying the drawing with canted heads, trying to get their bearings.

"There," Sam said, jabbing his finger at the spot where the sheriff's office was located.

"Yeah." Dean squinted. "OK, so, here's Mac's." His finger started at the outline of the old filling station right off the street and traced back into the deep lot. Two faint squares sat at the far edge of the property. His eyes met Sam's.

"Call again."

With a nod, Dean moved slightly away.

Sam continued to stare at the map. He wasn't sure how old the drawing was, but in his head he started trying to match each lot with its current occupant: Next to Mac's was the beginning of a series of attached store fronts that ran most of the length of the main street: a woman's clothing store that Sam had barely ever glanced at; after that, a used book store that Sam was familiar with, having spent more than a few hours over the years browsing for entertainment; next came the drugstore, an antique store, the post office; and finally the sheriff's office.

Sam could hear Dean leaving a brusque, urgent-sounding message for Luke (voicemail must be working again) as Sam brought his attention back to Mac's position on the map. Across the side street in the other direction was the Tea Cozy. Next came…. He stopped, eyes darting back to the rectangle outlining the Tea Cozy property.

Another deep lot.

And at its rear—Miss Book's house.

xxxx