Chapter Fifty-One

They woke up early the next morning, ate a quick breakfast, and drove to a small suburb where the late Mr. Davis had lived with his wife. The three of them were silent on the drive over; the only movement was Lilly leaning over to brush a hair from Dean's suit, then straightening her own. Sam sat motionless in the back.

Shortly after, they pulled onto the correct street and found the house they were looking for. It was small but well maintained, with a few flowers planted around the porch. Two rocking chairs swayed in the light breeze.

Lilly was the first to get out and walked briskly to the door. She shot Dean a look as he took his time glancing around, and waited until both brothers were standing next to her on the porch before knocking on the door.

There were a few muffled sounds from within, and then a short, thin woman with white hair and a wrinkled face peered out at them. "Yes?" she said, her voice frail.

"Hello, Mrs. Davis," Lilly began smoothly, holding out her badge, "we're with the police department, and we'd like to speak with you about your late husband." She held up a hand as the old woman's brow furrowed. "I'm sure someone has already spoken with you, and I'm sorry to bother you again, but we've come across some new information and need to do some fact-checking." Lilly finished with a brilliant smile. Dean had to admit that letting her come along was probably for the best; people were more forthcoming with a woman.

"Well, I suppose that would alright. Do come in, the weather may turn nasty soon." Mrs. Davis said as she opened the door and motioned them into a sitting room. Pictures of children covered every surface not intended for sitting. As Dean and Sam entered and Dean closed the door behind him, Mrs. Davis was already bustling towards the kitchen. "Would you like any coffee?"

"No, thank you!" Lilly called, examining the photos. She motioned to Dean to look closer. The picture she was studying was clearly of a younger Mr. and Mrs. Davis in a large city, wind whipping the curls back from Mrs. Davis' smiling face. Dean leaned in further, and saw that they were standing in front of a restaurant, the name of which was obscured but was clearly a 50's style diner. He pulled back from the picture, frowning, as he looked at Lilly.

"What is it?" He asked, glancing behind him to make sure Mrs. Davis was still in the kitchen.

Lilly looked at him in disbelief. "Don't you see anything?"

"No, what are you-" Dean stopped short as Mrs. Davis entered the sitting room with a steaming mug.

"Now, what did you want to ask me? Have you figured out who's responsible yet?"

"No, ma'am, we haven't," Sam began gently, his voice tender as the elderly woman looked down into her cup of coffee sadly. "We're trying our best to get to the bottom of this."

"Joseph was a good man, everyone liked him…" Her voice trailed off, and she took a tentative sip from her mug.

Dean sat opposite Mrs. Davis and held her gaze. "So you don't think this was personal in any way?"

She shook her head. "I don't see how it could have been… He didn't have any enemies, had been retired for over ten years; the only time he got out anymore was for golf when his hip didn't act up." Dean glanced at Sam, and noticed Lilly was still standing, looking at photos. He tried to motion for her to sit, but she didn't meet his eye.

"Mrs. Davis, where was this photograph taken?"

Dean's eyes flicked to Lilly; she was still looking at the same picture. He resisted the urge to roll his eyes and hoped she would move on quickly.

"Why, that was in Chicago, but it was years ago, surely that's not important…" Mrs. Davis trailed off, looking confused. Lilly quickly turned around and sat next to Dean on the couch. "It's nothing," she said smoothly. "Tell us more about the weeks leading up to your husband's death."

If she was suspicious, Mrs. Davis didn't let on. "We get some prank calls now and then, but they've never called late at night and they always say something. About a week before Joseph passed, the phone rang when both of us were in bed asleep. I answered, thinking something had happened, but all I heard was some scuffling, then whoever it was hung up. That was the first thing. A few days later the power went out, which isn't too bad with the weather lately, but no one else on the block lost power. It came back on a few hours later, so I didn't think much of it." Mrs. Davis sipped her coffee again and dabbed her mouth with a napkin.

"Was there anything else?" Sam asked. Mrs. Davis nodded.

"One of our windows broke the day before. It looked as if maybe a rock or a baseball had come through, but we couldn't find anything inside but broken glass. Nothing was missing though, and there wasn't anything unusual. Then the power went out again in the middle of the night, the night…" she trailed off. "It was warm when I woke up- I'm not sure why I woke up when I did- so I went to turn on the fan. Nothing happened, so I went downstairs to tell Joseph that it was out again. He sometimes slept in the rocking chair when the hip bothered him, so that wasn't out of the ordinary. That was when I found him." Mrs. Davis looked up at them.

"You don't know who might have called you, or broken your window?" Dean asked.

"No," the old woman answered. "I asked the parents nearby if their kids had broken the window but none of them did. They were honest, too; the kids may be rowdy but they wouldn't break something and then lie about it. I gave the police the phone number that called, too. It wasn't blocked or anything. They told me it was just a payphone though."

"Could we get that phone number again?" Sam asked.

"Sure," Mrs. Davis said, and headed towards the kitchen. She came back a moment later with a scrap of paper, a telephone number scrawled on it. "Is that all I can do for you?"

"Yes, that will be all, Mrs. Davis. Thank you for your time," Lilly said as she moved towards the door. Dean and Sam followed behind her and slid into the Impala. Lilly took the back without protest.

"Strange, but not especially useful." Lilly sighed as she buckled her seatbelt. Dean glanced into the mirror, checking that his path was clear, then meeting Lilly's eyes.

"What the hell was that, by the way?"

She looked baffled. "What was what?"

"That picture you kept looking at. You told me you saw something in it, and then asked the old lady about it too. Not exactly your usual subtle self."

"Oh it was-" Lilly frowned, collecting herself. "I saw-"

"You saw what?" Dean asked.

"I, um, I don't know," Lilly said. "I knew what I was seeing when I looked at it, but now… I'm not sure what it was."

Dean and Sam exchanged a worried glance in the front seat.