"One rarely falls in love without being as much attracted to what is interestingly wrong with someone as what is objectively healthy."

Alain de Botton

The darkness outside was lit only by the flickering street lights when the black 1967 Chevy Impala pulled up outside a shabby apartment building in Palo Alto, California, the home of Stanford University. At half-past three in the morning, the streets were deserted; even the hardest partying college kids asleep or passed out by now.

Pulling up alongside the curb opposite the building, the dark-haired young man in the driver's seat cut the engine, the strains of Led Zeppelin's 'Ramble On' fading away. Resting his elbow against the door, he stared across the street without really seeing what was in front of him, lost so deep in his own thoughts he'd need GPS to find his way out.

Was he doing the right thing in coming here? Honestly, probably not. It'd been four years, was it really fair to come in after all this time and ask his brother to abandon the life he'd built? Again, probably not, but...

Of course, if it'd been just him, he probably wouldn't be here, but he had her in tow and really he just couldn't handle being alone with her anymore. Four years and it was a girl that made him finally break down and come find his baby brother.

Ridiculous.

Taking a deep breath, Dean tried to ignore the lingering scent of the perfume she wore. Or maybe it was shampoo? Body wash? Deodorant? Hell, he couldn't pin down exactly what it was, but it wasn't like it mattered, shit was everywhere. And God, she smelled good...

"Dean."

Now if only he could ignore her as easily as he pretended to, and even that was hard as hell to do. She wasn't particularly loud, but she was annoyingly persistent and even more stubborn than he was. Not that he was stubborn. Strong-willed, maybe, but definitely not stubborn. And she was trying to get his attention. Again. If only her voice matched her demeanor, she'd sound like a fifty-year-old two-pack-a-day smoker but noooo, it had to actually be pleasant. The rural accent was absolutely charming when it wasn't being used to disparage his existence and insult his ancestry.

"Dean...Dammit." Picking up the book that she'd been reading, Dean's copy of Jack Kerouac's 'Road Trip', she reached over and smacked him with it, refusing to be ignored for a second longer. "I know you haven't gone deaf in the last hour, Winchester."

He'd seriously rather shoot himself in the foot than admit that hurt, but damn the girl had a surprisingly good arm on her. Considering how likely it was that she'd eventually haul off and slap the shit out of him, that could be a problem.

"What, Skyler?" Whipping his head around, he glared at the obnoxious brunette sitting next to him. He was already tired and aggravated, not to mention worried, apprehensive and just all around exasperated and pissed off with every goddamn bit of this entire situation and she wasn't even trying to help matters. At all. Granted, neither was he, but how could he be expected to when she was driving him out of his damn mind? And there was jack-all he could do about it right now except maybe strangle her in her sleep. Tempting. "What the fuck do you want?"

"For the millionth time, please stop callin' me Skyler. It's just 'Skye'. It's called a nickname, it's not that hard, it doesn't take a genius to grasp the concept." Retrieving the book from where it had fallen, Skye opened the glove box and stashed it back where she'd found it, right next to the gun. The book had been a surprise, the gun had not, and she had quite bluntly let him know just that. For like two hours. Pretty sure she hadn't even taken a breath the entire time. "'Course, from what I've seen, you're not burdened with an overabundance a brain cells, so I could be wrong."

"You know your parents were dicks, right? Who names their kid 'Skye'?" Great. He couldn't come up with something better than that? Christ, he needed some sleep.

"Oh, that is a massive understatement, but can't do anything about it at the moment, now can I?" As she twisted a strand of hair around a finger, she ended up fraying the end of the braid that hung over her left shoulder, one of the few nervous habits she seemed to have. She was damned hard to read otherwise...or at least she would have been if she didn't say every little thing that popped into her head. She was either rambling on about something for hours at a time, usually something horribly offensive about him, or completely silent. There didn't seem to be any kind of in-between. No happy medium. If he could just find her damn dimmer-switch, maybe she'd be a little more tolerable. "Besides, Dean, last I checked, your name was a title."

Fair point. Dammit. "Stay put, Skyler. I'll be right back." Throwing open the driver's side door, he stepped out into a night that was uncharacteristically chilly considering the locale, broken glass crunching beneath his black biker boots. Turning, he leaned in the door and gave the girl a long look before closing it, knowing damn well she wasn't going to listen. "I mean it, stay here."


Turning on a booted heel, Dean crossed the road to the small lawn wrapping around the building that stretched several stories above the street, leaving Skye alone in the Chevy to contemplate Life, the Universe, and Everything. For about forty-two seconds.

"Oh, fuck this noise." Muttering under her breath, she flung her door open and jumped out, slamming it behind her a little more forcefully than strictly necessary. Okay, maybe a lot more forcefully than strictly necessary. Even from here she could see Dean flinch at the sound of metal on metal. Good. He loved the damn thing so much, would serve him right if it ended up smashed to bits in a twisted heap of wreckage right in front of him.

Hands in the pockets of her worn-out jeans, dingy once-white kicks squeaking on the asphalt, it didn't take long to catch up to him. Staying just out of reach, she followed him down the stairs and through the heavy wrought iron door that blocked the entrance. Barely managing a glimpse around the dimly lit interior, she was forced to hurry her steps as he started up the staircase that spiraled squarely around to reach the floors above.

Despite her general opinion of the man, she couldn't quite keep her eyes off his backside. There was no denying he was attractive. Okay, let's be real, he was hot. Like seriously underwear-model gorgeous. And he knew it, too. Arrogant, self-absorbed, ignorant, sexist prick. ...But goddamn.

Feeling a headache starting in her temples, Skye tried to wrangle her wayward thoughts back in line. Christ, sometimes it was like herding cats.


Arms crossed, Skye raised a brow as she watched Dean kneel on the worn wooden floor in front of a door she could only assume was his brothers. This was such bullshit, even kneeling he was almost as tall as she was. Not that that was really saying a lot. At barely five-foot-nothing and ninety-eight pounds, she wasn't exactly the type to strike fear into the hearts of her enemies. Not even on a good day. Not that she had any enemies. That she knew of. Yet.

Dean, on the other hand, was six-foot-two and about two hundred pounds of solid muscle. Okay, just say it, dude was built. Not that she'd managed to get a great look under the twenty layers he insisted on wearing, no matter the weather. Psycho.

"Why don't you just knock?" Tucking her hands in her back pockets, she rocked back on her heels, watching him take a small pack of what could only be lock picks out of his jacket. Of course, he just happened to carry lock picks, because apparently that was a reasonable thing people did. Shoving as much condescension into her voice as she possibly could, she made it quite clear that she thought his IQ was roughly equivalent to his shoe-size, "It's not a hard skill, I could teach you if you want."

Seriously, it wasn't fair. He was tall, dark, and handsome as hell with a boyishly charming smile, perfect white teeth, and drop-dead gorgeous candy-apple green eyes. Also smart, funny, and had decent taste in music. Just about every woman's wet dream made flesh, and more than a few men, too. If only every square inch of him wasn't full of bullshit, sexism, and beer.

"Where's the fun in that?" With a faint click, the lock disengaged and Dean sat back on his heels. He looked up at her, aggravation in every line of his body. Good. Let him be aggravated. Served him right. "I thought I told you to wait your ass in the car."

Taking a second to rearrange her features into what she knew was a damn near perfect mask of innocence, she flashed him her sweetest smile, injecting so much pure loathing into her voice it was practically dripping onto her shoes, "What about the last few days gives you the slightest indication that I give a flying fuck about anything you have to say?"

"You're a real bitch, you know that?" Standing slowly, he towered over her for a moment, giving intimidation a shot. It might have worked if she hadn't spent the last week listening to him snore, drool in his sleep, and sing along horribly off-key to every eighties hair band that ever existed.

"You say bitch like it's a bad thing."

"I just- ugh." With a growl that rolled out from the back of his throat and sent a ripple down her spine, Dean jerked open the doorknob and let himself into the apartment, not bothering to wait to let his eyes adjust to the change in light.

Unwilling to let him see any hesitation, she forced herself across the threshold after only a brief struggle with her uncertainty. She had her doubts that this was really his brother's apartment. He was probably just here to steal something or...something. But her other option was to stay outside. Alone. Thousands of miles from home. In the middle of the night.

Between the two, a possible B&E charge really seemed the better option.