AN: Hello everyone :] First, I want to thank Regulargal for her kinda review on the last chapter, I'm so glad you're enjoying the story! Second, I want to apologize in advance for my slow updates. Grad school is getting crazy and I have a ton of course work right now, but the writing won't stop completely. This story is how I destress, but be patient with my updates. Please keep reviewing! They make me so happy and encourage me to keep writing! Enjoy!

Dean had always been a light sleeper for as long as he could remember. It was why he always slept near the door in their motel rooms because he would hear an intruder way before Sam. If they were relying on Sammy's ears for protection in the night, they probably wouldn't wake up until there was a knife at their throats. So when heard the springs of the pull out sofa creaking and Nicole mumbling in her sleep, he was immediately awake and alert.

Sitting up, he could make out her shape in the dark, moving restlessly. After debating for a moment, Dean decided to go wake her from whatever distressing dream she was having, but before he could move an inch, Nicole gasped away and sat bolt upright in her bed, chest heaving.

She didn't seem to notice Dean sitting up in his own bed as she ran a hand over her face and brushed her damp hair back off her forehead.

"Bad dream?" Dean whispered across the dark room, trying not to wake his brother. Nicole jumped so violently, Dean thought she might fall out of her bed.

Placing a hand over her check to calm her racing heart, Nicole just shrugged. "Sorry for waking you," she whispered back. Dean rolled his eyes.

"Nikki, it's fine. Come here and talk to me, I don't want to wake Sam up," Dean said, gesturing to the open side of the bed next to him.

Nicole shook her head. "I'm fine really, Dean."

"Don't make me come over there, Sweetheart."

With a small grin, Nicole finally kicked off her blankets and padded across the room towards Dean's bed. She seated herself on top of the covers, her oversized tee-shirt riding up her legs. In the dim lighting, Dean could see her bite her lip.

"Tell me about the dream," he prompted.

Nicole cocked an eyebrow at him. "Why? Is that going to make it go away?"

"It could help," Dean shrugged, clearly out of his element.

"Yeah? Is this what you do? Sit around and talk about your feelings? Open up about them to try and make them go away?"

Dean sighed, running a hand over his face. "Alright, you caught me. I was just trying to help because it was your first hunt."

The both sat in silence for a few moments before Nicole slumped down in the bed and turned to face Dean.

"I was back at the house, but human. Johnny over powered me and I couldn't fight back and he… well, you guys didn't get there in time," she whispered, hating herself for saying the words out loud and admitting to Dean how scared she had been.

"Hey, he's in jail now and he's never getting out." Dean whispered, starting to reach out for her, but stopping when he saw her eyes flash.

"I know. It was just a bad dream. I'm fine," she repeated, staring at Dean defiantly.

Throwing his hands in the air, Dean shook his head at her. "Alright, I get it. So can we get some sleep then? Get under the covers."

"I… what? I'm sleeping on the couch."

"Sweetheart, my nightmare chasing abilities only work from so far away and if you make me get up out of this bed later on in the night, I will kill you. Hence, you are staying right there."

Nicole eyed him, protests forming on her lips, but swallowing them down, along with her pride, she simply nodded and slid herself under his covers. A small, weak part of herself felt safer knowing that Dean was only 2 feet away and she really didn't want to have another nightmare. It had taken her years to get over the nightmares she had had about her father after they left him and she didn't want to experience anything like that ever again.

Rolling over to face away from Dean, Nicole finally relaxed and made herself comfortable. After a few moments, She felt Dean slide closer to her and he rested a hand on her back. He didn't try to hold her or comfort her, for which she was grateful, but his warm hand on her back was oddly comforting.

"Dean…" Nicole whispered into the dark.

"hmm?" He grunted in response, already drifting back to sleep.

"I am fine…" she reiterated.

"I know."

Over the next few weeks, things changed drastically for the trio. Nicole had put together a professional grade medical kit which now resided in Dean's trunk so that the boys wouldn't be giving each other stitches with dental floss anymore and she'd also introduced the boys to the magic of an iPod. When She first tired to put the hookup in Dean's cassette player, he almost broke her hand off until she explained that she had downloaded all this usual songs onto her iPod so he could still listen to whatever he wanted. He grumbled a bit, but stopped complaining when he realized how much better the song quality was. In a move that made Sam's eyes pop out of his head, Dean even let Nicole play a few of her own songs.

Nicole also came up with a clever way to make a little money off of the monsters they ganked which made Sam purse his lips in disapproval, but made Dean call her an evil genius. It struck her one day when she was making a student loan payment from Sam's laptop and watching her bank account creep closer to zero. They were literally leaving a gold mine of free stuff behind every time they ganked something, so Nicole had started taking watches and jewelry off their bodies, and if they happened to have a hide out of some kind, any valuables she could fit in a bag and pawning all of it. Once they ganked a werewolf who had expensive taste and made a few thousand dollars in one night.

The idea of selling stolen goods would have made past Nicole extremely uneasy, but vampire Nicole was living in survival mode and she had to do what she was able to while on the road to keep up with her bills so that her life would still be there waiting for her when she got back.

Currently, Nicole was curled up in the back seat of the impala with her noise cancelling headphones on while Dean blasted ACAD. She was hiding underneath a ball cap of Dean's and had huge sunglasses on her face to protect her from the sun while she napped. They had just come from Iowa where a witch had been reeking havoc on the locals crops just for spite. She was the latest in a long list of cases they had been working in the past few weeks, none of which had brought them any closer to the alpha, which Nicole had mouthed off about before falling asleep in the back seat.

So Dean, in an act of desperation since Cas was also coming up short, was driving them to Bobby's. The brother's had avoided going to Bobby's with Nicole so far, unsure of how he would react to them carting around a vampire with them, but desperate times called for desperate measures.

Nicole awoke when she felt the car pull off the road and slipped her headphones off. Yawning, she looked around her.

"I hate to state the obvious," Nicole said, leaning up in between the brothers, "But did you notice we're in a junk yard?"

"Can't get anything past your shape vampire eyes, can we?" Dean snarked at her.

"We're pulling into our friend, Bobby's, house," Sam answered her, rolling his eyes at his brother.

"You guys have friends?" She grinned. "I thought you just picked up girls out of ally ways and forced them to travel with you."

Dean pulled the impala to a stop in front of a house that Nicole thought must have once looked nice, but now looked like it needed a fresh coat of paint and a whole host of repairs. "He was a friend of our father's and he's the closest thing that hunters have to a help line. We thought maybe he could help point us in the right direction to find this alpha since Cas hasn't been able to dig up anything."

"So he's like your Yoda? Sounds awesome!" Nicole made to grab her back and reach for the door, but Dean stopped her.

"Sweetheart, you might want to wait here."

"Why?"

"We've never brought anyone here, much less a vampire and Bobby doesn't take well to strangers. Let us talk to him first, then you can come on up."

Nicole frowned and crossed her arms over her chest, but sat back in her seat. "Alright… but don't call me sweetheart."

Nicole watched the brothers on their way to the front door, where they were greeted by a middle aged man with a kind face who gave them both a huge hug. "Huh," she thought to herself, "I guess they do have at least one friend."

While they talked on the porch, Nicole decided to give her mom a call. She knew her mom would be at work and couldn't answer, but leaving a message was probably better anyways so her mom couldn't ask too many questions.

"Hey Mom, it's Nikki! I just wanted to call and say hi. I'm having a great time out here. I think I'm in South Dakota right now, but I'm not exactly sure because I fell asleep on the bus ride here. We just pulled into our next location. I've been giving lots of stitches and taking care of lots of sprains the past few weeks," Nicole chuckled into her phone, thinking about how many times she had to give one of the brothers stiches in the past few weeks. "I hope everything at home is okay! Tell Brandon I said Hi!"

She ended her call just as Dean started walking back towards the car.

"Bring all your stuff," he told her, opening the back door for her, "we'll probably going to be staying here for a few days. And don't be weirded out of Bobby asks you to touch or drink some weird stuff. It's how he checks to make sure evil creatures of the night don't get into his house… other than our resident vegetarian vampire." He winked at her and grabbed her duffle bag off her arm to carry it in the house for her which made Nicole scowl.

The filed into the living room and Nicole slipped off her sunglasses and Dean's hat.

"We told Bobby this wasn't really necessary because we were there when you turned so we're pretty positive that you are a vampire and not a skin walker or a demon, but he insisted," Sam explained with an apologetic smile.

"Can't be too careful," he man who Nicole now knew to be Bobby said, holding a flask and a small dagger in his hand.

"It's okay," Nicole smiled at him, "I get it."

He handed her the flask and told her it was holy water.

Unscrewing the cap, Nicole's eye flicked to Dean. "Is this going to hurt me like in the myths?"

"Nope. Only demons are affected by holy water."

Taking a sip, Nicole handed the flask back to Bobby, who gave her the dagger in return.

Dean mimed cutting his palm and told her skinwalkers and werewolves were allergic to silver. With a shrug, Nicole sliced open her palm which almost immediately healed.

"Welcome to my home," Bobby said, clapping her on the shoulder, "first time I've ever said that to a vampire. Now can I get you all a drink?"

When the brothers showed Nicole upstairs later that night, she was pleased to see that there were three bedrooms meaning that for the first time in nearly a month she would have some privacy, but as Sam and Dean each entered their respective rooms and said good night, she paused at the doorway. Ever since her first hunt in Piedmont, she'd taken to sharing a bed with Dean again. Though she'd only had a handful of nightmares since then, Dean always woke her up before they got too bad. She knew that Dean would probably not object to sharing his bed with her yet again, but Nicole refused to ask for his help.

"You good, sweetheart?" Dean stuck his head back out into the hall to see Nicole still standing there holding her bag.

"Yeah, of course," she said, putting on an easy grin, "Night, Dean." As she shut the door behind her, Nicole prayed she wouldn't have another nightmare.

A few hours later, Dean jolted awake to the sound of the front door opening. Immediately on the alert, he grabbed a shirt and his hand gun and stuck his head out into the hallway. Sam was also halfway out his own door.

"You heard the front door too?" He asked and Dean nodded.

As if on instinct, Dean looked towards Nicole's door and noticed that it was cracked and the light was on. Lowering his gun, he stepped across the hall and pushed her door all the way open.

"Relax, Sammy. It's just Nicole," he said, taking in her empty bed. Sticking his gun in the back of his pants, he stepped back into the hall. "I'll go talk to her, go back to sleep man."

Sam swallowed and glanced at his brother. "Um, maybe I should go talk to her."

"Why?"

"I mean… you aren't exactly nice to her and clearly something is bothering her." Sam shifted his weight uncomfortably.

"Of course I'm nice to her, what are you talking about?" Dean folded his harms across his chest and glared at his younger brother.

"Well you may not treat her like a bomb waiting to go off anymore, but you're not kind to her either. I mean, I'm not the one that has a crush on her and I'm still nicer to her than you." Sam retorted.

"I don't have a crush on her, Sam."

Sam grinned at Dean across the dark hallway. "Sure you don't Dean. I'm imagining the insane jealousy you get when any other guy talks to her and the way your eyes follow her around a room. I mean, dude, I have literally seen you lean around someone so that you can keep her in your line of sight."

"So?" Dean scoffed, "I worry about her. This life is dangerous and she's new to it."

"Well you're doing a great job of protecting her from every waiter or bartender that has tried to flirt with her these past few weeks. I don't know how she puts up with you. "

Dean stared at the ceiling and took a deep breath. "Sam, I do not have a crush on her. We aren't 13 here, okay? And just because I don't treat her like a delicate flower does not mean I'm not nice to her, okay? Now let me go talk to her."

Without waiting for his brother to respond, Dean turned tail and headed down the stairs. Not bothering to turn on any lights, Dean headed straight for the front door and found Nicole siting on Bobby's front step.

She didn't even glance at Dean as he sat down, instead continuing to stare out into the darkness.

"Not surprised to see me?" he asked.

"I heard you coming down the stairs," she said by way of an explanation, her voice rough with sleep.

"Nightmare?" Dean questioned.

"Actually, no. I just woke up and got to thinking and then going back to sleep became impossible," Nicole said, still staring out into the night. She still had yet to look at Dean.

"Want to talk about it?" Dean clenched his hand into a fist to keep from reaching out to touch her. He'd figured out during these past few weeks that she hated being comforted. She liked handling everything on her own.

Dean expected Nicole to say no, like she always did when he asked her to talk after having a nightmare, but she didn't answer right away. When she finally looked at Dean, he saw she was crying. Not noisy desperate crying, but silent tears were streaming down her cheeks. Unable to stop himself, Dean reached out and wiped her tears from her cheeks and pulled her into his arms. Taking a big shaky breath, Nicole fought back sobs at Deans actions.

"I'm just so scared we won't find the alpha and I can never go back to my old life," she finally admitted.

Dean pursed his lips together in a hard line. He felt for her, he really did, but her words hurt somewhere deep in his chest for reasons he didn't quite know. All he did know, what that the thought of dropping Nicole back off in Phoenix and driving away made him want to punch something, but that was what she wanted. She was out here crying in the middle of the night because she wanted nothing more than to go back to Phoenix and back to her old life.

Swallowing the sudden lump in his throat, Dean squeezed her shoulder. "We're gonna find him, Nikki, I promised didn't I?"

Pulling away from him and wiping her eyes, she managed a small smile. "You're right. Everything always seems worse in the middle of the night. You ever get that feeling around 4 am? Where everything just seems impossible."

Dean glanced down at his hands and Nicole could tell his mind was a million miles away in that moment.

"Yeah, I've been there," he admitted. "There's a lot you don't know about before you joined up with us. There was an apocalypse that was pretty stressful and I though I was gonna lose Sam for a while."

Knowing how much Dean loved his younger brother, Nicole thought the word "stressful" was probably an understatement, but she and Dean were similar in the way they both never liked to admit how much things bothered them.

"You came out on top, though. Like you guys always do" Nicole reminded him, reaching over to squeeze his knee.

"Yeah, we did. Come on sweetheart, let's get you back to bed before Sam starts to think you killed me out here." Dean stood from his place on Bobby's front stairs and reached a hand down for her, noticing for the first time that she was just wearing one of his big tee-shirts and a pair of purple underwear.

Reaching up to take his hand, Nicole flashed her fangs at him. "Call me sweetheart again and I will kill you out here, changing back be damned," she joked, but Dean didn't smile. "I'm kidding, Dean, you're allowed to laugh."

Opening the door for her, Dean looked her up and down. "Nicole, where are your pants?"

"What? Oh…" Nicole pulled she shirt down as far as it would go. "It was hot and I didn't expect to run into anyone in the middle of the night."

When they reached the stairs, Nicole walked up them while holding the shirt down as far as it would go so she wouldn't flash Dean.

"Jesus Christ," she head him mutter and she cheeks burned in embarrassment.

When they were both safely back in their rooms, neither were able to sleep any more that night.

AN: Next chapter they will be back on the road again, with Dean and Nicole as in denial as ever. I hope you all keep reading and don't forget to review!