A/N: So, this chapter is slightly filler but I kind of had a lot of fun writing it, so I hope you have as much fun reading it! Enjoy!
Dean Winchester was raised to know full well the repercussions of getting too involved with another human being. Getting close to any one, familial or otherwise, often resulted in somebody's death. It had so for he and Sam at least. Yet here he was, challenging the oldest rule in the book, knee deep in emotions, because he couldn't help it, he had it bad for the bartender any way.
To be fair it wasn't as though he'd never been down this road before. Heck, he'd fallen hard and fast for the last one. Cassie. He even told her the truth. About his family. About himself. About the gig.
Chyeah. And look where that got you. If this doesn't work out, how many nameless, faceless women will there be between Cassie and the next one?
Dean rolled his eyes, choosing to neglect his inner monologue and instead refocused his gaze on the object of his inner turmoil.
Taut, denim-clad legs and long, tousled blonde hair called to him from across the haze and gloom.
It was so cliche. It was so him. And yet somehow, this seemed different. Unlike Cassie, she wasn't just a civilian, so surely that had to count for something, right? Tandy was in the business. Their business. She had been so since birth. How many other hunters had he pursued before? Typically, they weren't his type, but typically, they didn't have the kind of curves you'd find only in a dirty men's mag.
Dean raised his glass, winced and began to pull a part all the small details that had led him here. Tandy Kinsella was an enigma, a puzzle he couldn't solve. She was the daughter of a Floridian hunter and a wise voodooiene that John had met on a hunt in N'Awlins when Dean was thirteen years old. Some letiche had been taking chunks out of locals down by the bayou and only a herbal remedy concocted by the woman could heal the wounded. Despite having hunted with her father on several occasions, Dean had not met the voodooiene or their daughter back then, but he had had the chance, several years later, when an exsanguinated corpse and stories of a monster that made the streets run red with blood drew the boys back to the Big Easy, and they arrived just in time to watch a young woman kick a severed head into the swamps of Louisiana, to be consumed by the 'gators. That night, when the smell of burnt flesh had finally left their nostrils, they had shared drinks in some long-begotten bootleggers' den, and he could remember thinking that she had reminded him of a Victoria's Secrets model, without the grace and gentility. She was clumsy, inelegant. No one questioned the deep, purple bruises that freckled her jaw or the many aged scars that marred her otherwise smooth, sun-kissed complexion. Her manager was almost scared to do stock take after her shift, she'd broken so many glasses she couldn't count. But then, he knew better. He knew that she was more than that. That the bumps and bruises looked more familiar to him than any tale she'd spin to the patrons who questioned the yellowing shiner on her cheek. She was more than she let on. More than just a bubbling, Southern belle with a sultry gaze and a wicked grin. Because when her fists closed around the grip of her Colt Mustang and her finger coiled around the trigger, her gaze sharpened, her deep, blue eyes became clear and focused. Her hand steadied and her nerves stilled. She was no longer the ham-handed bar maid that she pretended to be. She was a dead shot. A damn good gunswoman. Any hunter that had passed through the South knew that.
It didn't make him any less jealous though when they claimed to know other things about her steady hands, but he'd take that knowledge with him to the grave. In any case, like him, she wasn't one to kiss and tell, so for all he knew, the rumours could have been true. But it didn't matter, because Dean knew better, or so he liked to think. What he didn't know, however, what he couldn't explain, was why he was still there, skulking in the corner, watching her. Given the past few days, you'd have thought he would have been able to take a hint. Clearly not.
It was Tandy's first shift back since the Aswang and she had slipped right back into the rhythm of it all, seemingly glad to be back.
The bar, at present, was empty, which wasn't unusual given the tender hour, but it left him feeling uneasy nevertheless. His palms itched with the need to do something and though his healing ribs still ached each time he raised his drink to his lips, he couldn't help but feel, well, useless.
Sam had left several hours before and Tandy was pulling up barstools and wiping spilled beer off of the counter when she noticed him in the corner, silent and brooding.
"Dean. Jesus." She breathed, holding her chest in surprise. "I thought you left with Sam. Did you forget somethin'?"
"Nope, just lost track of time." Dean replied with an easy smile, a smile that rendered other women completely senseless and yet for some annoying reason seemed to have little to no effect on her.
He gestured towards the small but long forgotten pile of papers before him. "Research."
"Right." Tandy said, uncertainty lilting her tone. "It ain't like you to stay up and burn the midnight oil over research. I thought that was more of a Sam thing."
"Hey, it can be a Dean thing." He retorted, somewhat offended. Why did everyone always assume that Sam was the only one with a half a brain cell between the two of them? He could string a case together through monitoring the patterns just as well - if not better - than his dorky brother and he was resourceful. Sure, Sam had a laptop, which meant that he had the means right beneath his too-long fingertips, but Dean had just as much wit and know-how when it came to hunting. He wasn't just the braun in their dynamic duo, although he did wear that badge pretty proudly, if he were being completely honest.
"Since when?" Tandy challenged, popping her hip and folding her arms over her chest in a genuinely curious, if not challenging, manner.
Since you.
"Since -" Dean caught himself and chuckled. He stood and made his way over to the bar, placing himself in a stool. "Whatever. I guess I just wasn't ready to call it a night."
Tandy was silent, and it seemed for a moment, that she was mulling something over in her mind. Finally, she sighed and pulled up a seat behind the bar opposite him. "Well, in that case, a penny for your thoughts?"
"How about a nip?" Dean asked, licking his bottom lip.
Tandy smirked and removed a bottle of Jack from a shelf beneath the bar.
"Well, Dean." She began, sloshing a generous portion into his empty tumbler. "Let's hear it."
Dean watched the amber liquid spill up and over the sides of the glass and swallowed.
"Hear what?" He asked.
"Well, you were honest with me, so now I'm goin' to let you pick my brain 'bout your little problem." She stated. "So, how did you catch wind of the case?"
"The case?" Dean choked, startled. The shot he had just downed caught in his throat and began to burn. It wasn't completely unpleasant but it did render him momentarily speechless.
"Well, sure, that is what this is about, right? The broodin' and lurkin' and stayin' out late? Something rough must be playin' on your mind. A part from the nightmares, I'll bet it's a case, hence the research."
"Uh, right. Aha. The case." Dean responded, taking her bait in lieu of the truth. "Yeah."
"Mama said at breakfast that you were thinkin' demons. Maybe I could help?"
"We were." Dean responded. "But if your mama was already onto it, why didn't you take the case?" He added, intrigued.
Tandy shrugged.
"Mama saw somethin' in a puddle'a mud the other mornin' and thought this might'a been a Winchester thing."
"A Winchester thing?" Dean asked.
"Y'know ... from up there." Tandy replied, lowering her voice as she pointed an index finger skywards.
It dawned on him then, what she had meant and he chuckled. "Angels? Your mama thinks this is the work of angels?" Bodies found disembowelled in an abandoned warehouse, their entrails used to create the sigils of a summoning ritual, didn't exactly scream messengers of God.
"Mmhmm."
"And even if it was, why is that a Winchester thing?" Dean asked, bemused. Okay, so sure, it wasn't as if the whole - *air quote* "apocalypse shenanigans" *close air quote* - was a well-kept secret amongst the hunting community, but he and Sam weren't the only ones to be known affiliates of their cloud-hopping compadres, so to speak.
Tandy rolled her eyes and stowed the bottle beneath the counter. "Oh, I don't know. Maybe 'cause of that six odd foot, trench coat clad, feathery-assed angel you got hidden under your wing? No pun intended."
"No." Dean stated firmly, suddenly, surprising Tandy, and even himself. "Cas - Castiel doesn't know about this." He added more softly.
Tandy raised her eyebrows and popped out her bottom lip, apologetic. "Sorry, didn't mean to hit a nerve there. I know I've never met the guy, but the way you and Sam talk about him, I guess I just ... anyway, just 'cause he doesn't know doesn't mean it ain't his problem." She replied after a moment, removing her phone from her back pocket.
"Oh? Then what would you suggest that I do?" Dean asked in a smoother tone, attempting a charming smile that, yet again, failed him for the umpteenth time.
The girl was immune. Maybe there was a time when she wouldn't have been so damn quick to dismiss him, but because of his own idiotic doing she had closed her heart off to him. That, coupled with the fact that she was currently distracted, gazing down at the illuminated screen in her hands, only served to bruise his ego further.
"Call him." Tandy replied bluntly, her attention divided. "Or pray to him, however you do it, but ask him to keep an ear out. Better the angel you know than the one you don't."
"I don't think that's how the saying goes." Dean responded gloomily.
"Whatever. Just go with it. Mama never got a gut feelin' wrong." Tandy replied, punching something into her phone.
"I don't doubt that." Dean muttered, regret about hanging about when she was clearly pre-occupied creeping in.
Tandy glanced up then, guilty, and stowed her phone away, almost as if she could read his thoughts. "Look, I'm goin' to make you dinner tomorrow night, m'kay? Just you'n me. It might be a Winchester thing, but I'm here to help, however I can. Consider this me tryin'." She said, and she reached across the bar to place a small, warm hand over his. To say that the soft gesture caught him off-guard was an understatement.
She smiled at him - full, pink lips and kind, knowing eyes that suggested at something Dean wasn't entirely sure he imagined - and he felt his heart stutter.
He said her name in an exhale and the phone in her back pocket buzzed once more.
Tandy withdrew her hand, the smile quickly fading from her lips, and released a frustrated huff.
"Sorry 'bout that. It's m'damn brother. He's huntin' some bunyip in the sunburnt country and has me sendin' him info."
Dean chuckled at the irony.
"Long way to go for a hunt. Guess I'm not the only one up late burnin' the midnight oil." He uttered in a poor imitation.
Tandy smiled, however the light gesture didn't reach her eyes. "I guess not."
"I'll take you up on that offer. For dinner." Dean said, the words suddenly tumbling out of his mouth in an unusual hurry.
Tandy smiled, dimple-chinned and sparkling teeth, and this time, the light was there.
"Good. Now, are you just gonna sit there lookin' pretty or are you gonna help me lock up?" She replied, winking at him over her shoulder as she turned to collect her bag and keys.
Dean smirked and slid out of the booth.
So, she thought he was pretty. It wasn't much, but he'd take it. Hell, he'd take anything she gave him at this point.
The stench of swamp water rose up from the bayou's nearby and intermingled with the rich, smoky scent of jambalaya.
Tandy slid the lock into place and led Dean to the parking lot behind the bar, embracing the comfortable silence fell between them.
It wasn't Bourbon Street, so there was no lively music or neon lights to fill the blackness, just the dull gleam cast from the streetlights overhead and the distant sounds of the highway.
Dean's eyes, both dark and light at the same time but always impossibly green, peered at her beneath his heavy lashes.
She tried hard not to notice it, but there, beneath the moonlight, he appeared younger, softer, and she couldn't help but wonder if that was a part of his charm, or whether he'd always been that way, even when he was slicing the heads clean off of vampires. Maybe Hell had done a number on him, but he was still the same man he'd been when she first met him, and she'd be damned if she didn't at least try to reconnect with her old feelings for him. Heck, she owed it to herself to at least give it a go. He'd been through so much, they both had.
Tandy paused bedside her truck and turned to Dean.
"So, tomorrow ..." She uttered.
"I'll be there." Dean confirmed, not missing a beat. "I mean, I'm staying at your place, it'd be pretty rude of me if I wasn't."
Tandy smiled, flicked a coil of blonde hair behind her ear and fisted Dean on the shoulder in a light gesture, ensuring to avoid his damaged ribs.
"Good. I'll make sure I put on some pie, too." She said.
Dean mouthed "Score!", followed by a cheeky, if not slightly authoritative "Drive safe, precious cargo," as he gestured over himself.
Tandy rolled her eyes but nodded nevertheless. She watched him stalk around the truck and smirk and in that moment, she wondered why the greenness of his eyes made her weak at the knees.
Scratch that.
She'd always known why, she just didn't know why, all of a sudden, after years of being insusceptible to his flirtations, of pushing her feelings for him deep, deep down into the very pits of her stomach that that made her feel ... nervous. Uncomfortably so.
The sound of the passenger door rattling to a close brought Tandy out of her thoughts and she raised her head just in time to see Dean offer her a small wave and a devilish grin, gesturing for her to jump in.
Tandy cursed and clambered into her truck.
Damn that Dean Winchester and his sparkling eyes and too-pretty mouth.
She wondered what her mama would have to say to her when she got home.
If she'd say anything at all.
She doubted it.
Her thoughts then wandered to her family and she peered at her reflection in the side mirror, mindful that Dean's eyes were watching her. Round, blue eyes rimmed with black khol, full, pink lips and a small, straight nose peered back at her. She had the makings of a movie star imbedded in her genes, almost went that way too, if it wasn't for her pa's strict teachings and her mama's talent for mixing herbs into miracles. And still, for all her talents with a machete, her quick humour and her tender heart, too many men had tried to treat her like she was nothing more than a good time, a passing fancy, meaningless, fleeting. Hunters, civ's, heck, she'd even eyed off a vampire who claimed he was "vegetarian." God, was she really that desperate? She cut his head off anyway. Jesus. Maybe that was her problem.
Tandy swallowed the sudden lump in her throat and gripped the steering wheel tighter beneath her hands.
Dean, Dean, Dean.
That's probably all he saw her for as well.
She had known Dean for years. Avoided his charm for years. Avoided feelings for years.
Stupid Dean. Stupid feelings.
These things never ended well for her.
Despite what Sam and Tommy had said, despite the way Dean seemed to think he felt about her, she still couldn't help but feel that her heart beat more loudly than his did when it actually came down to it and that really, really sucked.
Tandy released a deep sigh. That could be tomorrow's problem. For now, though, she settled into a comfortable speed, making a point to avoid Dean's curious gaze and turned up the volume on her temperamental radio, allowing the open road navigate them home.
