Careful What You Wish For
Chapter Nine
Monkeywrench
Crowley scowled at the phone, even though it did him no good. "Balls." He muttered, hanging it up. "Double balls." Turning a slow circuit around the small apartment, he double checked all the seals and sigils to make sure no angelic of any sort could get in. Crossing to the small kitchen table, he sat down heavily in the creaking chair, and covered his face with his hands.
His plans hinged on keeping that monster's existence secret from the angels. Now, not only had the demons failed keeping her secret, but the girl had fallen in lots with the Winchesters of all people. If that feathered ball of contradictions didn't already know about the girl, he soon would. And then all of Crowley's contingencies in the world couldn't help him out of the hole he'd dug for himself.
The self-named King of Hell groaned and leaned back in his chair. He opened his senses, and addressed the air, but put the weight of his authority, and the power of his office through the words. "Someone, bring me that nephilim!"
He had to plan, and he had to do it fast. Getting the girl onto his side of the bargain was the best idea. Because if Castiel had her, he wouldn't need the souls from Purgatory. And if the angel didn't get the souls, Crowley didn't get his share either. Without the souls, his reign as King wouldn't be a very long one. But the girl, maybe he could use her as leverage.
As the seeds of a plan began to take root in his mind, Crowley settled more comfortably into his chair, and waited for some word that the girl had been taken.
Kayla wasted no time laying a fat envelope down in front of Bobby once they had returned to the salvage yard. She offered him a smile, and gave his forearm a light squeeze. "Take it as a thanks," she told him, before heading off from his desk. She picked up the plastic bag she had set down once more, and skipped up the stairs quickly before Bobby could form any sort of words.
Opening the envelope, Bobby Singer nearly had a heart attack. Cash. There had to be at least two, maybe three thousand dollars stuffed into the envelope, in neatly stacked, neatly banded twenties. Mouth open, unable to quite manage to process real words, Bobby looked up to find Sam watching him from the hall. Shock rapidly descended into irritation, and Bobby closed the envelope and stood up, prepared to go upstairs and give that girl a piece of his mind.
Sam blocked his way however. "It won't do anything, Bobby; we tried to talk her out of it for hours." Sam nodded at the envelope. "It's what's left of her college fund."
Bobby wilted back into his seat, eyes on the envelope again. "Awww. Dammit." He dropped it onto his desk with a thud and glared at Sam from beneath the brim of his hat. "Way to remind us what we're robbin' from her, huh?"
Sam came into the room fully, sinking down into a chair across from Bobby. "She's actually kind of cheerful about it. She told me that so much finally is starting to make sense now."
"You think she's bluffing?"
"I'm sure of it." Sam let out a soft laugh, one that contained no joy. "She's got skills we can build on though. Track and fencing."
"Fencing?" Bobby repeated, glancing up from his book. "Like, foo-fra epee stuff?"
"Saber, actually." Kayla answered as she came down the steps. "Rick enrolled me when I was twelve. Said I needed an outlet for my anger." She breezed through the room on her way to the kitchen, and Sam turned in his chair to watch her appreciatively.
She'd changed while she was upstairs, into a pair of little cotton shorts, and a tank top. Sam was glad his brother was still outside, so there would be no off-color comments on how nicely the fabric framed her bottom. And he could oogle without fear of blushing. Too bad he had forgotten about Bobby.
"Son, look." Bobby nudged Sam's shoulder.
"I am, believe me." Sam whispered in answer, feeling the flush of embarrassment easing up his face.
Bobby sighed. "Higher, boy. Higher."
Sam blinked, and yanked his eyes away from the more pleasing sights, to travel up the length of her back. As Kayla leaned into the fridge, her hair slipped over her shoulder, revealing what Bobby had already spotted. Aside from the skinny straps of her top, Kayla's back was completely revealed. Her shoulders were well-muscled, smooth skinned, except for two strips of puckered, raised scar-tissue. The scars ran roughly parallel to her spine, about five inches apart from one another. Sam drew breath to say something about them, when Kayla straightened, and shook her hair back to cover the marks once more.
She turned back to face them, holding up a trio of cold beers in her fingers. "You guys want one?"
The question snapped Bobby out of his thoughts. "Yes, but you ain't getting one."
Walking into the study, she padded silently on the floor, barefoot. Sam took one of the three, and she held another out to Bobby. Then, as if to directly spite him, she cracked the final beer open with a deft twist of her wrist. Cocking her hip to one side, she took a long pull on the beer. Sam felt his mouth go dry, and quickly dropped his eyes.
"I'm.. uh... gonna go check on Dean." He pushed himself up from the chair and was out the door before either of them could speak. Kayla looked almost forlorn in the wake of his disappearance, but shook herself out of it and lowered herself into the chair he'd vacated. She pulled her legs up, crossing them in the seat, and leaned back, pressing the cold bottle against her forehead for a moment.
Bobby was sure he saw the mask slipping. Forcing herself to be cheerful had to take it's toll. He sat quietly, afraid to move or speak, in case she was working up to some great, earth-shattering revelation. She bit her lower lip, chewing over how to say it, and she checked both doors before speaking. "Mister Singer?"
Those green eyes of hers had a way of boring straight through a person. Bobby took a swig of his beer, giving her an affirmative grunt for her to continue.
"My aunt.. and uncle... back home..." she trailed off again, and Bobby, intrigued leaned forward.
"What about 'em, sweetheart?"
Kayla shook her head, and unfolded her legs in a quick motion. She got to her feet and flashed him one of her brilliant smiles. "Nevermind! It's just me being silly... worrying, y'know?" She winked, and tipped the top of the beer toward him. "Thanks for the brew. See you in the morning!"
She was out and back up the stairs before Bobby could curse under his breath. He knew there was a reason he disliked teenagers. Kayla qualified, but just barely. Grumbling under his breath, he fell back into the book, back into the futile search for clues.
In order to give Kayla a tiny amount of privacy at least, Bobby had given up his room for the couch once more. The brothers still kept the guest room (even though Bobby had long given up thinking of it as such). As was her custom for so long, Kayla allowed herself to drift in and out of sleep, never fully unaware of her surroundings. Just like in her sorority house, she could feel the people in the rooms around her. Dimly, in her half-aware state, she knew Sam slept fitfully, fretful, and worried. Dean was lost in blissfully happy dreams of a life he'd never have. Bobby's were of darker stuff, of things that would make a lesser man sob for his mother.
Her own thoughts and dreams drifted lazily. Sometimes, she dreamed of a song, while at other times she could hear someone calling her name softly. She had never really paid attention to what her mind touched on while she was trying to sleep, if what she was doing could count as sleep any longer. She wished she could revisit that exhausted, almost-drugged slumber than held her just days before.
Kayla wasn't certain what it was that made her open her eyes. A change from one of the others, perhaps? Or something worse, maybe a sound? With no trace of drowsiness, she slipped from the bed, and padded slowly around the room, checking the window first, and then easing the door open a crack to peer out into the hallway. Nothing. The house was silent as a tomb. So what was it?
Then it happened again. Her shoulders itched. More specifically, the long, thin scars down her shoulder blades tingled and buzzed. She twisted one arm around to her back to try to scratch the spot, and had nearly succeeded when something descended over her head. The sack fell neatly around her head and shoulders, just as a hand clamped down over her mouth and nose to prevent her from screaming. With a few deft moves, her assailant had her bound and gagged, when suddenly the world went screwy, and all sense of balance left her.
Sam was the last one mobile the next morning. That was one thing he hated about downtime, having some semblance of a real sleeping schedule destroyed his ability to be alert as soon as he opened his eyes. He did like having clean clothes to climb into, and the promise of a cup of coffee waiting for him to start his day. Little things like that made life worth living. Jeans, a clean tee-shirt, and a pair of boots later, Sam was tromping his way through the hallway.
He paused for a moment in front of Bobby's bedroom, his attention caught by the cracked open door. When he knocked lightly, it swung further open, and he stuck his head into the room. Spotting the thrown-back covers, and the opened window curtain, he figured that she was up already, and waiting downstairs for him. He couldn't help but smirk a little at the irony of it all. He, the reluctant hunter, getting ready to train new blood into the age old profession.
You ready for this, Sam? He heard his father's voice chime inside his head, an ugly shade of doubt and worry rising up inside of him. Sam squared his shoulders, and turned to the stair. Hell yeah, he answered grimly, as he hustled down.
Just as he reached the study, Bobby was coming up from the basement with a half-dozen books in his arms. "This is it, Dean. The last of it." He dropped the stack onto the desk, sending up a cloud of dust from the uppermost book. "Once we're through here, we're outta books. Done. Finito."
Sam gave a doubtful look around, as he reached over Bobby's shoulder to pick up the top one. "You mean we've gone through everything?"
"Everything I ever collected." Bobby admitted, with a bit of a shrug. "And so far, not one little inkling of where we'd find an answer. I am plumb outta ideas after these, and I'm open to suggestions."
Sam flipped open the book in his hands, and paged past the first few sheets. "Heh, this would've been handy dealing with those dragons," he mused, as he headed into the kitchen for coffee. Dean dogged his steps, waiting until Sam was distracted by pouring himself coffee to nab the book from his hand.
"Why don't you go play Prince Charming and go wake up Sleeping Beauty? I think Bobby and I can handle six books on our own." Dean smirked, loving the idea of putting his little brother into awkward situations.
"Wait. What?" Sam overpoured the coffee, and cursed as it splashed over the counter. He missed the hotplate and instead just left the pot where it landed. "She's not already up?"
Dean shook his head, eyes widening as he picked up on his brother's growing sense of panic. When Sam took off for the stairs, Dean was right on his heels. Bobby looked up from the book he was reading as the boys bolted past; he pondered following them, but decided against it, knowing they would have the situation well in control before he got there.
Sam threw the door open calling her name, but received no answer for his troubles. Dean made a quick visual sweep of the room, cursing under his breath. Nothing was misplaced, nothing was askew. It just seems that she had vanished once more. Scrubbing his face with his hand, he turned to leave the room, taking a few steps out before he reached back and fetched Sam.
"C'mon Sammy, she probably smartened up and decided she wanted out." He had to rationalize it, for Sam, who still stood transfixed by the idea that she'd just up and left. "Or maybe Cas needed her for something."
Sam blinked at the second suggestion. That made more sense. He could tell that Dean was only trying to help, but some small portion of him still felt deflated. Kayla had seemed genuinely excited about learning what the brothers did for their self-appointed job. Dejected, he followed Dean from the room and closed the door behind him.
Kayla came to with the sense that she was lying on her side. Her hands were bound behind her back, and she couldn't see. It felt like someone had hit her hard enough to ring her bell within the last hour or so. Just as she was about to roll and struggle to her knees, she became aware of another person nearby. A steady, raspy breathing came from just to her left. She stopped moving immediately, and settled in to listen. When the breathing didn't change, she began to count time by it. Someone was sleeping nearby.
Perfect. She began to focus, pulling up all the details she could remember about Sam Winchester in her head. The back of her head throbbed as she worked, making the process take twice as long as normal. And when she finally managed to fix Sam's image in her head, she took a deep breath in and simply wanted to be with him. Instead of the now familiar feeling of the world shifting sideways, she received a backlash of blinding white agony that burst behind her eyes.
Unable to stop herself, she cried out in pain. And the sound of breathing changed remarkably. While Kayla lay still, whimpering in the aftermath of her escape attempt, a door opened and closed twice. Once to let her sentry out, and once to let her captor in. Someone knelt beside her, placing a cool hand against her face. A few moments later, she was freed of the blindfold, and could squint through the pain at the face of her kidnapper.
He flashed her a smile that never touched his eyes. Sharply dressed in an all-black three piece suit, she thought he was rather handsome, but in a very odd way. His face was on the round side, and he was solidly built without bearing any excess weight. His fingers were cool, and not unkind as he cupped the back of her head and touched the tender spot where she'd been struck.
With her so vulnerable in his hands, she waited for a moment or two before trying to speak. But as she opened her mouth, he held his other hand up, shushing her, while shaking his head.
"I think not, poppet." His voice was low, and brushed with an accent that she had trouble defining. Something British maybe, or Scottish even. "Consider yourself a permanent guest here; I can't have you goin' and interrupting my plans now, can I?"
Kayla blinked in confusion, and tried to twist away from his hands. It caused him to push his fingers against the tender spot near her temple, and send her senses reeling in pain once more. Kayla managed to sob a single word, causing him to release her, as he laughed.
"Why? Oh, Poppet." He settled back on his heels, resting his hands on his knees, while he regarded her carefully. "Because I'm the King of Hell, child. And you are an angelic crusader for the right folks, at the wrong time. Get comfy; you're in for a long stay."
With that, he rose quickly to his feet, and moved toward the door again. Stepping outside, she caught sight of a second figure out there. Thankfully, when the door closed, they both remained outside. Kayla looked around at the sigil-covered walls of her new room, and realized that she had no clue how to get herself out of this.