Thump. Thump.
Jo's heart hammered like a drum inside her rib cage, feeling oddly as if it were lodged somewhere underneath her jaw. Every nerve was on edge, ears tuned in to the fragments of sound drifting down the corridor.
She'd become halfway used to the incredible adrenalin this job warranted now, but nevertheless the memory never quite lived up to the moment itself. Despite how much she wanted to leap from her hiding spot and go sprinting down the corridor, she stayed where she was, pistol in hand and dryness in her throat.
There had been five murders in Chicago, Illinois, within the past three weeks. Every report had been the same- the victim had been bitten to death by what the coroner consistently reported to be a 'vicious mauling, typical of a large canine.'
Jo knew immediately what she was dealing with. She'd had her fair share of hunters passing through the Roadhouse not that long ago and she'd listened to the tales about the Black Dogs, the Hellhounds. After that, the rest was history. Google told her everything else she needed to know.
This man, Mr. Douglas Fawcett, had reported a sighting of a large black dog 'on the corner of Jefferson Park Road' to the animal authorities yesterday. Jo had been keeping an eye on those records, too. It paid to be vigilante. It wasn't much of a tip off, but the previous five victims had reported the very same thing, each time- to a relative, the cops, whatever- and the next day were always found mangled to death. 'A large black dog with red eyes.'
The sounds coming from down the aisle were faint, practised, like a stealthy predator stalking their sleeping prey. All things considered, that comparison made sense.
Jo was working primarily with her ears. Black Dogs were atypically invisible to anyone but the person they hunted. She held her Jericho pistol aloft, sheltered by the wall, waiting for the noise to become clear and close enough to guarantee a sure shot.
Jo braced herself. The sound of breathing was becoming more prominent. Her heart was beating so hard in her ribs- so loud she was sure the hound would have no trouble hearing it. She swallowed.
The pistol was a double-action shotgun; which meant, as such, there was no 'safety' mode. She couldn't decock the gun. Jo always kept only five cylinders out of six loaded, so if she accidentally dropped it, or literally 'jumped the gun,' she'd be punished with only a harmless, quiet 'click' as the cartridge flicked across.
The noise was almost breaching the wall, now. She subconsciously clamped her teeth across her tongue to stop herself from making a shock-induced noise and heaved a shuddering breath. Jo stepped forward into the hall, raised the Jericho and pointed it directly at the spot where she'd last heard the noise progression.
Problem was, there wasn't just an empty hall in front of her. There was a very solid, dark form only inches away who was just as startled, if not more so, than she was. And it wasn't a dog. It was very much human.
Shocked into a fluid reaction she flicked the trigger lightly to cycle onto the loaded cartridge and raised the gun directly to the man's face. She couldn't see him in the darkness.
He retaliated by raising his own gun right back at her.
Jo's eyes widened. Well… she hadn't expected that. Instinct told her to aim at his leg or arm and pull the trigger, but the split second it took her to decide was costly- the man caught her off-guard with a practised flick of his wrist and snatched the pistol right out of her grip, turning it around and aiming it right back at her.
Instinctively she delved into her pocket for her father's knife, but the man advanced sinisterly in the dark, decocking his own gun and letting it fall, for the moment, onto the carpet where it landed softly and almost noiselessly on the plush. He raised the Jericho to her temple and she tensed at the feeling of metal pressed to her head.
With a sort of masculine grace he shepherded her back across the corner and up to the wall, where she fumbled desperately in her pants for the knife.
When she finally found it she was pinned in between him and the wall, a gun to her temple and his body pressing against hers. Her heart began to pump more rapidly, a tremor running down her spine.
His breath was harsh against her ear, accusatory and almost manic, a bloodlust she couldn't comprehend. His free hand drifted up the line of her waist to her chest, and then her neck, pinning her there with one thumb pressed against her larynx, putting pressure on her breathing
A sliver of moonlight broke free from behind the window and fell across the bottom half of the wall, leaving them both still shrouded in shadow. But the light reflected from the metal of the pistol and something metallic on the man's neck. Her clouding eyes instantly registered the golden minotaur-like amulet and she was startled into a dumbfounded realization.
"Dean?" she whispered, flaring nostrils taking in the long-forgotten scent of the man's aftershave.
The stranger paused, shocked, and shifted only slightly to let a beam of moonlight fall across her flushed face. Realization smacked him hard and he expelled his breath in an incredulous huff, releasing her immediately and stepping backward as if stung. The sudden cold compared to the warmth of his body was startling and gooseflesh began to spread across her skin.
"Jo?" he whispered, a husky whisper in the half dark.
"Fuck. It's you. I'm sorry."
Jo snorted quietly in response, scarcely audible. Despite the kafuffle, there was still a completely innocent man sleeping in this apartment and if he should wake to find two armed strangers in his apartment he might be more than a little ruffled.
"Give me back my gun."
Dean seemed a little mirthful and flicked the gun back to the empty cartridge, handing it back to her handle first. She took it- or rather, snatched it- before Dean turned his back to go get his own discarded Beretta.
Now that he was facing the other way, she could see his profile in the moonlight. He looked tired, with a strange hardness about him she couldn't put a finger on. But he was still handsome, as ever. The job hadn't wearied him much at all.
Jo was overcome with a sudden peculiar possessiveness. Trust Dean Winchester to come barging headfirst into a job she had already covered from head to toe. From what she knew of him, she half expected to be told to go wait in the car. Jo's face twitched in an unspoken determination and her fingers tightened on the pistol.
When Dean had retrieved his gun, he turned to face her.
"What're you doing here?" he whispered over her shoulder as Jo surveyed the hallway.
"Shhh," she replied tartly, feeling an odd feeling of accomplishment as she heard Dean's indignant sniff in response. It was a stupid question, anyway. It didn't take a genius to figure out she was working a job.
I'm sneaking around with a gun in some random apartment for the fun of it, Dean. Friggin' idiot.
There was the sound of a hoarse panting from the doorway. Fuck.
Jo pressed herself to the wall, slowly sliding the magazine across once more to a loaded cartridge hole, bracing herself. She felt sudden warmth behind her as Dean slid up alongside and nudged her swiftly, as if silently demanding the front corner of the wall.
Jo elbowed him in the ribs in response- admittedly, probably harder than she should have, but he deserved it.
She could feel the irritation emanating from him in waves and she resisted the urge to say something scathing.
Control freak.
The panting became more pronounced as she listened keenly up to the point where she could feel the prickling at the nape of her neck which meant something had seen her. The panting stopped and there was a brief pause.
Dean seemed to intuitively seek out the same source of movement because they stepped out and pulled the trigger simultaneously, aiming out of instinct.
As luck would have it her aim was true, hitting a dark figure squarely on the physique with rock salt.
The dog's red eyes narrowed malevolently and in the hail of hot stone and salt the canine disappeared with a malign growl and the beginnings of a whimper.
"I thought hellhounds are supposed to be invisible," muttered Jo, bemused, but she didn't have much time for musing.
A foreign warmth on her back caused her to jerk subconsciously and it took her a moment to realise it was Dean's hand on the small of her back, fingers tightening on her skin and jerking her forward
"Bail," he hissed, brushing almost deliberately past her, the leather sliding across her bare arms causing her to shudder despite herself.
A light flicked on in one of the rooms down the way.
Without need for elaboration Jo found her head and immediately started after Dean, who had been joined by a familiar, taller man by the door.
Jo's heart constricted. Their last meeting hadn't been a nice one.
Flat-footed, she thundered out the door just in time to see the Winchester boys sprinting down the last case of steps. Bastards. They hadn't even waited.
Sour but excited nonetheless, she took the stairs two at a time down to the cement of the alleyway and ran back along the path towards the car waiting in the parking lot.
Breath throwing mist on the cold Chicago air, she habitually juggled her keys until she found the right one and unlocked the door, sliding into the driver's side. Cold fingers were a bitch on nights like this when speed was everything.
Trembling, she started the ignition and revelled momentarily in the warmth that shot immediately from the air conditioning.
With a huff she accelerated out of the parking lot before snooping neighbours could jot down her number plate. Last thing she needed was a court summons.
It took her until she had left the parking lot to notice the black Chevy following her out of the parking lot and out onto the main road.
She was spiteful, and only just restrained from winding down her window to give them at obscene gesture. God knew it would do them some good to understand how their self-absorbed little worlds sometimes collided very painfully with hers.
Jo was still sour over what had happened back in Duluth. She'd been practically bound and tormented by a demon-clad Sam and left without a word in the dark tavern.
She'd dragged Dean's ass out of the water down near the wharf and fixed his bullet wound for him- to be rewarded only with threats of more bondage and the empty promise of a call.
He didn't call. She knew he wouldn't. The transparency of his lies riled her.
But the confrontation was inevitable, and she preferred not to be followed back to her hotel room. She pulled into a sleepier neighbourhood and drove until she found a vacant lot, where she begrudgingly pulled over and turned off the engine.
She watched in the rear-view mirror as the two men shouldered gruffly out of the Impala, both looking tired and surly.
Jo watched without expression for a moment before she allowed her ironclad anger to dissolve slightly and stepped out of the sedan with an inaudible grunt of dismay.
The tension was taut as they walked towards each other. Jo had become a stronger girl in the time she'd been away from them. She was still a novice but she was learning with every hunt, becoming stealthier and less suspicious, picking up the tricks of the trade with every passing day. At first, the work had been slow and steady, a job here, a job there. But then in the space of no time the map had exploded with unexplained storms, murders, disappearances. It was as if all hell had broken loose, and to be frank, Jo loved it. It was nice to be constantly kept on her toes.
Jo slowed down warily as the distance closed until there were a few yards between them and crossed her arms, surveying them with an expression of utmost distaste which clearly put across the 'one wrong word and your life is forfeit' sort of vibe.
Dean didn't look too perturbed, and but Sam fidgeted despite herself, meeting her eyes only for brief periods of time before looking away again.
"Haven't seen you boys in a while," said Jo coolly after a moment to break the silence. Neither Dean nor Sam missed the coldness in her voice.
"What brings you to Chicago?" replied Dean inquisitively with that almost permanent expression of smug satisfaction plastered on his face. Jo scowled, but shrugged in answer.
"Same thing as you, I guess. I'm working a job."
"Ah," replied Dean in a magisterial tone, flashing her a slipshod smile. "Ellen told us you were out and about, hunting. How is it going for you?"
"Great," replied Jo in a lacklustre sort of way. Dean's conversational tone was annoying the crap out of her. She knew it was his way of dancing around the inevitable. She could almost see him struggling with the words he knew he needed to say. 'So, about the Duluth thing…'
She was much more interested in observing as the rusty wheels in his brained struggled to come up with something productive.
"It's been awfully busy, I'm sure you boys know all about it."
The brothers nodded in unison. A freaky brotherly jynx thing. Jo had become semi-accustomed to it.
"Strange, how whenever I meet up with you guys I always end up at knifepoint or gunpoint," she added snidely, unable to help herself.
"One of the bad points of the job, unfortunately," put in Sam backhandedly.
"He speaks," noted Jo wryly, causing Sam to flush slightly and smile in a sheepish sort of way, flashing his dimples. She smiled back despite herself.
Damn. Jo was a sucker for dimples. She knew it was a stupid flaw but she really was rendered almost helpless whenever Sam gave her that little boy grin of his. Not that she was attracted to him at all, but, well, when she was trying to drill in her angry point, smiling dopily back at him probably wasn't the best plan of attack.
Thank god it wasn't genetic. If Dean had dimples like that, she really didn't know what she'd do.
"I wanted to apologise for the entire ordeal back at Minn," said Sam in his typical level headed, rational sort of way. He was very easy to reason with but Jo was the sort of person to hold a grudge and his politeness aggravated her.
She was curious, though, as to if Sam was actually conscious inside his body when the demon was taunting her. If he'd heard the words that had come from his own mouth. If he could truly understand what she'd been constantly going over since then.
"I can't remember any of it, but Dean tells me I was screwing with you pretty badly," he added, answering Jo's question. She huffed.
"I think that sounded dirtier than you wanted it to," put in Dean with an arrogant smirk.
Jo cracked a grin, try as she might to stop it. Sometimes she thought Dean was a useless egotistical jerk but she had to admit, he was good for comic relief. Even Sam allowed a weary smile.
Dean caught Jo's eye and his expression of self-satisfaction intensified as he spotted her smile. For a moment the shared eye contact reminded her of that dispiriting moment back at the apartment and she shivered with something that had nothing to do with the cold.
"I'm ravenous," she said finally, most of the contempt having been chipped away to a more manageable anger that rested in waiting in her gut.
"What do you boys say to dinner?"
Both boys nodded at the precise same time again, with identical facial expressions which hinted to the possibility they hadn't eaten in a long time.
Ah, another weird-ass brother thing. Jo shrugged it off again and declined comment.
"Where to?" she asked, leaving the decision making up to them.
"There's a nice spot down the road from out motel room," suggested Dean.
"But please don't tell me you're going to follow us in that little shitbox of a car. Come in the Impala and we will drop you back here after."
"If you insult my car again I'm going to need to put sugar in your gas tank," she informed in a pleasant sort of way, raising an eyebrow as if to imitate Dean. She hated it when he did that, and it was nice to throw something back in his face once in a while.
"But, okay. I can deal with that."
"Let's hit the road, then," replied Sam without a moment's pause.