Gimme Shelter – Chpt 4.

By: sifi.

OOooOO

"So are you gonna see this one again or was it just another fuck?" Angela cocked her eyebrow from across the cubicle.

Deb shook her head smirking then sighed and smiled languidly, "Mmm he was... something definitely... different." She popped a chunk of tuna into her mouth before resuming her normal plastic every day expression, "If I'd come across him two years ago, I might be wiling..." she shook her head then looked at her best friend hating the shadow of pity that crossed her eyes, "just a fuck."

"Well at least dish a little dirt girl... what's the smile about? Obviously this one had a little something the rest of 'em don't?" Angela asked trying to rearrange the suddenly awkward vibe between them.

Deb grinned leaning across the carpeted square. A flake of fish dropped to the floor and she ground it into the carpeting, "Oh yeah... dude was so shitfaced he couldn't even see straight, not that it mattered... he could've flown me home on autopilot..."

Angela could feel her eyes pop open, "Does that mean what I think it means?"

"Uh huh..." Deb wrapped her tongue around the fork.

"No way!"

"Uh huh," she grinned bobbing her head up and down.

"You actually..." she looked around and checked her volume, "Did you finally... really?"

"I did! For the first time since..." she nodded, "well the first time with another person since then."

"So that's why you'd consider..." Angela smiled leaning back in her chair, basking in Deb's triumphant glow almost as much as Deb herself.

The cornsilk blonde tossed the remnants of her lunch into the trash and nearly bounced out of her chair, her smile broad and bright, "Be right back."

Circling the atrium toward the less frequently used bathrooms on the far side Deb wondered if she would one day be able to let a man into her heart again. Last night's adventure with the drunken hustler was the first time she'd been able to let down her guard enough to enjoy male company in years.

She locked the door to the stall and sat down, when did Ricky turn into a dick? But she knew the answer. He'd always been one, but he hid it well until after the wedding. That was when the man suit came off and the evil inside stepped out into the light.

While she contemplated how close she'd come to losing such a vital part of herself to someone else, a slender gray shadow snaked along the angle where the wall joined the ceiling. It stopped over Deb's stall riding a strip of darkness where the stall wall was anchored into the room wall, and as she rose and righted her clothes it sprang.

OOooOO

"...now... you wanna tell me what the hell's been going on since yesterday?" Dean mumbled between mouthfuls while he spread the photos and the still unopened envelope on the table between him and Sam.

"I don't know," the younger man shook his head, "first one was this one..." he tapped the picture of him and Kitsune then flipped it face down for at least a modicum of privacy, "it was under my pillow when I went to bed, about 2 a.m. I thought you put it there y'know to lighten the mood..."

Dean nodded back and forth, it was something he would do if he'd ever thought of taking a picture of his baby brother in the act, "Yeah well whoever did take it sure as hell was quiet with the ladder... I mean look at the perspective..." he flipped the shot over again, "Man she's got a beautiful bod... I'd almost forgot..."

"Come ON Dean! I don't need to know you had her first! You think I want your sloppy seconds!?" Sam leaped to his feet and turned away from his brother, combing his hair with his fingers.

"Relax Sam I helped her, I didn't screw her... I may have helped myself to a glance or two while she was getting dressed once or twice but not even you can blame a guy for appreciating a beautiful woman."

Sam's look of haggard disbelief hit Dean square.

"Aww up yours Sam," he grunted shaking his head, still not up to par and not in any way ready for whatever emo bullshit the younger man was about to pull out of his twisted up boxer briefs. He pushed himself off the chair and rolled onto his bed with the remote in hand, turning on the tv and waiting for it to warm up. "Why don't you go out and have a nice night for a change, let's see if your little fangirl or boy follows you out into the big bad world."

"Maybe my idea of a good time isn't necessarily going for a hookup behind my girls back!" Sam snarled between clenched teeth.

Dean pushed himself up, "What goes on between me and her is NONE of your business, so I'm gonna pretend you didn't just say that."

Sam wheeled, his eyes blazing into Dean's but that far too familiar lemon puckered mouth speaking volumes. "You're right." He nodded. "It's not my business," he slung his jacket over his shoulder, "That's one of the reasons I didn't say anything, I figured she'd want to tell you herself... just like when that son of a bitch got his mitts on her in Chicago, it was up to her to tell you..." he watched Dean's expression soften slightly with the reminder of that long ago incident, "So no, it's not my business Dean... I just thought you were better than that."

With his big brother effectively stunned silent he strode to the door burying the shame of the cards he'd just throw on the deck, "By the way," he couldn't seem to stop his mouth no matter how much he wanted to, "did you ever tell her you were about to break up with her before she asked you to kill her?" As much as he hated to admit it, Sam felt a deep sense of satisfaction at the look on Dean's face as he reminded the older man of that particular fact. How just before her car had stalled out at the perimeter of the wards around Bobbys' house he was in the middle of telling Sam he couldn't take it anymore. "Maybe instead of each of you drowning in your own insecurities you two should actually talk for a change." He hissed slamming the door behind himself and heading out to learn whatever he could about his mysterious stalker.

Son of a bitch is right... man I hate it when he's right... he drew a deep breath, Sam... and slid off the bed reaching for the door knob.

"And at the top of the hour; a local realtor was found strangled to death in the bathroom at work, area police are now on the scene..." Realtor? His head whipped around to look at the set even as he opened the motel room door.

"Sam!" he barked waving the younger man back from across the parking lot, "Get in here..." his eyes returned quickly to the set and the picture of the woman he'd spent the night with.

"Look," Sam sighed returning to the room, "You're right, it really IS none of my business, I'm sorry okay... I'm just..."

"Cranky," Dean nodded grasping him by the jacket and pulling him into the room, "You're always cranky when you don't sleep well, and you never sleep well when you don't know where I am... so... sorry..." he apologized then pointed to the tv, "We got a bigger issue though."

"What?" Sam asked noting the deep frown on his big brother's face. He sat at the foot of the bed and watched as the commercial break ended and the mid day news came back on leading with the story that had drawn the color right back out of Dean's face.

"That's the girl I was with last night." He explained quietly.

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Dean leaned back in the chair, his eyes glued to the computer screen, his mouth turned down in a scowl it was possible no one had ever seen, with his cell pressed to his ear, "Thanks Bobby, I appreciate it." He nodded, "Well so far it looks like that's about when it started." He shook his head, "I don't know, my guts are saying human, if it was something supernatural I don't think it would've waited this long to come out of the woodwork y'know?" He nodded again, "Yeah I'm not particularly wild about that fact either, a yard full of hunters, demons and sidhe, and not a single one of us sniffed out anything? Not even Ajax... I mean I know we were preoccupied but that's just... yeah yeah, excuses today or tomorrow doesn't change the facts, and the facts are whoever's been following us around enough to get these pictures," he shook his head, "I don't like it. Yeah. He's out getting some details on a possibly strange death. He's a big boy..." he sighed and rubbed his eyes, "I can't... I can't take that chance. Someone might've seen us together... last night." He muttered and cringed, "I know Bobby I know... can we just get back to the business at hand here? You know the dead body... alright... well yeah, it's not going to do any good getting out of town if whoever's been stalking us has been on our asses since then, they're obviously tracking us..." he glanced toward the door, "... Bobby I'll call you back." Then stuck the phone into his pocket, closed the computer and with the room key in hand headed out into the parking lot.

"Smart man Sammy, insisting on a rental..." he muttered moving around the Impala, feeling under the wheel wells and bumpers before sliding under the car to look for any signs of a tracking device. "C'mon talk t'me baby... who touched you? Someone stick something somewhere they shouldn't have?"

Leaving the room he didn't notice the plain white envelope with a fine coating of dust on it sticking out from under the door mat with his name written in confident block letters.

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"I don't understand," Sam shook his head, "and don't tell me she choked on an ice cube and it melted and that's why there's no trace of it."

To his surprise the coroner actually seemed to consider the possibility for almost a full second, "No, if that'd been the case there would've been trauma in the trachea from the corners and probably fluid in the right lung. Other than asphyxia as the c.o.d, I'm sorry detective but until a few more reports come back, histology, tox... I just don't have anything else that's definitive aside from the fact that she was sexually active within twenty four hours of her death, and it appears to have been consensual." He watched the young man nod and frown and seem to steel himself.

Sam patted down his pockets and frowned, "Damnit..." then gestured for the Medical Examiner's pen, "This is my cell, will you call me with whatever you find out?"

The older man nodded, "Detective, is there something in particular I should be looking for?"

Slowly Sam shook his head, "No, not really... I'm already pretty sure there's no link between this case and the other ones," he did his best to sound disheartened, "but the sooner I can confirm that, the sooner I can get back to Bull City."

The M.E. nodded his understanding and watched the young man leave carrying under his arm a copy of whatever information he'd already been able to glean from this particular corpse.

OOooOO

Glancing out the window into the parking lot, watching as the eldest Winchester slid his hands into the car's private places, then lowered himself beneath that black satin beauty breath stuttered sharply into an otherwise dry throat. In response the chest rose and fell quickly and as the shirt slid off the shoulders, the camera came up. The digital screen shone in the mirror ensuring that the focus was where it should be. The bruising was almost completely gone now and the scars were practically invisible, the incisions having been made at the borders of the aureolas. Satisfied with that shot the lens was angled just a bit lower to the abdomen where surprisingly thick lines of dried blood outlined a simple devil's trap, a pentagram within a circle carved into the skin there.

Stripping all the way down light footsteps padded into the bathroom and started running the shower, it was time to wash out the auburn dye.

OOooOO

Tbc.

Please R&R.

Thanks.

Sifi.