Hey guys, as promised, the shit shall hit the fan. Thanks to all of you who reviewed and especially everyone who followed me over from Locking Horns. Let me know what you think.
"So Ellie, would you like to tell me what's going on between you and my son?" John asked, an edge of accusation in his voice.
Her hands stilled on the tea kettle for a moment before she rejoined pouring. She said nothing.
"You owe me that much."
She could feel him approach behind her... could smell his cologne and a tang of gunpowder.
"I'm sorry, John," she said without turning. "I knew better. Dean pushed and I got carried away. He's young but I know better." The excuse sounded lame to her own ears. What was she supposed to tell him? That His son was Sexual Napalm?
"I lit into him pretty hard earlier. I thought he hurt you."
She turned, worried. "What? No! Not at all."
John raised an eyebrow. "You want to tell me what you saw?"
Ellis had to tilt her head up to meet his gaze. He was so much taller that he had an entire foot over her stature. "No. No I'd rather not."
He looked mildly taken aback. "I'm his father. You don't think I have the right to know what's going to happen to my son?"
"John, I don't know what it meant. They were tangled images that make no sense. Not everything I see comes to pass."
"Enough do for me to be worried, Ellis."
She shook her head. "I can't."
His expression grew darker. "Can't or won't?"
"Can't."
"You remind me of my son," he said under his breath.
"Dean?"
"No. Sam." She could tell the statement was not meant to be a compliment.
John turned away from her and leaned his hands against the counter. The broad shoulders were stiff and tight as he bowed his head.
Her impression of John Winchester had always been that of a man who carried so much weight. So much that it dimmed the light inside him. There was light there. She knew it. She felt it when he gave her one of his sad smiles. It was there, layered just under the whiskey and regret.
"John," she laid her hand between his shoulder blades. Ellis had always been tactile. It was how she gathered her impressions of the world. He accepted her touch and she moved her thumb along the line of his muscles, stiff and rigid under the fabric of his shirt. "I'm sorry I took advantage of your son."
"Ellie, I don't care about that. Dean is an adult. Where he puts his dick is none of my business."
That hurt a little. She kept the contact regardless. She deserved the callous remark.
"I don't know how to protect them," he continued. The flash of annoyance gone as soon as it had come. "Sam's out of my reach now entirely. Alone out there. And Dean... Dean is sideways without the little shit around."
"You've taught them to take care of themselves. They have the tools. They know how," she soothed, her hand still resting lightly against his spine.
"They don't have the experience."
"They'll gain it."
John turned to face her. "At what cost?" He rubbed a hand across the stubble.
Too high a cost, she thought. "John, you're tired."
"Damn right I am." He poured some tea into one of her chipped mugs. Faded kittens chased around the rim. He took a sip.
When he looked at her she could see a ceiling on fire reflected in his eyes. How this man could take so many hits in his life and yet that was the one that he'd never recover from.
Dean walked in with his cheerful smile and faltered. He looked at them both. "Am I interrupting somethin'?" he asked softly.
Neither answered and his look grew a little darker. "Let me grab something to drink and I'll leave so you can continue talking about me behind my back."
John rolled his eyes. "Dean, do not act like your brother."
Dean's jaw tightened and she saw several thoughts he didn't dare vocalize telegraph across its features. So much he didn't dare say that his father. Dean, she thought. Don't push it. She could sense John's frustrations were looking for a way to vent.
Dean popped the top on the beer with his ring and took a drink, looking at both of them.
John sipped his tea and met his son's gaze unapologetically. How he managed to look intimidating holding a kitten mug, Ellis would never know. She watched a silent exchange pass between them.
"Dean, I need to strike while the iron is hot here. Ellie gave me a lead earlier, so I'm going back in."
"You gonna take me with you this time?"
"I don't think I will."
Dean looked annoyed. "You know, why did you drag me out here then? I haven't done anything but sit on my ass all weekend."
John looked to Ellis. "Funny, looked like you were doing more than that while I was away."
Dean shot his father a glare and Ellis felt her own ire rise. "Excuse me, John Winchester, I'm right fucking here, you know."
"So... Dean doesn't want me to talk behind his back and you want the opposite?" He asked in his baritone, observing her reaction.
Fuck him. He could intimidate his son; John didn't frighten her one bit. "Instead of snark, why don't you be a man and tell me what your problem is?"
John set his mug down. "Not sure you want to hear it."
She put her hands on her hips.
He shook his head. "Now you look like Mary when she was spoiling for a fight."
"Maybe you have that effect on women."
John shrugged it off.
Dammit. He wasn't bothered, but he had her pissed off. Ellis knew how that went. Whoever cared less wins. She tried to think of a barb that would get a rise out of him. "You jealous of your son for having the balls to make the move you haven't for the last year?"
Dean's eyebrows raised and he looked to his Dad with a bit of anxiety.
She'd hit her mark. She saw John's eyes flash and his jaw tighten. "Excuse me for being professional, Ellis."
"You a professional? I-"
"Stop! Both of you!" Dean looked disproportionately stressed. "I thought I'd escaped this shit when Sam left, but here it is again!"
Ellis softened upon hearing the desperation in his tone. "I'm sorry, Dean."
John whirled on him. "Where are you getting the nerve to speak to me with that tone of voice?"
Dean's breathing hitched a little. He remained silent, suddenly small in the wake of his father's anger.
John looked back to Ellis. She met his glare with her own. "You can treat your son like shit, but don't you dare treat me that way."
John pushed past Dean, and stormed out of the room. They heard his displeasure telegraphed by the slamming of the front door and his truck starting up.
Dean slammed his hand on the counter. "Sonofabitch! He's left me here again!"
The next few hours between them were tense. Dean tried calling his Dad's cell and received no answer. He was starting to fret despite himself. His father would run off for days when provoked, but something just wasn't sitting right in his gut. He paced the room a few times, all nervous energy.
Ellis didn't seem terribly comfortable either. She fixed them both something to eat. Dean picked at the sandwich, jiggling his leg as his emotions searched for a physical outlet. He was pissed at his Dad. Pissed at Ellis. Pissed at fucking Sam for leaving him to deal with this shit alone. Pissed at Bobby Singer for drawing the line and making it so that Dean no longer felt comfortable calling him to talk. He dropped the sandwich on the plate and rested his head in his hands. "Ellis," he said finally. "I don't like this."
Her blue eyes locked on his, her mouth taut, making her look a little severe and older than she actually was.
"Oh God, please don't tell me you have a bad feeling."
Whatever John Winchester had been expecting when he broke into the babysitter's house next door to the Campman's, it wasn't the weird smell that greeted him. Sweet and gross, like rotted raspberries and decayed flesh. He slid to the floor through the window he'd jimmied open, drawing his .45 pistol with the Ivory grip. What the fuck was the smell? The house was dim in the twilight hour.
He scanned the room quickly and moved to the next. Once the downstairs was clear, he made his way up the steps of the little cape cod. The smell of sweet carrion was stronger up there. He rounded the corner to the bed room and saw it. On the dirty linen of the bed was a corpse, tied and half rotted. Probably the missing teen. A scurry of bugs ran for cover as he flicked on his flashlight. John glanced at his feet and realized that he was stepping on a few of them with his heel. He backed away in disgust and shook a bug off his boot.
Making a hasty retreat, he stepped sideways, his arm up to cover his nose, breathing through his mouth. As soon as he hit the hallway, his vision spun. He grabbed onto the banister unable to breathe, his flashlight clattering over the bars of the railing and plunging to the room below. Pain shook him and he buckled further. Some part of his mind registered that he'd walked into a trap. The witch knew he would end up there and had planted a hex bag somewhere nearby, activated when he walked into its proximity. He realized that he should have brought Dean.
John fell over, clutching his chest, the pistol forgotten on the rug. His body arched off the ground and he cried out.
It took a monumental effort but John rolled himself over onto his stomach and tried to crawl along the rug, one arm held tight against his aching chest and the other blindly searching for a bag anywhere nearby. This was bad. A bug crawled over his hand.
TBC...