Eight
Sam watched in the rearview mirror as Reggie hurried across the street and up the stairs of the municipal building, disappearing inside. A steady rain had begun to fall, thundering on the roof of the Plymouth and drowning out the music softly drifting from the radio. His cell phone buzzed on the seat beside him and Sam picked it up, seeing Dean's number on the caller I.D.
"Hey, man. She's inside now."
"Good. Let's hope she can get the information we need and get out without any problems."
The phone beeped as Sam lost his signal and the call disconnected. Sam glanced in the rearview mirror again, watching as a small pick-up truck stopped at the light, temporarily blocking his view of the building. An unexpected clap of thunder made him jump.
"Come on Reggie," Sam mumbled. He heard his phone buzz again and answered without looking this time. "Yeah?"
"Is she out yet?" Dean asked.
"No, not yet. It's only been about five minutes, Dean, relax."
"That's easy for you to say. You're not the one stuck back here at the motel."
"You could have come along. Instead, you chose to stay back at the room and nurse your hangover." He paused, waiting for Dean to argue with him. Sam was glad Dean hadn't come along. His brother was whiny and irritable when hung over and his mood would have made waiting for Reggie absolutely unbearable.
"Just hurry up," Dean snapped and slammed the phone down.
Sam sighed and dropped his cell phone back onto the seat beside him. He looked out the side window at the rivulets of rain running down and began doodling in the fog from his breath. He'd gotten so preoccupied by this activity that, when the passenger door opened, Sam jumped again.
Reggie slid in and slammed the door, yanking her soaked hair off her face. "Sorry. Did I scare you?" Sam handed her a towel and she began squeezing her hair with it.
"Were you able to get anything?" he asked, turning the car on so the heater could run.
She shivered and nodded. "I was able to charm my way into the records room and found a census that was done six years ago as well as the most recent phone directory, which hasn't even been published yet."
Reggie held her hands over the vent as Sam pulled out onto the road. She shrugged out of her jacket and Sam noticed the gray t-shirt she was wearing was soaked through, clinging tightly to her. He snapped his head back to the road and gripped the steering wheel, focusing on the slick street ahead of him. Reggie leaned over the seat into the back of the car and began rummaging through a bag on the backseat. Sam could feel the heat radiating off of her as she searched.
"This'll work," she said, sliding back onto her side of the car, a dark blue shirt in her hands. She tugged off her wet t-shirt and slipped the dry one over her head. Sam jerked the car back into his lane as a horn blared at him. Reggie chuckled. "Easy there, Sam. Maybe you should keep your eyes on the road."
"I wasn't...I mean, I didn't mean to..." Sam stuttered and she snorted.
"Relax, Sam. I was just teasing. It's not like you saw anymore of me than if I were in a bathing suit."
Sam laughed and glanced at her. "No, I guess not. But that still doesn't mean I want you to do that again, okay?" Reggie rolled her eyes.
"All right. I promise to keep my clothes on from now on," Reggie teased, holding one hand over her heart and raising the index and middle fingers of the other. "Scouts honor."
She pulled out a small stack of papers from an inside jacket pocket and placed it on her lap. Reggie had carefully sealed them within a plastic Ziploc bag to keep the papers safe from the pouring rain. Sam glanced over at Reggie as she stared down at it.
"How many people do you think will be missing from that thing?" he asked, nodding at the papers.
"The clerk said that they had record participation with the directory this year. Only four people opted to withhold their information, but I was able to get the guy to give them to me anyway," Reggie said, smiling deviously. Sam snorted and shook his head.
"I pity the poor guy," he joked. Reggie looked at him with mock innocence, batting her eyelashes. She tried to hold the look, but couldn't, and began laughing with Sam as they drove back to the motel.
Sam pulled the Plymouth up next to the Impala and turned the car off, handing the keys back to Reggie. "We'll make a run for it on the count of three?" he suggested. Reggie nodded and grabbed the door handle, waiting. Sam grabbed his handle and began counting. "Okay. One...two...three," and he yanked on the handle.
Both doors flew open and together they jumped from the car, racing to the covered walkway. Sam and Reggie continued to laugh as they made their way down the cement sidewalk. Just as Sam reached for the doorknob to his room, the door was flung open. Dean stood in the doorway, looking irritated.
"About damn time," he snapped, taking in their smiling faces. "I've been trying to call you for the last ten minutes." Dean stepped back to let them into the warm, dry room.
"Once we left town, I lost the signal completely," Sam explained, yanking off his wet jacket and hanging it on the back of a chair. He sat down on the end of his bed, still chuckling.
Reggie pulled out the papers and handed them to Dean. "This is what I was able to get. It should give us a pretty good idea as to who our ghouls are." She draped her jacket, which was far more wet than Sam's, on the second chair and sat down.
"What the hell was so funny?" Dean asked, looking from Sam to Reggie. They stared at each other, the same grin stretching across their faces as they continued to share their inside joke.
"It's nothing, Dean," Sam finally said, looking up at his brother. Dean stared at each of them, unconvinced, then shrugged and sat down at the table. He pulled out the documents and spread them on the table between him and Reggie.
"We're going to have to look over each name in the census and compare it to the names in the directory. Anyone who doesn't match up or isn't in the directory, we'll have to check out individually," Reggie said, pulling the smaller pile towards her.
"This is going to take forever," Dean whined as he flipped through his own pile.
"Unfortunately, it's the only thing we've got," Reggie replied as she reached out and patted Dean's hand comfortingly.
"That's it, I'm done," Dean cried out in frustration. "I can't take any more ." He pushed himself away from the table and stood up. It had been almost four hours since Reggie and Sam had returned from their trip into town and they had been searching over the list of names since them.
"Come on, Dean. We're almost finished," Reggie said, stifling a yawn. Sam had left almost a half hour ago on an errand to get them something to eat. Dean was sure Sam was delaying his return, hoping they would be finished by the time he got back.
"I don't care, I can't take another minute. I'm done!"
He flopped onto his back on his bed and glared at the ceiling.
He still had a dull headache from the night before, providing a steady drum in his temples and behind his eyes. Dean had had to reread the list three times looking for the last name Reggie had given him, the black words blurring together as he tried to search out Hilda Bradley in the sea of names. He closed his eyes, trying to relax against the pounding in his head. Dean heard Reggie sigh and put down her pen.
A few seconds later, Dean felt the bed beside him shift under her weight. "Still got your headache, huh?" she asked. He opened his eyes and turned his head, meeting the gaze of her piercing green eyes as she lay beside him. He matched his breathing to hers and smiled at her.
"It's nothing," he lied.
Reggie frowned at him and shifted slightly. Dean could feel the warmth of her skin against his as their arms touched and her continued stare on his face. Reggie's eyes drooped closed, her breathing slowed, and Dean watched as the woman drifted peacefully off to sleep.
Dean wasn't sure how long they lay there, or even sure when he himself had fallen asleep, when he heard the motel room door open. He opened his eyes, blinking rapidly as he tried to clear the sleep from them, and sat up. Sam was struggling through the door, his hands full. Dean got up quickly and took a bag from him.
"Thanks," Sam said before Dean shushed him. He pointed back at Reggie, who was still fast asleep and raised a finger to his lips. Sam nodded at him and gently closed the door.
"What time is it?" Dean asked, keeping his voice low.
"Almost seven," Sam whispered back. He reached into the bag, wincing as it crackled loudly around his hand, and pulled out a large Styrofoam container. He handed it to Dean and reached back inside the bag. "Did you guys finish the list?"
Dean shook his head, chuckling as Sam confirmed his earlier suspicions. "No, there's still a few more names left to check. Why don't you get to work while I eat," Dean said as he took the plastic fork Sam had just unwrapped out of his brother's hand and went to sit on the empty bed.
Sam groaned and sat down heavily on one of the chairs, pulling over the two piles in front of him. He looked at Dean for a second, hopeful that his brother would offer to help. Dean just shook his head and shoved a forkful of pasta into his mouth, chewing deliberately. Sam frowned at him, picked up a pen, and began scanning the pages for the next name on the list.
Dean ate slowly, not really hungry. The spaghetti felt heavy in his stomach and, after only consuming a third of what was in the container, he closed the lid and put it down on the bed beside him. Sam was still engrossed in the lists and he didn't want to risk waking Reggie up with the television, so he got up and grabbed his jacket.
"I'm gonna go for a walk or something," Dean said, keeping his voice low.
Sam looked up at him for a second.
"Okay."
He stared at Dean, trying to read his brother's face, then shrugged and went back to work. Dean stepped out into the cold night and closed the door gently behind him.
Taking a deep breath, he started across the muddy parking lot, heading for the stone picnic tables set on the edge of the woods. Halfway there, he changed his mind and headed for the Impala. A drive in his car always helped to clear his head. Dean pulled out of the lot onto the deserted highway and began driving east, no particular destination in mind.
Most of the previous night was still a haze and that bothered Dean. He remembered the blonde woman that Reggie had identified as a ghoul being there, but it was as if she'd been in the background. He couldn't remember her completely, her face a fuzzy blur.
"I should have known she wasn't human when she said that shit band was actually good," Dean grumbled.
As he drove, a steady rain began to fall again. Within minutes, visibility became so poor that Dean had no choice but to pull onto the shoulder of the road and wait for the rain to slow. He turned off the engine and relaxed back against the seat, listening to the rain pound against the Impala's roof. He was staring out the windshield, watching as the rain ran down in streams, when suddenly he remembered something about the night before.
Dean looked around, vaguely recognizing the spot he was parked in and the conversation he'd had with Reggie. He groaned and hit his hands on the steering wheel at the memory. Dean thought he finally understood why Reggie had been looking at him the way she had earlier that morning. She'd felt pity for him after he'd broken down in front of her. Dean cursed at himself and started the car, the Impala's engine roaring into the silent night. He turned around and headed back to the motel.