Chapter 18 - "You were dead."
"I called in a favour."
Bobby stuffed his phone back in his pocket and faced them.
"That's a pretty big favour Bobby." Sam frowned, crossing his arms over his chest. "You need to tell us how it is you can call up the county sheriffs office and ask for something like that."
Bobby sighed and sank into the chair.
"Your Dad didn't want you boys to know about any of this." He said quietly.
"Any of what?" Dean prompted.
With watery eyes, Bobby regarded them.
God they're so young.
Any younger that John and I were?
Unscrewing his flask, he took a swig and cleared his throat.
"You remember how your Mom died?"
Cas saw the swift pained look that passed between the brothers. Dean was frowning, shifting from foot to foot agitatedly. "Yeah. House fire. So what?"
"It wasn't no accident boy. Your Mom was murdered." He glanced at them, an almost shamed look crossing his face. "She was in the wrong place at the wrong time. She saw some big time mob boss getting his hands dirty. Mary was going to testify, was a really big deal, you know? But they got to her first. Fire bombed the house. No witness, no trial."
Sam ran his hands through his hair and laughed hollowly. "And no one did anything? The police?"
"You think your Dad didn't try? Boy, these guys have pets on the payroll all over the place, cops, attorneys, senators. Seems sometimes there's more dirt than not in the places where you're meant to be able to find justice.. After Mary died, your Dad was told, in no uncertain terms, that if he carried on making a noise then one day he was gonna come home and find his four year old's head in the oven and his baby nailed to the door. So yeah… he stopped."
Bobby took another angry pull at his flask, avoiding eye contact, his hands shaking a little.
Cas touched Dean gently on the shoulder.
He glanced behind him, looking at Cas's hand with confusion, hurt. Then he pulled away and seemed to shake himself.
"Ok. Well, that's a disturbing story Bobby, but what does that have to do with your cop connections and the arsenal back at Dads cabin?"
Bobby seemed to let the sarcasm slide. Instead he just sighed and continued.
"After all this, your Dad was approached by some people who said they helped those who had trouble. Mob trouble, dirty cop trouble, that kind of thing. They were too late to help John, but he decided that the only way he could get any peace from Marys ghost, her memory, was to help others. You know we were in the Marines together?"
"Vietnam." Sam said quietly.
"Yeah. Towards the end of it anyway. Didn't see huge action but it still got gnarly enough out there that plenty didn't come home. He called me up and asked me to go hunting. Left you two with a neighbour. While we're up in the mountain he starts talking about this modern day Underground Railway."
They lay on the rocky outcrop, looking down on the clearing, waiting for deer.
- He said his name was Rufus. You hear of him?
- Nope.
- They knew all about Mary, about the threats I got after.
- Might be a reason not to trust them John.
- I don't know.
He rolled over onto his back and sighed loudly.
- Bobby. A lot about this feels like a red flag. Like I should shut the door on it. Concentrate on raising the boys, running the bar…. But….
- What?
- When I close my eyes at night, she's there. She's on fire. She's screaming. And I can't do a goddamn thing about it.
- John…..
- Maybe if I do this, if I can help others… Maybe she'll be at peace. Maybe she'll let me sleep.
- But the boys….
- Takes a village to raise a child right?
- You're no use to them dead.
- I wasn't planning on dying anytime soon.
- You can't go vigilante and expect to be safe! Jesus John, you're not thinking this through!
A deer wandered into the clearing and they both turned to it, clicking safeties off and looking through sights.
- You take it.
John put the safety back on and rolled onto his back again.
The deer was a young male, small enough for them to carry back to the cabin, the shot was clean. Easy.
- I'm not gonna let you do this John.
- You don't get a choice.
Bobby sighed and flicked his safety on.
He had no stomach for killing today.
- Then I'm in as well. I'm not letting you do this alone.
- You'd do that? For me?
- No. For the boys. I'll make sure their Daddy's home safe every time.
John smiled, tears balancing in the corners of his eyes. He slapped Bobby on the arm.
- Thank you.
"We started small, you know. We'd drive some frightened kid to a safe house or baby sit a family for a few days, but over the years we did more. Finding people, hunting down their hunters. Hence the arsenal."
There was silence while they digested this information.
"I always thought Dad preferred hunting and drinking to us… you know?" Sam said softly. "I had no idea that…."
"Save it for your therapist Sammy." Snapped Dean.
Cas watched Sam flinch, but he shut up.
Bobbys phone buzzed and he grabbed it out of his pocket.
He moved to the other side of the room, fishing in his jacket for some paper and a pen.
"Dean…." Sam went to him but he held up his hand and walked away from them, opening the doors and stalking outside.
Sighing, Sam turned to Cas. "It was hard for him, you know? I was only a baby when she died so I don't remember her, but he was old enough….."
Cas didn't say anything, simply patted Sam on the back and followed Dean out.
"I'm not in the mood to talk."
"We don't have to."
Cas sat on the hood of the Impala, next to him, his face was etched with pain. Dean swallowed hard and looked away.
"I get it. Why your Dad did it."
"Yeah? Well I'm glad you do. 'cause I sure don't."
"You don't think it was a noble thing to do?"
Dean glared at him. "You think its noble for a man to leave his kids with neighbours and sitters for most of their childhood while he was running round saving everyone else's family?"
Cas said nothing.
He really didn't have a family life to use as bench mark for this sort of conversation. He could see that Dean was hurting and that made him feel bad, but he couldn't quite see why.
"You know what? When he was about he was nearly always drunk or sleeping. Sometimes I think he couldn't stand to be around us, me and Sammy, we reminded him of her."
"I suppose you would. You probably both have a lot of the same facial characteristics."
"Cas…. You're not making me feel better …"
"Sorry."
The door to the building opened and Sam poked his head out.
"We're ready."
Meg couldn't stop trembling.
He was smiling at her sadly, gently stroking her hair back from her face, running his fingers over the cuts and bruises on her skin.
"My poor child. Darling girl. What did he do to you."
It wasn't a question, he didn't seem to expect an answer, but then, he'd always done that, talked at her, not to her.
"You were dead." She whispered shakily as he took her ruined hand in his and frowned with concern.
"It would seem not."
"I saw him shoot you!"
Lucy nodded. "Yes. And yet, here I am."
He wrinkled his brow as a tear fell down her cheek, and deftly, he wiped it away.
"I don't understand."
"I know. But it doesn't matter. Not now." He pulled her to him and wrapped his arms around her. "I'm here and that's all that matters."
Kissing the top of her head Lucy breathed deeply. "You always were my favourite. I've missed you."
Something in her wanted to melt into his embrace, to bury her face in his chest and sob.
She'd mourned him.
Cried herself to sleep and dreamed of him falling, again and again.
But everything was different now.
When Cas had held her like this she'd felt safe, she'd felt the warmth radiating from his body and had wanted nothing more than to mould herself to him.
Lucy held her but she remained stiff limbed.
This was wrong.
He didn't make her feel secure, safe, loved.
She was being played.
"Lucy. Did you love me?"
He chuckled. "What a question."
"Well, did you?"
He pulled away from her and looked deep into her eyes, smiling almost paternally.
"I'm here aren't I?"
"Where have you been for the last three years?"
He stood up and walked over to the window, hands thrust deep in his pockets.
"You're not very grateful are you. If it wasn't for me you'd be dead now. Probably cut into tiny pieces and fed to one of Crowleys dogs."
The edge in his voice gave her the courage to carry on.
"You set me up."
Lucy sighed sadly.
"You set me up to take the fall for the deal…. You were working with Crowley the whole time…"
"So smart. You always were a clever girl."
Not clever enough.
She laughed, using it to hide the sob that welled deep I her chest.
"You know, I actually thought I loved you once."
He turned to face her then, his eyes hard, as flat and hard as dulled pennies.
"Child. They always do."
"So, my contact ran the registration through traffic cameras within a twenty miles radius of here and found our car." Bobby stabbed at the map with his finger. "It was on this highway through four cameras, then nothing on the fifth, which means it turned off up one of these tracks here."
There were four possible tracks, each winding a few miles until reaching dead ends.
"Its mostly second homes down there, a small hobby farm or two, but its our most solid lead."
"Ok, lets move." Dean grabbed the map and made his way back outside.
Bobby slapped Cas on the back.
"Your Meg got us this far. Time to keep our end up."
Cas nodded.
The squirming animal of worry that had lived in his chest for years was still. Instead he felt like a predator was waiting, calm, patient, for an opportunity to strike.
A veil seemed to fall over his eyes, his vision narrowing.
He only seemed to be able to focus on one thing.
Find Crowley.
And kill him.