Once again thanks for all the reviews and story favorites/follows! I'm in a hurry updating this but I wanted to post the next chapter already, so here it is!

"This is it? This is their super secret hideout?"

I parked behind the Impala and turned my attention to where Charlie was looking. All I could see was a cement bunker that looked like it was cut out in the side of a hill. It looked small and incredibly unimpressive.

"I was expecting something more…extravagant," Charlie admitted as she unbuckled her seatbelt. Under her breath I thought I caught her saying that this little bunker hadn't been worth that long of a drive. She wasted no time getting out of my Camry and stretching her legs outside, still eyeing up the little concrete entrance.

I turned the car off and began unbuckling my seatbelt when I suddenly felt a presence in the backseat. Whipping my head around, I stiffened at the sight of Crowley sitting there with his hands comfortably clasped in his lap.

"We should speak alone," he said in his smooth voice. With a wave of one of his hands the automatic locks on my car clicked, sealing me inside with him. "Don't worry, love," he crooned when he saw the panicked look on my face, "I need you alive."

"What do you want?" I demanded, though even I caught the tremor in my voice.

"Abaddon seems to be raising quite an army," Crowley told me. He glanced outside the window beside him. I followed his gaze to see Sam and Dean no longer fighting like they had been this morning; instead, they were smiling and laughing with Charlie while Castiel gazed at the bunker in front of him. "I have been forced into hiding," he said after a moment, turning his face back to me. "I don't like hiding," he added on, his voice low and dangerous. "She needs to be stopped, and soon. Every day she's killing off my loyal followers. And, from what I've been hearing, she's getting closer to releasing the big guy from his box."

"And now you need me?" I supplied for him.

He shook his head briefly. "Not quite yet, but I do know how tricky those Winchesters like to be so I wanted to speak with you in private."

My eyes narrowed at him instinctively. So he was aware we weren't really going to help him, or at least he really did know the brothers well enough to know they would find a way around helping him.

"What do you want?" I asked him again. This time my voice remaining steady as I spoke.

"You help me and I'll help you," he said with a smug smile. "Dean's one weakness is his brother, and I so happen to know that he's sick."

"You expect me to believe you know how to cure him?" I asked in disbelief. "I knew demons were liars, but I thought you were at least good liars."

The smug smile never left his lips. "I don't know how to cure him exactly, but I do know where you could begin looking for that answer."

"You're lying," I said immediately.

"Yes, yes," he replied lazily with a wave of his hand. "How could I ever want to save a Winchester when one is on the brink of death? Sounds a little too out of character for me, I know. But I care more about my place as the King of Hell than I do about saving a Winchester." His eyes darted out the window beside him again as Dean suddenly spotted him in my car. He glanced back to me, his voice sounding a bit more hurried. "So what do you say, love? Do we have a deal?"

I stared at his now outstretched hand between us. Sudden pounding on the window beside me caused me to jump. Dean and Sam were both there banging their fists against the glass and occasionally trying to open the car door despite it being locked. They were shouting at me to unlock it in a fury.

"Don't you dare make a deal with him!" Dean's muffled voice demanded through the glass between us.

"How do I know you really have information to help Sam?" I asked him skeptically while trying to ignore the constant banging and shouting.

"I'm not a used car salesman, Costella," Crowley said silkily, causing me to flinch at his use of my last name. "I do have some integrity."

"So basically I have to trust your word?" I asked incredulously.

"You'll find," Crowley said, "that I can be quite fair in serious matters such as these."

I chewed my lip as I thought it out in my head, ignoring the noise as both brothers continued shouting in futile outside my car. Crowley didn't even glance in their direction.

"So let me get this straight; you'll point us in the direction to find a cure for Sam, and all I have to do is kill Abaddon?"

"Precisely," Crowley confirmed. His hand crossed the gap between us again. "Do we have a deal?"

The banging on my car intensified as I hesitantly reached my hand out to shake his briefly.

"I'll be calling on you soon," Crowley said shortly before disappearing from my backseat.

The locks on my car clicked once more and Dean nearly ripped the door off its hinges.

"What did you just do?" he shouted at me, his face contorted in a mixture of fury and concern. "What idiotic deal did you just make with him?!"

"It wasn't idiotic!" I shot defensively.

Dean glared at me in return before running a hand over his face. "What did you do?" he asked me again, his voice deathly serious now.

"I made a deal to help him, and in return he is going to help us."

Dean's nostrils flared, fury written all over his face as he shook his head at me. Sam's expression changed to one of disbelief and something that almost looked like a cross between pity and fear.

"What did you agree to help him do?" Dean asked in a frighteningly soft tone.

"He just wants me to kill Abaddon, and—"

"Abaddon can't be killed," Sam cut in. "You just agreed to get yourself killed for him."

"He claims he has information to help us," I said boldly.

"Of course he did," Dean shot venomously, "demons lie. That's what they do."

"What did he say he could help us with?" Sam asked me curiously.

I paused before I answered, taking in the sight of him. His skin was still a sickly pale and the bags under his eyes looked darker than I had remembered them being the night before. He looked tired and weak despite his height and muscular build. I remembered how I had found him unconscious in the alley outside of a bar, not even able to fight off a single demon.

"He said he knows where we should look to find a cure," I said slowly. "For Sam."

Dean's expression went through a mixture of different emotions. Sam became entirely silent beside his brother, shifting his weight uncomfortably to his other foot and refusing to meet my eyes with his.

"You don't know that he isn't lying," Dean said softly. The anger that had been in his voice just seconds before was no longer present.

"No, but it's the only thing we've got to go on," I admitted.

Sam cleared his throat and caught Dean and mine's attention. "I don't want you getting yourself killed for this."

"I'm not a child, Sam. I can make decisions for myself," I shot at him.

"This isn't about that," Sam said roughly. "I'm sick and probably going to die, I've come to terms with that. I don't need you, or anyone else," he said shooting Dean a look, "throwing their own lives away for my sake. I didn't ask you to and I don't want you to."

"I'm a hunter, Sam. Born and raised one just like you and your brother," I said fiercely. "It's my job to put others before myself. If I can kill Abaddon and keep Lucifer trapped while possibly finding a cure for you in the process, then I say that sounds like a really good deal."

"I don't want your death on my conscious," Sam retorted.

"Good," I said, "Neither do I. So don't put it there if I do die. This is my choice, and if I'm the only one who can do it, then I don't see another option here."

"You're being ridiculous," Sam told me.

"I'm being realistic," I shot back.

I held his severe gaze, our eyes both locked onto each others'. I could see the muscles of his jaw clenching and unclenching out of the corner of my eye.

When he finally looked away, he said, barely audible, "I'm going for a walk." And then he disappeared down the way we had drove in, his tall frame blending in amongst the trees.

"Let's just get inside," Dean said after a moment.

I followed after him in silence, catching sight of Charlie and Castiel leaning awkwardly against the Impala. No one said a word.