It's been four months since I've seen Sam or Dean, or even talked to them. I'm back to living how I was before, alone and moving around in a cheap car that was made before I was born.

It's nice like this. Efficient. No one to get attached to. And nothing is messy like it is around the Winchesters. The stuff they get tied up in… It's like trouble goes out of its way to find them.

Though I've been working non-stop to help keep my mind off everything—off them—my last hunt, a kitsune, managed to cut my side pretty deep with its claws and so I'm incapacitated while I recover. I had to stop hunting for at least a week while it healed up, so I broke into a house in Washington that belongs to a family that's out of town on vacation.

Right now, I'm curled up by the crackling fireplace as it rains outside, idly flipping through news articles on my phone. Dean's phone, actually. He gave it to me when I first got back from hell because he had a few of them and I had none. Though it's mostly personalized by now, there's a few things I haven't had the willpower to delete. The photos, for instance.

I haven't even looked at them.

But I'm feeling safe right now, nice and cozy in a warm home, and the safety reminds me of my time with the Winchesters. I'm hit with a pang of nostalgia, so I close the news app and open up the photos.

There's a few gory pictures that were taken for evidence here and there scattered among the other pictures, but for the most part, they're just pictures of me, Sam, and Dean.

I'm sure I took most of them, or got Sam or Dean to do it for me. Sam and Dean have never really had a thing for recording memories, but my selfie habit from before I started hunting sparked up again when I was with the two of them and now this phone has at least five hundred pictures of us.

I start flipping through them. Me making a duck face. The three of us in front of the world's largest ball of twine, which we'd visited three times by that point. Me again, posing with a dead body (why did I even take that picture again?). Me wearing Sam's coat, which makes me look tiny in comparison, while Sam rests his arm on top of my head with a huge grin on his face. Sam kissing my cheek at a diner. I smile at the memories. We took that picture the first time I had visited South Dakota. And the one before that was taken on my birthday.

I keep flipping. Sam smiling. Sam talking. Sam. Sam. Sam. I really took a lot of pictures of him, didn't I?

Suddenly I'm glad I have this phone, that I have something to remind me of how things were before I'd had my life and relationship with Sam ruined by hell. How could I have forgotten what he meant to me?

I feel a jab of loneliness. I'd been getting on so well before by myself. And now I just had to be reminded of what I'd had. Though I'd never admit it, I need Sam, and Dean as well. They're my family.

I hold back tears and take a deep breath. Could I really go back now, though? Even if they forgave me, could I handle the on-edge feeling I constantly had when I was around Sam?

I shake my head. Better not. I'm sure they've moved on anyway.

I hit the Select All button in the photo app and press Delete. There. Nothing to remind me of them anymore. Now I can focus on my work.

Trying to push the thought of the Winchesters from my mind, I go back to the news app, browsing the state news for anything I could go after in a couple days, after my wounds have healed up.

Woman sues restaurant for food poisoning. Nope.

Governor introduces new bill that would legalize marijuana. Nope.

Library to increase late fees. Nope.

New parents found brutally murdered, child missing. Well, brutal murder is a place to start.

I open the article.

Ella and John Lewis were found dead Saturday morning in their home in Redmond, Washington. Their newborn baby girl, who had been born two weeks premature just several days before, was nowhere to be found and is presumed missing. There are currently no leads on who is responsible for the murders and kidnapping of the child.

Hm. Ella and John Lewis. I look them up in the search bar, to see if they've made any other news, or if they have any enemies.

Only one other article pops up, from seven months ago: Miracle baby conceived.

Okay, not really what I was expecting, but it's a start.

31-year-old Ella Lewis, diagnosed infertile due to premature menopause two years ago, was ecstatic to find out last week that she and her husband John are expecting a child.

"I had given up on any hope of becoming pregnant, but I started to show some signs associated with early pregnancy," said Ella. "I wasn't expecting much with the pregnancy test, but it turned up positive and a visit to the doctor confirmed it!"

Yeah, that's definitely unusual.

I'm reminded of the baby I could have had, if Crowley hadn't taken it away. I wonder where I would be now, if I hadn't gone to hell, if I'd carried it to term. Would I still be with Sam? Would I be as excited to have a kid as the couple in this story were?

Then something hits me.

I found out I was pregnant nearly nine months ago. This baby was born a few days ago. This woman wanted a baby but couldn't have one. And what had Crowley said? There's a nice couple who have been trying unsuccessfully to conceive and who are going to be receiving a pleasant surprise.

And now the baby is missing, the parents killed - somebody must have wanted her. Knowing Sam and Dean's lineage, it does seem likely that somebody could have set their sights on the child of a Winchester.

This couldn't be connected, could it? That baby, my baby, could have gone anywhere. And this one might just have been something unusual, nothing more…

But there's still a gut feeling that this is linked to me.

Taking a deep breath, I dial Sam's number and wait.

It takes a few moments before the phone is picked up. "Hello, this is Agent Donovan from the FBI," the voice on the other end says. Sam. It's almost relieving to hear his voice again. I was right all those months ago when I said goodbye - I do miss him.

"Sam, it's Eva," I say bluntly.

"Eva?" he says, his voice gone from cool and collected to shocked in a matter of moments.

"Yeah. We need to talk."