The pair set up at the table, covering it with more papers and both of their laptops. She thought perhaps she could catch an hour or two of sleep but, to her dismay, she found it came with less ease without Dean nearby. She decided to work the job instead.

"You're sure we're dealing with a second kitsune?" Sam asked, knowing she hadn't suggested many other possibilities while he had thrown out a handful of theories. Admittedly, he was coming around to that possibility as well but didn't want to rule anything out or decide to follow the wrong trail.

"I'm certain I killed one of them." She took a deep, thoughtful sigh, "But maybe there was a den or something. Hell, there could be more than one."

Sam cringed. "That's not a possibility I want to entertain."

"Yeah. Well..." Mae shifted, rubbing the back of her neck in distress, "A kitsune makes sense to me. Why else would some other thing target me so specifically?"

"Could be a demon. Could be the demon."

She leaned back in the chair a bit. "Could be. But...I know this doesn't mean much, it doesn't feel like a demon. Does it feel like a demon to you?"

"No." Sam finally said, not sure if he was relieved by the idea or not. "I haven't had any dreams or visions either. So... have you seen a fox running around? Maybe we should check animal control reports or something?"

Mae looked over her notes, as if she hadn't memorized them already. "It's worth a shot."

Her tone was level, in not mildly distracted. "You don't seem convinced."

"No, it's a good idea. But some of them can shape shift and you can't tell them apart from whatever they've shape shifted to unless they're drunk, which is how I found the last one. When her true form was revealed, she shifted back into a fox and ran off into the woods. Some look like foxes all the time. Some of them are invisible unless they've possessed you and then you can see them."

Sam's pressed his lips together, part because he was impressed by her detailed research of kitsune and part because it didn't give them much more than they already had. "Then let's hope we don't see one."

"Yeah," she mumbled.

Sam assessed that the redhead had fully shifted into some thought process she wasn't willing or able to discuss with him yet. While Dean was out checking up on the two hits Sam had found that had ties to Mae's last job, She and Sam kept poring over what they could find online, information on the two men currently in the hospital, and the past week of newspapers for anything that popped out as suspect.

It was several hours later when Dean returned. Only then did Mae realize she hadn't moved from her place at the table. She took a moment to lace her fingers together and stretch her arms over her head until her spine gave a satisfying crack. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Sam make a similar move, but her main focus was on the plastic bags Dean carried. He tucked his keys into his pocket with one hand as he raised the bags in offering with the other.

"Hope you're still hungry."

"God yes." Mae said more to herself than anyone else.

"Well, if we can't figure this out, I'm putting you in the competitive eating circuit."

The tight-lipped glare she gave him was more for show than out of actual annoyance and that brought a small smirk to Dean's lips.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Joke all you want, pal. I'd clean up and I'm pretty sure there's a cash prize."

Standing, she gathered her papers, shut her laptop, and grabbed the materials to place them on one of the beds. Then stepping up to Dean, she tried to relieve him of the bag. At first, he kept his hold on it while he studied her face. She looked less frantic, perhaps slightly more worried, or frustrated, and maybe just a little more rested but only slightly. Before her eyes narrowed or she questioned him, he let the bag slide easily onto her hand from his.

"Okay then."

"What did you get?" Sam couldn't tell what his brother had picked up as Mae too it over to the small kitchen area of the room but there seemed to be more than they would possibly eat. He was more concerned about the quality of the food rather than the quantity. He rarely trusted Dean's concept of healthy eating.

"Mexican. Don't worry, Susan, I got you some kinda chick salad." At least somethings would remain the same, Sam thought as he gave his brother a deadpan thanks. "And for the lady eating for two, tacos and tamales."

"You know, you're not gonna get a very good tip with an attitude like that Sparky." Mae said, freeing the to-go containers and plastic flatware from the plastic bag. It smelled better than it should have and while she wanted to claim she wasn't nearly as ravenous as she had been, her stomach growled loudly in protest and anticipation.

"Oh, watching you eat like a long-haul trucker is tip enough."

Mae's lips twitched, a sharp rejoinder on her tongue as she set the food and utensils on the table and sat back in the chair, she had recently vacated.

"Okay so what did you find Dean?" Sam changed the subject.

Dean nodded as he took a seat at the table as well. "Well, the good news is if this is Mae, there are no police records on her or anyone identifying anyone matching her description involved in anything over the past week."

"What's the bad news?" Mae asked, opening her container of food, and held off from shoving everything in her mouth as quickly as she could.

"Same thing. We've got bread crumbs but whatever this is, you either didn't leave much of a trail or you covered it."

"So, the theory is I was completely out of it but still making sure it didn't look like I was here?"

Dean shrugged, busying himself with his own meal. "You could be as much of a victim as anyone else. Or you just got wasted."

A flare of temper came with the annoyance of the situation for Mae. "We're still at square one, just in a different place."

"Maybe not," Sam interjected, "We're here because we have two guys who look like they've been attacked the same way the victims on your last job. They just ended up in the hospital but that means something must have happened before then. And you didn't leave a trail so maybe you were hunting this kitsune, or whatever it is."

"Then why don't I remember any of that? Why were my clothes trashed? What was up with the booze?" She sighed, "I mean, maybe I was possessed prior to that, and it just got tired of me."

A hot and nauseating thought spiraled around Dean's brain before he finally spoke it aloud. "Maybe not possessed, maybe...infected."

Mae took a sharp, short breath before she pinned him with a hard stare. She wasn't angry and she wasn't scared, but Dean wasn't sure what emotion passed through her pretty eyes before she exhaled. "They're not werewolves. Besides, I... I would have noticed a bite or a scratch."

"Really? It looked like you had a few scratches that are almost healed."

Then annoyance flashed in that stone gray. "Yeah, rocks and branches from the fight. Nothing from the fox. It doesn't even work that way."

"Are you sure?" Sam asked.

She wasn't but didn't reply. Her eyes cast down for a moment at her food, suddenly an appraising prospect. "No, not 100%. If that's possible, then we have a bigger problem I guess."

"It wasn't that long ago. We could probably see a bite or scratch, Red."

"I haven't seen anything."

"You can't see all of you."

That gained Dean a glare from both Sam and Mae, but his gaze was still on the woman. "Now you're just saying that because you want to see me naked."

"I can want more than one thing at a time."

Mae rolled her eyes, an indignant huff still on her lips. She grumbled, trying to eat a little more but with no real passion or enjoyment of the meal.

"I'm serious Maes. If you don't want me to check, then Sammy can but we need to know."

"And you don't believe me when I say I wasn't bitten or scratched?"

"I believe you don't think you were and that you don't remember it happening. You can't account for a big period of time."

He was right, she thought as annoyance colored her thoughts. While she hadn't found any reference for kitsune being able to transmit the transformation to one through a bite or a scratch, the fact that they could shape-shift left the door open. Dean was even more correct in his assessment that she hadn't been able to check over her entire body. She hadn't done that. She had applied antibiotic ointment to the worst of the scrapes after she closed the case but to her knowledge, to her remembrance of the event, she didn't recall that she had been bitten or scratched by the fox. That didn't mean it didn't happen.

The part none of them said out loud yet but were all thinking was what if they found some implication that she'd been bitten and was perhaps turning. What were they going to do about it? The only surefire treatment for any sort of shape-shifting infection of curse was to kill the victim. Silver bullet to the heart. When she called Dean and Sam, her intention wasn't to put them in that positions. But if she needed to be dealt with, she at least trusted that Sam would do it, if they had run out of other options. If the task were left to Dean, she wasn't sure he could pull the trigger.

"Fine." She ground the word out, more forcefully than she meant, "Let's at least eat first. I'm not going to turn into an energy stealing fox right now."


They all ate, with little important conversation before she and Dean adjourned to the bathroom so he could check her for any injury she may have over looked.

"Let's just get this over." Once the door was closed, she opened the front of her shirt, Dean's shirt, she reminded herself. Under other circumstances, this could possibly fun. If not fun, then at least not weird. But that air of awkward familiarity and distance filled the air. Mae didn't realize her eyes had slammed shut and head turned to the side as she held the garment to expose herself to his gaze until his hands fell on her waist, warm and firm and she snapped her attention back to him. Dean paused, waiting for her to tell him to stop. She didn't. Instead, she took a quick breath, closed her eyes lightly and tilted her head up towards the ceiling.

He didn't have to touch her. But he did. Her skin was soft, over hard muscles that only tensed slightly. She smelled intoxicating. She had never been a perfume girl, but a sweet, somewhat floral fragrance mingled with her own natural scent. Not floral, he though, herbal. It occurred to Dean, that whatever she wore or used, maybe soap or an oil was probably laden with the colorful flowers and herbs that she grew around her house and was likely some form of protection, like laying down a line of salt or drinking holy water. Not a bad idea. Plus, she smelled good.

Because she didn't say no, he let his hands smooth over her skin as he looked for any bites or scratches, fresh or healing. He also tried to convince his body not to respond with such eager need at the mere sight of her. It didn't surprise him this time. He almost anticipated it because Mae was right; he did want to see her naked again. He wanted to be with her again. This however was perhaps the least opportune time to express that. He checked her torso, avoiding prolonged contact with any areas that seemed like he was just groping her for fun. He was quick, efficient.

"Legs next. Panties too, girl." He tried to add a little bit of levity. Unsuccessfully.

She opened her eyes, pinned him with a narrowed glare. "Don't be gross."

Then she sighed and let the worn flannel of his fall around her chest. She untied the strings of her also borrowed sweatpants, pushing them down before closing her eyes again, and trying not to think about anything. His hands stroked down the front and sides of her long legs, quickly brushed between her legs, again without touching her in way that might make her feel even more uncomfortable.

"Turn."

She did and his hands ran back up her calves and thighs, over the rounded hills of her backside. His touch was almost clinical, which was not something she expected from him at all. She appreciated the care he took to keep things on that level, but she also knew there was nothing he could do to make her body not long for the slower, firmly possessive touch, if he was going to put his hands on her.

To her relief, he pulled her pants up for her, rather than making her bend down. "We're almost done, Show me your back."

With her back towards him, she let the shirt slide down. His hands repeated the searching motion over her shoulders, her back, her arms. "Can you turn this on or off?"

The question was odd to her, but he tapped on the yantra on her lower back, which didn't entirely clarify the question but gave her a better idea what he was talking about. "It's not a light switch."

"You said it was for protection. But you've been possessed while you had it so...maybe it doesn't work."

She shook her head. "I think it does, as much as any symbol does. Last time was...different. I think if I agreed to it and there's a powerful enough counter spell, the yantra can be... over powered. Not turned off."

"Did you make deal with a kitsune?"

A frown creased her face. "No, to my knowledge. So...am I gonna turn into a murder fox?"

"Not any more that you already are, as far as I can tell."

Mae tugged the shirt more securely around her shoulders and began buttoning it closed. Her hands came to a pause when his hand bushed her hair out from under the collar and the fingers of his other hand slid gently over her neck. She couldn't stop the goose flesh from rising, hoping he would say nothing. He stayed silent but moved his hands to check over her scalp as well, just to be safe. When he was sure he had checked everything, he could, he put his hands on her shoulders, stepping as close to her as he could without pressing himself against her.

"You're good," He whispered against her ear.

It wasn't sexual, at all. But a shiver of arousal moved down her spine and her body and brain demanded that she spin around, kiss him hard, and make him undress her. This was not a good model for taking a break, for keeping their distance. She couldn't tell if that was his plan, to try to seduce her in this way or if it was simply the way she reacted to him. Mae let out a shaky but quiet sigh as his hands dropped away and she heard the door open.