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“Yeah, well…” Scrawny looked around too and scratched his head at the obvious lackluster gathering. “You two took too much time fucking,” he complained. “You missed all the good parts. Plus, these two hos is the only ones who screwed up and got caught by the wrong guy. Course that’s ‘cause the Dom that shoulda caught ‘em was me, and I didn’t go looking for ‘em.” Then he cackled again, and Dean had to curl his fists at his sides and look away from the man.
“Well, this has been fun,” Sam lied. “The chase and fight at least.”
“Fuck you, man,” the guy Sam had beaten bloody said from the other side of the room. He had an unopened beer can held to his swollen eye and flipped them the finger.
“Yeah, that part was great.” Composed now, Dean added, “I hope you’ll invite us again. So? What’s up there?” He motioned to the stairs with his chin.
“Aww, nothin’ but a couple moldy mattresses and some vermin.” All smiles and oily charm gone, the snake within the man coiled and eyed them dangerously despite the offhanded words. “Yeah, the party’s ‘bout wound up anyway. Hey! Leviathan, git yer lazy ass up and give these fellers a ride back to their car. It’s late.”
Interesting, Dean thought, nodded as if bored, and then turned with Sam and Kimberly to follow the big Dom out the door. Very interesting indeed.
None of them said a word until they got in the beach house. They didn’t even speak when they rushed her from Leviathan’s beater to their car. Sam had just driven in white-knuckled silence while Dean sat her in between them and held a shell-shocked Kimberly all the way to their place. She spent the entire drive with her head on his shoulder. Neither he nor Sam missed that she kept one hand on the back of Sam’s neck or arm the whole time. It was as if she needed to assure herself they had all made it out safely, and the men were fine with that.
“Let’s get her into the shower, Dean.” Sam was the first to break the silence as he hurried ahead, flipping lights on as he went. “I’ll get the water running.”
“God, yes,” Kimberly groaned with a full-body shudder. “I think I got gum stuck to my ass from that truck.”
Goddamn but the woman had spine. It about brought him to his knees the way she never broke. Even when tears streamed down her face and she’d slapped at them, she pulled herself back from that slippery edge by her manicured nails and stood—my God, had she stood. After all she’d been through tonight, she was making jokes. They followed Sam into the master bath, and the two of them stripped Kimberly out of these garments for the last time. He’d see them burn in hell for what could have happened to her in that outfit. He kissed her, patting gently at her tangled hair.
“Any pins or clips left in here?” he asked her and got a reluctant smile in return.
“No, I think I lost ‘em all.” But she poked around at her scalp just in case before she let them handle her into the stall and under the hot spray.
It was a huge walk-in shower they had designed with their own fun and games in mind. Sammy had turned on the three faucets in the corner so she’d feel like she was bathing in a waterfall. It was a good pick, and Dean thought she might be able to let herself break down a little and have a good cry in there. When they turned to leave though, she grabbed them both by the wrists.
“Don’t go.” Her voice was tremulous, something new from her, and it pulled his heart right from his chest and into her hands. “Stay with me. Please.”
They both stopped and turned their bodies in her direction, ready to offer whatever she needed from them. Comfort, solace, protection. Hell, Dean would run out and get her a cheeseburger right now if that’s what popped out of her mouth.
“Do you want us to stay in the bathroom?” he asked her gently. “We can stay in here if that’s what you need to feel safe.”
She shook her head and tipped it back so the water caught it and turned the thick locks to molten gold. She blinked droplets clear of her inky lashes and then stood there looking like Botticelli’s Venus emerging from the sea.
“I do feel safe,” she told them, enchanting as a siren. “And angry. And agitated, and like I could kill them all with my bare hands.” She lifted them now, held them trembling out in front of her to them with a look of such pleading in her eyes that they both began to shed their clothes on the spot.
Sam reached her first, and Dean saw the tender way his partner took her in his long arms. Saw the way she turned those pleading eyes on him.
“There’s so much inside me right now,” she told him, and a half sob cracked her sultry voice. “So much. I want to kill them. I want to go back there and kill them all.”
With a hushing sound, he pulled her close, kissed her hard on the temple, then held her face against his heaving chest. Dean saw her turmoil was tearing Sam up as much as it was him.
“Those women! Those poor women! Why didn’t we save them? Why didn’t you stop them? Arrest them?” She wasn’t frantic or accusing; she was confused and so desperate to understand that Dean felt a fist clench in his chest. Naked, he stepped around Sam’s shoulder, and she turned her mermaid eyes his way but kept herself tight in Sam’s embrace. He was searching her anguished expression for clues on how best to help her, when he felt her fingers brush against his.
“You’re too far away.” She pulled him to her back, then nuzzled her cheek on Sammy’s pec. “Help me understand.”
Dean kissed the top of her head, then her shoulder, the water falling over them hot and filling the room with steam. He kept his lips pressed to her for a moment, enjoying the feel of her wet skin, then he straightened and told her things she already knew.
“We don’t have enough for a warrant yet.” Kimberly shook her head, her face scrunched up in impotent fury as he went on. “Think about what you really saw tonight. None of the women there made any attempt to ask for help. No one was bleeding; no one was in immediate danger. Wait, listen. We know there is a dangerous and ugly underbelly going on. But right now, knowing that doesn’t get us back onto the property with a warrant in hand. On the surface, that was just a bunch of really hardcore, consenting adults.”
Sam cursed. “Unfortunately, the only thing we can charge them for at this point is unlawful discharge of a firearm. Fucking little dickhead.” Sam’s hands were running up and down her sides as he spoke, and Dean’s went to her hair. He pulled it back from her face, held his free hand under the automatic dispenser in the wall, and told her, “Tilt your head back and close your eyes.”
She did so without question or complaint, though there was still an unsettled expression on her face.
“How can you guys stand this?” she bemoaned as Dean scratched his nails down her scalp and worked the soap into a lather. “How can you stand to do nothing when you know what you know?” They were under a shower, but Sammy saw and wiped angry tears away from her cheeks, while Dean continued to rub and massage her scalp.
“It kills us all at first,” Sam told her, kissing her softly on the side of her trembling lips. “Still grabs us by the balls sometimes if we’re being honest. But it’s the job. It’s how the system works. If we’re wrong—or worse, we’re right but we fuck up and let these animals off on a technicality—that’s when we’d never be able to live with ourselves.”
Kimberly nodded. Dean tipped her head back, took his time rinsing, and let the water do some massaging of its own. They held her there, Dean by the head and neck, Sam by her waist. As Dean looked down at the feast laid out between them, not just the incredible, vibrant hellcat within but the abundant, glorious packaging all that came wrapped up in, he was ready to forget all about the case. His eyes met Sammy’s; his partner was ready too.
