We're not calling it Babe 11/?
Chapter 11
Dean brought the car to a halt in front of Melissa Nolan's house. He peered through the window at the nice little house in the nice little neighborhood. The perfect place for a nice little family. There was even a white picked fence surrounding the property. According to the file Melissa lived alone, though. No husband, no two point five kids. Not even a cat.
Dean's gaze wandered up to the sky. It was a nice day but not too warm.
"Think we can leave Mac in the car?" He asked, leaning down to give Mac an apologizing scratch behind the ear. "Taking him to a crime scene doesn't sound like a good idea." He explained when Sam gave him a confused expression.
"We don't want to contaminate something." Sam caught up with him. "Sorry, little guy. You have to wait here for a moment." He gave Mac a pat as well and then they almost fled the car before Mac could give them the little piggy eyes.
"We'll be back soon." Dean promised and was glad when Mac studied him through the glass of the window for a moment but then settled down for a nap. "Good boy."
The front door was secured with yellow police tape but this time they even had a key, thanks to Officer Adams, and were inside only a moment later. Sam closed the door behind them before they took out the EMF meters.
Without a word they made a quick sweep around the floor but they didn't find anything. There was still a glass and an open bottle of wine on the couch table and some leftover dishes in the sink. Everything for a single person. It looked like Melissa had a quiet evening alone before she went to bed.
The guest room didn't look like it had been used in a while and the bathroom was a little cluttered with toiletries as if Melissa hadn't bothered to put everything back in its place. She lived alone and didn't expect company.
At the door to the bedroom Dean took a deep breath. They were used to gore and blood, have seen their fair share of dead bodies, and some alive ones, but Dean had seen the pictures, what lay behind this door wasn't pretty.
He feared the day he wouldn't need a deep breath to face something like this. With the Mark on his arm that day might be not that far away anymore but today he still needed that moment to gather himself before he opened the door.
Letting the door swing open the brothers just stood in the doorway, taking in the scene in front of them.
"At least somebody with a mop has been through here." Dean said and stepped into the room. It was a neat little bedroom with creamy white furniture and some highlights in lavender, very tasteful.
The white floorboards were covered with thick fluffy rugs but near the bed there were strains of rusty red on them. In fact, around the bed the floor had been soaked with blood.
The bed itself was stripped bare but the mattress was still there, also soaked with blood.
With his EMF meter in hand Sam made his way around the room while Dean examined the bed closer. Their meters didn't pick up anything and as far as he could tell there was no sulfur around either. Dean lifted the mattress but there was nothing under it except for some dust bunnies.
"Why do they make teddy bears this big?" Sam interrupted his thoughts. When Dean looked up he found his brother frowning at a giant teddy bear sitting in a chair in the corner.
"At least it's not a giant clown, right Sammy?" Dean teased.
Sam just wrinkled his nose but then leaned in to sniff the teddy.
"Dude." Dean groaned. "Seriously?"
"It still smells like popcorn." Sam explained. "You think somebody won it for her at the fair?"
"A lover?" That would explain how somebody got into the house without breaking in. And it would explain why she'd been in bed wearing only her sleepwear. "I haven't seen anything indicating that she was seeing someone."
There was nothing supporting their theory in the bedroom, no clothes except for Melissa's lying around, so they went back downstairs. Even with fresh eyes they didn't find anything indicating that Melissa had company the evening she had been murdered.
"Family pictures." Sam pointed at a few framed pictures on a side table. Melissa with her parents in front of what looked like a hunting cabin, her sister with her family, several of her niece and nephew. If there had been somebody in Melissa's life, he hadn't made it to the family gallery yet.
"Let's see what her sister has to say." Dean suggested.
Back in the car Mac demanded all the cuddles from them for making him wait.
"Good boy." Dean gave him a biscuit and then handed cuddle duty over to Sam so that Dean had his hands free to drive them over to Melissa's sister. It was only a few streets over and they were there in under five minutes. Mac hadn't even settled down yet and was still head-butting Sam's shin every time he dared to stop with the petting for a second.
"This is not a crime scene." Dean observed casually.
"He has proven himself to be a good icebreaker." Sam added.
A minute later two FBI agents with a puppy on a leash walked up to the front door. A woman opened and even with her puffy eyes and red nose Dean recognized her from the pictures he'd seen at Melissa's place.
"Jennifer Darner?" He asked just to make sure. She nodded and they showed her their FBI badges. "Could we come in for a moment?"
"Of course." She stepped aside to let them in but then her eyes fell on Mac.
"I hope you don't mind." Dean had followed her gaze. "He can stay in the car if he bothers you."
"No, no, it's okay." She led them into the living room where two children were sitting over their homework. Curious eyes met the newcomers and for a second the boy's eyes lit up when he noticed Mac. He had to be around ten or twelve, his sister was a few years younger, but both kids wore expressions way older than their years. They had lost their aunt only two days ago.
"Go to your rooms and finish your homework there." Jennifer told them and without a word of protest they gathered up their books and left the room. In the doorway the boy hesitated and looked back at them. Dean wasn't sure what to read into this but then the kids were gone and he sat down with Jennifer to talk to her about her dead sister.
"When have you last seen Melissa?" Sam took the lead, traumatized family members always responded better to him than to Dean.
"Tuesday when I picked up Brian and Katie." She answered with a small hitch in her voice. "Melissa had taken them to the fair that day. I picked them up in the evening and the next morning when I wanted to bring them over again ..." She had to pause and blow her nose. They gave her a moment to gather herself. "When she didn't open I let myself in, I have a key, you know, for emergencies, she has one for our house as well, we look out for each other." Kneading the tissue in her hand she shook her head as if she tried to get the pictures out of her head.
She had been the one who'd found Melissa, Dean remembered.
Sam reached out and took her hand in his. "I'm sorry for your loss." He said sincerely. He ducked down to look her in the eye and after a second she nodded her indication that they could continue with the interview.
"Was she seeing someone?" Sam asked the more awkward question first, just to get it over with.
"No." Jennifer shook her head.
"Is there anybody else who has a key?" Dean jumped in.
"Our parents but they don't live here."
"You say Melissa has been to the fair with your children that day." Sam changed the topic. "Did she mention something? Something weird? Like somebody following her?"
Jennifer shook her head again and reached for a fresh tissue. "Nothing. They had fun."
"I'd like to ask Brian and Katie a few questions if that's okay with you." Dean said. "Maybe they have noticed something."
Jennifer just nodded and showed him the way to the bedrooms.
Mac stayed at Dean's side and didn't make a sound. Dean was pretty sure that Jennifer had forgotten about the pig but he could come in handy when he was talking to the kids.
Sam and Jennifer stayed in the hallway from where she could keep an eye on her children but wasn't hovering in the background. Dean trusted his brother to keep her occupied so that the kids would speak more freely with him.
Katie told him in a flat voice that they had been to the fair. They had cotton candy and had been on a few rides. Aunt Mel had even won a teddy bear for Brian when he'd asked for one but then he didn't want it anymore. She hadn't noticed anything. While she was telling him that Katie sat at her desk, not bothering to look up from her homework.
Dean thanked her and went over to Brian. The boy was more animated than his sister and he was on his knees, reaching out to Mac the second they entered his room.
"Katie told me that you were to the fair with your aunt the other day." Dean prompted.
"Yeah, it was fun." Brian answered the question, more busy with Mac than anything else. However, something in his voice caught Dean's attention. He came down to a crouch next to the boy.
"Did something happen?" He asked. "Did you see something?"
Brian kept quiet for a long moment. He held Mac in his arms as if he needed something to ground himself and Dean knew that was Mac's specialty.
"He isn't really a puppy, isn't he?" Brian asked instead of an answer but in a low enough voice that his mother didn't hear him.
"No." Dean answered honestly and wondered what Brian saw in Mac. Some children had a clearer view on the things around them. Until they learned that all if it was just imaginary. "He is a magic pig." He leaned in closer. "But that's a secret. You can keep a secret, right?"
Brian nodded and looked at Mac with awe.
"I wanted that stupid teddy." He finally said. "I begged Aunt Mel to win it for me. She's good at shooting."
"So she won it for you." Dean thought about what Katie had told him. "Why didn't you want it anymore? Was there something about it? Something like with Mac?"
"No. It … it just smelled weird. I didn't like it." Now tears welled up in Brian's eyes. "She got it for me and then I didn't want to take it home. And then … she … she …" He couldn't hold back the tears anymore. He just clung to Mac who let himself get squished in the boy's arms.
A second later Jennifer was at Brian's side, assuring him that Aunt Mel knew how much he loved her. Quietly Dean picked up Mac's leash and left.
"Did the teddy smell weird to you?" Dean asked his brother when they were back in the car. What was his life that that question didn't even sound strange to him anymore?
Sam thought about it for a moment. "Just popcorn. Maybe like the chemicals they use for cheap toys like that." He shrugged.
Dean drove them back to their motel. They went to their own room first were they set Mac free before they went over to examine Frank's room.
The room was very much like their own. A generic motel room. The only exception was the blood soaked bed. And the giant teddy bear sitting in the corner.
Chapter 12
Masterpost