Violently (Part II)
Sam stared out the side of the car, his thoughts spinning like a tornado he had no hope of outrunning. The scenery wasn’t much of a distraction, but when you grew up in the back of a car there wasn’t much that caught your attention when there was nothing to look at but passing fields and farm houses. Maybe things would be different if they were headed someplace else. Maybe it would be different if Dean didn’t look like death warmed over. Maybe, just maybe, things would be different if the last four years of hunting together had given them anything but grief and pain.
Dean was still nursing some heavy bruising and his lips were still cracked and split from the fight. He ignored the pain in his chest at the memory of walking in to find his brother beaten by Alastair. Watching his brother in a hospital bed afterwards had almost been too much. It was almost as bad as the time Dean had been in a coma and chased by a reaper; maybe worse, because at least then Dean had been trying to talk to him.
Now the silence was thick between them. Angels and demons were giving them hell, the game was changing left and right, and all they had to hold onto was each other, only that seemed as unsteady as everything else. Sam had to fight down the anger that someone else had bruised Dean, but that was a familiar ache he’d grown used to over the years.
Dean pulled over to a diner for lunch and Sam knew neither of them was eager for the hunt. As best as Sam could make out a ghost was electrocuting people in a set of college dorms. It would be an easy hunt to get Dean back into the game after the angels had taken him to play chop shop on Alistair, forced his brother to torture the demon who had once tortured-and broken-him. Sam just wished the hunt wasn’t at Stanford.
“You coming, Sammy?” Dean asked as he stood outside the Impala in the parking lot. Sam knew his thoughts were too chaotic since he hadn’t noticed the car stop, but he had more important things on his mind. Like how to keep his brother sane over the next few days and how to keep him close.
He needed to be strong for Dean, he knew that. It wasn’t that his brother was even weak, because once Dean set his mind on something he always got it, but Sam was afraid his brother was going to just give up completely. He’d seen it happen once before and he wasn’t willing to watch his brother in another hospital bed because he was courting death.
“Yeah, I’m coming,” he finally managed to say, as he scrambled out of the car to join his brother. Dean would barely look at him for more than a second or two, so he walked slightly behind him, keeping out of Dean’s line of sight. It was easier to pretend that way.
They had a table in the back and he sat at Dean’s elbow, trying to think of anything to say. Nothing came, so he continued to look at the menu long after he was done figuring out his lunch. The waitress came and took their orders, stealing their menus as well, so Sam contented himself with looking out the window.
“So, you know anything about this hunt yet?”
Sam took this words for the olive branch they was. “So far there have been four deaths, all within a four block radius. All four people were electrocuted. The last victim’s time of death happened during a power outage in her neighborhood.”
“So no possibility of her slipping in the bathtub with her hairdryer,” Dean said as he smiled up at the waitress. She set their drinks down and walked away leaving them alone again.
“There doesn’t seem to be any connection between them, but once we start interviewing witnesses maybe we can figure out what’s happening.”
Dean nodded as he took a sip of his coke. Sam couldn’t help but watch the way his lips pulled tight around the straw, or how his cheeks hollowed ever so slightly as he sucked. He had a sudden urge to drag his brother back to the bathroom and push him down to his knees and force his jaw wide open. Dean looked up from his drink and Sam didn’t know what showed in his expression, but Dean’s eyes hardened as if he could read his thoughts.
“You think you’ll run into any friends at Stanford?” Dean asked, cruelly, since his brother knew the way the years had taught Sam to keep people at a distance.
“It’s been four years since I walked away from Stanford.” The waitress came to drop off their plates, and Sam poked at his meatloaf with the fork for a minute. “Even if someone did know me back then, I doubt they’d recognize me.”
He looked up at Dean’s contrite face, realized Dean had just been trying to steer them into safer waters, and he took a deep breath to try to calm his irritation. It was the demon’s fault, all those bruises over Dean’s body, bruises Sam needed to replace with his own. He dug into the meat on his plate and ate with a single mindedness that was normally reserved for the eldest Winchester brother. His mind, however, was on something else entirely, another hospital bed and another hunt where his brother decided the world would be better off with him along.
**
Sam stared at his brother in the white bed, the walls sterile around him as the machine beat out his heartbeat for all to hear. Sam hated that machine. He hated everything about the room because the four white walls made his big brother look small and desolate. He hated himself more because he knew why Dean looked that way and it had nothing to do with white walls and wires hooked to machines.
He was angry, more so than he’d ever been before. His body hurt from the night before, from the way Dean had taken him, but he was able to get around just fine. He’d had a lot worse helping Dad and Dean on a hunt.
The doctors said Dean would be in the hospital for a few weeks, which Sam figured meant he’d stay until the end of the current week but Sam couldn’t find the mercy in his heart to care. He loved Dean with everything he was, and Dean had just gone out and fucked things up. After the night before, after he’d claimed Sam, he thought Dean would keep him close. He never imagined his brother would react so violently against what had happened between them.
It set a fresh wave of anger through him. He knew what Dean was doing the night before. He didn’t know what had happened to Dean to make him so afraid for Sam, but it didn’t take a genius and Sam was pretty damn close to one. His brother had been hurt, and in his drunken stupor his experience and his shameful desires had won out, so he’d walked into their room, settled on Sam’s bed, and taken almost every first-time Sam had left.
Dean looked up as Sam took a step closer, his eyes wide and his skin suddenly pale as the sheets. Sam had locked the door when he snuck in and knew the nurse’s routine. He’d been watching them all day to see when would be the best time, and it wasn’t hard to sneak around the hospital after visiting hours.
He snapped the curtain around Dean’s bed closed even though the room was empty of other occupants. He slipped his shoes off and crawled up on Dean’s bed, needing to feel his brother’s heartbeat under his hand.
“Sammy?”
Sam’s hand pressed down on Dean’s mouth to shut him up, the apologetic tone of his voice pissing Sam off even more. “Shut the hell up and do what you’re told,” Sam whispered harshly.
The tone was all John Winchester and Dean swallowed whatever he’d been planning to say. Sam didn’t bother with other words. He needed to show Dean he wasn’t some victim. He was just as strong as Dean and he could give as well as he could take. Dean would see then that Sam needed this more than anything. He needed Dean strong and healthy and his.
He let go of Dean’s mouth and couldn’t help but trace his brother’s lips with his fingers. He pressed against them and two of his digits slid past Dean’s lips into the waiting heat. He bit his lip to keep from moaning as his fingers coaxed Dean’s tongue into movement.
When he pulled them out he didn’t bother to watch Dean’s reaction. Instead, he crawled up his brother’s chest, being careful to avoid knocking into his brother’s damaged arm and leg, thighs spread wide around Dean’s chest as he pulled the waist of his sweat pants down. He pulled his cock out with one hand and even though it was obvious what he was expecting, he had to use his other thumb to pry open Dean’s jaws.
He couldn’t stop the next moan as he pushed his dick into Dean’s mouth. There were tears in Dean’s eyes already, and Sam didn’t care, because tonight he deserved this. After watching Dean recklessly throw himself into the hunt - the resignation in his eyes when he thought the nymph had him, and how he hadn’t even fought against her - Sam needed this.
He slid his cock out over Dean’s lips, watching as he pushed back in, forcing his way down Dean’s throat. He could feel Dean struggling under him, the way his throat constricted around Sam as he gagged, and he pulled back enough that Dean could breathe.
It didn’t take long. Other than Dean sucking him down the night before, Sam had never had anyone touch him like that. As he thrust into his brother’s mouth he dropped a hand to his hair, watching Dean as he braced himself with his other hand on the back of the bed. The position gave him more leverage and he moved quicker, snapping his hips forward as tears trailed down Dean’s cheek.
“Oh, fuck, Dean,” he whimpered as his orgasm shot through him. He thrust harder into Dean’s heat and watched his brother try to choke down his come. He didn’t have a choice with Sam’s cock still pressed deep, and he shivered when he felt Dean swallowing around him.
He crawled down the bed, careful of Dean’s injuries, until he could just lay there for a second and catch his breath. When he had, he fixed his clothes and got out of bed, slipping his shoes on. His legs felt like jello but he wasn’t sure if it was his orgasm or the knowledge that he’d just taken his brother like that.
When he looked up at Dean, finally looked into his eyes after it was all done, he realized nothing was what he thought it was.
“Sammy,” Dean’s voice was gravel deep from the abuse and the regret was thick on his tongue. “I’m so sorry, Sammy.”
Sam’s body shuddered at the words. “It’s Sam.”
He should have known Dean wouldn’t see. His brother looked at him like he was the one broken, like the thing between them had made him into less of a person. He still didn’t understand that Sam was strong and capable and he wanted anything Dean would give him.
Anger filled his chest at the thought of Dean tossing aside his offering like that and he let the emotionn fill him as he walked out the door.
Dean was in the hospital another five days, and Sam didn’t go back. When he stumbled into the front seat of the Impala, Sam gave him a tight smile and went back to the latest book he’d borrowed from the library that would never make its way back. John Winchester didn’t have time for library trips. He didn’t have time for his boys either. He looked at Sam in the rearview mirror, raised an eyebrow at the lack of reaction to Dean’s arrival, but just drove on as Dean got himself comfortable. He had two bodies in his car and there was a hunt, so all was alright in John Winchester’s world. He just had no idea how fucked up the lives of his own boys were.
**
The drive to Stanford was long, but at least at the end Sam could point them to a motel that wasn’t dirty and to a cheap restaurant where they could both happily order from the menu.
It was early evening by the time they got done eating so they hit up the local newsstand and got the latest papers for Dean to go through while Sam trolled the internet. Dean spread the papers over his bed and Sam set up the laptop on the table, hacking into the college police’s files to see what could be found out about the two bodies found on campus. He hacked into the local police as well to see if they had anything.
“Hey Sammy, you said she was found electrocuted, right?”
“Yeah.”
Dean held up the paper where two reports were circled in red sharpie. “I got another electrocution death on campus. I’ve got something else though, a woman found drowned.”
“Where?”
“In the middle of the library.”
“What?” Sam asked as he pushed away from the table and grabbed for the paper.
The article was brief but succinct. “What the hell?”
“Ghosts don’t change their MO. Two hauntings at the same time on the same campus? What are the odds?”
“Dean, did you see anything in the paper about a tragedy?”
Dean shook his head. “Nothing out of the ordinary. I’ve got a real bad feeling about this hunt, Sammy.”
“It’s Sam.”
Dean’s eyebrow shot up and Sam just stalked back to the computer to see what he could dig up in the local online papers for the past few weeks. He’d stopped correcting Dean on the nickname years ago, knowing how useless it was. The fact that he knew Dean had just slipped up - that it wasn’t meant to be cruel - should have had him overlooking it, but they were at Stanford and Sam was jumpy as hell about that.
He was tense and waiting for Dean to make his move, more than aware of how the subject of college affected his brother. Dean had been all for Sam leaving when he did, but ever since he’d come back it was a sore spot he knew was better left unprovoked.
Sam loved his brother more than he should, and he knew Dean loved him too. It didn’t mean Dean wouldn’t lash out when backed into a wall though and taking Dean to Stanford was like putting a wild animal in a cage and standing between him and the door. If he couldn’t keep him calm, Dean was gonna spring with a ferocity Sam didn’t want to remember.
“We need some cash,” Dean said after a few minutes as he got up and grabbed his jacket. “Know of a good place?”
Sam rattled off the name of a few bars he’d gone to when he’d been low on cash. “Be careful, Dean.”
Dean stared at him from across the room, and Sam swallowed against the lump in his throat. Dean would come back with a thick wad of cash, but it wasn’t why he was leaving. As much as Sam was trying to keep his brother calm, Dean was doing his best to reel back his needs as well.
“Don’t wait up, Sammy,” Dean said, his smile cold and mean as he turned his back, opened the door, and left Sam behind.
He spent a few hours looking for more details, half waiting for Dean to come back, but in the end he called it a night, just hoping his brother didn’t get into too much trouble.
**
The room was pitch dark but he relaxed as the bed dipped beside him, the familiar scent of oil and alcohol and leather that was his brother after a night of hustling making him relax his grip on the hilt of his knife.
“Sammy,” Dean’s voice was dark, night whispered against the back of his neck, and he barely had time to register it before Dean’s hand pressed against the back of his neck.
He tried to push up but Dean had the advantage as he swung one leg up over Sam’s, straddling him. He could feel the hairs on Dean’s legs and from his vantage point he could see Dean’s clothes in a pile on the floor. “Dean, don’t do this,” he begged. He knew it wouldn’t do any good, even as he felt Dean’s other hand pulling his boxers down.
He kept still, waiting for the moment when Dean was off balance to push up and dislodge him. He managed to get up, but Dean was still on him and all his struggles managed to do was help Dean pull the boxers further down his thighs. Dean managed to get his knee in the middle of Sam’s back, forcing him back down to the mattress.
“Stay the fuck down, Sammy,” Dean’s voice was far more threatening for the wrecked sound of it, so he stopped, steeling himself for what was next.
Fingers were pressed into his mouth and he almost gagged on them the way Dean shoved them so far in, but he knew what Dean wanted. He sucked and licked on his brother’s fingers, hunger and need and anger replacing the need to fight. It was about fucking time! He’d been waiting for this for three days, ever since he’d mentioned the hunt to Dean. He needed to feel his brother’s claim on him, needed to know Dean still wanted him there. He thought Dean understood, that no matter what happened he was with Dean, but somehow after all the years, Stanford was still a threat to Dean. Maybe the way Cassie was still a threat to Sam, someone who had a part of Dean that Sam would never have. He bit Dean’s fingers hard enough he caught the taste of blood before the fingers were wrenched from his mouth.
“Fuck, Sammy,” Dean complained as he pulled his knee back. His dry hand was back on Sam’s neck holding him still while Dean wedged his knees between Sam’s legs. He forced Sam’s legs apart and then his fingers were pushed in as one, punishing thrusts that twisted and turned and loosened him up even as they burned.
He couldn’t get away from Dean, and no matter how much he fought Dean, he didn’t want to. He didn’t know how to make Dean talk about anything else, but this he could take. When Dean took him hard and fast, he knew Dean wanted him. He knew for this, at least, Dean thought he was worth fighting for.
The fingers were gone too quickly and Dean’s cock lined up against his hole. “Dean, not yet, Dean,” he begged but he knew it was useless.
Dean pressed in, his filthy fingers pressing against Sam’s mouth to muffle his screams. It wasn’t just a burn, it hurt as Dean surged forward, and he would feel it the next day, but Sam loved that part of it. He pushed his hips back, and Dean’s hand pulled away from his neck and mouth to grip him tightly. “Jesus fuck, Sammy,” Dean moaned as he pulled Sam’s hips back, slamming into him. “Always so tight, just like that night,” he whispered.
Sam shuddered at the mention of it, trying to find his way to his knees for Dean. Dean kept him pressed down though, fucking hard into him. He never mentioned the first time, and Sam didn’t know what it meant that he was now. He needed Dean to be with him though, in the now and not back then. Dean in those days had been broken and lost. He needed Dean to be strong, needed him to find himself again after everything else had happened to him.
“That all you got?” he baited his brother.
Dean’s fingers gripped hard enough to bruise, and Sam arched his back to get more. He felt his brother’s fingernails digging in as he thrust faster and faster in and out of Sam’s body. When he leaned over Sam’s back one hand forced its way under him to grip his cock. Dean stroked him hard in rhythm with his thrusts, and when Dean began hitting his prostate Sam was done. His whole body seized up with the intensity of his orgasm, and Dean bit down hard on his shoulder as Sam’s body gripped him tighter.
Dean didn’t stop his hips though, just kept going, even as Sam’s body was a quivering mess underneath him. “Yeah,” Dean whispered as moved back to rest his hands on Sam’s hips, keeping him in the position he wanted him. “Always take what I give you, no matter how wrong, don’tcha, Sammy?”
Sam felt Dean’s hips losing their rhythm, and he knew how to send him over the edge. “Come on, make me take it,” he answered. “Always take it for you.”
Dean slammed into him one more time, and Sam ached where they were joined as Dean rolled his hips, trying to get even deeper. Dean was coming inside him and Sam knew he’d be leaking later. His dick twitched underneath him at the idea and he moaned as the rough sheets rubbed over his sensitive skin.
Dean finally let go of his hips, but instead of climbing out of bed, Dean pulled out gently and flopped down onto his side next to Sam. Dean’s hand moved up his back, tracing his spine. He pulled Sam back into him but his fingers didn’t stop until they were buried in Sam’s hair, curling and uncurling with the rhythm of Sam’s heart.
He didn’t know what to do, but with the beat of Dean’s heart at his back and his fingers in his hair, his eyes drifted closed and he fell back to sleep, sated and safe.
**
Dean stared at the bar, watching the people move in and around it. The place was a college bar, that was for certain. They had long tables towards the back where Dean could see two distinct groups of students studying as they passed around plates of wings and nachos right alongside pitchers of cheap beer. Booths along the front corner housed older clientele where Dean had seen someone addressed as professor. There were pool tables to one side of the bar and even a small stage next to them for the weekends when they had live music.
Dean was taking a long pull from his beer as he settled next to a small group of friends. He’d managed to get them talking about strange happenings around campus, but they’d long since moved on to inane ghost stories. Every campus had its story about the haunted tower or the ghost in the theater.
“Hey, good looking, you stare any harder and your boyfriend might get jealous,” the guy beside Dean said.
Dean smiled back, as he looked away from Sam where he sat with his back to Dean, chatting up some students. Tammy, Richie’s friend from freshman year apparently, refused to leave Dean alone. It was easier to say he was gay to stay in their good graces as he got them to talk. Rod, who was sitting and whispering with her, had looked Dean up and down so wistfully that it wasn’t hard to guess which way he swung. Dean had clarified then that he was there with his boyfriend. Jesus, if Sam ever heard about it he could kiss his ass good-bye.
“Holy shit,” Richie said suddenly, staring past Dean, before he could respond to his teasing. Dean looked back where he was looking and watched as his brother turned, eyes wide as he looked their way.
“Sam?” Richie called over the noise of the bar.
“Richie?” Sam’s long legs ate up the distance between them, and he had Richie in his embrace before Dean had a chance to react. “Christ, man, what are you doing still hanging out here?”
“I’m a townie now,” Richie declared as he stood back, looking Sam over. “It’s good to see you. I know, after Jess, you needed to be on the move, but there were a lot of us that missed you.”
Sam sighed, looking down at his feet, and Dean wanted to pummel Richie for bringing her up. Sam saw Jessica everywhere they went; Dean could see it in his eyes. It made him want to comfort Sam and claim him at the same time. Without realizing it, he’d stepped closer, his fingers curling over Sam’s hip where his fingerprints still marred his brother’s skin.
Sam looked up, taking a deep breath as he looked at Dean.
“Oh, man, I didn’t realize,” Richie said apologetically. Dean looked up in confusion, but Richie was staring between him and Sam. “You came in with Sam?”
“Yeah,” Sam said, with a furrow in his brow. The word was out too fast for Dean to stop it, but he could see Sam was working out that Dean had laid some sort of cover story. “Who’d you expect him to be with?”
Richie smiled. “Let’s just say I never realized you were barking up that tree too.”
Sam’s smile was confused, but Dean stepped in before it could get messy. “Sammy, babe, why don’t we grab some drinks for everyone?”
“Yeah, sure.”
“Thought you hated to be called Sammy?” Richie asked as Dean pulled at Sam’s sleeve.
Sam looked at him, and Dean couldn’t read his brother’s eyes in that moment. He had no idea how Sam would react to this. It wasn’t liked he’d planned on finding an old friend of Sam’s and outing them. Hell, he was happy enough to get Sam away from Stanford and everything it represented, but people were dying and they had to figure it out.
“Dean’s the only one that’s ever been able to get away with it,” Sam admitted as he finally looked back at Richie. Richie looked between them but just nodded, and Dean pulled Sam away from them to get back to the bar.
“Look, Sam, I just told them I was here with my boyfriend to keep from getting hit on,” Dean said.
“I walked right into that one, right?”
“Yeah, sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it, Dean. There are worse things you could have said.”
“Yeah?” Dean huffed in irritation, “like what?”
“Like you were family,” Sam said softly.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Dean demanded. Yeah, he’d fucked up their lives pretty good, but he never thought Sam hated him. He’d wished sometimes that he would, but he never did. When he’d come back to get Sam at Stanford he’d hoped things had changed, but he was barely in his brother’s door when he knew how wrong he’d been. It wasn’t gone and it never would be. Four years later and even though he was able to control his need, he still found himself lashing out with it from time to time, pushing his brother down into the mattress like he had just the first night, brutal and violent and never able to say the things he needed to say, to admit to what he really needed. He had to take what he could from Sam because he knew Sam would never give it freely.
There had been times when he thought, just maybe Sam might. There was too much between them now though to make this thing pretty. Sam took and Dean took, and even if he could no longer deny that it went both ways, he could never forget he’d done this to them. He didn’t deserve Sam. Hell, he’d known it even before the angels had shown up and taken him away. They were right though. Dean was only good at two things: hunting monsters/creatures and hurting people.
He could still feel the steel of Ruby’s knife in his hand as he’d sliced into Alistair, felt the beauty of his pain in ways his soul had become accustomed to so many years ago with Sammy struggling underneath him.
Yeah, he fucked it up, but even back then Sam had held his own, and Dean didn’t think he hated him enough to tell people so.
“Dean, I couldn’t tell anyone where I came from so I just said it was a bad place. They inferred a lot from things I never said. All I mean is if you said you were family they’d make a lot of assumptions.”
“Like?”
Sam looked down at his shoes. “Like I was abused and neglected.”
Dean looked up at Sam and even though his brother refused to make eye contact, he could feel the guilt coming off his brother. Sam didn’t tell his friends a goddamn thing, but they still came up to the right conclusion.
He wanted to say something to his brother, but nothing would come out. Instead, he just rummaged through his pocket until he found his car keys. He pushed them into Sam’s hands and walked away from the bar, ignoring the anxious tone in Sam’s voice as he called after him.
He had to get out though, away from the noise and Sam’s friend and the knowledge that Sam had exposed them so completely to a bunch of strangers who didn’t know anything about them. Jesus, what had Jessica thought when Dean showed up, stealing Sam away from her?
“Dean, don’t do this,” Sam’s voice caught up with him, and he stopped to look at Sam. His brother was begging, his eyes carrying his emotions as they always did.
His hands were shaking and he let out a deep breath in an attempt to ease the ache in his chest. He couldn’t leave Sam when he looked at him like that, like he needed him. Dean was broken, he knew that. He’d told Castiel in the hospital, but the damn angel just wouldn’t let anything go. He’d wished Cas away, wished his brother back, because even if Sam believed Dean was too weak to be worthwhile he still loved him. They were brothers, and no matter what else the world threw at them, John had drilled that into them well enough, trust no one but family. As fucked up as John had let their lives become, it was no wonder Sam and Dean could rip one another to pieces and still come back to glue each other together. It was the one thing John taught them better than anything else. No one could hurt you like family.
**
“I said no, Sammy,” Dean bit out as Sam glared across the room at him. Dean couldn’t care less what he thought. The kids Sam wanted to hang out with were trouble and Dean knew it. Hell, they were the kind of kids Dean would hang out with. He knew what sort of trouble they’d get into, and Sam was starting to fight about everything all on his own. He didn’t need another influence.
“When did you become Dad?” Sam demanded as he stood up. He pressed up against Dean’s chest, trying to force Dean to take a step back. Dean didn’t let him though.
“Back off,” he gritted out as he pushed Sam back. His brother hit the wall, but Sam grabbed him, using his momentum to spin them until Dean was the one with his back on the wall.
“What do you think they’ll make me do, Dean?” Sam roared. “You think I’m stupid enough to get drunk with them? Or do drugs? Or you afraid they’ll make me do the things you already taught me? To pick pockets? How to break and enter? How to hustle?” He pushed his chest up against Dean’s again and his eyes were on fire. “Or maybe it’s something else. Maybe you’re afraid of what else they’ll make me do. Is that it, Dean?”
Dean’s hands were clenched into white knuckled fists as he forced himself to stay still. He wanted to shut Sam the hell up, remind him he was his older brother and his protector, but he knew Sam wasn’t as far off the mark as he wanted him to be. The idea of Sam spending time with those kids when Dean was there just pissed him off. It’d been two years since he’d first touched his brother but the ache and need had never gone away.
“Are you jealous? Afraid they’ll make me take it? Afraid they’ll fuck me better than you do?”
The door slammed and Dean jerked around, putting himself between Sam and danger, Sam’s hands falling to his side as a voice rang out behind them. “What the hell is going on here?”
“Dad?” Dean’s voice was a bare croak. Dad was supposed to be gone for another week. He hoped his dad hadn’t heard Sam’s words but the look in his eyes didn’t leave any doubt.
“What did you do to him?” Their dad demanded as he stepped further into the room.
Dean could feel Sam’s hands clenched hard into the back of his shirt. He wasn’t sure if Sam was trying to hide from their father or if he was trying to keep Dean away from their father’s wrath.
There was nothing else in John’s eyes or his voice but rage. Dean knew what it meant and he held his head high. It was his chance to make things right, to find a way to stop what was happening. “Sammy, go to your room.”
“No,” Sam’s fingers curled harder into him, so Dean dropped his hand back, fingers biting into the thick flesh of Sam’s thigh to show he wasn’t messing around.
Their father’s eyes followed the movement, but Dean didn’t stop until he felt Sam gasp, his palms press against Dean’s back. “Sammy, now.”
“Dean…” Sam whispered, his voice broken in a way Dean knew meant he’d do what Dean told him to. Sam slipped out from behind Dean and moved to the hallway. Sam’s eyes stayed on Dean, but he kept his focus on their dad. He didn’t know why Sam was hell bent on protecting him after what he’d done, but he knew that was why Sam wanted to be there.
He waited until he heard the door shut to their bedroom. Their dad was watching Dean, fury settled into his stance, but he wasn’t moving. Dean could see his mind working behind the anger, and he knew he couldn’t leave it like that. He had to make sure his dad thought about Sam first this time, instead of the damn hunt and what it would mean to his quest.
“I raped him,” Dean said without preamble. He relaxed his hands and squared his shoulders, ready to do what he had to. “When he was fourteen, I pinned him to his bed and fucked him. He said no, tried to get away, but I didn’t let him, not until I was done with him.”
John took a step closer, but it still wasn’t the reaction Dean needed him to have. “I never stopped. Two nights ago I fought with him until I had him pushed down over the kitchen table and didn’t let him up until he was raw and bleeding. Don’t worry,” Dean gave his father his best smirk, “I made him sit real still while I cleaned him up.”
“Son of a bitch,” his dad yelled. Dean didn’t try to move, just waited as his father’s fist slammed into him. He didn’t try to block when the second one came, but it knocked him off balance and he fell to the floor. His father’s heavy boots connected with his ribs, and he only had a few more minutes before he let the pain take him under.
When he woke he was in his father’s bed. He was bandaged and cleaned up, and Dean moaned because he was still there, even after his admission.
“You touch him again,” John said from the doorway, “and I will kill you.”
Dean closed his eyes because it wasn’t true. He’d confessed to the worst crime in the Winchester handbook, hurting and betraying his brother the way he had, but his father had simple given him a beating. Dean realized then the man in front of him was just another stranger, a hunter, not the father he’d always tried to make him out to be.
“I wanted to protect him from the monsters,” Dean said softly. “Not the ones in your books, but the real ones, the men who would hurt him if they could.”
He looked up then and saw the confirmation in his father’s eyes; he’d known what happened to Dean all along even if he’d never told him. It wasn’t surprising. really, since it had been a hunter. and hunters liked to brag after all, but the fact he knew and never said anything just made it all that much worse. “I never stood a chance though, not when everyone we ever knew were monsters too.”
He saw the anger flare in his father’s eyes. but then Sam called to John from the other room. He heard the hard edge and the pain, the rawness of his brother’s voice as he called their father away. He figured Sam probably just saved his life.` but he couldn’t find it in himself to fight the resentment.
**
Dean wasn’t sure how they both made it out of the bar alive - with all the references to Sam and Jess’s perfect life - but he bit his tongue and pretended to be the supportive boyfriend. Sam knew he was on thin ice and did his best to keep the others from prodding too much, but in the end Dean called off with an ‘early morning,’ and Sam stayed behind to catch up and see if he could get anything more from his friends than Dean had been able to get from them as a stranger.
Sam made it back to the motel later than usual, but Dean had refused to give him the satisfaction of a fight. Instead, he’d turned his back to Sam, letting his brother get ready for bed in silence. He had nothing to say anyway; abuse and neglect? It wasn’t like he could fight the truth.
He didn’t know how long he stared at the door, trying to sleep, but he knew he wasn’t the only one pretending sleep. In the morning Sam was gone when Dean woke. He showered and tried to rid himself of the growing funk Stanford seemed to hold over him, but Sam was back with breakfast when he got out. They took their food to the table and began going through what they knew of the hunt again.
“Dean,” Sam said as his fingers sped over the laptop’s keyboard. “So we have four women electrocuted and one drowning. I decided to check out the local PD and see if anything sounded similar.”
“You found something?” Dean asked as he scooted his chair over to see what Sam was looking at. “Son of a bitch.”
“Yeah,” Sam said as he pointed at the screen. “A woman was found three weeks ago, drowned. Her eyes had been cut out. A week before that a woman was found, electrocuted, but with her hands cut off.”
“Least we know why they’re coming back. Anything else come up with missing body parts?” Dean asked.
Sam typed it into the search and shook his head in a way Dean knew meant he’d found something else. “Jesus, Dean, a beheading.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah. The police are looking for a serial killer who’s collecting body parts as trophies.”
“Do I need to say it again?” Dean asked.
Sam looked at him and they spoke in unison. “People are crazy.”
**
The day was long as Sam and Dean went to visit the families of the five women who had been found. All five were students at Stanford, but they didn’t have any classes together and there didn’t seem to be anything tying them together. They got the names of the cemeteries they were buried at, though, so it wasn’t a wasted trip.
Dean would have preferred a day to rest up before a night dig, but there were people dying and they didn’t know when the next one would strike. They dug up the grave of Allison Hardly first, two deaths could be laid at her feet and she was the most likely to strike again. They worked fast and for once there was no angry spirit to knock them around as they burned her body. Dean had a bad feeling about it all, afraid the ghosts weren’t attacking because they were tied to the stolen body part, but they had to give the salt and burn a try.
When they were done they hauled ass to the second cemetery and found Tonya Bonsman’s grave. She was in the back corner of the property, which meant they weren’t as likely to be seen from the road, and Dean was grateful for that at least.
“What the hell?” Dean asked as the second body went up in flames. “We never get this lucky.” Two graves in one night and neither had attacked.
“Let’s just get the hell out of here before something can go wrong,” Sam answered as he grabbed up the shovel.
They made it back to the motel without incident and they were both cleaned up and ready for lights out without any trouble. When the room was dark, Dean sat there trying to get his head around the hunt. “Something’s wrong, Sam,” Dean said to the ceiling.
“What?” He didn’t turn to look, but he heard his brother move in the other bed.
“I don’t know, but this went too easy. Five deaths. We have two suspicious murders, and we salted and burned them without any sign of their ghosts. Every instinct I’ve got says to take you the hell out of here and run.”
He hadn’t meant to say the last bit, but it was true anyway. They had too much coming after them, too many creatures that thought of Sam as fair game, and Dean was the only thing that stood between him and something really nasty.
“Dean,” Sam’s voice was quiet, and Dean looked across the beds to see Sam leaning up on one elbow. “We can’t leave people to die.”
“I know. Doesn’t change how I feel though. Whatever is happening here, we didn’t stop it yet.”
Sam didn’t question his words, and Dean marveled at how Sam could continue to have faith in him after everything else, but Sam never questioned his hunting instincts.
“We better get to sleep then. We’ll probably have a long day ahead of us.”
On to Part Three