Sugar and Spice - Part 3
Part 3
Twenty minutes later, the three men were on their way back to Uncles Chad and Aldis’ home. Though neither Nathan nor Jensen wanted Jay to risk entering his old home, Jared was determined to see his uncles with his own eyes. He knew that if he was going to continue his new life, the only way he’d be able to do it was if he knew that his family would be okay without him. That meant stepping foot in his old home, and solving his murder.
So far, the plan they had constructed was simple. Nathan and Jensen were simply going to go through the front gate, and ring the doorbell. From there they had approximately 4.9 seconds to take a few steps away from the door and hold up the box containing the much needed pie from The Cupcake, in an effort to keep Chad from shooting first. Meanwhile, Jay was going to be breaking into his uncles’ house by climbing up a series of makeshift ladders along the side of the house- something he claimed to have been doing for over a decade.
While Nathan and Jensen distracted Chad and Aldis, Jay was going to search the upstairs bedrooms for any sign of the kangaroos of evil. Since he was the only one who knew what they looked like, he had the best chance at locating the kangaroos, or, at the very least, the case they had been packed into.
So for better or worse, by the time the finally reached the Murray-Hodge household, that was the only plan they had. And in all fairness, even Nathan admitted that it was a decent plan, unless they wanted to risk an argument with Chad and his shotgun if he found one of them snooping around upstairs.
They reached the front gate and the three of them slid through before Jared ducked into the side courtyard to begin the process of sneaking into the house. Nathan and Jensen continued up to the front door. Jensen stayed back a few steps, already in position with the box, while Nathan braced himself to wring the doorbell. “Jensen? If this ends badly… there’s a box in the second drawer on the right side of my desk. I need you to open it and follow the instructions in it. You can use the money in the drawer above it if need be, okay?”
“Nathan, nothing bad’s going to happen. Chad won’t shoot us. And if he does, he won’t kill us.”
“How reassuring. But seriously, Jensen. If something happens to me, I need to know that you’ll deal with the box. Please.”
“Yeah, man. You know I will. But what’s so important?”
“You’ll find out if you need to open the box. If we survive, I don’t want to regret having told you too early. Just trust me on this.”
“I trust you. Now ring the doorbell already; we’ve delayed long enough.”
Nathan rang the doorbell and scurried back to where Jensen was standing. “Maybe you should stand in front of me. You have the pie.”
“Are you seriously telling me that you’re afraid of a dude who wears an eye-patch?”
“Yes.” Nathan barely got the word out before the door was flung open to reveal Chad pointing his shotgun at them.
“Hi,” Jensen said weakly, waving half-heartedly at Chad.
“What are you two doing here again?” Chad asked suspiciously, as he lowered the shotgun.
“I wanted to talk to you and Aldis again. I haven’t seen you in ages, and being here just reminds me of Jay. Nathan’s still looking into Jay’s murder, and he wanted to check over some of Jay’s personal effects if that’s okay with you and Aldis. May we come in? We brought pie.”
“What kind of pie?”
“Guava and peach pie.”
“Huh. Yeah why not,” Chad replied, letting them into the house. “ALDIS!” he shouted up the stairs, “Get your ass down here already. Jensen and the private dick are here with pie, and I’ll eat your share if you don’t stop me.”
“Private dick?” Nathan muttered to Jensen. “Seriously? Who talks like that?”
“Chad does.”
“Fair enough, I guess.” The two of them followed Chad into the living room where they opened up the pie box. Aldis joined them with plates, forks, and napkins, and Chad, Aldis, and Nathan dug into the pie.
“Jensen, are you sure you don’t want any of this delicious pie?” Aldis asked him in concern.
“No, I’m okay. I spend most of the day surrounded by pies, cakes, and every other baked item you can imagine, so I’m usually not that interested in eating them.” While this was Jensen’s standard excuse, the truth was that he occasionally used fruits that he had brought back to life in his baked goods. So it was safer to just avoid eating his pie unless he knew for sure that it was made with naturally fresh fruit.
“Alrighty then, if you’re sure…” Aldis trailed off in uncertainty. “Mr. Fillion, Chad tells me you’re interested in examining some of Jared’s things. Is there anything in particular that you’re looking for?”
“There is, actually. I’m interested in anything Jared had with him on the cruise. The travel agent who you told me to talk to has also been killed. Based on Ms. Cohan’s cause of death, I think we’re looking at a serial killer, and the cruise trip is the only thing that connects Jared to the travel agent. I think I might be able to find some additional clues from his luggage. Ms. Cohan was involved in some suspicious business practices, and likely some illegal activity, so we think she may have tried to smuggle something with Jared. The cruise said that they passed his baggage on to his next of kin, so do you in fact have his luggage?”
“Well yeah, we are Jared’s next of kin,” Chad replied sarcastically.
“So… where is it?”
~*~*~*~*~
As Chad and Aldis explained that they’d put all of Jared’s luggage into his bedroom where they didn’t have to look at it, Jared was making his way towards the room quietly. He’d taken a detour after climbing onto the upstairs balcony and through the window that never quite locked. Once inside the house, he hid in the shadows of the hallway as Uncle Aldis walked by him, heading downstairs to entertain Nathan and Jensen.
For Jared, it was a new kind of torture. He thought the hardest thing he’d have to handle in his new life was not seeing his old home or his uncles. It was only as he sat at the top of the second floor watching his uncles from a distance that he realized how wrong he had been. The hardest thing was going to be watching them and knowing that not only could they not be allowed to see him, but he couldn’t really give them any message or sign that would make things easier for them. He was going to have to continue sitting in the shadows, watching his old life continue on without him.
When the four men were sitting in the living room, Jared finally got back to work and began to check each of the rooms upstairs. The first room he checked was his uncles’ room. Although it made no sense for them to store his luggage there, Uncle Chad’s had a tendency to make a room look like a chaotic vortex of doom, which was pretty convenient whenever you wanted to either lose something or ignore it forever. Jared was pretty sure his uncles wanted to avoid the fact that he had died, so that meant he had to venture into the vortex.
Ten minutes later, Jared stumbled out of the bedroom vortex of chaos missing a sock, but he had managed to find a couple of his things that he wanted to take back to Jensen’s. Despite the crazy mass of everything else in the room, he hadn’t found his luggage, so it was onto the next room: the prop room.
Whereas the bedroom was as insane as Uncle Chad, the prop room was maintained by Uncle Aldis. Everything had a place, whether it was clothes, books, trick playing cards, or even throwing knives. Jared took one look in the room, and apart from checking under the bed, he knew in a moment that his stuff hadn’t been put in there. Although the Magnificent Magicians had retired years ago when the seagull took away Chad’s much needed depth perception, neither Aldis nor Chad had ever managed to get rid of the remnants of their old life. Jared knew that his uncles had never gotten rid of their stuff, let alone his, so that left one last room for him to look through: his own bedroom.
Jared braced himself for his first step into his old room, knowing it would be difficult for him to remain focused on finding the kangaroos while surrounded by his old life. He put aside his personal feelings, and headed into the room. His luggage from the trip was piled next to his bed. Jared quickly moved the larger cases to the side, in search of the small, heavy silver case that Lauren had given him.
Finally, he found the case, shoved halfway under the bed. He opened it up and found the two kangaroo figurines inside. He picked one of them up, still surprised at its heavy weight. As he was about to put the kangaroo back, he heard a loud creak. Knowing that the creak meant that someone was coming up the stairs and had in fact already reached the fourteenth step, Jared grabbed the kangaroos, shut the case, slid it back into place and quickly hid on his own balcony behind a thick curtain.
Jared held his breath as he saw Uncle Chad come into the room searching for something. Chad had gotten curious when Nathan described what he was looking for in Jared’s possessions. When Nathan explained that Jared had likely had something that didn’t belong to him at the time he died, Chad remembered that there had been a strange case amongst Jared’s baggage. Although Aldis had told the deliverymen that Jared hadn’t owned a case like that, the tag with his name on it had suggested otherwise.
Chad dug the case out from under the bed, picked it up and turned to head back downstairs to the others. Before he could get much farther than the hallway though, he was grabbed from behind.
~*~*~*~*~
The facts were these: the thieving murderer had been thwarted time and time again in search of these kangaroos. When they passed into the hands of one Jared Padalecki, he thought he finally had them in his grasp-until he killed Jared without first securing his room number and key. When the bags were removed from the cruise ship, the killer went after Lauren Cohan, believing that she had either retrieved the figurines herself or knew the location of their current holding place. She knew neither. But thanks to the extensive media coverage surrounding Jared’s murder, it hadn’t taken him long to track down the Murray-Hodge household, where he finally found the missing case in the hands of Uncle Chad. Having already killed five others in pursuit of these kangaroos, the killer had no qualms about taking out a man with an eye-patch for the same reason.
~*~*~*~*~
Jared was frozen in horror as he saw his uncle being choked by his own murderer. He stepped out of his hiding place on the balcony, intending to do something to save his uncle. However, Jensen got there first. Having remained downstairs waiting with Nathan and Uncle Aldis, Jensen became worried when Chad didn’t immediately reappear. Believing that somehow Jay’s cover had been blown, Jensen offered to go help Chad look for the case, and arrived as the killer was trying to strangle Chad.
“Hey!” Jensen yelled at the killer. The murderer loosened his grip on Chad’s arms, turning to Jensen. That moment of distraction was all that Chad needed. He swung his arm up, still holding the kangaroos’ case, and the killer dropped him. Chad fell to the ground struggling for air, and the case fell out of his grasp and slid to a rest in front of the killer.
By now the murderer had pulled out the gun he was concealing and had it pointed at Jensen, apparently deciding that Chad was no longer much of a threat. He carefully bent down and picked up the case, keeping his weapon trained on Jensen the entire time.
Jared stepped into his room in an attempt to distract the killer from taking out Jensen. His distraction worked, as the murderer saw him and said in disbelief, “What the fuck? Didn’t I kill you?” He quickly fired his gun at Jared, but he missed when Jared quickly ducked. Jared took a step towards his killer, but at the same time, Jensen tried to get closer. The murderer pointed his gun at Jensen again without even blinking, deeming him the bigger threat. As the killer prepared to shoot Jensen, there was a loud metal click and then the unmistakable bang of a weapon being discharged.
~*~*~*~*~
Jared jerked in place at the bang, thinking for sure that Jensen had been shot. It took him a moment to register what had actually happened though. It wasn’t the killer who had fired his gun at Jensen after all. Instead, it was Uncle Chad with one of his trusty shotguns who had avenged his nephew’s murder. While the killer had ignored him, Chad had inched towards the hallway cabinet, which happened to be one of many locations where Chad had stashed his shotguns.
The murderer was thrown off his feet, and was sent crashing into the wall next to Jared. Chad remained standing, with his shotgun held perfectly still. His aim had been absolutely perfect. He stood frozen in place, looking straight ahead. Looking straight ahead at the spot where Jared stood next to the killer’s body.
Both Jensen and Jared began to panic, believing that Chad had seen Jay. They shared nervous looks, just waiting for Chad to say something, to ask how Jared could be standing there when they had only buried him a day earlier. But as the moment dragged on, they realized that Uncle Chad had not seen Jared at all. Instead, Jared was standing in Chad’s blind spot thanks to the eye patch.
With a sad smile on his face, Jared slid properly out of view and headed to his balcony, where he began his escape route back to Jensen’s car. Jensen walked towards Chad, keeping an eye on the killer’s body.
“Are you okay?” Jensen asked him, “He had a pretty good grip on you for a while there.”
“I’m fine, Jensen. I’m a master of death-defying acts, remember? Is he dead?”
“I don’t actually know. I don’t think I can bring myself to check though,” Jensen said, lying quickly. If the murderer really was dead, he was pretty sure that bringing him back to life with his touch would make this crazy situation even worse.
“That’s alright. Can you get Aldis to come up here and check? I’m pretty sure I’ll just kill the guy officially if he ain’t already dead, and it might be best if I don’t touch him again until the police come. Have the police been called?”
“I’m pretty sure Nathan or Aldis called once they heard you fire that shot, but I’ll go check and send Aldis on up.”
Jensen hurried down the stairs, hoping that Jay had managed to hide somewhere that the police wouldn’t find him. By the time he reached the bottom of the stairs, he could hear the sirens wailing in the distance, approaching the house. He saw Aldis heading towards him and told him, “Chad wants you to check on the body. He’s not sure if he’s killed the guy who attacked us or not.”
“Jesus,” Nathan replied, “What the hell happened up there?”
“I think the guy who killed Jay and Lauren came after that weird case again. He almost killed Chad over it, but he got his hands on it and left Chad alone after that. The guy nearly killed me, but you know Chad.”
“Lemme guess,” Aldis said as he headed up the stairs, “He used one of his hidden shotguns again.”
“Yup, that he did. Saved my life too.”
“Well, at least the guy didn’t try to kill me,” Nathan said cheerfully.
“Gee, thanks.”
“Please. This suit is Armani. Do you have any idea how hard it is to get blood stains out of a fine suit like this?” Once he was certain that Aldis was out of hearing range, he asked the most important question. “Did anyone else see Jay?”
“Only the murderer, so Jay’s in the clear. It was a near miss with Chad, but if Jay made it out of the house and found a good hiding place, he’ll be fine.”
The sirens outside brought the two men back to the task at hand: solving the case without ever letting on that Jared Padalecki wasn’t as dead as everyone believed he was.
~*~*~*~*~
Jared did manage to get out of the house before the police officers showed up. He managed to get into Jensen’s car, and slid down, intending to remain out of sight until the action was over. From where he was hiding, he saw Nathan and Jensen let the officers into the house. When the ambulance arrived, he saw the EMTs bring out a gurney, and then a body bag after one of the officers came out to talk to them.
Jared couldn’t help but feel a wave of relief wash over him as he realized that his murder had been solved, and his killer taken care of. Knowing that Uncle Chad had been the one to take out his killer gave him hope that his uncles would be okay, now that they too knew the truth. At least, they knew as much of the truth as they could for the time being.
While he waited for Jensen and Nathan to finish up, Jared reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out one of the items that he had rescued from his uncles’ evil vortex of a bedroom. It was a small photo album, the kind with pages only big enough to hold one photo. It was an album full of photos of his life: there were photos of his mom, his uncles, photos of him helping out in the neighborhood, and photos of him and Jensen as kids. He smiled as he looked through the album. Living his new life was going to be hard, but as long as he still had his connections to his old life, he thought things might actually be okay.
~*~*~*~*~
It had been an incredibly long day by the time Jensen, Jared, and Nathan returned to The Cupcake. The restaurant had been closed hours ago, and Danni had taken care of the cleanup, leaving Jensen with nothing to take care of downstairs.
“I’m going to head home,” Nathan said with a yawn. “I’ll keep you updated on the case, but we all know it’s completely straightforward. Hopefully the $20,000 reward will still be on the table, even if Lauren did wind up getting murdered herself.”
“Yeah, we’ll see what happens with the reward. At this point, I almost don’t care about it - I’m just happy we solved my murder,” Jared replied with a tired smile.
“Well we figured everything out except for one tiny, almost insignificant detail,” Jensen pointed out.
“True, true,” Nathan replied. “Wait, what did we leave out?”
“Yeah,” Jared said, “I thought we really did solve everything.”
“Actually, we never did figure out why the kangaroos were such a big deal in the first place.”
“Goddamn kangaroos. I am so sick of these kangaroos. Do you still have them on you?” Nathan asked Jay.
“Yeah, I’ve got them.”
“Okay. You two figure it out. I’m going home and I’m going to sleep.”
“Night Nathan,” Jensen replied with a laugh. He locked the door behind Nathan and he and Jay headed towards the stairway leading up to the apartments.
“Does Danneel have Sadie and Harley?”
“Yeah, probably. She usually keeps them with her until I get them. Do you have any idea what time it is? I don’t want to wake her up if it’s too late.”
“I think it might only be around 10:30. It’s too early for her to be asleep yet.”
“Alrighty. I’ll go get them. You start figuring out the riddle of the kangaroos.”
Jensen headed next door hoping to get his dogs back from Danneel without too much trouble. When she answered the door and invited him inside though, he knew his luck had run out for the evening.
“Danni, I’m really tired. It’s been a couple of long days, and I’m exhausted. Can I just take the dogs home?”
“In a minute. Look, I’m going to say this as plainly as I can because it’s serious. I know that Jay isn’t just some childhood love of your life. He is Jared Padalecki. The guy who died a few days ago.” Jensen tried to protest, but Danneel cut him off. “I’m not finished yet. I know that you’re not like other people Jensen, you have two dogs and apparently an undead boyfriend that you don’t touch. You have out of season fruits that we use in baking, despite the fact that we never seem to get imported shipments of these fruits. I know that there’s something really important that ties all of this together, something that you’ve been keeping a secret, and I get it. I just want you to know that you’re still my best friend, and if you ever feel comfortable telling me, then I’ll keep it a secret until death.” She tilted her head at that, “Which apparently doesn’t last that long these days.”
Jensen looked down at the floor, warring with himself over whether or not to reveal his secret. Mind made up, he locked eyes with Danni. “Are you okay with the short version for now?”
“Seriously?” Danni exclaimed, “I’m fine with you not saying anything if that’s what you really want.”
Jensen took a deep breath and let it all out in a rush, finally revealing his secret to her. “I can bring dead things back to life with a single touch.”
“So Jared…”
“Yes.”
“And the dogs…”
“Them too.”
“And this is why Nathan drags you out to consult on murder cases.”
“It’s easier to solve a murder when you can just ask the victim who killed them.”
“Huh. That’s a lot to take in.”
“Yes it is.”
She reached over and gave him a hug. “Thanks for telling me, Jensen. I’ll get the dogs. You should go see your boy, and get some sleep.”
When she returned with the dogs, he gave her a tired smile and headed to his apartment. When he got inside, Jared was already sitting at the dining table staring at the two kangaroos. “Any ideas yet?” Jensen asked him, shaking off the life changing conversation he’d just had.
He poured them each a glass of water as they sat across from each other, each staring at a kangaroo.
“None so far. They’re just so heavy for ceramic kangaroos. There has to be more to them than this.”
“Maybe they’re solid inside.”
“Maybe they’re kangaroos that are under a spell. Maybe they have to kiss to break the spell,” Jared said with a laugh as he made his kangaroo smooch the one in Jensen’s hand.
“Seriously? That’s what you came up with? Magical kangaroos.”
“Hey, don’t knock the freaky magic thing. I was dead a couple days ago, remember?”
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Jensen replied, using his kangaroo to kick Jared’s. He used a little too much force, because they heard the unmistakable sound of shattering ceramic. He winced immediately, not knowing how much damage he had done to the pair of figurines that Jay had died for.
His look of horror immediately became a look of shock when he examined his kangaroo. Looking up at Jared, he saw the same expression mirrored on his face. Without speaking, the two men began to carefully chip away at the remaining ceramic, revealing what had been hiding underneath the outer layer all along.
When they had finished removing the ceramic, they found themselves holding what appeared to be two solid gold kangaroos, each worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. “Holy shit,” Jensen whispered.
“Yeah, I’d say this makes a hell of a lot more sense now. No wonder that guy was so desperate to get his hands on these. Even just a chip of one of these is worth a small fortune. I can’t even begin to fathom how much money we’re holding right now.”
“Think we should let Nathan know?”
“It’s pretty late. I’m sure he’s already asleep by now.”
“So that’s a yes then, to waking him up?” Jensen asked with a smirk.
“No, actually that’s a hell yes,” Jared replied with a grin.
Jensen dialed Nathan’s number, and tried to school his face into a serious expression so that he wouldn’t start laughing into the phone.
“Jensen, why the goddamn hell you calling? You do realize I left you to go to sleep right? This had better be good.”
“Hey Nathan, Jay and I just wanted to let you know that we figured out why those kangaroos were so important.”
“Again, I repeat, this had better be good.”
“They’re solid gold.”
“…WHAT?” Nathan shouted into the phone. At that, both Jensen and Jay dissolved into helpless laughter.
Solid gold kangaroos. What the fuck?
~*~*~*~*~
Apple Cobbler - with adjustments by Katie Cassidy
Ingredients:
Apple Filling:
5 cups tart apples, peeled and sliced (You have to use tart apples, otherwise your cobbler will end up way too sleep.)
3/4 cup sugar (You can use plain granulated sugar, but I like to use ½ cup granulated and ¼ cup light brown sugar for flavor.)
2 tablespoons flour (All-purpose flour is fine.)
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 cup water (Cool water works best for me.)
1 tablespoon butter, softened (Not melted)
Topping:
1/2 cup flour, sifted
1/2 cup sugar (Again, use whatever sugar or combination of sugars you like)
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons butter, softened
1 egg, slightly beaten
Preparation:
In a medium bowl, combine apples, 3/4 cup sugar, 2 tablespoons flour, cinnamon, 1/4 teaspoon salt, vanilla and water. Spoon into a lightly buttered 9-inch square pan. Dot apples with 1 tablespoon butter, broken into smaller bits.
Combine all of the topping ingredients. Beat with a wooden spoon until the mixture is smooth like cake batter. Drop the batter in spoonfuls, over the apples, spacing evenly. Batter will spread during baking.
Bake 35 to 40 minutes at 375° or until apples are tender and crust is golden brown. (if you’re not sure about your oven, make sure to check on it half an hour in-nothing’s worse than a burnt pie.) Serve warm with ice cream. Serves 6 to 8 people.
~*~*~*~*~
Prologue - Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Epilogue - Master Post - Art
Twenty minutes later, the three men were on their way back to Uncles Chad and Aldis’ home. Though neither Nathan nor Jensen wanted Jay to risk entering his old home, Jared was determined to see his uncles with his own eyes. He knew that if he was going to continue his new life, the only way he’d be able to do it was if he knew that his family would be okay without him. That meant stepping foot in his old home, and solving his murder.
So far, the plan they had constructed was simple. Nathan and Jensen were simply going to go through the front gate, and ring the doorbell. From there they had approximately 4.9 seconds to take a few steps away from the door and hold up the box containing the much needed pie from The Cupcake, in an effort to keep Chad from shooting first. Meanwhile, Jay was going to be breaking into his uncles’ house by climbing up a series of makeshift ladders along the side of the house- something he claimed to have been doing for over a decade.
While Nathan and Jensen distracted Chad and Aldis, Jay was going to search the upstairs bedrooms for any sign of the kangaroos of evil. Since he was the only one who knew what they looked like, he had the best chance at locating the kangaroos, or, at the very least, the case they had been packed into.
So for better or worse, by the time the finally reached the Murray-Hodge household, that was the only plan they had. And in all fairness, even Nathan admitted that it was a decent plan, unless they wanted to risk an argument with Chad and his shotgun if he found one of them snooping around upstairs.
They reached the front gate and the three of them slid through before Jared ducked into the side courtyard to begin the process of sneaking into the house. Nathan and Jensen continued up to the front door. Jensen stayed back a few steps, already in position with the box, while Nathan braced himself to wring the doorbell. “Jensen? If this ends badly… there’s a box in the second drawer on the right side of my desk. I need you to open it and follow the instructions in it. You can use the money in the drawer above it if need be, okay?”
“Nathan, nothing bad’s going to happen. Chad won’t shoot us. And if he does, he won’t kill us.”
“How reassuring. But seriously, Jensen. If something happens to me, I need to know that you’ll deal with the box. Please.”
“Yeah, man. You know I will. But what’s so important?”
“You’ll find out if you need to open the box. If we survive, I don’t want to regret having told you too early. Just trust me on this.”
“I trust you. Now ring the doorbell already; we’ve delayed long enough.”
Nathan rang the doorbell and scurried back to where Jensen was standing. “Maybe you should stand in front of me. You have the pie.”
“Are you seriously telling me that you’re afraid of a dude who wears an eye-patch?”
“Yes.” Nathan barely got the word out before the door was flung open to reveal Chad pointing his shotgun at them.
“Hi,” Jensen said weakly, waving half-heartedly at Chad.
“What are you two doing here again?” Chad asked suspiciously, as he lowered the shotgun.
“I wanted to talk to you and Aldis again. I haven’t seen you in ages, and being here just reminds me of Jay. Nathan’s still looking into Jay’s murder, and he wanted to check over some of Jay’s personal effects if that’s okay with you and Aldis. May we come in? We brought pie.”
“What kind of pie?”
“Guava and peach pie.”
“Huh. Yeah why not,” Chad replied, letting them into the house. “ALDIS!” he shouted up the stairs, “Get your ass down here already. Jensen and the private dick are here with pie, and I’ll eat your share if you don’t stop me.”
“Private dick?” Nathan muttered to Jensen. “Seriously? Who talks like that?”
“Chad does.”
“Fair enough, I guess.” The two of them followed Chad into the living room where they opened up the pie box. Aldis joined them with plates, forks, and napkins, and Chad, Aldis, and Nathan dug into the pie.
“Jensen, are you sure you don’t want any of this delicious pie?” Aldis asked him in concern.
“No, I’m okay. I spend most of the day surrounded by pies, cakes, and every other baked item you can imagine, so I’m usually not that interested in eating them.” While this was Jensen’s standard excuse, the truth was that he occasionally used fruits that he had brought back to life in his baked goods. So it was safer to just avoid eating his pie unless he knew for sure that it was made with naturally fresh fruit.
“Alrighty then, if you’re sure…” Aldis trailed off in uncertainty. “Mr. Fillion, Chad tells me you’re interested in examining some of Jared’s things. Is there anything in particular that you’re looking for?”
“There is, actually. I’m interested in anything Jared had with him on the cruise. The travel agent who you told me to talk to has also been killed. Based on Ms. Cohan’s cause of death, I think we’re looking at a serial killer, and the cruise trip is the only thing that connects Jared to the travel agent. I think I might be able to find some additional clues from his luggage. Ms. Cohan was involved in some suspicious business practices, and likely some illegal activity, so we think she may have tried to smuggle something with Jared. The cruise said that they passed his baggage on to his next of kin, so do you in fact have his luggage?”
“Well yeah, we are Jared’s next of kin,” Chad replied sarcastically.
“So… where is it?”
~*~*~*~*~
As Chad and Aldis explained that they’d put all of Jared’s luggage into his bedroom where they didn’t have to look at it, Jared was making his way towards the room quietly. He’d taken a detour after climbing onto the upstairs balcony and through the window that never quite locked. Once inside the house, he hid in the shadows of the hallway as Uncle Aldis walked by him, heading downstairs to entertain Nathan and Jensen.
For Jared, it was a new kind of torture. He thought the hardest thing he’d have to handle in his new life was not seeing his old home or his uncles. It was only as he sat at the top of the second floor watching his uncles from a distance that he realized how wrong he had been. The hardest thing was going to be watching them and knowing that not only could they not be allowed to see him, but he couldn’t really give them any message or sign that would make things easier for them. He was going to have to continue sitting in the shadows, watching his old life continue on without him.
When the four men were sitting in the living room, Jared finally got back to work and began to check each of the rooms upstairs. The first room he checked was his uncles’ room. Although it made no sense for them to store his luggage there, Uncle Chad’s had a tendency to make a room look like a chaotic vortex of doom, which was pretty convenient whenever you wanted to either lose something or ignore it forever. Jared was pretty sure his uncles wanted to avoid the fact that he had died, so that meant he had to venture into the vortex.
Ten minutes later, Jared stumbled out of the bedroom vortex of chaos missing a sock, but he had managed to find a couple of his things that he wanted to take back to Jensen’s. Despite the crazy mass of everything else in the room, he hadn’t found his luggage, so it was onto the next room: the prop room.
Whereas the bedroom was as insane as Uncle Chad, the prop room was maintained by Uncle Aldis. Everything had a place, whether it was clothes, books, trick playing cards, or even throwing knives. Jared took one look in the room, and apart from checking under the bed, he knew in a moment that his stuff hadn’t been put in there. Although the Magnificent Magicians had retired years ago when the seagull took away Chad’s much needed depth perception, neither Aldis nor Chad had ever managed to get rid of the remnants of their old life. Jared knew that his uncles had never gotten rid of their stuff, let alone his, so that left one last room for him to look through: his own bedroom.
Jared braced himself for his first step into his old room, knowing it would be difficult for him to remain focused on finding the kangaroos while surrounded by his old life. He put aside his personal feelings, and headed into the room. His luggage from the trip was piled next to his bed. Jared quickly moved the larger cases to the side, in search of the small, heavy silver case that Lauren had given him.
Finally, he found the case, shoved halfway under the bed. He opened it up and found the two kangaroo figurines inside. He picked one of them up, still surprised at its heavy weight. As he was about to put the kangaroo back, he heard a loud creak. Knowing that the creak meant that someone was coming up the stairs and had in fact already reached the fourteenth step, Jared grabbed the kangaroos, shut the case, slid it back into place and quickly hid on his own balcony behind a thick curtain.
Jared held his breath as he saw Uncle Chad come into the room searching for something. Chad had gotten curious when Nathan described what he was looking for in Jared’s possessions. When Nathan explained that Jared had likely had something that didn’t belong to him at the time he died, Chad remembered that there had been a strange case amongst Jared’s baggage. Although Aldis had told the deliverymen that Jared hadn’t owned a case like that, the tag with his name on it had suggested otherwise.
Chad dug the case out from under the bed, picked it up and turned to head back downstairs to the others. Before he could get much farther than the hallway though, he was grabbed from behind.
~*~*~*~*~
The facts were these: the thieving murderer had been thwarted time and time again in search of these kangaroos. When they passed into the hands of one Jared Padalecki, he thought he finally had them in his grasp-until he killed Jared without first securing his room number and key. When the bags were removed from the cruise ship, the killer went after Lauren Cohan, believing that she had either retrieved the figurines herself or knew the location of their current holding place. She knew neither. But thanks to the extensive media coverage surrounding Jared’s murder, it hadn’t taken him long to track down the Murray-Hodge household, where he finally found the missing case in the hands of Uncle Chad. Having already killed five others in pursuit of these kangaroos, the killer had no qualms about taking out a man with an eye-patch for the same reason.
~*~*~*~*~
Jared was frozen in horror as he saw his uncle being choked by his own murderer. He stepped out of his hiding place on the balcony, intending to do something to save his uncle. However, Jensen got there first. Having remained downstairs waiting with Nathan and Uncle Aldis, Jensen became worried when Chad didn’t immediately reappear. Believing that somehow Jay’s cover had been blown, Jensen offered to go help Chad look for the case, and arrived as the killer was trying to strangle Chad.
“Hey!” Jensen yelled at the killer. The murderer loosened his grip on Chad’s arms, turning to Jensen. That moment of distraction was all that Chad needed. He swung his arm up, still holding the kangaroos’ case, and the killer dropped him. Chad fell to the ground struggling for air, and the case fell out of his grasp and slid to a rest in front of the killer.
By now the murderer had pulled out the gun he was concealing and had it pointed at Jensen, apparently deciding that Chad was no longer much of a threat. He carefully bent down and picked up the case, keeping his weapon trained on Jensen the entire time.
Jared stepped into his room in an attempt to distract the killer from taking out Jensen. His distraction worked, as the murderer saw him and said in disbelief, “What the fuck? Didn’t I kill you?” He quickly fired his gun at Jared, but he missed when Jared quickly ducked. Jared took a step towards his killer, but at the same time, Jensen tried to get closer. The murderer pointed his gun at Jensen again without even blinking, deeming him the bigger threat. As the killer prepared to shoot Jensen, there was a loud metal click and then the unmistakable bang of a weapon being discharged.
~*~*~*~*~
Jared jerked in place at the bang, thinking for sure that Jensen had been shot. It took him a moment to register what had actually happened though. It wasn’t the killer who had fired his gun at Jensen after all. Instead, it was Uncle Chad with one of his trusty shotguns who had avenged his nephew’s murder. While the killer had ignored him, Chad had inched towards the hallway cabinet, which happened to be one of many locations where Chad had stashed his shotguns.
The murderer was thrown off his feet, and was sent crashing into the wall next to Jared. Chad remained standing, with his shotgun held perfectly still. His aim had been absolutely perfect. He stood frozen in place, looking straight ahead. Looking straight ahead at the spot where Jared stood next to the killer’s body.
Both Jensen and Jared began to panic, believing that Chad had seen Jay. They shared nervous looks, just waiting for Chad to say something, to ask how Jared could be standing there when they had only buried him a day earlier. But as the moment dragged on, they realized that Uncle Chad had not seen Jared at all. Instead, Jared was standing in Chad’s blind spot thanks to the eye patch.
With a sad smile on his face, Jared slid properly out of view and headed to his balcony, where he began his escape route back to Jensen’s car. Jensen walked towards Chad, keeping an eye on the killer’s body.
“Are you okay?” Jensen asked him, “He had a pretty good grip on you for a while there.”
“I’m fine, Jensen. I’m a master of death-defying acts, remember? Is he dead?”
“I don’t actually know. I don’t think I can bring myself to check though,” Jensen said, lying quickly. If the murderer really was dead, he was pretty sure that bringing him back to life with his touch would make this crazy situation even worse.
“That’s alright. Can you get Aldis to come up here and check? I’m pretty sure I’ll just kill the guy officially if he ain’t already dead, and it might be best if I don’t touch him again until the police come. Have the police been called?”
“I’m pretty sure Nathan or Aldis called once they heard you fire that shot, but I’ll go check and send Aldis on up.”
Jensen hurried down the stairs, hoping that Jay had managed to hide somewhere that the police wouldn’t find him. By the time he reached the bottom of the stairs, he could hear the sirens wailing in the distance, approaching the house. He saw Aldis heading towards him and told him, “Chad wants you to check on the body. He’s not sure if he’s killed the guy who attacked us or not.”
“Jesus,” Nathan replied, “What the hell happened up there?”
“I think the guy who killed Jay and Lauren came after that weird case again. He almost killed Chad over it, but he got his hands on it and left Chad alone after that. The guy nearly killed me, but you know Chad.”
“Lemme guess,” Aldis said as he headed up the stairs, “He used one of his hidden shotguns again.”
“Yup, that he did. Saved my life too.”
“Well, at least the guy didn’t try to kill me,” Nathan said cheerfully.
“Gee, thanks.”
“Please. This suit is Armani. Do you have any idea how hard it is to get blood stains out of a fine suit like this?” Once he was certain that Aldis was out of hearing range, he asked the most important question. “Did anyone else see Jay?”
“Only the murderer, so Jay’s in the clear. It was a near miss with Chad, but if Jay made it out of the house and found a good hiding place, he’ll be fine.”
The sirens outside brought the two men back to the task at hand: solving the case without ever letting on that Jared Padalecki wasn’t as dead as everyone believed he was.
~*~*~*~*~
Jared did manage to get out of the house before the police officers showed up. He managed to get into Jensen’s car, and slid down, intending to remain out of sight until the action was over. From where he was hiding, he saw Nathan and Jensen let the officers into the house. When the ambulance arrived, he saw the EMTs bring out a gurney, and then a body bag after one of the officers came out to talk to them.
Jared couldn’t help but feel a wave of relief wash over him as he realized that his murder had been solved, and his killer taken care of. Knowing that Uncle Chad had been the one to take out his killer gave him hope that his uncles would be okay, now that they too knew the truth. At least, they knew as much of the truth as they could for the time being.
While he waited for Jensen and Nathan to finish up, Jared reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out one of the items that he had rescued from his uncles’ evil vortex of a bedroom. It was a small photo album, the kind with pages only big enough to hold one photo. It was an album full of photos of his life: there were photos of his mom, his uncles, photos of him helping out in the neighborhood, and photos of him and Jensen as kids. He smiled as he looked through the album. Living his new life was going to be hard, but as long as he still had his connections to his old life, he thought things might actually be okay.
~*~*~*~*~
It had been an incredibly long day by the time Jensen, Jared, and Nathan returned to The Cupcake. The restaurant had been closed hours ago, and Danni had taken care of the cleanup, leaving Jensen with nothing to take care of downstairs.
“I’m going to head home,” Nathan said with a yawn. “I’ll keep you updated on the case, but we all know it’s completely straightforward. Hopefully the $20,000 reward will still be on the table, even if Lauren did wind up getting murdered herself.”
“Yeah, we’ll see what happens with the reward. At this point, I almost don’t care about it - I’m just happy we solved my murder,” Jared replied with a tired smile.
“Well we figured everything out except for one tiny, almost insignificant detail,” Jensen pointed out.
“True, true,” Nathan replied. “Wait, what did we leave out?”
“Yeah,” Jared said, “I thought we really did solve everything.”
“Actually, we never did figure out why the kangaroos were such a big deal in the first place.”
“Goddamn kangaroos. I am so sick of these kangaroos. Do you still have them on you?” Nathan asked Jay.
“Yeah, I’ve got them.”
“Okay. You two figure it out. I’m going home and I’m going to sleep.”
“Night Nathan,” Jensen replied with a laugh. He locked the door behind Nathan and he and Jay headed towards the stairway leading up to the apartments.
“Does Danneel have Sadie and Harley?”
“Yeah, probably. She usually keeps them with her until I get them. Do you have any idea what time it is? I don’t want to wake her up if it’s too late.”
“I think it might only be around 10:30. It’s too early for her to be asleep yet.”
“Alrighty. I’ll go get them. You start figuring out the riddle of the kangaroos.”
Jensen headed next door hoping to get his dogs back from Danneel without too much trouble. When she answered the door and invited him inside though, he knew his luck had run out for the evening.
“Danni, I’m really tired. It’s been a couple of long days, and I’m exhausted. Can I just take the dogs home?”
“In a minute. Look, I’m going to say this as plainly as I can because it’s serious. I know that Jay isn’t just some childhood love of your life. He is Jared Padalecki. The guy who died a few days ago.” Jensen tried to protest, but Danneel cut him off. “I’m not finished yet. I know that you’re not like other people Jensen, you have two dogs and apparently an undead boyfriend that you don’t touch. You have out of season fruits that we use in baking, despite the fact that we never seem to get imported shipments of these fruits. I know that there’s something really important that ties all of this together, something that you’ve been keeping a secret, and I get it. I just want you to know that you’re still my best friend, and if you ever feel comfortable telling me, then I’ll keep it a secret until death.” She tilted her head at that, “Which apparently doesn’t last that long these days.”
Jensen looked down at the floor, warring with himself over whether or not to reveal his secret. Mind made up, he locked eyes with Danni. “Are you okay with the short version for now?”
“Seriously?” Danni exclaimed, “I’m fine with you not saying anything if that’s what you really want.”
Jensen took a deep breath and let it all out in a rush, finally revealing his secret to her. “I can bring dead things back to life with a single touch.”
“So Jared…”
“Yes.”
“And the dogs…”
“Them too.”
“And this is why Nathan drags you out to consult on murder cases.”
“It’s easier to solve a murder when you can just ask the victim who killed them.”
“Huh. That’s a lot to take in.”
“Yes it is.”
She reached over and gave him a hug. “Thanks for telling me, Jensen. I’ll get the dogs. You should go see your boy, and get some sleep.”
When she returned with the dogs, he gave her a tired smile and headed to his apartment. When he got inside, Jared was already sitting at the dining table staring at the two kangaroos. “Any ideas yet?” Jensen asked him, shaking off the life changing conversation he’d just had.
He poured them each a glass of water as they sat across from each other, each staring at a kangaroo.
“None so far. They’re just so heavy for ceramic kangaroos. There has to be more to them than this.”
“Maybe they’re solid inside.”
“Maybe they’re kangaroos that are under a spell. Maybe they have to kiss to break the spell,” Jared said with a laugh as he made his kangaroo smooch the one in Jensen’s hand.
“Seriously? That’s what you came up with? Magical kangaroos.”
“Hey, don’t knock the freaky magic thing. I was dead a couple days ago, remember?”
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Jensen replied, using his kangaroo to kick Jared’s. He used a little too much force, because they heard the unmistakable sound of shattering ceramic. He winced immediately, not knowing how much damage he had done to the pair of figurines that Jay had died for.
His look of horror immediately became a look of shock when he examined his kangaroo. Looking up at Jared, he saw the same expression mirrored on his face. Without speaking, the two men began to carefully chip away at the remaining ceramic, revealing what had been hiding underneath the outer layer all along.
When they had finished removing the ceramic, they found themselves holding what appeared to be two solid gold kangaroos, each worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. “Holy shit,” Jensen whispered.
“Yeah, I’d say this makes a hell of a lot more sense now. No wonder that guy was so desperate to get his hands on these. Even just a chip of one of these is worth a small fortune. I can’t even begin to fathom how much money we’re holding right now.”
“Think we should let Nathan know?”
“It’s pretty late. I’m sure he’s already asleep by now.”
“So that’s a yes then, to waking him up?” Jensen asked with a smirk.
“No, actually that’s a hell yes,” Jared replied with a grin.
Jensen dialed Nathan’s number, and tried to school his face into a serious expression so that he wouldn’t start laughing into the phone.
“Jensen, why the goddamn hell you calling? You do realize I left you to go to sleep right? This had better be good.”
“Hey Nathan, Jay and I just wanted to let you know that we figured out why those kangaroos were so important.”
“Again, I repeat, this had better be good.”
“They’re solid gold.”
“…WHAT?” Nathan shouted into the phone. At that, both Jensen and Jay dissolved into helpless laughter.
Solid gold kangaroos. What the fuck?
~*~*~*~*~
Apple Cobbler - with adjustments by Katie Cassidy
Ingredients:
Apple Filling:
5 cups tart apples, peeled and sliced (You have to use tart apples, otherwise your cobbler will end up way too sleep.)
3/4 cup sugar (You can use plain granulated sugar, but I like to use ½ cup granulated and ¼ cup light brown sugar for flavor.)
2 tablespoons flour (All-purpose flour is fine.)
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 cup water (Cool water works best for me.)
1 tablespoon butter, softened (Not melted)
Topping:
1/2 cup flour, sifted
1/2 cup sugar (Again, use whatever sugar or combination of sugars you like)
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons butter, softened
1 egg, slightly beaten
Preparation:
In a medium bowl, combine apples, 3/4 cup sugar, 2 tablespoons flour, cinnamon, 1/4 teaspoon salt, vanilla and water. Spoon into a lightly buttered 9-inch square pan. Dot apples with 1 tablespoon butter, broken into smaller bits.
Combine all of the topping ingredients. Beat with a wooden spoon until the mixture is smooth like cake batter. Drop the batter in spoonfuls, over the apples, spacing evenly. Batter will spread during baking.
Bake 35 to 40 minutes at 375° or until apples are tender and crust is golden brown. (if you’re not sure about your oven, make sure to check on it half an hour in-nothing’s worse than a burnt pie.) Serve warm with ice cream. Serves 6 to 8 people.
~*~*~*~*~
Prologue - Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Epilogue - Master Post - Art