Thank you to all those that viewed the last chapter. As you've noticed I'm sure, I did skip over episode 18, and went right into episode 19:Provenance however I wanted to make it clear that it had been a while of Kate trying to figure out her way home. Alone, before she begins to go with the flow of the 'show'. I was gonna wait a little longer to post it, but given that it is a a part two of the last chapter and it's all set to be posted I figured it wouldn't hurt to upload it now. Anyway for this episode I decided to break it up into to two parts because... well it was A LOT longer than the first one- but, I figured that kinda made up for skipping over Something Wicked. The next chapter of Dead Man's Blood will hopefully be out next week. I'm working on finishing a few things up with it, then I have to look it over for any errors and what not, but I doubt I'll be able to get to it this weekend. Work tends to get crazy over the weekend. Thanks again all!

Thank you all for taking the time to read and especially to those that choose to review.

Chapter 3: Provenance: Part 2

Kate had attempted to wait up for the boys, but she must've passed out at some point, because before she knew it. It was morning and Dean laid across from her in the other twin bed, his arm draped over his torso in an uncomfortable looking position. He was sprawled out on top of the black and white blankets still dressed in the clothes he wore yesterday. Kate took the time to over look his features, he looked relaxed in comparison to how he was when awake. Her eyes moved over his angled forehead and over the closed eyes- his expression was peaceful. Her eyes lingered over his pouty lips and idly wondered how they'd feel against her own, but she shook herself from her thoughts as she made a move to stand from the bed. She grit her teeth in pain, and tried to contain her groan. Her abdomen was throbbing with a dull ache. "oh god." She whispered as she walked towards the bathroom.

The doctors had wrapped up her mid-section tightly with what looked like ace bandage wrap, so it was going to be challenging to get it all off. Setting foot in the bathroom she wasn't the least bit surprised to see the disco-like décor all over the place. The black and white tiles caused her mind to picture it like an optical illusion, but Kate reminded herself to start the shower and get undressed. She groaned as she pulled her shirt off, and slid her jeans down her legs.

Heaving a sigh she began to remove the tape and bandages from around her ribs moving downwards closer to her wound. The doctor said that she'd suffered from a bruised rib, but that was the least of her worries. Unwinding the dressing from her body she stared in the oversized mirror above the sink and found the bruising the doctor had mentioned she'd see. She took note of the gash needing five stitches, her color was back in her skin, and her blue eyes looked much less tired than they had yesterday when she'd seen her reflection in the hospital. With a sigh she stripped herself of her underwear and bra before setting foot in the shower. The lukewarm spray felt like heaven to her body. She felt as though she hadn't had a shower in a week, but in actuality it had only been like three days- however the sweat from being wrapped up was causing her to feel far more gross than she actually was. Using a light amount of bar soap that the hotel offered she washed her body trying to avoid her wound as much as possible. Kate also made a half-hearted attempt to run her fingers through her hair in substitute of a brush.

Quickly cutting the water off she realized she'd forgotten the duffle with her clothes she inwardly groaned biting her lip nervously. Yanking the curtain back she took a cautious step out of the tub and wrapped one of the towels from the hotel within reach around herself. It was a stiff, and scratchy white towel that felt as though they'd been left there from the last guests.

Before she thought twice and lost her nerve she pulled the door open quietly- still half hoping Dean was sleeping and, stepped out. Her feet hit the grey carpet surprised by the softness of it as she tipped toed her way across it towards the linoleum laid out over the kitchenette area.

With a sigh, and shaky hands she made quick work of her zipper as she yanked out a random pair of jeans and, a navy blue tank top, along with a bra and underwear. She turned sharply, and gasped in surprise, only to grip her side in pain. Dean sat at the edge of his bed- his shirt removed and his jeans still half-undone, his bag of clothes still open beside him. Clearly she'd surprised him as much as he surprised her.

"S-Sorry." She mumbled, her eyes moving over his form appreciatively. She could feel her cheeks flushing as she awkwardly stood before him. She knew in order to get back into the bathroom she'd have to cross him. Silently berating herself for not already doing so, she turned away quickly.

"No need to apologize." He grinned at her as he stood quickly doing up his jeans. "I-I thought you'd be in there longer what with your injury and all." Dean was quick to throw on a black tee as he moved in closer towards her. Glancing over her shoulder to find him dressed she turned to face off with him.

Kate was freaking out on the inside, her body simply frozen where she stood- her mind a blank as her eyes moved over Dean's lithe form, and gulped. She felt her breathing quicken as her mind thought back to every single shirtless episode she'd seen, and dirty fanfiction she had read about the man before her.

"Uhm…" She trailed off softly as he moved to stand inches from her.

"Do you want a hug?" She heard his hoarse voice ask. Kate cocked her head back by the weird question, her eyes widening.

"Uhm… what?" She asked her voice quivering.

"Do you want a mug?" Dean asked as he reached around her and pulled his coffee off the table from the brewer behind her. Kate breathed a sigh of relief as she side-stepped around him.

"O-oh. No thank- thank you." She told him as she moved quickly into the bathroom shutting the door behind her quickly, before moving to wrap her wound back up and, putting her clothes on slowly.

By the time she'd exited she heard Sam's voice, "Hey, good to see you up and walking around, Kate. How's the wound?"

Kate shrugged, it still hurt, but it was a lot more bearable than it had been yesterday. "It's alright; definitely better today than it was yesterday." She told him as she glanced up at Dean- now wearing a flannel over the black tee as she passed by him towards the bed she'd taken over from Sam. She placed her duffel bag atop the covers and began sorting out the dirty clothes from the clean ones. "What happened last night though?" She asked changing the subject as she pulled on her denim jacket taking car for the injured side.

Sam and Dean looked over at her after glancing at one another with serious expressions over their similar features. "The lady the painting was sold to was killed." Dean told her.

"I guess it was a family friend of the Blake's that bought it. Sarah was really upset." Sam told her. Kate nodded unsure of what to say, she had hoped that by putting the portrait on hold it wouldn't have been sold, but clearly with money in question… had no shame.

Kate sighed running a hand through her wet hair, she sat back on the bed slowly as she tried to think what to do now. A sudden knock on the door sounded surprising the trio inside. Sarah entered angrily as Sam opened the door, "Hey." He greeted, "Are you alright?"

"No, actually. I just lied to the cops and told them I went to Evelyn's. Alone, and found her like that." Sarah said. Kate could see her anger written all over her face. Sarah took notice to Kate's presence, but didn't say much- she seemed to angry to form a polite greeting.

"Thank you." Sam said, clearly relieved to be in the clear from dealing with police. Kate remembered that not too long go from this episode Dean was wanted for murder due to a shape shifter problem. She had to bite her cheek from nearly laughing at the fact that things like this were the norm in this place. Time? Universe? She wasn't quite sure what this was exactly.

"Don't thank me." Sarah said interrupting Kate's ridiculous train of thought. "I'm about to call them right back if you don't tell me what the hell is going on. Who is killing these people?"

The room rang with silence as the trio exchanged uneasy glances. She saw Dean shrug at Sam in a rather nonchalant way.

"What." Sam corrected.

"What?" Sarah asked now confused.

"It's not a who. It's 'what' is killing those people." He told her. Sarah's further confused face displayed that she wasn't grasping what Sam was trying to tell her. "Sarah. You saw that painting move." He finished.

Sarah looked more and more uneasy as the realization dawned on her. "No. No. I was-I was seeing things." She began, her brain clearly trying to come up with something- anything other than what she actually saw. "It's impossible." She finished with a slight chuckle.

"Yeah, well. Welcome to our world." Dean interrupted rather bluntly.

"Sarah, I know this sounds crazy, but we think that the painting is haunted." Sam told her, also bluntly. Kate inwardly groaned, the boys weren't very good at easing people into the existence of monsters and what not.

Kate watched as Sarah's eyes watered, and she was adamantly trying to refuse the existence of anything Supernatural. "You're joking." She rationalized, then she took a look at the trio before her. Her eyes moved over Sam's serious expression, and Dean before resting on Kate.

"You're- You're not joking." She said finally. Kate watched her reign in her emotions as she muttered, "God, the guys I go out with."

"Sarah. Think about it." Kate began as she slowly stood from the bed, with an arm wrapped around her mid-section. "Evelyn, The Telescas. There have been other's before them. Where ever this thing goes, people die. We just want to stop it from happening ever again." She explained.

Sarah paused taking in Kate's injured form. "Is- Is this what you guys do? You fight the things that go bump in the night?"

"Not exactly." Sam chuckled.

"We don't get paid." Dean muttered from behind him.

"Well, Mazel Tov." She muttered, eyeing him reproachfully. "Well, I guess you better show me what exactly is that you do." She told Sam suddenly as she moved around him towards the door. "I'm coming with you."

"What? No. You should just go home. Sarah, this stuff can get dangerous and-." Sam cut himself off, clearly unsure if he wanted to approach this subject. "and, I don't want you getting hurt."

A pause passed as Dean glanced down at the laptop he was on. Kate looked around the hotel room trying to pretend she was interested in the 70s décor.

"Look, you guys are probably crazy." Sarah said with an air of contempt, "But, if you're actually right about this then, my dad and I were the one's that got these people killed."

"No-." Sam began as he moved in closer towards Sarah.

"We sold these people that painting, and then my dad sold it again. If you're right, then it's our fault they died." She said before taking a steadying breath. "Look, I'm not saying I'm not scared; because I am scared as hell-." Join the club. Kate thought begrudgingly she was too, she just didn't have the luxury of showing it. "But, I'm not going to run and hide either." Sarah finished before walking to the door, and opening it. "So are we going or what?" She asked as she made her exit. The boys looked to one another stunned, while Kate smirked to herself.

"Sam." Dean spoke up from the silence. "Marry that girl." Kate snorted out a laugh as she pulled up her duffel bag up from the bed.

"Whoa, where are you going?" Dean asked as he grabbed his leather jacket.

"I'm working the case, Dean." Kate replied as she made a move to step around him.

"No. You're walking injured, you've been benched." He told her. Was that a football reference? She asked herself with a slight smirk.

"You're ridiculous if you think I'm going to just sit here, while someone else dies, again." She tacked on the last word bitterly given that she'd had a plan in place to spare the old woman her life, but it didn't work out.

"Hey, no ones dying-."

"People already have." She argued, then she sighed at his stubborn expression. "I'll level with you, kay? I won't go out and do any heavy lifting. Just research." At his lack of agreement she added. "C'mon what could happen during the day? The only thing that's out to get me is demons… apparently." She told him. "Not a haunted painting. Not a ghost."

He gave her a look with his mouth set in a hard line, "Alright, fine. Just- just stay close." Kate rolled her eyes as he took her duffel from her and followed her out.

After checking the painting, the guys pointed out that Kate was right, the painting in the painting was different. Dean looked to see it was now a picture of a crypt, of course the show didn't go into in depth detail about which graveyard the Mausoleum was in. So with that in mind they split up Sarah and Sam took the impala and Dean and Kate too her car. They spent nearly all afternoon checking graveyard after graveyard.

"I'm starting to think this ghost id just jerking us around." Dean grumbled from beside Kate. She chuckled with a shake of her head.

"It's not like the ghost can give you gps co-ordinates to it's grave marker." Kate told him.

"Yeah, well something other than a picture would work. A name of the cemetery would be better than this." He continued to grumble. Kate saw a rather large stone house built up over the headstones surrounding it.

"Hey." She said with a tap to Dean's bicep. He looked to her before she nodded in that direction. "I'll call Sam." Dean said once they realized they found it. Her and Dean waited around for the arrival of Sam and Sarah with some idle chatter.

"So, Kate… Where're you from?" He asked. It hit her that she hadn't ever really talked about herself with the boys.

"I'm from Springfield, Massachusetts." Although admittedly she was living about an hour away in North Grafton for College.

"You're an East Coast girl then, huh?" Dean asked with a look in her direction.

"What of it?" She asked defensively.

"Nothing. It's- It's just that Meg is supposedly from Massachusetts as well."

"If you have something to say than just say it, Dean." Kate told him quickly becoming aggravated.

"It's just an interesting fact, is all." Dean told her holding his hands up as if to fend her accusing tone off. She huffed rolling her eyes at him.

"If I were a demon you think I'd have let her stab me?" Kate asked him exasperatedly. It was clear now that even through the time she's spent with Dean over the last few days he and, Sam still had their guards up with her.

Dean chuckled slightly, a smile breaking through his stoic features "No. I really don't think you would have." Ah, so it's Sam that's paranoid. She thought looking back towards the entrance of the graveyard in time to see the Impala driving up the gravel road. She tried to remember when he'd been investigating Meg, and everything that took place because he didn't look into her before hand. She could understand why he was so untrusting.

"Hey, you found it?" Sam asked as he got out and slammed the creaky metal door.

"Could you drive her any rougher, Sam? You know they made a brake pedal for a reason." Dean snapped at him with a concerned expression for his precious baby.

Kate snorted shaking her head, "Like you're one to comment on anybody's driving with the way you've been whipping my car up and down these streets."

Sam sent her a quick smile before they all moved on to the Merchant family crypt. Dean cut the chains off the door, the padlock falling to the dirt with a thud. Sam and Dean pushed open the heavy door to see the threshold covered in cobwebs. Kate was grateful to not be the first person entering. Standing in the small, dirty cement building sent a chill through Kate- she felt inherently wrong. As though invading someone's home. Four urns lined the mantel underneath some carved out nooks in the cement wall. Each nook contained something seemingly personal to the person that was now dust in vases at the base of it. Everything appeared to be covered with an inch of dust and spider webs

"Okay, that right there is the creepiest thing I have ever seen." Sarah stated as she looked into the farthest nook. Each of them were covered with glass as to preserve the object within.

"It was a sort of tradition at the time. Whenever a child died- they'd preserve the kid's favorite toy in a glass case to leave it near the headstone, or- or in a crypt."

Dean was looking around the place with a determined expression as Sarah and Sam droned on. "What is it?" Kate asked him.

"You notice anything strange here?" He asked suddenly taking a step back t see the four urns as a whole.

"Uhm, where so I start?" Sarah asked sarcastically, much to Sam's amusement.

"No, that- that's not what I meant." Dean told her. "There's only four urns-."

"Yeah, the mom and the kid's." Kate said coming up. She'd forgotten the dad actually hadn't been cremated. She was starting to wonder if she remembered things right or not. It had been a few years since she'd seen the episodes of the first season all the way through.

"Daddy dearest isn't here." Dean replied with a pointed look to her.

"Then where is he?" Sam asked aloud.

"Well there's only one way to find that out." Dean said with a smirk as he walked out. Kate followed him remembering he had her keys.

"Where're you going?" Sam called as he and Sarah still stood at the entrance to the Mausoleum.

Dean didn't respond he just grinned as he climbed into the driver side of Kate's red car. She rolled her eyes speeding up her walk to get in the passenger side. "Where are we going?" She asked him.

Within 20 minutes and using Kate's gps on her blackberry she and Dean pulled up to the town hall. "You're going to find out where Isiah Merchant is buried from here?" She asked.

"Yep." He told her simply as he reached back and pulled his duffel bag that he placed in the back seat of her car.

"How? Don't you need to be his family-?" She cut herself off as he pulled a small tin box from the bag and flicked the lid open on it's hinges. Kate was privy to the assortment of ids Dean kept on him. "Not when you're an Private Investigator." He told her.

"You're not dressed like a PI." She pointed out, bluntly. She was mildly disappointed not to get to see him in a suit.

"We're undercover." Was all he said as he climbed out of the car. Kate tried to follow him in a hurried fashion, but her side throbbed painfully as if reminding her of her close call with the real Supernatural. She huffed moving slower, more gently.

"I don't have an ID, Dean."

"They won't even ask to see it." He told her with a shrug, "You're walking injured." He added as he held the door open for her. Dean marched purposefully up to the information desk and explained quickly that they were searching for the death records for a cold case they were working on. The woman looked him up and down, clearly not really believing him when she shook her head. Kate watched him try again only to get no where.

She stepped up smiling kindly. "Please. It's for a wealthy family here in town, they did this genealogy thing online, and traced their ancestry back to the 1900s and found out they're great, great grandfather was accused of a crime. We're here to look into it for them. He's the PI, I'm just his research assistant. You'd be doing me a real favor of not having to go online to look all this up." She said before glancing back at Dean and leaning in closer over the counter, "Not to mention, he can be a real dick when he doesn't get his way. I'm tired of having to clean up his messes- especially with the clients." She whispered lowly. Kate was cradling her arm in closer to her side, making it rather obvious she was injured.

The older woman with a short curly red hair looked back at Dean from over her glasses, "Alright." The woman relented as she handed a key off to Kate. "I've been there, honey. You'll only be an assistant for ungrateful jerks for so long. Hope you open up your own practice someday." The woman glanced at Dean with contempt as she turned back to her paperwork behind her.

"I don't know what you said to her but it worked like a charm." Dean muttered as he took the key from Kate. "I knew I kept you around for some reason there, Katie." He chuckled out.

She rolled her eyes as she followed Dean into the hall of records. The pair stepped into the room cluttered with floor to ceiling shelves of records upon records.

"Oh god." Kate muttered rolling her eyes. This was going to take forever.

"Alright, why don't we split up?" Dean asked. "You take that side, and I'll start over here. We can meet in the middle." Kate nodded quickly as she took off towards the opposite end. She was trying to wrack her brain to think of the little girl's name, but nothing was coming to her- she didn't think they'd actually ever mentioned it. She wanted to do some research on the girl, but the name just wasn't coming to her.

Mary Merchant? Meghan Merchant? She remembered that it started with an M- which she only remembered from eating M&Ms when she'd seen the episode the first time and equated the big and bad ghost to an M&M candy. Damnit. She thought angrily as she combed through the shelves looking for the M column. Her short work-study in her schools library taught her a few things about shelving and organization. She noted that the files were organized by last names. She reached the M's finally after going up and down the aisles quickly. Dean was still combing the shelves 2 aisles down from her. She grabbed all the files with the name Merchant scrawled across it and carried them to a nearby table calling out to Dean. He stood over her from behind.

"You found it? That was fast." He finished as he took the vacant seat besides her. Kate nodded as she slid some file in his directions.

"These are all under the name Merchant. We need to get specific. Do you remember the first names of the family?" She asked.

She watched Dean looking like he was straining to think. "Isiah, and Mary were the parents names." He told her more assured than she had anticipated. With that in mind both of them began scouring the record laid before them. After a few minutes Dean had an 'A-ha' moment as he slammed his finger down on the papers.

"Isiah Merchant. Body was turned over to the state, so as to not disturb the eternal rest of his family, he was buried at the states expense in the New Paltz Rural Cemetery." Dean looked proud of himself as he grinned down at Kate.

"This is one of these, 'job well done- pat yourself on the back' moments, isn't it?" she asked, clearly underwhelmed.

"Shut up." Dean muttered with a sour expression. He folded up the paper and made a move to exit, but paused when Kate snatched the folder and began looking through the other papers there.

"What're you doing?" Dean asked her confused.

"Hang on. I-I want to see something." She muttered to him. Kate continued flipping through the file marked Merchant. She scrolled through the paperwork glancing over things quickly. She finally found it the certificate of adoption in the file. Melanie Merchant. The show in the end recognized the big bad ghost to be the little girl in the portrait- not Isiah.

Kate read quickly that the had been adopted from the New Paltz poor house where her parents were mysteriously found murdered in their bed. These records were a lot more thorough than the show had been- the girl had been born in 1900, and within the first five years of life had lost everything- her father died at the tender age of three thus cutting off the family income. It wasn't written, but Kate assumed the mother got remarried given that it was a couple that had been murdered from the newspaper clippings she gathered.

"Look." Kate said as she pointed down to the newspaper article.

"What?" Dean muttered with a dramatic eye roll.

"It's the little girl. There's no way it could be anyone else." Kate muttered to him as they leaned over the article.

"No way." Dean huffed out with a quick shake of his head.

"Think about it, Dean." Kate began slowly as she shook her hair from her face glancing up at him. "Her mother, and step father were murdered in the poor house the same way as all these recent ones were."

Dean's eyes moved over her face seeing her serious expression. "But- but the little girl was cremated. How can it be her? What's still keeping her here?" He asked his eyebrows turning down together in thought.

Kate remembered the doll hair, but was unsure how to explain it. "No. No way. It's gotta be Isiah." Dean said with a shake of his head. "It's the only one that makes sense."

None of this makes sense. Kate thought begrudgingly, her own situation flashing through her mind. She was growing frustrated with her lack of leads to take her back home. Kate scrolled through the articles and pictures before her again, but she paused over the portrait photos.

"The doll." She muttered, acting as though it had just occurred to her. "Dean. The doll. It- It's made in her image. Look."

"I-. No, thank you. I hate dolls." He told her as his eyes glanced away from the photo she held to him.

"Cut it out. Just shut up, and look." She told him snapping. Dean finally took the photo from Kate and stared at it.

"I see a doll." He told her clueless.

"Look at the hair. The hair." Kate told him, with some exaggeration on the last word. She watched his eyes glance from the doll to the girl and back again.

"They used the kid's real hair?" He snapped finally putting it all together. Kate nodded solemnly, "Man, that's so creepy…" He trailed off. His expression becoming distant before he shrugged non-chalantly. "Human remains though… I suppose it could work the same way as bones." Kate nodded slowly. With that the par began to move out of the chairs, leaving the file strewn about the table.

As they moved away Kate heard a noise, she jumped turning around. Dean halting his steps immediately. "Did-did you hear that?" She asked softly.

Dean simply nodded wordlessly with a focused expression as he glanced around at the shelves they were surrounded by.

"You left all this out?" A familiar voice called, Kate was surprised to hear the woman from the front desk at the other end of the room by the table she and, Dean were just at. "C'mon…" The woman grumbled. Kate paused as she felt guilt eating at her.

"We did leave everything out back there." She told Dean softly. Dean sent her a glare, but she moved forwards all the same towards the woman. "Yeah, sorry we weren't done quite-." Upon exiting the aisle her and, Dean went down she found her pressed against the wall by her throat.

"Yes, you are." The older, rotund woman seethed. Her onyx eyes sent a chill of fear up Kate's spine, she froze only remembering the pain she felt at the stab from Meg the last tie she'd tangled with Demon's. More of them? She thought her eyes widened when she watched Dean jump into action, he grabbed the demon at the back of the neck and yanked her from Kate.

The woman's head smashed into the end of the tall wooden shelves before she rebounded with an unseen strength on Dean. "Winchester." She seethed, her black eyes wide. Kate gasped as she side stepped out of the way of the demon.

Dean was pinned back against the wall now, face first. "Protecting her, huh?" The demon asked through clenched teeth as Dean made a valiant attempt to fight it off. Kate froze, still having a hard time believing this was all real. "Too bad it's gonna be what get's you killed." She whispered into Dean's ear rather loudly. The woman slammed his forehead against the wall roughly. Kate watched a cut appear as she yanked his head back from the wall bending his neck at an painfully awkward angle

Kate's shaky hands wrapped around the excess change in her pocket- it was random, but she remembered after being on the shooting range for a while prior to getting her license to carry the instructor told her that even the most seemingly useless things could be used as a weapon, so with that she yelled out, "Hey, head's or tails?" She finished, her voice displaying way more confidence than she felt. With that said, the demon had turned around and locked his black eyes on her, sufficiently dropping Dean to the ground.

Kate was sent the change soaring through the air as the demon made a move towards her. Kate was hoping- pretty much- on her life that the basic human instinct to flinch was strong enough to over ride the demon's control.

She lucked out. The older, short curly haired woman before her flinched as her eyes were pelted with coins. Kate took the opportunity to take off down the aisle at lightening speed-even with her abdomen screaming in protest. She was hoping to give Dean time to recover and get away.

"I don't think so." She heard the woman growl and, without missing a beat Kate felt something grab her shirt and yank her back. The strength the demon had was impressive given the person it was currently possessing. Kate gasped in pain as she was slammed against one of the shelves full of files.

"What do you want from me?!" Kate yelled in fear as the demon looked her over.

"I thought it was obvious. We want you gone. You pose too much of a threat to our-."

"Plans! Yeah, I gathered that. What is it that you think I know?" Kate asked, fear audibly in her tone.

The demon grinned at her, "Don't play coy with me. It's not attractive on you, Kate." Kate's eyebrows turned down now. The demon knew her name. She wondered what else they knew about her.

Before the demon could answer she watched Dean appear from no where. He slammed his body roughly against the woman, thus dropping Kate to her feet painfully. The woman was shoved across the aisle and Kate watched as the unsteady shelves began rock.

"Kate. Kate! Go!" Dean's voice rang out as he yanked her with him dodging the falling paperwork, and books. Kate was yanked forwards as Dean slipped between the quickly collapsing shelves. Silence rang through the room- the woman- demon thing was momentarily trapped under the mountain of shelves. The pair was dropped down to the ground after tripping over papers and books strewn about the place. Kate found herself pinned under Dean, she groaned as the pain registered in her brain.

"Fuck." She hissed out as Dean pushed himself up on his arms and glanced down to her stomach. She scrabbled at the tank top and pulling it up slightly.

"Your stitches." Dean muttered as he pushed himself up quickly. Kate could feel the warm, wet blood that was seeping out from a part that was torn. "Damnit." Dean cursed, "We can fix that back at the hotel." He finished.

"What?" Kate yelped with widened eyes. "No. Just-just drop me back off at the hospital."

"We don't have time for that now. C'mon." With Dean's word being final he pulled her up and assisted her in walking through the now empty lobby and into the passenger seat of her car.

Maybe twenty minutes after that, Kate found herself standing over a small fire in the graveyard as Dean set the doll ablaze starting with the hair. Dean had made a make shift bandage with adding more ace wrapping around her abdomen until they could get to the hotel. "Did Sam really go back to the house to double check that the painting was neutralized- so to speak?" Kate asked. "Was it really necessary after burning bot, Isiah's body, and the doll?"

"Yeah, well. He's more of a 'better to be safe than sorry' type of guy." Dean said shortly, as he slammed her back door after tossing his duffel bag into the car.

Kate paused staring at him from over the top of the car. "What?" He asked her.

Kate quirked an eyebrow up at him., "Are- are you okay?" She asked feeling weird. After all the bonding they'd done in the last 24 hours she was surprised at his gruff attitude. She figured it might've been because of her freezing up when the demon came at them back in the hall of records or it was simply because of whatever plans the demon implicated she knew about. For him and his brother. She was thinking the latter.

"Peachy." He told her before ducking down into the driver's side. "You getting in or what?" He hollered before turning on some classic rock music over the stereo and, cranking it up loudly. Kate grimaced as her side throbbed getting into the car and heading off in the direction of the hotel. She wasn't sure which she was dreading more. Dean trying to sew up her torn wound, or the answers she was going to have to figure out when Dean began asking the right questions.

Thanks all for reading! Your views are greatly appreciated.