The Short Second Life of Mil Winchester - Book 2

Let it Bleed

LET IT BLEED

Dean wasn't reading that book, and it wasn't fooling anybody. I watched him with a careful eye over top of Samuel Campbell's father's journal. My brother hadn't said a word since he'd entered the basement sometime last night with heavy footsteps and the grim news that Castiel had been by, and that he'd failed to change the angel's mind.

"Well, you know what, at least you tried," I murmured.

Dean looked up, a steely glint in his eye as he immediately understood what I meant. "Yeah, fat lot of good it did," he snapped. "Why did he even come, right?"

I didn't have an answer for that one; I could only shrug. Sam, surrounded by books at Bobby's desk, sighed heavily. I watched him silently flip a page, having no voice in Dean and I's exchange. I just about jumped as Dean slammed a book shut with a bang much louder than its size.

"Well, Samuel's journals are pointless," Dean announced, fixing his book in a stare too acidic for an inanimate object. "I mean, I'm sorry, but uh, Jebediah Campbell has squat to tell me about how to stop Cas from cracking Purgatory."

"Well actually, it's not about the journals we have, it's about the one we don't," Bobby said. The grim faced older hunter had appeared in the doorway, carrying a large envelope. I didn't know what that meant, nor where he'd been.

"Meaning what?" Sam prompted.

"Well, that's the bad news. Our pal Cas didn't stop in last night just to mend fences."

Oh crap. Bobby had a heck of a lot of valuable stuff here - valuable to us, anyway. What had the traitor taken?

I watched Dean's eyes flash cool betrayal. "What did he do?"

Bobby grimaced. "Stole something."

Shoot. "What?" I demanded.

"The journal of one Moishe Campbell."

I didn't know who that was, but I'm guessing they were important.

"Moishe?" Sam echoed, at a loss.

"Of the New York Campbells," Bobby explained.

There were Campbells in New York? Damn, that bastard we were supposedly related to had slimy tendrils everywhere.

"Well, uh, so we gotta get it back, right?" Sam asked. How, exactly, we didn't know, and his tone conveyed it.

"Or just read the copy I'd already made," Bobby suggested with a slight grin. He handed Sam the envelope, and we all stared at the older hunter in disbelief. A copy? Seriously? Damn, you're good, Bobby. "Hi, glad to meet you. Bobby Singer. Paranoid bastard."

I chuckled under my breath. Good old Bobby.

Sam tore open the seal on the envelope, and opened it on the desk to take out a stack of loose papers. We divvied up the pages, and I took my stack back to the coffee table I'd claimed as my workspace. I began to read, Dean on the couch near me. I had to say it wasn't uninteresting. The journal was old - much, much older than dad's. Some of the reports contained creatures I'd never even heard of before. It didn't take long, however, for Dean to get bored.

"Who wants coffee?" he asked, abandoning his allocated reading and getting to his feet.

He's just avoiding the work. At any rate, I didn't feel like coffee. "No thanks," I replied distractedly, reading about a Leshii thing from the 20's.

"Thanks Dean," Sam muttered.

Bobby simply grunted, which Dean took to mean 'no'.

"So two coffees, coming right up." I watched my brother flounce to the kitchen, shook my head, and dropped my attention back to the Leshii on the page. I didn't know what a Pagan God would tell me about Purgatory, but it was riveting stuff. That God was a much more powerful creature in the 1920's than when we'd met her about two years ago as a House of Wax enthusiast.