“I think we should at least call him first, let him know we’re coming,” Sam reasoned, or tried to, as he attempted to catch up with his brother’s long strides, which was saying something because normally, it would be Dean who would be struggling to do so. “You know, so we won’t end up black and blue after his bodyguards kick our ass.”

Dean continued walking through the spacious corridor, there were only two suites on this floor and Suite 105 was the one to the right, according to Ms. Tyler, the front desk personnel who had given him the extra key card after asking him if he’d like the hotel to bring up a complimentary bottle of champagne, to which he said ‘why not’ because really, why the hell not?

“Funny, hey, did you know that Black and Blue is the title of one of their albums?” he chanced a glance at Sam who looked a tad bit lost and shrugged.

“I tell you, those fangirls at the lobby are a lot more useful than Google, you might want to remember that the next time you have visions of a celebrity and need a quick research without telling your big brother.”

Sam sighed exasperatedly and Dean sighed in frustration because seriously, how far is this door and just how big is this friggin suite? “Dean, I said I’m sorry!”

“I heard you the first ten times Sam!” Dean exclaimed. “But if you think I’m going to let it easy on you, you have another thing coming.”

Sam sighed again, and then straightened his shoulders, his tall frame though seemed to look non-threatening to the eyes, was poised for battle, or burly bodyguards.

Dean pressed the button and Sam knew there was no backing away now.

- -

He was confused, and rightfully so. It didn’t make any sense and that was saying a lot, because he had said a lot of things that didn’t seem to make a lot of sense to anyone else but they always sound right to him yet this, this new discovery clutched in his hands, it was almost frustrating. Almost, because right now, he was trying to control frustration and let confusion have a go.

Had he been hustled by a couple of Demon children?

Was it all a ploy to make him think that he was safe and then when he got too complacent, Daddy Demon was going to pull that rug from beneath him and watch him fall on his ass and die?

But why was Daddy Demon so pushy about him asking Dean how his father had died? Didn’t he call Dean a liar? And what was the point really? Demon children had played them right into their hands and could have killed them if they wanted to (he wondered if that sawed off shotgun was intended for his head) but they didn’t, they just left.

And fuck it, he just bought two hundred boxes of salt and it could have been a scam, a sick, icing on the cake joke from the Demon children to make him think he was sleeping safely at night.

And what the fuck, just what the fuck! Demon Children? Daddy Demon? WHAT THE HELL!

“It doesn’t make sense,” he said, shaking his head while still staring at the picture. The Demon but not really, because this one didn’t have yellow eyes, this one was smiling, and probably ten years younger, and had kind eyes and was wearing a friggin Marine uniform.

“Because something doesn’t add up,” Kevin replied carefully and he hated it when the guys did that, to spring a surprise on him and then afraid that he’d overreacted and started walking on eggshells around him. “This is big Nick, it’s their Dad.”

Of course he knew that; Kevin didn’t have to spell it out to him. What he needed was a solution, the next step, anything that could help him move forward, make something out of this new information so he didn’t have to just stand there and listen to things that he already knew.

“You should call them,” AJ said.

The door bell rang, which made him jump and in any other circumstances, they’d be laughing at his jumpy ass by now but none of them said anything, save for an eyebrow raising moment from Kevin.

“I’ll get that.” Howie offered, looking very relieved as he walked away.

“Are you nuts?” Kevin said, and for a second he was unsure if Kevin was referring to Howie offering to answer the door or to AJ.

“No,” AJ frowned. “You want some answers, you go straight to the source.”

“And risk exposing ourselves to them?” Brian asked. “What if they’re really bad news? We’re going to give away the fact that we know about this little information?”

AJ shrugged. “If Daddy Demon is visiting Nick in his dreams don’t you think he’d find out that Nick knows about this one way or another? Seriously guys, we’re complicating stuff here when the answer is just a phone call away.”

“Or a doorbell away,” Howie called out from the opened door, where stood Sam and Dean Winchester, the latter looking very much pissed off and for that split second he decided, was resolved, that no one else get to be as pissed off as he was right now, especially not Dean Winchester.

= =

“You son of a bitch!” Apparently, he wasn’t the only one who was thinking this, because Dean said the same thing, at the same time; and that made him more frustrated (he decided to let frustration take over confusion now) because what right had Dean to call him that when he was the one who lied!

“Are you trying to mess with my head?” he cried.

Dean seemed offended and he guessed, by the look on his face, angry too. “No you’re the one who’s trying to mess with mine!”

“You lied.”

“What do you mean I lied? You’re the one who lied!”

“You fuckin’ lied and you know this!”

Dean rolled his eyes. “Lets do this out in the open shall we? Make it look official; they’d think we break up and stop printing stupid stuff on papers!”

This made him frown. Dean was talking nonsense as far as he was concerned. Make what official? And what were they supposed to break up? “Dude, what the hell are you talking about?”

Dean frowned. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about this!” he exclaimed, pushing the picture into his hands. “That’s your father. He is also the yellow eyed demon who’s been visiting my dreams. You saw a sketch of this in my book. You knew.” Spat it with tons of accusation he could muster.

Dean had the audacity to look sad, broken, and what the hell, he was expecting guilt, an oops caught with my hands in the cookie jar look, but no, Dean stared at the picture longingly, as if surprised to see this younger version of his dad. “Where did you get this?”

“Kevin did some research,” he replied, pointing towards Kevin, who stood at the back, watching the whole thing silently. Knowing Kevin, he was probably studying the two brothers and making his own conclusions before joining the crowd. “He’s my brother.”

“You were checking up on us?”

“They wanted to make sure I wasn’t being fooled.” Nick explained. “And after this, I think I have the right to be concerned. Were you following us again? Is that what your daddy told you to do? Are you going to kill us all and make it look like an accident? Is this demon talk even real or are you just-”

“You don’t know my dad.”

“He’s in my fucking head!”

“That’s not him.”

“I find that hard to believe.” He also found it hard to believe that so far, none of the guys, including Sam, took a step forward to intervene this little confrontation, but he wasn’t going to say that out loud for now.

“Demons don’t have bodies Nick, I thought we told you that,” Dean said firmly. “My dad was once possessed by the demon that killed our mother and Sam’s girlfriend. You saw him in your vision, in that abandoned house when he pinned us both to the walls. You drew him eavesdropping on our conversation before he came out asking for the gun, so excuse us if we were hesitant to tell you about our dad and the whole demonised episode.”

“He told me to ask you about how he died,” he said. “Said that you lied to me, but I figured he was lying to me, just playing with my head, demons do that.” Right?

“My dad died saving me and I don’t like to talk about that, so that’s all you have to know,” Dean said. “The next time he pays you a visit, tell him I said to get his own identity.”

AJ broke the tension with a choke and he turned briefly to see Howie rubbing his back and he understood why. If the situation wasn’t this serious, he’d be choking too, because wasn’t that what Kevin once said to Nsync? Get your own identity!

“Your friend all right there?” Dean asked, peering over his shoulder, where AJ was.

“He’ll live.”

Dean nodded. “Good, because we don’t have much time and I want you to clear some stuff up before we leave, Backstreet Boy.”

Whoops. Okay, so he kind of lied too.

“Yeah about that…” but the rest of what he was about to say was lost somewhere as his eyes dropped to the papers. He frowned; felt that he had been doing that a lot lately, frowning. The Inquirer on his hands and the headlines made him dizzy. Oh great.

“Fuck.”

“Damn right fuck.” Dean said and he could hear it, that thin line of frustration laced in his voice. “We’re on a friggin’ job and we wasted a chance because we were mobbed by your fangirls and paparazzi.”

He looked back at his friends, saw confusion and couldn’t believe it, couldn’t believe that they had been back in L.A. for a good day and didn’t realise what was going on. Or maybe they were just getting good at acting, at pretending they didn’t know but they did, just like they went behind his back and met up with Kevin, just like they had AJ as a course of distraction, bring him to breakfast, they probably said, take him out so he won’t ask too much, take him shopping, anything, just don’t let him know we’re meeting Kevin.

And he thought buying 200 boxes of salt was random and fun.

Damn it, why must everything be so complicated?

“You guys didn’t know about this?” When it actually said, you kept this from me?

“I know nothing about that.” Brian offered.

“I haven’t heard anything about that.” Howie added.

“You’d hear it from me if I know anything about that,” AJ said. “You know I’d take every opportunity I get to rub it in your face.”

That is true.

“I’ve heard about it,” Kevin admitted, now moving slowly towards him. His eyes shifted past him, over to Dean, and the look was apologetic, soft, kind, and he missed this, missed that look, even though it wasn’t directed to him right now but to the stranger who had been helping his brother out for the past few days, helped him. “I was going to tell them today but we didn’t quite get to that point yet. I’m sorry we messed up your job. I’d offer you my help but I’m not sure if there’s anything useful that I know that might help.”

Sam cleared his throat, and for the first time that day, made his presence known. He moved next to Dean, eyes fixed on Kevin, who was now standing right behind him, like he used to when he was still part of the Backstreet Boys, the one who was always hovering over his shoulder even when he wasn’t physically there, his mind always going ‘Kevin’s not going to like this’ when he was about to do something random and stupid (and sometimes funny and harmless but still stupid and would make the headlines and frustrates the management) and even though Sam’s a head taller than Kevin, he looked small and young and polite and for a brief second, it made him wonder about Kevin, how the hell did he do that?

“Actually,” Sam said, eyes glancing towards his brother for a flit second and that was enough for him, enough to know that Dean had no idea what Sam was up to, was as clueless as he was, as the rest of them. “You uh, you can help us, a lot.”

And he looked at Dean, sharing the same question in their eyes, wondering what his brother was up to and what his brother could do to help and wouldn’t this blink and you’ll miss it moment between them be a hot seller if a paparazzi had been around and snapped a shot?

a/n: i really would like to see sam's expression when he saw Howie answering the door after expecting some burly bodyguard to show up.