Sleep of the Just *Complete*

Faith sighed and let the hot water wash over her face, turning to soak her hair. The shower beat down on her, rinsing away the day and she tilted her head back, wiping the water from her eyes before she picked up the soap. She washed quickly, knowing Dean would be back soon with their dinner. They’d flipped for first shower when they rolled into town and she’d won, so he’d agreed to go grab some food from the Mexican restaurant down the street. She’d been riding with him in the Impala, Sam driving her car behind them with Dawn. They hadn’t stayed too long at the river and they’d made good time, getting in some good miles to make up for their little swim.

Making quick use of her razor, then washing her hair, Faith finished her shower and stepped out into the steamy bathroom, nearly jumping out of her skin when her cell phone, sitting on the counter, began to ring.

She snatched it up and answered it, recognizing the ringtone.

“Angel?”

~*~

Something was up. Faith was sitting on the bed with her cell phone on the nightstand when Dean walked into the motel room with the food. He’d left Sam and Dawn at the restaurant, sitting down to eat, and was expecting to find Faith still in the shower, or at the very least, waiting for him. It looked like she’d just gotten off the phone though and the look in her eyes was troubled.

He set the bags down on the table.

“What’s up?”

“We have to go. Me and Dawn, we have to go to LA,” she said, looking up at him as if just realizing he was there.

“Why?” he asked, sitting beside her on the bed. She looked at him.

“A friend’s in trouble. He needs my help,” she said.

“He?” Dean tried to ignore the twinge of jealousy.

“Angel,” she said and his eyebrows rose.

“The vampire? Buffy’s boyfriend?” he asked, remembering the big fuss there’d been about him in Sunnydale when he and Sam had been there.

“The same, but he’s not Buffy’s boyfriend anymore. He got me through some rough stuff a while back. I owe him,” she said.

“We’ll go with you. We can help,” Dean said, but she was shaking her head.

“No, it’s okay. We can handle it. Hopefully it won’t take long.”

There was a long silence before Dean asked, “When are you leaving?”

“We should go as soon as possible, now, tonight, but-“ Faith paused, looking at him.

“Dawn and Sam,” Dean supplied, searching for an excuse and Faith nodded.

“We’ll give them tonight. We can leave first thing in the morning,” she said, sounding relieved.

~*~

Dawn hung up the phone and put it back in her pocket. Sam was watching her, waiting, she supposed, to find out what was going on.

“That was Faith. I guess she and I are leaving in the morning for LA. We’ve got a friend there that needs a hand,” she told him.

“And we’re not coming with you?” he guessed. She shrugged.

“Guess not. I’m assuming Faith decided we can handle things. You and Dean should go ahead to the Roadhouse, find out what you can. I’m sure we’ll be meeting back up with you guys as soon as we get things taken care of,” she told him. She looked down at her plate, mostly empty now and wasn’t really hungry anymore.

“You ready to go?” he asked, as if reading her mind. She nodded.

“Yeah, lets get out of here,” she said. She dug in her pocket and pulled out enough money for her meal, paying on her way out and waiting for Sam as he paid for his food. They walked in silence to the motel, seeing that Dean and Faith’s room was mostly dark. Dawn waited while Sam unlocked the door and then followed him inside.

She didn’t know if it was force of habit for all of them, or what, but they’d once again asked for two rooms with two beds when they’d checked into the motel. There was absolutely no doubt in Dawn’s mind that one of the beds in the other room was vacant, of course.

“You can have first shower,” she told Sam, going to her bag to start getting her things out for bed. He flashed her a smile.

“Thanks, I’ll be quick,” he said. He grabbed what looked like a pair of sweats out of the side pocket of his backpack and headed for the bathroom. Despite their kiss earlier in the day, things were back to being awkward and it was driving Dawn insane. She thought they’d gotten past that stage. One way or another, she was going to get it through Sam Winchester’s head that wanted to be with him and this distance between them just wasn’t going to cut it.

He was fast, true to his word. It was less than ten minutes later that he came out and said, “It’s all yours.”

Dawn picked up her clothes and her small toiletries bag and headed into the bathroom. The room was still warm and steamy and she quickly undressed, clipping her hair up on top of her head to keep it dry before stepping into the shower. She wasn’t nearly as fast as Sam had been, using her own scented soap, shaving and then, once she got out, using lotion on her arms and legs. She slipped a t-shirt on and it fell to mid-thigh, then she looked at her panties, still sitting on the counter, chewing her lip as she tried to decide. In the end, she put them into the little bag with her lotion, razor and soap, picked up her dirty clothes and left the bathroom, flipping off the light.

The room was dark and she set her bag and the pile of clothes on the chair by the window, then made her way toward the beds. Hers was on the right, furthest from the door. She could barely see the shape of him under the covers in his bed, from the tiny amount of light that was coming through the blinds. Taking a breath to steady herself, she walked past her own bed and pulled back the blankets, sliding into bed beside him.

“Dawn?”

Sam sat up and turned toward her, seeming startled.

“It’s just me,” she said.

“What are you doing?” he asked, after a moment’s pause.

“What do you think?” she countered, leaning close and kissing him. He seemed to hesitate for a minute and then he was kissing her back, his hands finding her waist, pulling her closer. Dawn put her arms around his neck, rising onto her knees to face him, feeling the heat of his bare chest through the thin t-shirt. Sam broke the kiss, pulling back, just enough to look at her.

“Dawn, you don’t have to-“

“Sam, shut up,” she said, pulling his head back down to hers.

His hands slid down her back, over her hips, until his fingers were on bare skin on the back of her thighs. His palms skimmed up, finding only bare skin and he paused for a moment before his hands pressed firmly against her, lifting her so that she was wrapping her legs around his waist. He laid her back against the pillows, hands sliding up and pulling the shirt with them, until she was arching up to help him remove it completely, leaving her lying naked before him. She looked up at Sam, suddenly feeling shy, resisting the urge to cross her arms over her bare breasts. He must’ve sensed it, because he whispered, “You’re beautiful.”

~*~

Faith was grinning when she watched Dawn and Sam walk out of the motel room. Dawn was holding her backpack over one shoulder, looking up at Sam with a smile and Sam had his arm around her. They were talking quietly and she thought she heard Dawn say something about them being back as soon as they could. Faith could get behind the idea, though. She looked over at Dean, who was beside her, leaning on the Impala, looking at Sam with what seemed like pride on his face.

She and Dean both managed to stay silent, watching the two of them, until Dawn turned around and put her arms around Sam’s neck, stretching up on her toes to kiss him. He kissed her back and Dean apparently couldn’t help himself any longer.

“Aw, come on, Sammy, you guys just spent the whole night together! Let’s go, time to get on the road,” he said, grinning and Faith had to bite back her laugh. Dawn was blushing when she turned around and Sam gave Dean a look that said he was going to pay for that later.

“Let’s go, girlfriend, we got some miles to cover,” Faith said and Dawn nodded, looking back at Sam.

“We’ll see you soon,” she said and he smiled at her, that killer smile that made school girls draw little hearts all over their notebooks with his initials in them and Faith shook her head. She wasn’t into Sam that way, but damn. If he smiled at girls that way more often, he’d never spend a night alone. Then again, she reasoned, if he did that he wouldn’t be Sam. Dawn got into the car and Sam walked around to the passenger side of the Impala.

Faith turned to Dean, sliding her hands into the back pockets of her jeans to keep from touching him, from hugging him, doing the whole mushy girly scene like Sam and Dawn had and she so wanted to for some stupid reason.

“So you guys are headed to the Roadhouse?” she asked.

“Yeah. Our contact there, Ash, said he might have something for us on the demon that killed our parents,” he said. She nodded, chewing her lip for a moment. Dean didn’t talk about his parents much, or the yellow-eyed demon, not with anyone but Sam.

“Then we’ll call, when we take care of the problem in L.A. We’ll meet up with you then,” she said, feeling strangely uncertain of herself. The feeling vanished when Dean took a step, closing the distance between them and grabbed her waist, yanking her against him and kissing her, hard. She gave in to her need to touch him then, putting her arms around his neck, returning the kiss until they both pulled back, breathless.

“So I’ll see you,” she said, her eyes locking on his.

“Yeah,” he said, one hand coming up, fingers brushing over her mouth, before he released her, stepping back.

Faith bit her lip, teeth pressing where his fingers had touched, then turned and got into the car, starting the engine and pulling out of the parking lot, refusing to look back, but glancing in the rearview anyway, to see him standing beside the Impala, watching them go.

“Um,” she heard and glanced over to see Dawn staring at her with a smirk.

“Shut up,” she said and Dawn laughed.

~*~

One month later…

“Really, Angel, the next time you get the urge to lose your soul, don’t,” Faith said, sighing as she tossed her backpack into the trunk of the car. She turned to face the vampire, leaning back against the car.

“Thanks for coming. No one could have done this but you,” he said, looking guilty and grateful at the same time. Once again, Angelus had been set loose on the world and Faith had had to come and do damage control. They’d called Willow, of course, but it had taken her almost two weeks to get her hands on an Orb of Thessula to do the spell and put his soul back. Then another week to clean up the mess Angelus had made while he was free.

“You’re sure the powers that be lifted the curse? The bad part, I mean?” Dawn was asking Willow and the witch nodded.

“Positive. Angel won’t be losing his soul again,” Willow said.

“Good,” Dawn said, her voice muffled as she hung over the seat upside down, searching for the chapstick she’d dropped. She paused, then her head popped up.

“Hey, Faith, I found your cell phone!” she said and Faith turned around, reaching through the window and taking it from her.

“I’m not even gonna ask how it ended up under there,” Willow said, wisely. Faith raised an eyebrow and smiled.

“What can I say, I’m a little disorganized. It was on vibrate so I couldn’t call it and find it. Damn thing’s been missing since we got here.” She reached through the window in the front seat and grabbed the charger from the glove box, plugging it into the cigarette lighter and watching the screen light up, wondering…

The display flashed “13 missed calls” and she flipped through them quickly. They were all from Dean and she grinned, dialing her voicemail while Dawn continued to say her goodbyes.

The first three messages were pretty much, “Hey, how’s it going” and “Hope you’re still alive” but the last one…

The static was thick on the line, but she could swear Dean was crying. She caught a few words, “Sam… gone… don’t know… stabbed…” and she went cold. Sam hadn’t called Dawn since shortly after they left, but they’d just assumed that he and Dean were busy on a job. Now she looked at Dawn, wondering just how wrong they’d been. She listened a minute longer, heard “Cold Oak, South Dakota” and “Bobby” and then the message ended.


“Dawn,” she said, hearing the change in her own voice. Dawn stopped talking mid-sentence and looked at her, eyes wide.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, recognizing Faith’s all business tone.

“We have to go, now,” Faith said and Dawn looked over at Willow, Angel and the others.

“See you guys,” she said, with a regretful half smile, before she got into the car. Faith was already starting the engine and pulled away from the curb before Dawn even got her seatbelt buckled.

“Faith, what is it?” Dawn asked, watching the set of Faith’s jaw, the tension in her shoulders.

“Something’s wrong. I think something happened to Sam,” Faith said, shortly and Dawn stared at her.

“What do you mean, something happened to Sam?” Dawn asked, quietly. Faith handed her cell phone over and Dawn dialed the voicemail, listening to the garbled message, a week old according to the date, her fingers tightening on the phone. When it ended, she hung up, staring at the Motorola Razor for a moment before digging her own phone out of her pocket.

“What are you doing?” Faith asked, glancing at her as she took the onramp onto the freeway.

“I have Bobby’s number in my phone. Sam gave it to me, in case anything ever happened,” Dawn said, flipping open her phone and scrolling through the contacts until she found Bobby Singer. Chewing her lip, stomach knotted with worry, Dawn pushed talk and waited for an answer.