Chapter 3: Stolen Moments
The basement air was cold and smelled of gun oil and old concrete. Sadie had followed him down under the pretense of needing .45 rounds, but the moment the door clicked shut behind them, the pretense evaporated. “Two weeks,” she said, her voice flat in the dim light of a single bare bulb. Xavier didn’t turn from the rack of shotguns, his shoulders tense. “You made your choice.” “I didn’t choose anything,” she shot back, stepping closer. “I got in the car. That’s all.” He finally turned, his eyes dark and unreadable. “Same thing.” The space between them crackled, thick with everything unsaid since the motel. In one fluid motion, she closed the distance, shoving him back against a stack of olive-drab ammo crates. His surprise lasted only a second before his hands were on her, rough and claiming, pulling her against him. There was no gentle lead-up, just the frantic scrape of zippers and the shift of denim. She climbed onto him, biting his shoulder to stifle her gasp as she took him inside, the cold metal of the crate searing through her jeans. He gripped a fistful of her pink hair, not gently, using it to angle her mouth to his in a brutal, searching kiss. Their rhythm was punishing, a physical argument of teeth and clutching fingers. Upstairs, the faint sound of Sam moving, of coffee mugs clinking, was a world away. “This doesn’t fix it,” Xavier rasped against her throat, even as his hips drove up into her. “Wasn’t trying to fix it,” she panted, her forehead pressed to his, each word a hot breath shared. “Just trying to feel it.” A crate lid dug into her back, a sharp pain that only sharpened the coil of heat tightening in her core. His grip on her hair tightened, his other hand splayed possessively on her lower back, holding her down onto him as he thrust up, once, twice, a third time, and she shattered, her cry swallowed by his mouth. He followed with a choked, ragged groan, his body bowing into hers. For a long minute, the only sound was their ragged breathing and the distant hum of the furnace. Slowly, he released her hair, his hand coming up to cradle the back of her head instead, his thumb stroking her jaw. The tenderness of the gesture was more devastating than the sex. “Sadie,” he started, his voice raw. The basement door opened above, Sam’s voice calling down, “You guys find those rounds?” They froze, entangled, caught.
They froze, entangled, caught.
Footsteps descended the wooden stairs, slow and unsuspecting. Sam’s head came into view, then his shoulders, his expression shifting from casual inquiry to stunned, horrified processing in the span of a single heartbeat. His eyes, wide behind his glasses, darted from Sadie’s flushed face to Xavier’s gripped hands on her hips, to the unmistakable, intimate join of them.
He physically recoiled, stumbling back a step as if struck.
“Uh…I’m gonna leave you guys…to…whatever this is…” Sam stammered, his voice strangled, his gaze fixed desperately on a point on the ceiling. “Just…clean up after? Please?” He didn’t wait for a response, already fleeing back up the stairs. The door slammed shut with a finality that vibrated through the silent basement.
The slam seemed to unstick them. Sadie shoved herself off of Xavier, her movements jerky and furious as she yanked her jeans up. The cold air hit her sweat-slicked skin, raising goosebumps. Xavier turned away, adjusting his own clothes with a sharp, efficient rigidity, his back a wall of tense muscle.
“Well,” Sadie spat, the word tasting like copper and shame. “That’s one way to tell him.” Xavier didn’t answer, just ran a hand over his mouth. She could still feel the ghost of his hands, one in her hair, one on her back, the terrifying contrast of brutality and tenderness. “Say something, damn it.” He finally looked at her, his eyes hollow. “What’s left to say?” He grabbed his jacket from the floor, the movement slicing through the thick air. “It’s all said now.” He took the stairs two at a time, leaving her alone in the gloom with the taste of his skin and her brother’s shattered expression hanging in the air between the crates.
He took the stairs two at a time, leaving her alone in the gloom with the taste of his skin and her brother’s shattered expression hanging in the air between the crates. She didn’t move for a long time, just sat on the cold metal, feeling the imprint of him fading from her body. The basement’s silence was a physical weight.
Eventually, slow footsteps creaked on the stairs again. Sam came down, not meeting her eyes at first, his hands shoved deep in his pockets. He leaned against the workbench, studying a stained map.
“I’m not mad.” Sam said, his voice careful. “Surprised? Definitely. Find it a bit weird? Yeah. But mad? No.” He finally looked at her, his gaze soft behind his glasses. “You’re an adult. He’s… well, he’s a hunter who doesn’t stick around.”
Sadie let out a shaky breath she didn’t know she was holding. “It’s not like that.” “Which part?” Sam asked, gentle. “The part where you’re risking your heart, or the part where he’s risking Dean finding out?” The question hung there, blunt and unavoidable. She picked at a splinter on the crate, the memory of Xavier’s confession in the motel bed colliding with his cold exit this morning.
“It’s complicated,” she muttered, the word utterly inadequate. “It always is,” Sam sighed, pushing off the bench. “Just be careful, Sadie. He’s got ghosts.” “We all do,” she shot back, but her defiance was thin. Sam nodded, accepting that. “He’s good in a fight. I’ll give him that.” A faint, wry smile touched his lips. “The hair-pulling thing, though? Not my business.” A startled laugh burst from her, sharp and relieving. It broke the tension, leaving something raw and real in its place.
It broke the tension, leaving something raw and real in its place. Sam pulled her into a sudden, tight hug, his concern radiating through the simple gesture. “Just…be safe.” Sam says hugging her.
He released her and headed upstairs, leaving her alone with the echo of his warning. She found Xavier outside by the cars, leaning against the Impala’s fender as if waiting for a storm. The afternoon light cut across the weary lines of his face, highlighting the faint bruise her teeth had left on his shoulder.
“Your brother give you the lecture?” he asked, his voice devoid of its usual edge. “Something like that,” she said, stopping a few feet away, the gravel crunching under her boots. He pushed off the car, closing the distance in two strides, his hand coming up to cradle her jaw.
His thumb traced the line of her cheekbone, a touch so startlingly gentle her breath hitched. “This is a terrible idea,” he murmured, his eyes searching hers. “I know,” she breathed, leaning into his palm.
He kissed her then, not with the fury of the basement, but with a slow, devastating certainty that felt like a farewell. It tasted like coffee and regret. When he pulled back, his forehead rested against hers. “I’m not a good man, Sadie.”
“I’m not asking you to be.” The words were a vow she didn’t fully understand. He nodded once, a sharp, resigned gesture, and opened the passenger door of his truck for her. “Then let’s go.”
Before she could move, the roar of the Chevelle’s engine split the quiet. Dean’s car skidded to a halt in the driveway, kicking up dust. He emerged, his expression thunderous, his gaze locking directly on Xavier’s hand still holding the truck door open.
He emerged, his expression thunderous, his gaze locking directly on Xavier’s hand still holding the truck door open. The air in the driveway curdled, thick with the scent of hot engine oil and impending violence. Dean’s boots crunched gravel with deliberate, heavy steps as he closed the distance, his focus a laser on Xavier’s face. “What the fuck?” Dean says, the words low and dangerous, each one a coiled spring.
Xavier slowly let go of the door handle, his own posture shifting into something neutral yet ready, a wolf deciding whether to stand its ground. “Dean…” Sam, who’s on the porch now, snaps at him, his voice cutting through the static. “Stop.” Dean’s head whipped toward his brother, betrayal flashing in his eyes. “Did you know?” Dean points at Sam, his finger a rigid accusation.
Sam descended the porch steps, placing himself partially between Dean and the truck. “I…found out.” Sam shrugs, his hands raised in a placating gesture that did nothing to soften Dean’s glare. A muscle in Dean’s jaw ticked, his eyes darting from Sam’s guilty face to Sadie’s defiant one beside the truck. “I didn’t say that,” Sam continues, his voice firming up. “But she is a legal consenting adult. You can’t stop her from doing whatever or whoever she wants.” Sam says.
Dean’s argument deflated relatively fast at that, the rigid anger in his shoulders slumping into a frustrated, bewildered exhaustion. He stared at Sadie, his expression crumbling from outrage into a raw, helpless concern that was somehow worse. The silence stretched, filled only by the tick of cooling engines. “We’re being safe, Dean.” Sadie whispers, the words barely audible but sharp in the quiet.
He looked at her, really looked, seeing the woman she was becoming, not the kid he remembered. His gaze flicked to Xavier, a long, measuring look that held a lifetime of unspoken warnings. Finally, Dean shook his head, turned on his heel, and walked back to the Chevelle without another word. The door slammed, the engine roared, and he was gone, leaving a cloud of dust and unresolved tension hanging in his wake.
The dust settled into an awful silence. Sam let out a long, weary breath, scrubbing a hand over his face. “He’ll cool off…just maybe don’t make out in front of him for a while.” Sam says before walking inside.
The screen door slapped shut behind him, leaving Sadie and Xavier alone in the gravel drive. The space between them felt charged, different. “You still getting in this truck?” Xavier asked, his voice low. He wasn’t looking at her; he was watching the empty road, a sentinel braced for a return that wouldn’t come tonight.
Sadie yanked the passenger door open. “We’ve got a job.” The seat was sun-warmed leather, familiar and foreign. He slid behind the wheel, the cab suddenly intimate with the scent of him, gunpowder, and the lingering echo of the basement. He didn’t start the engine immediately, just gripped the steering wheel, his knuckles pale. “That wasn’t just a lecture,” he stated, a fact. “That was a line in the sand. For him.” “The line’s behind me,” she said, staring straight ahead. He finally turned the key, the engine’s growl cutting off any reply. The headlights cut twin swaths through the descending twilight as they pulled onto the blacktop, leaving the safe house behind. She watched the trees blur past, her reflection a ghost over the darkening landscape. “This haunting Sam mentioned,” Xavier began, his tone shifting into work-mode, a deliberate shelving of the personal. “The patterns suggest a wraith, not a standard spirit. Feed on regret, not anger.” “Lovely,” Sadie muttered, folding her arms. “We’ve got a surplus of that.” A faint, almost imperceptible smirk touched his mouth. He reached across the console, his hand finding hers, not holding it, just resting his calloused fingers over her knuckles for three solid seconds before returning to the gearshift. The simple contact was a volt of pure, undiluted current. It promised nothing and everything. The road ahead was dark, long, and empty.
The road ahead was dark, long, and empty. They drove for an hour in a silence that was neither comfortable nor hostile, just full of the words they couldn’t take back. The neon sign of a roadside diner finally broke the monotony, its flickering pink glow bleeding across the wet asphalt. "We should eat," Xavier said, his voice rough from disuse. "And ask some questions." The diner was mostly empty, smelling of stale coffee and fried grease. A tired waitress with a name tag reading "Darlene" slid two menus toward them without making eye contact.
"Rough night?" Sadie asked her, aiming for a lightness she didn't feel. Darlene just shrugged, her gaze darting toward the large window overlooking the dark woods. "It's always a rough night out here lately." Xavier leaned forward, his elbows on the Formica. "How so?" "Things go missing," Darlene muttered, polishing the same spot on the counter with a rag. "Then they turn up broken. Or worse, they whisper at you from the shadows." She looked directly at Sadie, her eyes hollow. "You feel watched. You feel like all your worst regrets are crawling up your throat."
Sadie exchanged a glance with Xavier; the wraith theory was solidifying. "Anyplace specific?" Xavier kept his tone casual, disarming. "The old Barton place," Darlene said, nodding toward the black tree line. "Nobody goes there since the funeral. But the feeling… it spreads." She walked away, her shoulders hunched. Xavier’s knee brushed Sadie’s under the table, a fleeting, deliberate contact. "We'll head there after," he said, low, his eyes already scanning the darkness beyond the glass. "This is it, isn't it?" Sadie whispered, the thrill of the hunt momentarily pushing the personal chaos aside. He gave a single, sharp nod, his expression grimly focused. "Yeah. This is the haunting."
The old Barton house was a skeleton of peeling clapboard hunched against the moon. They moved through the overgrown yard, the wet grass soaking their boots, the only sound the crunch of their steps and the low murmur of Xavier’s voice outlining the plan. "It'll go for the weakest emotional point in the room," he said, checking the iron rounds in his revolver. "We draw it out, salt and burn the remains." Sadie nodded, her own knife heavy in her hand, but a deep, irrational chill was already settling in her bones, unrelated to the night air. The front door groaned open to a parlor frozen in time, dust swirling in their flashlight beams.
A wedding photo on the mantle showed smiling faces, now just faded ghosts behind cracked glass. "Regret central," Sadie whispered, trying to shake the creeping sense of being personally watched. Xavier moved toward the kitchen, but Sadie felt pulled to the staircase, a cold draft whispering down the steps. "Conners, wait," she started, but a voice, thin and familiar, slithered into her ear. "He’ll leave you." It was her own voice, layered with a static hiss. She spun, flashlight cutting empty space. Xavier was back at her side in an instant, his hand on her arm. "What is it?"
"Did you hear that?" she asked, her breath fogging. He hadn’t. The temperature plummeted around them, a cold that originated from her own chest, a sucking hollow feeling. Shadows in the corner thickened, not into a person, but into a shimmering, man-shaped distortion, like heat haze over asphalt. It didn't look at Xavier. It faced her. A deep, resonant ache bloomed behind her sternum, the visceral memory of Dean’s betrayed face, of Sam’s disappointment, of Xavier saying This is a terrible idea. "It's not just in the house," Xavier realized, his voice tight with a new urgency. He stepped between her and the form, but it passed through him as if he were mist, its focus absolute. The cold drilled into her, and the whispers weren't echoes of the dead Bartons.
They were her own. You’re a mess. You ruin things. He’ll be gone by morning. The wraith was a black hole, and it was feeding exclusively on the storm of regret it had stirred inside Sadie Winchester.
The cold wasn’t in the air anymore; it was in her veins, crystallizing every doubt she’d ever swallowed. The whispering voice sharpened, morphing from a hiss into the clear, cruel tone she used on herself in motel bathroom mirrors at 3 AM. He only wants the fight, not the fallout. You saw how he left at the safe house. You’re just convenient. Xavier was shouting, but his words were muffled, distant thumps against the roaring static in her skull. She could see his mouth moving, see him firing the revolver—the iron round passing through the shimmering form with no effect.
It fed on the metaphysical, not the physical. It was drinking her guilt about Dean, her shame in the basement, her terror that Xavier’s confession in the motel was just another weapon he knew how to use. The pressure built behind her eyes, a screaming, psychic headache. “STOP…” SADIE IS GRIPPING HER HEAD NOW. “STOP IT. PLEASE…STOP!” She wasn’t talking to Xavier. She was begging her own mind. Xavier didn’t hesitate. He dropped the gun, grabbed the salt canister from his belt, and didn’t throw it at the wraith.
He stepped directly into its chilling presence and poured the entire contents over Sadie’s bowed head and shoulders. The coarse crystals shredded the psychic connection for a fractured second. The whispering ceased. In that sudden, silent vacuum, his hands clamped onto her face, forcing her to meet his gaze. “Look at me. It’s lying. It eats lies.” His thumbs brushed sharp salt grains from her cheekbones. “Your regret is its gasoline. Stop feeding it.” The wraith reformed, angrier, hungrier, the air around it warping. Xavier kept his eyes locked on hers, his voice cutting through the returning drone. “Tell me one true thing. Right now.”
The words tore from a raw, unfiltered place the wraith couldn’t touch. "I LOVE YOU." SADIE WHISPERS BACK, the admission explosive in the dusty silence, not sweet but a guttural defiance. The warping air around the entity shivered like a struck bell.
A high, thin shriek of rage tore from the nothingness where its mouth should have been. It recoiled, the psychic cold retreating from her bones as if scalded. Xavier’s breath hitched, his eyes widening for a fractured second before his grip on her face tightened, accepting the truth as a tool. "Then burn it," he growled, shoving the lighter into her salt-gritted palm and turning her toward the source of the draft—a rotten floorboard by the hearth hiding a child’s hair ribbon, the focus. She sparked the flame and dropped it, the fire catching with a hungry whump that painted the room in violent orange shadows. The shriek became a fading wail, sucked into the void as the ribbon blackened. The oppressive weight vanished, leaving only the crackle of fire and their ragged breathing. Sadie swayed, the emotional hemorrhage leaving her hollowed. He caught her before her knees buckled, his arms wrapping around her, holding her upright against his solid warmth. They stayed like that until the fire burned down to embers, his chin resting on her salt-streaked hair.
The smoke tasted like burned plastic and old tears. He didn’t let go, even when her shaking subsided into something quieter and more final. “We should move,” he finally said, his voice gravel against her ear, but his arms stayed locked around her. She nodded into his chest, the salt from her hair dusting his jacket like gray frost. Every muscle protested as he helped her stand, her legs wobbly as a newborn colt’s.
The night air outside was a shock, clean and sharp, scouring the smell of the house from their clothes. They walked to the truck in silence, his hand a steadying pressure on the small of her back. He opened the passenger door for her, his movements deliberate, almost formal. She climbed in, the leather seat cold through her jeans, and watched him circle the hood, his profile etched by the moon.
He slid in, started the engine, and didn’t drive. The headlights cut two lonely paths into the trees. “What you said in there,” he began, staring straight ahead, his knuckles white on the wheel.
“Was ammunition,” she finished, her own voice hollow. “I know.” She was so tired. “It worked, didn’t it?”
He turned then, the interior light painting harsh lines across his face. He looked stripped bare, all his usual guarded control incinerated in that parlor. “It wasn’t ammunition.” He reached over, his fingers brushing the lingering salt from her temple, his touch terrifyingly gentle. “It was the truth. And it’s the only thing that’s ever fucking scared me.” He swallowed, the sound loud in the quiet cab. “I’M NOT LEAVING YOU. EVER.”