Supernatural Fresh Meat by Alice Henderson Read Free Book Online

felt a pang of regret for how he’d been raised, the hardened lifestyle he and Sam had been plunged into after the death of their mother. Most kids would be jealous that their dad spent time practicing in batting cages with other kids, and here Dean was jealous that this guy got to kill monsters with his dad and probably risk his own neck.
    “What brings you to town?” Jason asked, taking a sip of his beer.
    “A case,” Sam answered.
    Bobby leaned in. “You know anything about the folks disappearing out by Emigrant Gap?”
    Jason shook his head in consternation. “Hell, yes, I do. Tried to burn the sucker three weeks back. Thing cracked three of my ribs, tore some cartilage in my shoulder. I’ve barely begun to recover. But I’m going back.” He gestured at them with the bottle. “That why you’re here?”
    Dean nodded. “Yep.”
    “That thing’ll have you for dinner. I’ve never hunted one of them before, though I remember my parents telling me about one they killed in Oregon before I was born.”
    Dean felt some perverse pride rise up in him. “We killed one out by Blackwater Ridge in Colorado a few years ago.”
    Jason raised his eyebrows. “Oh, yeah? How bad you get hurt?”
    Jason wasn’t wrong to assume. That thing had done a number on them.
    Bobby was all business. “You know where its lair is?”
    The hunter stared out the window for a minute, then looked back at them. “I can get you close. I couldn’t find the actual nest, but I knew I was near. It’s an old mine near Sawtooth Ridge. Everything pointed to there.” He looked down, frowning. “It got me before I got a chance to take it out.”
    Bobby pulled the topographic map out of his pocket. “Can you mark it on here?”
    “I’ll do you one better. I’ll take you. Thing got the better of me once. It ain’t gonna happen again. It needs to go down.” He winced as he shifted his weight on the barstool.
    Dean wondered if Jason was damaged goods. Maybe no more so than Bobby, with his bruised ribs. But with Bobby’s tracking skills and this guy’s knowledge of the area, they stood a good chance, even if they were all a little banged up.
    “What do you say?” Jason asked him.
    Outside, a sudden wind kicked up, bringing a cloud of dust past the saloon windows. Dean saw an honest-to-god tumbleweed go by. Sam looked to Bobby and him. “I think we could use him.”
    Bobby took a swig of his beer. “Agreed.”
    They slapped a twenty down on the bar and got up.
    Jimmy rushed over. “You leavin’ already?” Dean noticed that his front teeth were brown and a few were missing entirely.
    “Good meeting you, Jimmy,” Dean told him.
    Jimmy gazed at him hopefully, clutching his bar rag with both hands. “Maybe I could ride shotgun?”
    Behind him, the bartender waved her hand across her throat in the gesture movie directors use to say “Cut” and shook her head.
    “Maybe next time,” Dean said, giving him a light, friendly punch on the arm.
    “Aw, hell.” Jimmy turned away, defeated.
    That night they ate at the Enraged Cow and Sippery, Dean finishing off a steak lathered in BBQ sauce and topped with crispy onion curls. Bobby ate a salad and Sam a turkey pita.
    Then, with Jason following them in his beat-up Chevy pickup, they drove back in the darkness toward Emigrant Gap.
    They restocked in Reno in a twenty-four-hour outfitter that had everything from warm jammies to guns, crossbows, combat boots, and night-vision goggles. They even got a second flamethrower for Sam. Dean had to love Nevada.
    Jason limped up to the cashier, who tried not to stare. Jason was right. The wendigo had messed him up good.
    In a low voice, Sam said, “Sure we want to take Jason on this hunt? Look at him.”
    Bobby frowned. “Was wondering that myself.”
    “Me, too,” Dean added. “But he’ll be helpful. If he can keep up.”
    “He has got useful intel,” Bobby conceded.
    While Jason finished checking out, Bobby grabbed the Reno Gazette off the stacks.