Dean walked out of the study holding the blueprints.
“How the hell can she be missing?” he said running his fingers through his hair in frustration.
“Calm down,” Sam said knowing better than to touch him when he was angry.
Sam, Lee and his brother, the other officer had checked the entire house and outside without finding Cassie. But Dean insisted on going with them to check again, twenty minutes later as they stood in the kitchen Dean remembered the blueprints he was carrying.
“Wait, if Cassie didn’t leave the house than she has to be here right?”
He cleared off a spot on the counter and showed them the blueprint that didn’t match the house even though it had the same date as the one that corresponded with the layout as it was now.

Lee, the young afro American cop, didn’t like Dean; he felt he was too arrogant for his own good. Lee had dated Cassie when they were freshman and he still had a crush on her though she had no idea. Dean could tell Lee knew something he wasn’t sharing.
“This reminds me of something Cas mentioned when she was younger that she and her friends played hide and seek in some secret area. Do you know anything about that Lee? You two grew up together right?” Dean asked looking suspiciously at him.

He didn’t answer right away; he just looked at Dean like he hadn’t said anything.
“We’re wasting time,” Sam interrupted in an attempt to move things along.
“He’s right; you said you were her friend. If you know something tell us,” Dean insisted trying to be civil while all he wanted to do was punch the guy.
“I haven’t thought about that in years,” he said finally.
He reached for the blueprints and showed them how they worked together.
“We should go through the wine cellar because it’s easier,” he said heading toward a door in the corner and down a short hall, something that wasn’t an obvious part of the kitchen.
Lee asked his brother to stay upstairs to let the sheriff know what was going on when he arrived.

When they entered the hidden part of the house the first thing Dean noticed was the musty dampness and the lack of light. Lee ran back to the kitchen to find a flashlight then came back. The floor was uncarpeted as the long hallway led to a section of cubicle looking areas without doors. They found Cassie in one of them. Her eyes were covered with a bandanna, her mouth and hands with duct taped. When they saw her she seemed to be unconscious. They had been calling her name since they came down the stairs without hearing a response. The only sound was water dripping from some hidden source.
Dean rushed to her side; but Lee stopped him to carefully remove an envelope that was taped to her shirt which was ripped. He gave Dean the tape to put back on her shirt to hold it together.
“Maybe there are fingerprints, we’ll get the tape when we get to the hospital,” Lee said getting out of Dean’s way.
“Cas,” Dean said touching her head to raise it.
He gently pulled the tape off her mouth as she seemed to be coming around.
“Cas, I’m here,” he said in her ear.

She stretched and groaned in pain as she wrapped her arms around his neck while he helped her up. Then he realized his hand was wet from her hair and he was surprised to see blood. Why would they treat her with such disregard? He reached for his cell to call 911 but figured out quickly there was no signal. Lee went up to make the call while Dean helped her out of the chair. Sam stood by waiting in case Dean needed his help; but he had a hunch Dean wanted to be the one to do this for her.

Once they were in the light Sam saw the blood. “She’s bleeding?”
“Well, it was on her scalp but it seems to have stopped,” Dean said as he helped her to a seat.
“We’re going to wait for an ambulance, okay,” he said kneeling in front of her holding her hands.
“Thanks,” she said as he put his hands on her face and kissed her while trying hold in his emotions.
Dean went to retrieve her purse and searched it for a hair band. One of the first things he learned dating a woman of color was that she had to always look presentable. Once he found it he gently pulled her hair back into a loose low ponytail. He didn’t know his idea of gentle was painful for her but it was the thought that counted. Sam wondered what he was doing and smiled with the explanation. His brother truly was in love. Cassie smiled weakly at him, happy that he remembered. Once the ambulance arrived Dean rode with her and Sam followed in the car after grabbing the bag and the blueprints. Maybe all of this will help us with the mystery.

At the hospital, they took Cassie to a room while Lee talked to Dean and Sam in the hall about the note.
“It said she needed to leave town before she really got hurt; and it called her all kinds of racially explicit names,” he whispered.
“I don’t get this I’m starting to think something is in that house or on that property that someone wants.” Dean said.
“Cyrus’ is family built and owned that house originally, right?” Sam asked.
“Yea, years ago, they built a lot of the town.” “We’ll discuss this later,” Dean said going to the desk to find Cassie’s room.

When he saw her she was sitting up in bed drinking some water.
“I’m fine, they only gave me ten stitches but I have to stay overnight,” she said with a smile as Sam walked in behind Dean wearing a silly smile.
She told them what happened. She decided to go to the kitchen to warm up some food when someone hit her in the head from behind and put their hands over her mouth and eyes while they taped her hands. She believed there were two people involved but neither said anything, which enforced the idea she knew them, of course, there were few people she didn’t know around town. It happened right after she left them, so fast there wasn’t time for her to scream out.
“I did kick one of them while I was struggling, but I doubt if it really hurt him; they may have a bruise though,” she said looking as though she was in pain.

“I knew you were a fighter as stubborn as you are. Do you have a headache still?” Dean said taking her hand and kissing it, then he kissed her forehead and couldn’t resist kissing her mouth in the end.
“A little,” she said running her finger down his jaw line.
“How did you find me?” she asked.
When he told her that Lee remembered the area from when they were younger; she informed Dean that she didn’t know Lee when she was young, he didn’t move into the area until high school.
“I don’t know how he would know about our house,” with concern in her face. Dean was furious but he tried not to let it show, Sam stepped in.
“It’s okay; we’re still trying to figure this out, you just rest,” Sam said.
“He’s right we aren’t going anywhere tonight; we are spending the night here,” Dean added.
Dean insisted she close her eyes and take a nap.

They stepped out in the hall to talk.
“I know you hate those guys, Dean, but that doesn’t prove they did anything.”
“The hell it doesn’t, they were the only other people in the house and they said they didn’t see anyone, hello,” Dean said as he started to pace and take deep breaths.
“Maybe the people that did this where already in the house hiding,” Sam suggested.
“But if someone was in the house they could get what they wanted anytime without involving Cassie or her family,” Dean replied trying to wrap his mind around the new option.
Dean hated the possibility even more but nodded and excused himself to go to the men’s room while Sam went back in the room.

In the men’s room he leaned on the sink with his hands on the cold porcelain while he finally released his frustration and fear. “ Why? Why is the woman I care about in the middle of this nightmare?” he said hitting the wall as the tears came before he realized it.
They weren’t acceptable so he wiped them away as fast as he could as he left to go take care of his woman.

He ran into Lee as he was leaving the men’s room.
“There you are,” Lee said.
Dean glared at him flexing his fingers, he’s a cop right now that is keeping me from punching him out. I have to keep that in mind or I won’t be free to help Cassie. He reported to him that there weren’t any fingerprints on the tape or the note but the sheriff sealed off the house again since there was another crime committed there. They posted policeman inside hoping to catch whoever was doing these things and to keep searching that second area for clues.
“You guys are leaving after the service tomorrow, right?” he wanted to know.
Dean nodded as he walked away without saying anything.

Back in the room, she heard him come in the door; he looked into her eyes and knew what he felt was real. She made room for him so he lay beside her on the sheet as he put his arms around her.
“I love you,” he said into her ear laying his head on the pillow beside her.
She relaxed against him and smiled as she closed her eyes again.
Sam was across the room watching television; he looked over at them with a smile on his face; enjoying a chance to do something frivolous he crossed his feet and went back to watching the 70’s show.

When the doctor came by a couple of hours later, Cassie and Dean were awake and kissing. Sam cleared his throat when he appeared in the room.
“Just what I ordered, TLC, for Cassie,” he said as Dean got off the bed to get out of Doctor Patterson’s way.
“Hi Doc,” she said.
“Well, Cassie, we’re still keeping you overnight but come back in a week to have the stitches out, okay.”
Cassie nodded and Dean walked out with the doctor to make sure there wasn’t something he was holding back. Doctor Patterson insisted everything was fine; but Dean had the feeling again that he wasn’t telling them the whole truth. When he was back in the room Cassie let him know she had known the doctor all her life but she never really liked him because generally he treated her family like second class citizens.
“You could have fooled me,” Dean said.
“I never wanted him to know how I really felt because it wouldn’t have helped.”
Dean lay beside her again as he sighed.
“I know my being sorry won’t help anything but I am,” he said with a smile as he kissed her nose.
“Keep taming him,” Sam said from across the room.
Dean shot him a look.
“He wouldn’t be the Dean I want if he wasn’t a little impulsive,” she said looking at the man who had her heart.