[h2]Esme[/h2]
When Esme got to the range, and Duke called her sweet pea, she couldn’t help but smile. It was something new. She had never had anyone call her that. If he had already come up with a name for her, did that mean he was already getting comfortable around her, or was that something Duke called all the girls he was around? She shrugged off her thoughts. She couldn’t hold back her laugh when he joked back with her. It may have sounded mean, but it was too funny not to laugh about. “Ah, so I wasn’t imagining that internal struggle.” she laughed. When she asked her question after collecting herself, Esme noticed a change in Duke even though his smile remained. Her smile faded a bit as she watched him look across the yard. She could see she had taken him off guard with her question, so much he had to think before answering her. She watched his actions before he finally spoke. A small smile graced her features when he admitted he mostly just wanted to get to know her and make a new friend. Even though he added, ‘while I’m around, she was perfectly fine with that.

Did that mean he wasn’t planning on sticking around long, as Dean had warned her? Duke sighed and continued, her smile fading at his words. “I may be your shrink, but you don’t ha……” She was cut off by him shooting one of the mannequins, hitting his mark. Esme fell silent as he spoke about the Werewolves and his parents. She never could have imagined he’d tell her about what happened this soon. Her eyes dropped to the gun in her hands after he shot at another target. She knew what it was like losing your parents, or parent in her case, to a monster. When he offered her the targets, Esme pulled the magazine and checked to make sure it was loaded. After popping it back in, she pulled the slide to load a bullet and aimed at a mannequin. She blinked away the tears that were trying to well up in her eyes. She shot the mannequin right between the eyes after Duke finished talking with a heavy sigh. “I’m so sorry, Duke. I know how it feels to lose a parent to a monster you hunt almost daily.” she told him with sorrow heavy in her tone. 

Esme aimed at another target, then shot twice, making a slight adjustment in between, hitting a pan and a can. She lowered the gun along with her head, closed her eyes, and sighed through her nose, fighting the tears. Images of her mother flooded her mind and the night she was taken from her, making her want to close in on herself. She shook her head to clear her thoughts, looked up, and looked at Duke, her hands now shaking as well. Her eyes were glassy, with tears threatening to fall. “It was a Hellhound that….. That killed my mother. I was barely.” she said, her voice filled with tears. She looked back at the targets. She hated it when others saw her teary-eyed. “I don’t know why it came for her. She didn’t seem like the person to make deals with demons…. She always said she had everything she could ever want.” Esme lifted her gun once more, doubled-tapping, hitting a mannequin in the chest before letting it drop to her side along with her head, gritting her teeth. “Then it came for me…. It bit me just above the ankle, snapping the bone. It dragged me three miles from home….”

“It roughed me up pretty good before my father was able to catch up. He showed up just before it turned to attack me.” Esme involuntarily shuddered before lifting her head again, looking out over the yard. Every time she saw the scar, she was reminded of that horrific day. Bringing up her left hand, Esme wiped her eyes. She was tempted to put her gun away and walk over to Duke and hug him, but she refrained from doing so. “What are the odds that we would lose parents in almost similar situations and be used as toys by those monsters?” Esme asked after a brief silence. Esme could hardly believe that all came out to Duke, especially since she had never gotten that far into it with Dean. Closing her eyes, she sniffled, then took a deep breath, slowly letting it out to calm herself down.