Dean had to refrain himself from rolling his eyes the moment the elevator doors opened. He had recently started taking the contraption an hour later, because of the technical glitch that effected the entire company's computers - thanks, Garth - and now he had to redo the past six month's accounts, all over again. From scratch.
Unfortunately, this meant that instead of sharing the elevator with people from the tech floor - them staying until it was indecently late - and maybe other's from his own, he was sharing it with the partner of Sandover's CEO - though Gabriel actually overlooked most of the work even more so than Zachariah - and his brother, whom was apparently being shown around before he took over Gabriel's position.
It would have been fine, really, if a bit awkward. And Castiel was fucking hot. Dean would have proudly admitted to it... if it weren't for the fact that every single time, Gabriel would visibly stop talking in English when Dean stepped in, and switched to Russian. And sure, Dean could have tolerated even that... if the two didn't dig holes into the sides of Dean's he'd until they finally left the elevator, getting off at the lobby while he went the extra floor down to the building's garage - like hell was he gonna park Baby on the streets when he had the safer option.
But anyway. The continuous speaking in another language, knowing that Dean didn't know what they were saying, and obviously taking advantage of it... yeah. Every single time, Dean seriously wondered why he never took the stairs.
"Chuvak," Gabriel whispered not at all quietly to Castiel, his gaze pointed at Dean. "Dlya volokity, on ochen' khoroshiy ulov."
Castiel hummed, looking Dean up and down, but he was a bit more subtle with his staring. Still didn't change the fact that he was looking in the first place. "Vy dolzhny perestat' govorit' tak grubo, Gabriel'." Castiel said. And fuck, okay, god exactly knew what they were talking about. But hearing Castiel's tongues shaping over those letters, was just. Fuck.
Gabriel scoffed, making Dean's hands tighten his grip on the strap of his satchel, before e forcefully reminded himself to ease it up. "Zachem? Yego ne tak, kak on mozhet vse ravno nas."
Castiel hummed. "Eto vse yeshche ne vezhlivo."
Gabriel huffed. "Vse chto pozhelayete." Mercifully, he stayed silent after that. But when they left, Castiel exiting the elevator first with Gabriel following behind, the latter stopped at the doors, looking behind to throw a wink over his shoulder at Dean before moving on.
Yeah. Dean really hated those dicks.
oOo
And so it continued. For the next few weeks, Dean had to suffer through his boss's partner and brothers incomprehensible chattering, and each time he exited the elevators with a small headache forming which only increased with each day.
And then on one of the days, the monotony stopped. Gabriel was suggestively licking a lollipop, which Dean was doing his usual best of avoiding looking at, when Castiel addressed him.
"Do you have the time?"
It took a moment to realize that Castiel was speaking in English, and then another to realize he was addressing him. He was so taken off guard - because, hell, if he thought Castiel speaking in Russian was sexy, the dude actually speaking to him was another thing on its own, with that fucking deep voice and - oh. Right. The man had asked a question.
"Uh, yeah!" Dean jumped a bit, his hand immediately coming up to his face to read his watch, ignoring Gabriel's shit eating smirk. "10:47."
Castiel nodded, and Dean was almost disappointed that he didn't say anything else except for a thank you. Judging by the look on his face, Gabriel was just as exasperated, because he huffed, rolling his eyes.
"Castiel-" he began, but almost immediately, he was cut off.
"Ne govori nichego."
Dean raised his eyebrows when Gabriel shut his mouth closed, though visibly reluctantly.
The elevator fell into awkward silence again.
oOo
After that, they fell into their regular rhythm again, much to Dean's irritation. He actually decided to take the stairs one day, packing up his bag and preparing himself for the long descant, when his phone rang.
"Hello?" He answered, not bothering to check who the caller was.
"Salut frêre."
Immediately, Dean felt his day brighten.
"Sammy! Man, it's been so fucking long - how've you been?" Dean asked, automatically switching to his mother tongue as he spoke to his brother. His actions were a lot more lighter as he flipped his satchel closed, pausing to make sure everything in his office was properly shut down or put away for the day.
The sound of his brother's chuckling over the phone filled Dean with a considerable amount of energy. God, had Dean missed him.
"Busy as always, you know how the life of a lawyer goes."
Dean let out a chuckle of his own, irritatedly repositioning a statue of an angel. No matter how many times he told Alfie, the kid never got the point to stop touching the thing. Even after he finally broke and told him that it was one of the only things left of his mother's. Instead, his personal secretary seemed to take it upon himself after that to make sure the thing was constantly dusted and polished. And always left it in the wrong place afterwards. Had the guy not been sweet and obviously trying to do it for the right intentions, Dean would have probably torn the kid a new one a long time ago.
"Yeah, gotta say, it's kinda been the same for me as well," he jogged back to his computer, moving and clicking the mouse just to make sure that it hadn't gone on screensaver mode on him instead of powering off. "Ever since Garth accidentally let out that bug-"
Sam let out a short burst of laughter. "Man, how'd he even manage that anyway?"
"I don't know!" Dean exclaimed, throwing his hand up in the air - the one that wasn't holding the phone. Satisfied that his computer was turned off, he picked up his satchel, slinging it over his shoulder. "You'd think that with the top of the line security systems or whatever, we wouldn't be dealing with any of this shit. But dude, he's even got Charlie stumped. Charlie, man!" Dean repeated, for emphasis. He moved to pick up his coat, casting one last glance at his office before he left, closing the door firmly behind him. "But anyway, yeah, they're working on, but I've got my own share of duty, and let me tell you, I'm so sick of coming home late at night. I haven't even jerked off in like, weeks."
Sam groaned over the phone. "C'mon, man. I so didn't need to know that." Dean couldn't help but smirk at that.
"But anyway," Sam cleared his throats, and instantly Dean was on high alert. That tone of voice usually meant that Sam was about to start nagging him about something, usually because he talked to someone else who would reveal something about Dean... "I was talking to Jo yesterday."
And oh. Oh, shit. Dean barely had time to remember cursing and swearing at Jo the previous weekend about blue eyes and deep voices and fucking Russians - pun intended - before he realized with a start that he was standing right outside the elevators. And the doors were opening. And Gabriel and Castiel were, as usual, standing inside. Because apparently, his life could get worse.
"Oh my god, Sam. I will do anything, fuck, you can even hound me about this all you want in person," and yeah, he was totally gonna regret that. "But can we please do this later?" He forced a smile on his face as he nodded in greeting to the brothers, before turning to face the elevator doors as he normally did.
"Why, what happened?" Sam's voice was only slightly worried, but he still definitely held that teasing lilt in his voice.
"Because I'm in the elevator and about to lose connection, that's why," Dean spoke in a rush, the words flying so fast out of him that it took his own brain a moment to catch up with his tongue. "I'll talk to you later. Bye, Sammy."
He cut the call, trying not to visibly exhale too hard as he slipped the phone in his pocket.
All was silent, until Gabriel let out a low whistle. "So. You speak French, Mr. Winchester?" Dean bristled, before changing the expression on his face to something more cordial as he turned to look at Gabriel.
"Yes, sir. My mom spoke French." He said shortly, not really willing to explain himself further to Gabriel, of all people, about how because his mother died, in a fit of trying to let his kids have some sort of closeness with their mom, John had left them at Samuel and Deanna Campbell's house every weekend. He didn't want to explain about how, despite Samuel's clear distaste for John, he was still a bit stiff with Sam and Dean, though not as cold. He didn't want to explain that spending his weekend at his maternal grandparent's house was one of the best highlights of Dean's memory, trying to push himself as close as possible to his mother's roots, her history, her childhood home that still held traces of her even after so many years, that in the night's before falling asleep, Dean could pretend his mother was just down the hallway.
"Just your mother?" Castiel asked, and Dean fought off a wince. He was thankful that the guy didn't address Dean's usage of the past tense, but of course he picked up on that instead.
"My dad's Italian." Dean said, kinda awkwardly. Gabriel was starting to look more impressed, and Castiel... he wasn't really sure what to make of Castiel's expression, actually.
The elevator doors opened, and Gabriel straightened from his slouch against it's wall, stretching exaggeratedly - well, as far as he could go with his suit. He made his way out of the elevator first, but stopped, just a little outside of the doors, making Castiel almost bump into his back. Castiel moved backwards to give himself some space - and ended up walking right back into into the elevator. "That reminds me. My brother wanted to ask you something." He grinned, stepping away as he waved brightly, extracting a candy bar from his pocket with a flourish, just as the elevator doors closed.
"Neispravimyy-" Castiel cut himself off with a sigh, his eyes closing as he pinched the bridge of his nose with his index and thumb.
"Uh."
Castiel whipped his head up to look at Dean, looking slightly startled as if he had forgotten Dean was there.
"I apologize about my brother," Castiel waved a hand at the elevator's doors, sighing as he watched the light announcing their current floor change from lobby, to basement. "He's a bit... overeager."
Dean raised his eyebrows, confused. "Overeager?"
And then Castiel was suddenly looking flustered, clearly avoiding meeting Dean's eyes. "I may have mentioned to him that I had a bit of an attraction towards the production manager after my first visit, and after that, he had made me accompany with him every day after my own work just to ride the lift downstairs with you."
Dean felt his jaw slacken, trying to keep up with Castiel's words. "...Attraction?" He finally managed to utter.
Castiel shot him a brief, sheepish grin. "Yes. He was trying to push my to ask you out, and when I had failed to go at his pace, he arranged for a computer expert of our, Ash, to mess with your accounts-"
"Wait, what?"
"Which I apologize severely on his behalf for!" Castiel hastened to explain, his hands raised in a placating gesture. Dean barely registered the elevator's doors opening, suddenly too enraged to focus on anything apart from the man in front of him. The man, who was apparently involved in making him stay way past his hours.
"Do you know how many contracts and accounts we've lost and - because of that - how much work we've fallen behind on?" Dean wasn't yelling, no... but he was pretty damn close to it.
Castiel cringed. "Like I said... Gabriel can be quite overeager."
"Understatement." Dean couldn't help but mutter. Castiel sighed.
"If it's any consolation, Ash can have it fixed just as quickly as he caused the problem-"
"Oh, you better hope that he gets to that soon then." Dean crossed his arms, and then froze. What the fuck was he doing, chewing out his boss's partner's brother - who was soon to be boss's partner - but just as powerful as his boss?
But Castiel didn't seem to care, because he was looking away again. "Yes, I'll tell him to do that immediately."
They fell silent, and Castiel finally seemed to realize that they had already long reached Dean's floor. He pushed the button to open the doors, but Dean couldn't bring himself to leave just yet.
"You know," Dean started hesitantly. "Your brother went through a lot of work for you."
Castiel looked at Dean confusedly. "What?"
"I mean, he kinda toppled our business for the last few months, just so you can ask me out apparently... so aren't you going to?"
Castiel blinked, his face still in a frown. "Going to what?"
Dean sighed, trying to stop himself from smacking his head. "Ask me out, you idiot."
"Oh." And then Castiel's face brightened, his posture immediately straightening. "Oh." Castiel smiled at Dean, while he continued to wait for the man to say the words.
"Will you, Dean Winchester, go out on a date with me?"
Dean smirked, taking a step closer to Castiel. "Of course." he rumbled, his voice low. He leaned forward, pressing a kiss to Castiel's cheek. "Just text me when," he whispered in Castiel's ear, slipping his card into the man's pocket before standing back again, letting his hand fall from the man's chest. Damn, because even through the layers he could feel Castiel's strong chest.
Turning, he noticed the elevator doors had closed again, and he pushed the button to open them again. Stepping out, this time, it was Dean's turn to wink at Castiel, before he started to walk away to his car.
"See you tomorrow, Cass."
Behind him, he heard Castiel let out a small groan.
"Blyad."
Dean's grin grew, a slight bounce in his step.
Oh, he so couldn't wait to hear the man in bed.
oOo
Translations in respective order
Dude, For a redneck he's a pretty damn good catch
You must stop speaking so crudely gabriel
Why? It's not like he can understand us anyway
It's still not polite
Whatever you want
Please don't say anything
The incorrigible -
Fuck