Disclaimer, Summary, Rating: See Chapter 1.
THE SCENT OF YOU
Chapter 12
"What do you think…the catfish?" Dean pondered.
"Looks good…" Sam admitted, torn between the catfish and the ribs.
It had been ages since he'd had really good ribs smothered in real barbeque sauce. Growing up as he and Dean had made them experts on the perils and pitfalls of usually eating food prepared by others. The restaurant menu was varied enough to give a reasonable variety of offerings to the majority of customers, but sufficiently limited to indicate that the food was freshly prepared and actually cooked in the kitchen; since no commercial kitchen had space to stock a vast array of foodstuffs or could afford to do so on the off-chance someone might pick them, a place that offered the diner everything under the sun gave itself away as a place that defrosted, microwaved, boiled in the bag and poured hot water on powdered substitutes.
"Toss a coin?" suggested Dean. "Heads we have catfish, tails we have ribs?"
"Ah cahn reehully recaahmend thuh catfish…suh."
Sam looked up at the female voice next to their table…and up…Whoa…A vision of Valkyrie perfection stood a foot away, in a demure waitress uniform that she managed to make look like a fantasy French Maid outfit. It was a vista of endless legs, lush bosom and luscious pink skin over a heart-shaped face with massive baby-blue eyes and flaxen tresses pinned back for from her apple-blossom pink face. She held the order pad in one slim hand, as she worried the top of her pen with her full upper lip in a way that went straight to Sam's groin like a charge of static electricity.
"Really?" Only the tips of his ears, which were scarlet, gave lie to Dean's façade of aplomb as he turned up the charm to maximum and the wattage of his smile to 'outshine the sun' level.
"Uh-huh," she got the signals and sent them back in full measure; although she looked like one of those stunningly healthy Nordic types – all corn fed and fresh air – her accent was pure, lyrical Southron and flowed like warmed, golden honey.
"There are two of you," Sam blurted unintentionally as his disbelieving eyes spotted an identical goddess of love a few tables away that had clearly reduced the trio of businessmen there to puddles of adoring goo.
"Yes, suh, ah'm Kimber; that's mah twin, Kerry."
Twins…long-limbed, luscious…one of whom was doing everything but simply spread-eagling herself across their table and husking, 'Take me now'…he and Dean exchanged a single, eloquent glance.
"We were raised never to contradict a lady," Dean purred, "the catfish it is."
"Comin' right up," she sashayed away, the unfussy, supposedly prim back of her skirt doing absolutely nothing to disguise her voluptuous buttocks.
Sam took a healthy gulp of the iced water from the jug to relieve his suddenly bone-dry mouth…okay, excise all thoughts of bone…boners. His jeans were tight to the point of pain and there was no way he could have stood up from the table without seriously embarrassing himself. From the way Dean fidgeted he was suffering exactly the same problem. He concentrated on memories of Jess, for as with when he'd kissed Lori Sorenson during the whole Hookman deal, he usually experienced guilt and a sense of shamed betrayal when he found a woman desirable.
But for some reason, it wasn't as effective a mechanism as usual. Though he and Jess had met at the end of his Freshman year, they hadn't gotten 'serious' until they were Sophomores and had only lived together for eighteen months before she was murdered. They had had a satisfying and fulfilling sex life, which was a lot more adventurous than many would have believed, and therein lay the problem. Sam's body was accustomed to the sweet warmth of a woman's body cuddled against his in the night, to nuzzling and stroking silky skin and to being welcomed into her slick sheath, hot and wet for him …whoa, not helping yourself, Sam!
He swallowed convulsively. Come-hither Kimber bore a faint resemblance to Jess…maybe that was why their murderous nemesis Meg had chosen to be a cute, petite blonde chick? As a way to try and 'hook' a Sam left emotionally vulnerable to 'defenceless' women? His ardour cooled considerably as he concentrated on Meg and how she had nearly killed them in Chicago, and how thanks to her they couldn't be with Dad and be a family again…not yet anyway. But unlike Meg, and for all his psychic and telekinetic abilities, Sam was only human and his body responded accordingly.
Ironically, it would have been easier over the past months if Jess had pulled that 'soulmate/love-of-a-lifetime' guilt trip on him, but just after they'd moved in together they'd been with a group of friends that had got into a deep-and-meaningful on the subject of life, love, divorce and 'forever'. That night they'd carried on the discussion back at their apartment; not that he went on about it, but Sam had sincerely held religious convictions which included a belief that your marriage vows of 'in sickness and in health till death do you part' meant exactly that and not, 'until I get bored', 'until I meet someone cuter/wealthier', 'until we hit a rough patch and its easier to dump you than to make any real effort', 'until I can't be bothered to keep my promise' and so on. Dad of course had always been the example of such deep love…twenty-two years later John Winchester always reacted with a sort of surprise if you called him a 'widower'. In his head he was and always would be Mary's husband.
Jess had held identical beliefs. Her parents had married at twenty-five in the small Baptist Church of their home town and were still together thirty years later after having made it through some harsh times. As far as Jess was concerned, a 'successful' marriage was where you were still married to your original spouse when you were a cantankerous ninety-year-old tormenting the care home nurses.
But then she had told him that she didn't expect 'Purdah'. If anything happened to Sam a few years down the line, Jess did not intend to bury herself with him. She would move on with her life, even if that included new love – and she expected Sam to do the same.
"'Time and unforeseen occurrence befall us all, Sam'" she'd quoted as she'd snuggled up to him, "'and if I get hit by a bus tomorrow I don't expect you to carry on the sackcloth and ashes routine until you're eighty.'"
He hadn't liked her to talk about death, especially her own, but he had pulled her close and teased, "Um, what about if you're not dead...?'"
"'Then you'll wish you were; I'll chop it off with a cleaver, Samuel Winchester!'"
"Yes ma'am…" He'd laughed and rolled over, nipping and nuzzling all her ticklish places so she giggled and wriggled and then moved against him incitingly and they'd made love so wonderfully…
Sam gritted his teeth as his eyes burned with tears. Now he understood Dad, now he knew why John Winchester had dedicated his entire existence to the destruction of the thing that killed his wife. Carefully averting his head as if checking out the other diners, he managed to compose himself before he turned back to Dean, since if his brother became aware of his distress and went into protective big brother mode Sam knew he would humiliate both of them by bawling like a baby in front of everyone…and this was Texas, where men could give the Brits a run for their money with the stiff-upper-lip and emotional-repression routine.
He was saved by delicious, distracting culinary smells and Kimber came with two plates of catfish, depositing each plate in front of them in a manner designed to give them maximum appreciation of her cleavage.
"Thanks, Kerry," Dean drawled as he picked up his fork, making her flick him a startled glance, as did Sam who had not noticed any difference, but who had no doubt Dean had got it right.
As promised, the meal was succulent and they devoured it in short order. By the time it got to dessert, it had become a little game. A twin would appear at the table and in a tone that got huskier each time, sweetly enquire if they needed anything else. Each time Dean called her by the right name, though in the end it was Sam who asked what time they finished their shift.
Dean and Sam waited just outside the restaurant until nine o'clock and at dead on, the girls came tripping out in 'peasant' style blousons and thigh-length skirts that revealed their shapely legs – Daisy Duke, eat your heart out. Dean offered his arm to Kimber, and Kerry linked her arm through Sam's, and they went into the hotel's on-site casino. It offered the usual diversions – slot machines, Baccarat, Vingt-Un, Roulette and a poker table cordoned off by a red velvet rope. Other than poker, neither Sam nor Dean gambled for the simple reason that with the other games, mathematically the odds did favour the 'house' even if the casino didn't resort to crooked practices designed to inflate their profits; poker (when played without cheating) was the only game where winning depended on the skill of the individual player rather than the random roll of dice or the flip of a card.
However, they accepted complementary flutes of champagne and sauntered over to the Roulette table. Sam took the merest sip of his champagne for appearances sake but wouldn't imbibe any more – they were on a job after all and a drunk Hunter was easy prey for any opportunistic nasty that might be lurking in the shrubbery, never mind O&E not that far away in Amarillo – some evil creatures such as a Wendigou could cover a lot of miles at great speed on foot faster than any car. Eyeing the table, he remembered Dean's quip after the whole Max Miller nightmare – in more ways than one – about Vegas.
Well…why not? His inglorious visions hadn't done anything for him so far other than to indicate he ought to buy lots of shares in every headache medication company on the market. What was the point of having this so-called 'gift' if it couldn't be used to benefit those who were most important to you? He glanced at where Dean and Kimber were exchanging glances so hot the air in between should have ignited. Dean, you shall go to the ball…Concentrating as hard as he could, Sam waited until Dean and Kimber came to stand by them near the table.
A lifetime of practice enabled Sam to whisper softly at just the right pitch for Dean to hear him, but nobody else, and he instructed, "Red Seventeen."
Giving no sign that he had heard him, Dean placed his similarly untouched flute of champagne down on a side table; like Sam, he would not drink it. Nodding to the croupier, Dean placed a $50 chip on Red Seventeen; the wheel spun and the twins clapped as the ball landed on Red Seventeen. Even though Sam didn't drink it, the champagne flute proved to be a useful prop to disguise his whispered instructions. Sam found that it was becoming easier as he went along, and the thought occurred that maybe he could prevent or at least lessen the not-fun migraines if he practised his 'talents' rather than trying to ignore them until the vision whacked him upside the head with the psychic equivalent of a two-by-four.
Words had long since become extraneous when it came to Sam and Dean communicating. When they'd won $10,000, Dean obeyed Sam's flicked sidelong glance as perfectly as if Sam had spent ten minutes explaining the idea in detail with diagrams. He placed $1,000 of the money on Black Twenty-Three…and lost.
It was gone eleven o'clock at that point; ignoring all blandishments they called it quits. Sam and Kerry went to the casino desk and cashed in the $9,000 worth of chips left, and Sam requested the cash be placed in the hotel's security vault. The casino desk clerk was pleasant and only too helpful. Doubtless the staff knew the brothers had only been staying a couple of days and had booked the whole week, and thus were under the fond illusion that they would recoup the $9,000 and possibly more from the Winchesters in short order. Who was Sam to disabuse them of that idea?
Leaving the casino Sam instantly realised Dean and Kimber were not waiting for them; for a moment he tensed but Kerry archly suggested that Dean might have walked Kimber to the room the twins shared in the hotel on the staff wing. Not needing it spelled out to him, Sam allowed her to walk them down the quiet corridor, and wasn't surprised when a thump and a giggle suddenly emanated from behind the bland white door of what appeared to be…he opened it…what a surprise, a fairly large laundry store and…Kimber and Dean were wrapped around each other like eels with no sign of coming up for oxygen.
There was a soft click as Kerry pulled the door shut behind them and wickedly confessed, "We're not allowed to invite anyone to our rooms."
"Uh-mmmm…" Sam's comment was cut off as she surged forward and started to massage his tonsils, but he didn't really mind
…In fact…oh yeah…coherence was vastly overrated; she was voluptuous and bountiful and …oh, god, yes…an octopus in disguise with a thousand nimble fingers doing…anything she wanted as long as she kept doing it…
He was brought back sharply as Dean suddenly groaned out a crude, coarse expletive that he usually did not use around women and certainly not in such a situation as this. The shirt he'd been wearing over his customary black T-shirt was a crumpled discard on the floor and his open jeans and half-mast boxers displayed his full arousal as he pulled back from Kimber, who momentarily stood there with her blouson and skirt bunched at her waist flaunting her swollen taut-peaked breasts and ripe thighs, clearly dazed at the sudden cessation of their activities and on the brink of orgasm.
Dean laid his right arm on the edge of one of the metal shelves and rested his forehead on his forearm, extending his left arm out towards a baffled Kimber with his forefinger raised in warning. "Don't touch me right now."
"Dean?" Though in a similar state of urgent need, Sam gently put a likewise dishevelled Kerry away from him; he managed to slightly re-zip up his fly as best he could without doing himself injury, though he was also fully aroused and very close to the edge of climax. Trying to clear the fog of lust from his higher brain, he focussed on his brother's stressed face. "What is it?"
Dean raised his head from his forearm, his lips a flat slash across his face with the effort of his self-control, beads of sweat pearling along his hairline and jaw. He looked at Sam, "Are you carrying any protection?"
For a moment Sam was confused, since Dean had been the one to lock his Glock-17 and Sam's 9mm Beretta in their room safe in the first place...then it twigged that Dean meant a prophylactic…condoms…
Sam closed his eyes and mouthed several swear-words silently. "No."
He turned to the twins, who were exchanging, no pun intended, identical expressions of chagrined, sexually frustrated realisation.
"I suppose we could…" Kerry began dubiously.
Dean shook his head from side to side negatively, "Nuh-uh…are you really ready to risk being called Mommy?"
Continued in Chapter 13…
© 2006, Catherine D. Stewart