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Chapter Nine:

Come On, Angel

Jessie hadn't been kidding when she'd said the barrel was 'maxi-sized'. It was as tall as Dean was and large enough that he couldn't wrap his arms all the way around it. If he hadn't had backup, he would have spent a good long time scratching his head, trying to think up a way of removing the barrel; hopefully, coming up with something other than opening it up and letting its contents slop onto the floor.

Luckily for him and for whoever had to mop this place, he had the best kind of backup he could ask for.

Cas took one look at the stainless steel cylinder and rolled his eyes at this measly human contraption. With the barest push of his grace, he loosened the fastenings and let gravity drag the barrel from its place atop a thick-legged table and into his waiting arms. He lifted the barrel like it was a sack of potatoes and heaved it onto his shoulder without breaking a sweat.

All the while, Dean stood back and watched, bouncing on the balls of his feet like a boxer waiting for his turn in the ring. The adrenaline was making him heady, euphoric, downright giddy. It coursed through his veins like tiny zaps of electricity, pinging from one extremity to the next, desperate for release.

When Cas adjusted his grip, the barrel tilted, and Dean lunged forward, arms out, only for Cas to stop him with a hand laid on his shoulder.

"I've got this," the angel said.

Had it been anyone else, Dean would have hovered—hell, in the state he was in, he would have ignored the reassurance completely and stepped in. But this was Cas, rebelling angel extraordinaire, with a voice that wasn't quite human yet felt safe and kind of like home.

A scoff spluttered past Dean's lips at the thought.

Cas's eyes narrowed on him, all squinty and suspicious, as he asked, "What?"

"Nothing." The word came out too quickly and too high-pitched making Dean wince. He cleared his throat to cover up for it, but a blush burned along the back of his neck, spreading all the way to his ears.

Cas didn't look away. His gaze lowered to Dean's throat and rose, slowly tracking the progress of scorching skin, which accomplished nothing more than making Dean feel like he was standing in a furnace with the temperature slowly getting amped up. Bursts of energy kept on jolting away inside him, and a bead of sweat carved a cold trail down his back. He felt like an insect under a magnifying glass under the sun.

A crash rang out from the other side of the wall where the bar's patrons were still going at it, and Cas's gaze flicked away, breaking whatever fight of flight trance Dean had found himself in. The heat vanished, but whatever relief that should have brought barely registered. Everything inside him seemed to sag, folding in on itself like a deflating balloon now that Cas's gaze was no longer holding him upright. His shoulders drooped, and his heartbeat stuttered even as the adrenaline kept on pumping, pounding through him almost painfully.

Action—that was what he needed.

"Let's get out of here before someone decides that what this party needs is more hooch," he said.

He didn't glance at Cas as he bounded toward the back door—a great big thing of solid steel that looked like it ought to give out onto a delivery ramp and not some back alley. The red bricks around the door frame were chipped and covered in cement, as though the door was a recent addition and the owner hadn't splurged to get it installed. It was the perfect size to get the beer barrel through, which lent itself to the 'newly-installed' theory.

The minute Dean stepped outside, the cold air assaulted him, biting into his burning skin so sharply that he swore up a storm. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and scrunched up his shoulders high enough that they protected his ears from the wind only to glance over at Cas who stood beside him, completely unbothered by the cold, looking up at the sky as he calmly waited out Dean's cursing.

The soft light above the door bathed Cas in gold and, from where Dean stood, created a halo behind Cas's head. The angel's face looked well and truly angelic, but the beer barrel made him seem like a frat student with a problem. That contrast had laughter bubbling up from his throat, easing out in a soft chuckle only to snowball so quickly that he struggled to catch his breath. He doubled over, hands resting on his knees, laughing like he'd just heard the best joke in the world.

"It's the effects of the potion," said Cas, still holding that beer barrel that was bigger than he was. "You're feeling everything a little more strongly than you usually do."

Dean nodded, the movement jerky between his gasps for breath. When the final sob of laughter ebbed and air returned to his lungs, he managed to straighten and lean back against the alley wall, his gaze darting over to Cas.

"Yeah?" he asked, panting out that one syllable and watching the way Cas's eyes softened, crinkling at the sides even though his lips barely moved. "How about you? What are you feeling?"

Cas watched him, that gentle look growing for a moment before it changed, morphing into something sardonic with only a wry twist of his lips. "Unchanged."

Dean's heart sank, his insides squirmed, and the painful fluttering returned as though butterflies were dive-bombing his stomach. "So…what?" he asked. "The only impulse you have is to steal people's fries?"

"It would appear so." The words came out as a whisper as Cas turned away, and Dean felt—

Stupid. He felt stupid.

With a grunt barely escaping his tightly pressed lips, he pushed himself away from the wall and started down the alley, heading away from the centre of town and expecting Cas to follow. The angel did just that, silently keeping pace as Dean kicked up every newspaper and beer bottle he came across.

Something that felt like disappointment clawed at his gut, which was dumb because he had no reason to feel disappointed. There was nothing wrong with Cas's answer; it just wasn't the one he'd expected. He wasn't exactly sure what it was he'd wanted to hear, what answer Cas could have given that had Dean holding his breath even as his lungs complained, but 'unchanged' wasn't it. 'Unchanged' was very far from it.

He punted a glass bottle hard enough that it hit a garbage can and shattered upon impact. Shards skidded back to him and crunched beneath his boots, creating a steady sound almost like walking over hard-packed snow. He focused on the noise—feet slapping the ground and glass cracking; rodents scurrying from one dark corner to the next; puffs of breath filling the air and blood drumming against his ears. Distantly, fires crackled and people spoke, but the words were quiet and the night subdued as though already the townsfolk were winding down from their brush with impulsivity.

"What are we going to do with this?" asked Cas as he lightly patted the barrel. The clang of echoing metal and sloshing liquid joined the quiet symphony, there and gone in less than an instant without disrupting a thing. Fleeting.

Dean shrugged, a petulant jerk of the shoulders better suited to a scorned teen; the kind of shrug he'd pulled off once in front of his dad and had his head bitten off for it. "Real men use their words, Dean," John had barked. "If you have something to say to me, you say it." Dean had a lot to say to his old man—he knew that now—but back then, seeing that look in his dad's eyes, all anger and impatience and disappointment, it had made him feel sick, like he was five seconds away from either throwing up or bursting into tears. He wasn't sure which would have been worse. Which would John Winchester have taken to least kindly?

It didn't matter. Not anymore. Not right now. Not when it was just him and Cas, and Cas had done nothing to deserve Dean's pissy mood.

With a quiet exhale, Dean forced the coiled muscles in his back to unwind, loosening out of his 'shady mugger' stance.

"We should call Sam and tell him what happened," he said, glancing over at Cas and the barrel. He smiled—so what if it was a little strained?—and added in a tone so forced full of cheeriness that it grated his ears, "And maybe find out from Sophie how to defuse this"—he rapped his knuckles against the barrel, reaching his arm behind Cas to do so—"so that we can take it home with us."

Cas looked over at him, face wary and wilfully blank for a moment before his features relaxed. "It won't fit in your car."

Always so pragmatic.

Dean's smile relaxed. "So we'll bottle it first. Can't let it go to waste."

Cas let out an exhale that might have been a soft chuckle, and the two men and their barrel stepped out of the long alley and onto a dark and empty street. Half the streetlights were out, piles of shattered glass lying at their bases, and the ones that were on flickered and dimmed, as though the job of lighting the town was too much for them without their fallen brethren.

Light or dark, Dean didn't care. No matter how odd a sight he and Cas made, in this town riddled with chaos, anyone who would bat an eye at them had bigger fish to fry.

"Where is your car?" asked Cas, his frown scrunching up his face and practically burying his eyes beneath his furrowed brows.

Dean wrapped his fingers around the Impala's keys in his pocket and rubbed his thumb over the warming metal. "I left her in the woods behind the motel."

Cas's expression didn't change—if anything, his brows knitted further. "Why?"

"It's safer there than it is here," he said, but Cas kept on staring. Dean rolled his eyes. Dealing with Cas was like talking to a little kid sometimes: you had to spell everything out for them. "Someone vandalised her." The words came out in an undertone. He couldn't bring himself to say them any louder than that. It was a delicate matter, not one to be shouted from the rooftops.

Cas didn't see it that way. The deep rumble of his voice sounded like a groan of thunder over the quiet street, where even a whisper echoed like a gunshot. "You have a very unhealthy relationship with that car."

"Shut up," said Dean with a grunt, a huff, and a glare as he pulled his phone from his pocket and hit the speed dial button. It barely rang through once before Sam picked up. Dean didn't beat around the bush. "Cas and I found the source of the potion. Aaron spiked a beer barrel at that bar we were at yesterday."

Sam swore, and something clattered to the ground on his end. "Do you need backup? I can be there in fifteen minutes."

"We handled it. We've got the barrel, and we're heading back to the motel."

"Great. Good." It might have been Dean's imagination, but he could have sworn that Sam sounded disappointed. A groan and a sigh followed as Sam picked up whatever he'd dropped. "Sophie and I need a few more hours to brew the antidote, then it needs to refrigerate for another hour or two after that, so we'll catch up with you guys first thing in the morning."

"Will the antidote work on the beer?" Dean asked, side-eyeing the barrel and Cas along with it.

Sam puffed a laugh, and his voice became muffled as he spoke to Sophie before coming back on the line. "Yes, Dean, the cure will work on the beer."

Dean shot Cas a thumbs up. "Awesome."

He could imagine Sam smiling and shaking his head as he said, "Let me know if anything else happens."

Without a sign-off, the line cut out, and Dean slipped his phone back into his pocket and turned to Cas. "Good news: the beer can be saved. This hunt wasn't a total loss after all."

"With or without the beer, this hunt wasn't a loss at all," said Cas. "You may not have killed a monster, but you helped these people. You saved them from themselves."

Dean scoffed. "That's your takeaway from the bar fight I started?"

"You didn't start it." Cas said it in that tone, the one that sounded like he was reciting an inarguable fact, the one Dean couldn't bite back at, so he didn't.

They fell into silence with only the sounds of their feet slapping against the concrete and the buzz of the streetlights following them along the sidewalk. The icy wind calmed to a cool breeze, and Dean breathed it in, letting it ease the burn in his lungs. Stars twinkled overhead, less than could be seen from the bunker or the open road but so many more than in any city. It felt peaceful, and it spread over Dean like a balm.

He glanced at Cas and at the firm hold he had on the barrel, hands splayed and steady, and Dean's fingers twitched. The tremor passed like static at the memory of a palm pressed against his, of warm skin and a strong grip keeping him steady.

Dean snapped his gaze away and squeezed his hand into a fist before the craving for physical contact that was running through his veins made him do something stupid.

Holding Cas's hand had been impulsive—an act brought on by a combination of adrenaline and Sophie's potion. Cas had so little experience with the more intimate side of humanity that he had no way of knowing that holding hands was not something men did with their friends. Dean shouldn't have taken advantage of that.

In the blink of an eye, the peacefulness vanished, and guilt was quick to burrow its way into the places the warmth left behind. That was all it took for the night's events to catch up with him. A deep ache overtook his muscles, and a dull throb pulsed through his face and torso. He felt like he'd gone a couple of rounds with Chuck Norris and come out on the losing side. His pace slowed, and his breathing became laboured.

Cas took notice, stopping in his tracks as he said, "You're hurt."

Dean tried to shrug it off but winced when his shoulders jolted. "Turns out humans can do just as much damage as monsters if you're not careful." When Cas went to put the barrel down, Dean held out a hand, stopping short of touching Cas's arm. "It'll be fine. I've had worse."

Cas sighed. "I'll take a look when we get to the motel."

That didn't give Dean much time to cool down—no time at all, in fact. While he'd been mopping, they'd covered a lot of ground, and one last bend in the road landed them in the parking lot of a squat building in front of which the vacancy sign buzzed and flickered.

Dean stumbled, his stomach churning much like it had those few times Cas had teleported him somewhere. Unease spread through him, and his mind threw up one muddled thought after another all leading to the same impression: he did not want to be stuck in a motel room with Cas for untold hours with nothing to distract himself with.

Cas, however, didn't hesitate. He walked up to the right door and waited while Dean fumbled for the key.

With hot, sweaty palms—and feeling more and more like a grown-ass guy taking a chick home for the first time—Dean pushed open the door, stepped aside, then stopped. His gaze went from the doorway to the barrel and back again.

"Shit."

"We didn't think this all the way through," said Cas as he reached the same conclusion. He took a step back and eyed the building, gaze landing on the window. Tilting his head toward it, he asked, "Does it open all the way?"

Dean didn't answer and instead dashed inside to check. He leaned against the kitchen table to reach the latch, but it wobbled and groaned beneath him, so he shoved it out of the way. The latch was stiff from frost and disuse, but with a heave, Dean got it unlocked and slid the window open.

Cas waited on the other side and carefully shifted the barrel so that its edge rested on the sill. "I'm going to push it in halfway, then come inside to get the rest of it in. I need you to keep it balanced while I go through the door." Dean nodded already grabbing on to the barrel, but Cas wasn't done. In a tone that should be reserved only for misbehaving children, he added, "Do not try to lift it, Dean."

Dean tried to glare instead of looking sheepish. He loosened his grip and slid his hands to the top and side of the barrel, moving to the left so that he stayed next to the window where he could counterbalance and not lift. Cas pushed the barrel, stopping halfway as promised, and waited as Dean locked his knees and gave a go-ahead nod.

The sudden weight difference as Cas let go made Dean falter. He almost let go as his muscles bulged and his tendons stretched, teeth gritting so hard his jaw hurt. "Son of a—"

Cas was there in two seconds flat, and Dean could almost forget that the guy's wings were out of commission. The angel dragged the barrel the rest of the way in and lifted it so that it didn't bang against the creaky wooden floor. The ease with which he did it looked a whole lot more impressive now that Dean knew how much the damn thing weighed.

The floorboards groaned and protested as Cas set the barrel down in a corner, but they didn't crack, and they quieted down after a second. In that silence, Dean's rasping breaths sounded all the louder. Cas marched over to him, his face scrunching with concern, and Dean tried to push himself away from the wall, but his limbs wouldn't cooperate, so he stood, slumped and too sore to move.

Cas stopped less than a foot away, critical eyes roving over Dean's face as he laid a palm on Dean's cheek and said, "Here. Let me."

Warmth ebbed from Cas's hand and washed over Dean, making him feel like he was slipping under a down comforter over silk sheets. His eyes flagged shut as the pain eased away, and his breathing evened out.

It took him longer than it should have done to realise that the pain relief kept coming despite the worst of his injuries being taken care of. It seeped deep into him—so much further than it had ever gone before—and rubbed against his sore bones and tense muscles like the most extreme deep-tissue massage available. It felt good—really good. Spa-day-followed-by-copious-amounts-of-sex good.

The thought had his eyes snapping open as his body took a little too much interest in the situation. He felt like he was starring in a soft-core porno with the way Cas was cupping his face, and the fact that he wasn't hating it made his gut twist.

He pushed away from the wall and out of Cas's reach, grunting and grumbling as he went. "Dammit, Cas. I'm fine."

"Of course you are." The words came out just above a whisper and were followed by an exasperated sigh.

Dean ignored it as he bolted—at a controlled pace—toward the bathroom, his thoughts so overcrowded with the need to get some distance between Cas and himself that he almost forgot his wash bag and had to make a u-turn to grab it. He kept his gaze firmly turned away from Cas and only caught a glimpse of him as the bathroom door closed between them, spying the tail-end of an eye-roll.

The door clicked shut, and Dean could breathe again. The weight on his lungs lifted, leaving him feeling like he'd been underwater for too long and had finally come up for air. It hadn't felt like drowning, even if the rushed beat of his heart tried to convince him it had. There had been something comfortable in the pressure, something warm in the suffocation—like a too-tight hug meant to squeeze all his broken pieces back together.

Releasing his white-knuckled grip on the door handle, Dean stepped toward the tub, shedding clothing as he went and kicking it into a corner.

His toes curled as they touched the cold fibreglass, calloused skin grating over the cracks and scratches of the off-white surface. When he turned the control, the shower head sputtered and spat like an old man with a cough, pipes groaning and clanging until they forced out a steady stream of warm water. Dean upped the temperature as far as it would go, making steam rise and fill the small room. He flinched when he stepped beneath the spray, the scalding water burning his skin and turning it a bright red.

Without lowering the temperature, he grabbed the motel soap and started scrubbing it over himself with ruthless strokes. He scoured away the day's dirt and sweat and a layer of skin along with it, washing off James Aaron's apartment and the whole thing with that guy on the street and hoping that the pelting water would beat away the tension thrumming through him.

When every inch of him was cleaner than he had ever been, he leaned his forehead against the cold tile wall, breath coming out in short pants as he watched the soap suds circle the drain at his feet.

With no task left to occupy his mind, his thoughts wandered to Cas, and certain parts of his body took notice, stirring to attention.

A flood of heat that had nothing to do with the hot water burned over his cheeks, and he tried to think of something else—anything else. Roofied or not, he was not going to be that guy who thought pervy thoughts about his best friend to jerk off to in the shower.

Sophie's potion, that was all this was. He was feeling extra horny because of it and was focusing his urges on the closest person around. He wasn't interested in Cas specifically. He couldn't be.

He tried to think about Trisha or Jesse, Sophie or Sarah; he even gave Daisy Duke a try, but his mind kept stubbornly flicking back to Cas. Cas, whose voice sounded like he'd swallowed gravel. Cas, whose eyes shone so bright when he smiled. Cas, whose grip raised Dean from Hell. Cas—

Dean shook himself.

He was not allowed to be interested in Cas, not even temporarily because Cas was his best friend, and that would be awkward. Also, Cas was a guy—well, not really. Cas was a 'multi-dimensional wavelength of celestial intent', but he had the body of a man, and Dean didn't swing that way, not for pleasure.

He'd thought about it, though. Whenever he saw a good-looking face in the crowd, his eyes would linger a little too long and his pulse would flow a little faster, and he'd think: maybe. But he always turned away because that wasn't him.

Except Cas was harder to ignore.

Cas could be anywhere, doing anything, yet, for some reason, he spent most of his time by Dean's side.

Dean thought he knew Cas pretty well. They'd been through a lot together: Hell, Purgatory, alternate realities, several apocalypses—but one thought always came to burst that delusion of closeness. Cas had been alive since the beginning of the universe. What hope did Dean have of ever understanding someone that old who had seen so much? He was out of his depth.

With a drawn-out sigh, Dean turned off the valve and stepped out of the tub. He towelled off and threw on a pair of jeans and a t-shirt that he'd abandoned on the bathroom floor last night, grabbing his discarded suit as he unlocked the door, and he stepped out.

Cas stood between the two beds, staring at a painting of Lake Eufaula. He'd shed the trench coat and suit jacket and laid them out on one of the beds—Dean's bed. Dean stared at it as the part of his brain that insisted on being inappropriate brought up thoughts of marking territory and staking a claim. He tried to shake the idea off, but it was like batting at gnats—the damn things wouldn't leave him alone.

The motel room was so non-descriptive that Dean had barely registered anything about it the night before. He'd stayed in a thousand places like this one and would probably stay in a thousand more but watching Cas look around with that too-serious expression and those too-observant eyes made Dean's gut twist with a sudden bout of self-consciousness.

He did his best to push the feeling away as he cleared his throat, drawing Cas's attention away from his perusal. "I'm surprised the trench coat still comes off."

Cas tilted his head, and the lines on his face deepened his perpetually confused expression. "You've seen me without it before."

A blush burned its way up Dean's neck as his brain reverted back to his horny teenager days when that kind of comment only served to throw up all types of crude, clothing-less images. Only this time he wasn't imagining the hot cheerleader who'd decided to go a day without her pom-poms; instead, he saw Cas, and the room got uncomfortably hot.

Without a decent comeback at the ready, Dean lumbered over to the fridge and peered into it, letting the cold air wash over him. It cooled his burning skin and brought some sense back to his mind, but he couldn't bring himself to look over at Cas, who seemed to have lost interest in the conversation.

Before he decided to crawl into the fridge, Dean grabbed a beer and closed the fridge door, but as he uncapped the bottle, his gaze landed on the barrel, and his stomach churned enough to make him change his mind. He set the bottle down on the counter and went to look out the window, all the while keeping Cas in sight out of the corner of his eye.

The silence felt heavy in the small room, and Dean was almost glad when Cas said, "You never answered my question."

Dean took a moment to rack his brain, but the evening had been too hectic for him to remember any unanswered queries. He turned away from the window to find Cas frowning at the pay-per-view pamphlet. "Huh?"

Cas set the pamphlet back onto the TV set and took extra care to centre it just right. "I saw several people slapping each others' rears at the bar, and I still don't understand why humans do it."

Dean stared, his mind blank, convinced he'd misheard or misunderstood, but when Cas turned his way with a questioning tilt of his brows, Dean knew he'd heard just fine.

A laugh bubbled from his stomach into his throat and got caught there, sending him into a coughing fit while his mind flashed back to the first time Cas had voiced that curiosity: sitting in an old cabin, watching porn while Sam and Dean worked.

Dean's eyes watered as he choked on air, but Cas kept on staring, so Dean took a deep breath and managed to say, "It's what people do when they like each other."

"Oh."

Through the blur of tears, Dean saw Cas's shoulder's drop as he slowly sat on the bed, springs squeaking beneath his weight.

"Have I done something wrong?" Cas asked.

The laughter stopped. Dean's brow furrowed, and he quickly wiped away the tears and ignored his burning throat as he took a step in Cas's direction. "'Course not."

Cas studied his clasped hands for a moment and sighed before looking back at Dean. "You haven't been acting like yourself. The potion is obviously affecting you, but it feels like more than that. Something must be wrong."

Dean shook his head only for his gaze to catch on the headboard over Cas's shoulder, where nail grooves had been clawed into the wood. His jaw clamped shut, and he huffed a breath, his insides squirming. He was two seconds away from stomping off because could there be one thing not screaming sex at him right now, please.

Except he knew he wouldn't leave. His feet were glued to the floor, and if he broke free, it wouldn't be to the door he would march. Cas felt like a damn magnet, and Dean was the tiny iron particle that didn't stand a chance.

"You can be very obtuse at times, Dean," Cas said, snapping Dean's focus back to him.

"I what?"

Cas rose from his seat and slowly closed the last of the distance between them. The closer he got, the faster Dean's heart pounded, sweat dampened the back of his t-shirt, and he squeezed his hands into fists to hide the way they shook. "Whatever is bothering you, you can tell me," said Cas. "I'm your friend."

They stood no more than a foot apart. When Cas heaved a sigh, Dean felt it against his neck; when Cas frowned, Dean saw the way the angel's eyes clouded. The smell of laundry detergent wafted off him and mixed with the cheap motel soap coming from Dean. There was more, though—an underlying feeling that always followed Cas, a tingling of electricity like a forewarning to a dry thunderstorm, an energy that was both volatile and warm, dangerous and exhilarating.

Dean's gaze fell to Cas's lips, and, even as sirens rang through his mind, the loudest part of him shouted, "Fuck it!"

He leaned forward and kissed his best friends.

Their teeth clashed and their noses bumped as warm lips met chapped ones, and finally, Dean understood, even if his brain still didn't quite get what it was, his body did. His lips parted Cas's, and he shivered at the feel of him, the smell and taste of him, and Dean's hormones went into overdrive, like when he was sixteen and puberty had finally kicked in, making him feel everything and him not having a damn clue what to do about it. But he knew now. He knew—

Shit. Was Cas kissing him back? Or was he standing there, frozen in horror, too shocked to move?

Dean pulled away, an apology spilling from his mouth, but before the words could get out, Cas grabbed two handfuls of his t-shirt and dragged him back in, stealing the air from his lungs in a dizzying kiss.

What the angel lacked in technique, he made up for in enthusiasm, and in that kiss, Dean tasted something that made his head spin and set his insides afire and brought to life every other chick-flick, romantic cliché he'd ever mocked. He felt giddy, electrified, invincible. It was nothing like when that guy in the street had kissed him because this was Cas and Cas meant safety; Cas meant comfort. Cas meant home.

Dean rested his hands on Cas's cheeks, the stubble beneath his fingertips creating a strange sort of friction that Dean found invigorating. He ran his tongue over Cas's bottom lip, desperate for more, and Cas gave it to him, opening his mouth and letting Dean in as his arms wound around Dean's waist, pulling him close so that there wasn't an inch of space left between them.

With a moan that Dean would have firmly denied was his under other circumstances, he spun Cas around until the angel's back was pressed against a wall. The thought dimly occurred to him that there was no way he could've done that if Cas hadn't let him.

Cas had been punched, kicked, shot, stabbed and thrown through walls, but unless there was unnatural strength behind it—a demon's malice or an angel's intent—he could choose not to register the sensation. Hell, Dean had nearly broken his fist on Cas's jaw that one time he got it in his head that decking an angel was a good idea. Cas could only feel things when he wanted to, and he was choosing to feel this.

Cas bit down on Dean's lip, kissing like an animal fighting for air. His hands went to Dean's hair, pulling and tugging, causing delicious pinpricks of pain that had Dean groaning and rocking into Cas, grinding against him. There wasn't an inch of space between them, yet still, Dean needed to be closer. He eased back so that he could unbutton Cas's shirt and remove the tie, fingers sliding as quickly as possible despite the way they trembled. Cas helped, starting from the bottom while Dean worked on the top. When their hands met, Dean dropped his mouth to Cas's neck as Cas shrugged out of his shirt. Dean kissed the sensitive skin and ran his hands over Cas's surprisingly buff torso.

"Dean." His name came out as a moan from Cas's lips, carried off in needy pants of breath. Chest heaving beneath Dean's fingers, pushing against him.

Dean gave a sharp bite to Cas's earlobe, making the angel gasp as Dean stepped away. His eyes glided over his best friend, taking in the sharp collarbone and defined muscle usually hidden beneath loose clothing. He took a moment to think that he'd need to hit the bunker's gym more often, then he pulled off his t-shirt and watched Cas's gaze drop, pupils blown, leaving only a trace of blue behind.

A growl rumbled in the back of Cas's throat, and he surged forward, pushing Dean with barely-tempered angelic strength.

Dean landed hard on the bed. The breath fled his lungs, and he didn't get the chance to catch it again before Cas joined him. The bedsprings creaked loudly as Cas moved on top of him, pinning him into the mattress, pushing against him, and kissing him like it was the only thing that mattered.

"More," Dean mumbled into Cas's mouth.

Cas broke the kiss, face hovering above Dean's as he said, "Whatever you want."

The look in Cas's eyes made Dean's already pounding heart pick up speed, stomach fluttering as confessions he didn't take lightly eagerly waited on the tip of his tongue. Dean dragged Cas into a kiss and lost himself in it.

"So?" Dean asked, lying, sweaty and panting, next to Cas, who was just as dishevelled as he was. "How was it for you?"

As the high abated, his nerves resurfaced. The warmth in his gut and the stuttering of his heart insisted that this had been something far greater than just two people getting their rocks off, and he wasn't sure how to handle that.

Cas rolled onto his side with a groan, bending his elbow and propping his head onto his raised hand so that he looked down at Dean. His eyes lost the hazy look of sex and regained their usual intensity as he thought through his answer—he had to think about it. That wasn't a good sign.

A frayed laugh escaped Dean, one he tried to make cocky as he said, "Please, don't somehow compare it to religion. You've already ruined Wile E. Coyote for me."

Cas's lips quirked upward, and he leaned down, his nose bumping against Dean's and his breath fanning over Dean's mouth. "It was highly enjoyable."

Dean guffawed, his nerves easing just like that, and he leaned up for a quick press of their lips in a kiss that barely qualified because of their smiles.

"I love you," said Cas, his hand resting over Dean's heart.

Those words did something to Dean's insides—as though every organ simultaneously started an acrobatics routine complete with fanfare and a cheering audience. An answer bubbled up in his throat, and he didn't try to stop it. "I love you, too."

A/N: Writing this chapter has made me realise that I am very bad at writing romances. The amount of editing it took to get this part of the story even halfway decent is absurd. The characters didn't help either because Dean's so obtuse that he won't figure his and Cas's feelings out unless they smack him in the face and Cas is too polite and accommodating to do that.