Castiel was nervous. It was a bath day. He tended to give Dean a certain amount of leeway with personal hygiene, seeing as he was part beast after all. It also had to do with the intimacy of the act, bathing Dean was very uncomfortable for Cas too. The golden muscles that were always on display were that much closer and wet and he was supposed to touch them too. It was both too much and simultaneously not enough.
When Castiel had first brought Dean into his lab he had waited almost two weeks to clean him. Cas hadn't known how kindly Dean would take to the application of water, would he hiss and claw like a house cat or enjoy it wholeheartedly like a tiger? Cas had wanted to build some trust between them first and get Dean accustomed to his presence.
When he first arrived, Dean's hair had been in long matted tangles, its rich tawny colour camouflaged by dirt and years of neglect. However, while the rest of Dean had definitely had a deep and strong albeit not entirely unpleasant musky smell to it, his body had been relatively clean, obviously those eye-catching tongue baths of his, that left Cas short of breath and needing to excused, must have been doing him some good.
That first time Castiel had been sure to make noise as he approached Dean to wake him, not wanting to startle the catboy before they'd even started. Dean had merely opened his startlingly green eyes and watched Cas curiously. Castiel had nervously fingered the needle full of sedative in his lab coat (it was for emergencies) as he reached out and led Dean to the artificial stream that ran through his newly forested lab.
To put Dean at ease, Castiel had shucked his lab coat on the stream's bank and joined Dean in the water in his swim suit. Happily for Cas, Dean, like his larger wildcat counterparts, quite enjoyed the water. It had still been agony for Cas, who had to get in close and lather Dean up and run his hands over that soft downy fur. Dean had been wary of the soap at first but he seemed to enjoy the tactile attention if his rumbling purr and nuzzling affection were any indication.
The initial haircut had been much trickier. In cleaning the filthy locks, Castiel had quickly come to the conclusion that there was no salvaging Dean's hair, it would all have to go. This would require an electric razor and that was liable to freak out his catboy considerably. Cas had been right, Dean was afraid of the razor, he had hissed at it, baring his fangs. In the end, Castiel had put the cagey catboy at ease by demonstrating on a patch of his own leg hair. Once Dean had seen that it had done him no harm, he'd allowed Castiel to approach him with the device in hand, but had a grim look on his handsome face that told Cas in no uncertain terms what harm would befall him if he shaved Dean entirely. When the deed was done and Castiel had admired his own handiwork it was both with pride and despair, for with a buzz cut and smelling like mint soap he'd used Dean was only more appealing.
Now today Castiel was going to have to do it all over again, run his soapy hands over those lean, smooth flanks and try to pretend he wasn't dying to jump Dean and ravage him. To be fair, of the two of them Dean was probably more likely to do the ravaging. Cas would love to let Dean ravage him any time, but it was thus far not meant to be. Castiel had a duty as a respected biologist to not get sexually involved with his charge no matter how handsome or mischievous. He wouldn't want to take unfair advantage of a being not entirely human.
Castiel sighed as he finally gave up and roused himself from bed. He hesitated when he reached for his swim trunks though, if he considered it rationally, Dean should really be able to wash himself at this stage, it was pretty self explanatory and he'd certainly had enough hands on demonstrations. Despite this and despite the fact that he always dreaded bathing day, Castiel did need this outlet for his mounting sexual frustration.
In an effort to assuage his guilt, Castiel did promise himself that he would make an effort to begin Dean's civic rehabilitation. It was no use studying Dean indefinitely, now that his existence had been made known in the scientific community (even if no one believed it) and he had been captured, Dean should learn how to behave more conventionally and fit in with human society, for he was unlikely to be released back into the wild. Even if Castiel did let the catboy go, it would have been no guarantee that others would not search for him and his kind, if he had any. No next week Castiel would have to attempt to tame the beast, despite his own reluctance.
