Chapter Text
Honestly, Dean doesn't know whether he should be offended, intrigued, or just plain amused. He decides on amused, ‘cause, damn, they are going to make so much bank today.
The weirdo who decided to wear a trench coat to a high-stakes strip billiards game just blinks wide blue eyes at him from across the room.
So here's the thing.
Dean's just as good at sexing shit up as he is at pool. He’s a good-looking guy with pretty lips and the devil’s grin, and when his fingers slip up and down his cue stick, people watch them move. That's why this whole business works, obviously, and why Dean makes the big bucks.
(That used to be a joke. It’s not a joke anymore. Which is… kind of awesome, actually?)
Now, Dean could argue that he's even better at being fucked then he is at sinking balls—yeah, pun totally intended… except for two things.
First, the whole ‘likes to be bent over, ridden hard, and put away wet and dripping’ thing isn’t something that he lets get around in circles like this. It’s not a secret—‘cause that would make it tempting; Dean knows all about secrets, and how they can be used against folk, especially in underground channels. But it ain't like he wears a pride flag wrapped around his shoulders or a blue, pink and purple bandanna when he sets himself up to play. If people are gonna assume he’s straight—well, let ‘em assume.
But, second, and more importantly: Dean is really good at sinking balls.
He’s really good at it.
So these days, most of the time when they bring someone out here to play against—snort, distract—him, it's a girl. (Woman. Okay, yes, yes, woman. He saw what that lady Donna did to Crowley when he called her ‘girlie.’ Brrr. Dean knows better than to underestimate a pretty, soft-looking blonde. The curves on her, though…)
Sometimes he misses the old days, because it’s not like this was how Dean started out. As he likes to tell Benny when they meet up, still training to keep each other sharp and mean, his first days at the club were playing high-stakes illegal billiards the normal way, angles and shots rather than these mind games. So how the fuck did he end up in this situation?
“Oh, yeah, you’re sufferin’, brother, I can see it all over your face,” Benny tells him, snorting, when Dean complains. “You know what? Blame Crowley. And then get over here and show me you still know how to do more than shake your pretty tailfeathers.”
“You think my butt’s pretty?” Dean says, looking up from racking the set. He dodges when Benny throws the chalk at him.
But Dean can’t deny that this makes him a lot more bank than straight billiards ever did—ha ha. The whole “lose one article of clothing with every ball your opponent sinks” business is fun in its own way, too, as weird as it gets sometimes. He has to say, he has a lot of respect for someone who can shoot a good game of pool knowing that it could end with her titties hanging out!
They almost always do end up hanging out, ‘cause, like Dean said: he's really damned good at pool.
“I hope you have your A-game in your pocket today,” Crowley tells him in the back of the black car that picks Dean up for every game. Because Crowley is a fucking cliché. But Dean has to admit that the leather upholstery smells good—if not as good as it would feel if Dean could just drive himself to and from the club.
Dean makes a sympathetic face in the rearview mirror at the guy who’s driving them, then rolls his eyes dramatically, ‘cause their driver’s got to be as tired of Crowley as Dean is, right? But the dude meets Dean’s gaze for just a second in the glass before turning his attention back to the road, expression not changing at all. Dean doesn’t know what to make of the fact it’s a different guy driving them to the club every time—every single time—but frankly, he doesn’t want to ask. There are a lot of things like that, when it comes to ‘no last name, just Crowley, and if you compare me to Madonna you will not wake up tomorrow morning.’
“Oh, damn!” Dean says, patting wildly at his pockets. “We have to turn around. Left my A-game in my other jeans!”
“Cute,” Crowley says, not looking up from his phone. “It’s a landmark game, Squirrel. I have a suit jacket in the back for you to wear.”
“Nope. No thanks,” Dean answers immediately. He’s very sure that nothing of Crowley’s would fit over Dean’s shoulders and torso, but he also doesn’t know where Crowley gets his capital, and he can’t rule out that the suit jacket in the trunk could fit him perfectly. Which is just creepy enough that Dean doesn’t want to try it on. “What do you mean, landmark game?”
Crowley pokes at his phone screen with his stylus. (A stylus, he actually uses a stylus.) “Tenth game in your exhibition winning streak. The pre-show numbers are looking very promising, Squirrel. It’s the largest pot we’ve ever played for already, so someone is excited.” He doesn’t quite rub his hands together like a Disney villain. “And they haven’t even broadcast you meeting your opponent yet. You could wear something other than lumberjack chic, for once.” He raises his eyes and studies Dean with his lip curled. “Or at least not… that.” He flicks a finger in the direction of Dean’s top layer. “One fewer layer won’t kill you. And it would sweeten the challenge.”
Dean doesn’t call him on the ‘we,’ because Crowley does front half of the buy-in for each of these games. But he does shudder at the sound of ‘sweeten’ coming out in Crowley’s smarmy British drawl. “Dude, no one watches the game to see my bare ass,” he objects. He doesn’t tug his comfortable, well-washed—Goodwill—flannel closed over his plain—Walmart—undershirt, but it’s a close thing. “I get six articles of clothing, I’m wearing six. And I’ve still gotta win, so no, I’m not playing in an unfamiliar jacket.” He scoffs. “’Sides, I don’t need sweetening. I’m sweet as pie.”
Crowley sniffs loudly. But they don’t talk the rest of the short drive to the outskirts of town.
Crowley’s not wrong: Dean’s had some off nights, like anyone, but he hasn’t dropped a really high-stakes game in a long time. Months, now, though he didn’t realize he was up to ten already. Not since… who was it? That exhibition match against the weird dude with the custom hand-carved cue stick, what was his name—Dr. Badass, right, right. Back in the before times, when no one ended up in their skivvies at the end of the night.
Which was a good thing, because first of all, Dean doesn’t want to know what a dude with a mullet like that was wearing underneath jeans with so strong a smell of weed to them that Dean likes to blame his loss on a contact high. Second, Dean’s a pool shark, but that skinny dude turned out to be a fucking great white or an orca or whatever it is out there that kills sharks.
It was a big game, too, with the odds all in Dean’s favor.
Dean had won at the club often enough by that point that after he lost, Crowley didn’t drop him (or take him out back and have someone shoot him, for that matter). He had enough put away that he didn’t vomit at coming home and realizing that he was five grand poorer than he’d been just a few hours ago, with nothing to show for it but shaky hands and sour sweat staining the pits of his undershirt.
Yeah. He hasn’t forgotten what it felt like to lose.
Dean’s not rolling in it—even if it feels like it, sometimes; it took months before Dean stopped flinching every time he had to put in his monthly mortgage payment, ‘cause it hadn’t been that long ago that Dean had been lucky enough to have half that sum to his whole damned name. Including what he used to keep (still keeps) tucked into the back of Baby’s glove compartment as bug-out money.
Just in case. Just in case.
Yeah. There's a certain irony that the reason Dean is so goddamned good at billiards is that a lot of his skills come from a time when it was either run the table or not put food on the table, so to speak. And, well, the fact that he got so good means that Dean never had to sell himself growing up—even though it would have made him money a lot faster than hustling rich idiots in dive bars who thought they could beat a skinny kid with a pretty face and a smirk.
So Dean might get a little distracted by fingers running up his arm, more than a little by a particularly nice, bouncy pair jiggling in front of him or draping over onto the felt as a girl lines up her shot. That’s pretty as anything, the arch of shoulder and hip and breast on the table, the lean, beautiful line of skin contrasting against the green and the wood and the bright resin colors of the balls. Nothing like it. He can see the appeal!
He’ll look—he’s human—but a little distracted isn’t the same as a lot. It’s not the same as losing.
He doesn’t care if they touch him; half the time, Dean’s cock doesn’t even end up interested in the proceedings. None of it’s enough to take his real focus enough off the game.
High stakes, you know. Them big bucks. The 10K buy-in reminds him of that fact every time.
The bar doesn’t have a sign out front, but for some reason, even though it’s early evening, there are always people sitting and having a drink. A weird mix of people, always: suits that Dean’s sure cost more than his game buy-in, mixed with jeans and Converse sneakers. Sometimes the barflies glance up when Dean and Crowley come in and head towards the back stairs, but mostly? They don’t pay him any attention, looking down at their drinks, or their phones, or their laptops.
Dean wonders if any of them are betting on him. Or against him. Watching him.
It doesn’t pay to think too hard about that, though, all things considered. Or that ‘strip billiards’ thing considered.
“Hiya,” Dean says, nodding at Jo. “You got a kiss for luck for me?”
“I dunno, you got a death wish?” she asks cheerfully from behind the bar, and pours herself a shot, putting it back with a flick of her fingers. She doesn’t flinch as she swallows, or offer him one. But her smile is genuinely fond—or at least, Dean likes to think so.
“Aw, at least one drink?” Dean answers, pausing to rap the bar top with his knuckles. Crowley huffs with annoyance.
“Thought you don’t need luck,” Jo teases.
“Sweetheart, we all need luck.”
“You call me ‘sweetheart’ again, you won’t need luck, you’ll need a funeral home,” Jo says, sweetly enough to be poisonous. But she pours herself another shot and tosses it back, saluting Dean with the empty glass. “May you keep your pants on tonight. Or lose ‘em. I dunno, never quite sure which you prefer.” She shakes her head. Dean thinks that’s the end of that, but she surprises him by adding, “And you’re gonna need that luck today, with who you’re playing.”
Dean almost pauses on his way past the bar. She’s never said that before. But Crowley’s moving past Dean without stopping to wait for him, and he really hates that, so… Dean hurries to catch up for him.
“What does she mean by that?” Dean asks, once they’re out of earshot of anyone who might be, y’know, listening. Or betting.
“It’s a surprise,” Crowley sniffs.
“For me or for you?” Dean asks.
Crowley sticks his pointy little Brit nose up in the air and swans through the back door in front of Dean without acknowledging the question.
Well, yeah. Dean’s a professional. What does it matter who he’s playing? Not even the perkiest little ass, or nice, bare legs, or hands straying over his stomach, his hips, cupping the front of his jeans—not even that pretty lady who had pierced nipples, and tiny, glittering chains hanging from them that sparkled pretty as anything when she draped her boobs onto Dean’s shoulder as he bent over the table… none of that changes what Dean’s doing here.
He almost always loses his socks, because they somehow always find him opponents who really do know how to play well. Where’s the fun if they don’t? Sure, he's lost his shirt a time or two, and even his undershirt. Memorably, twice, his pants (and since then, he’s always made sure he’s wearing nice boxer-briefs when he comes to play; that was embarrassing) and once, his underwear. The AC kicking on and the waft of cool breeze on his balls and taint when he spread his legs and bent over to take his shot? Woof. That was distracting.
But he hasn’t lost a game. Not in a long time.
So now? Now, Dean gets to be felt up by hot women who have to take off a piece of clothing for every ball he pockets, and he gets paid for the privilege of it. Sure, he's whoring himself out. Sam just thinks that Dean's gone pro on some underground billiards betting circuit, and, Dean’s gonna let him keep on believing it, because he's not wrong.
Dean knows that the video feed of every night he plays gets livestreamed from the club to a very select group of people, a lot of whom are placing more money on Dean then he's likely to ever see in his life. Some sick asshole is getting his rocks off watching Dean get felt up, some girl shedding her clothes and rubbing herself on Dean as they shoot pool, and, you know, that really should bother Dean a lot more than it does.
But when he turns his face up to the dark eye of the lens and winks before he goes back to his line of sight, a girl cupping her tits and playing with her nipples—just for him—as she leans over the table? When he thinks about those eyes on him, the red blink of the cameras watching Dean rule the felt with someone draped over his back and cooing? He's not bothered at all.
But today?
Today, as Dean strides into the meeting room, his game face firmly in place, he almost stops dead.
Today there’s a dude staring at Dean across the narrow, industrial span.
He’s a good-looking dude. Or at least, objectively he is. Dark hair, nice tilt to his eyes, pretty pink lips. The way he’s styling just… isn’t much, though. What’s with the ill-fitting penguin suit? Is that a tie he’s got on? And that trench coat—what’s this guy’s schtick, flasher special?
Huh. That would be new.
(Dean’s been accused of wearing too many layers at these games. But Crowley can suck it, because Dean knows the rules down to the letter: no more than six articles of clothing, shoes don’t count. It’s not his fault that most of the girls he plays are naked by the time he’s four shots in—they could be wearing more clothes to start if they wanted to, they just… don’t. Plus, he looks really good in his jeans and flannel and undershirt, sleeves pushed up to just over his elbows.)
“Hi,” Dean says, and puts a little extra swing in his step, the way he always does when he walks into this particular room. He doesn’t think anyone can see that it takes more effort than it should.
He wonders sometimes how his life took this particular twist. Yes, Dean’s aware that there are people who log into this particular livestream because they’re playing the odds, on the line to watch Dean play some really badass billiards. And, well, all things considered, they’re probably the ones who’ve got some real cash on his name and his game. Some of the numbers that Crowley throws around? Dean doesn’t think of that as real money. It’s, like, Monopoly. Numbers like that don’t really exist in Dean’s world.
However, a lot of the railbirds who he's willing to bet are dropping some serious cash so they can peek in? Yeah, they're just old-fashioned pervs.
And maybe Dean should have a problem with that. He is willing to bet that there would be a lot of clutching of pearls if Sam knew any of the details. Something about Dean being exploited or taken advantage of or whatever.
So Dean's never telling his little brother how much fun this is.
The dude gets better the closer Dean gets to him. Maybe Dean’s age—a little older. There’s a spark or two of grey in his dark hair. And those eyes—mm-mmm. Dean smiles. The baggy suit isn’t doing him any favors: Dean thought he was a good bit shorter. Some of the girls he’s played against recently haven’t been particularly tall, and Dean can only imagine that was an intentional choice: he can only imagine how the shots of them up on their tiptoes, or sprawled out on the felt, looked on the cams. Especially once the clothes started to come off.
But on the approach? Flasher Special is nearly Dean’s height.
Actually, this is going to be fun. It's been a long time since Dean played against a dude. A long time. There’s something to be said for going up against someone who’s got the same reach as Dean. All of his first opponents when he started this gig were guys, most of them pros or former pros, and Dean didn’t mind playing them: it was just straight billiards (that expression is never going to get old) and the prize money paid the bills—some days, barely, with the buy-in. Not at all, when Dean walked away 5K in the hole.
But then Bela Talbot upped the stakes and started the whole stripping-for-shots business, and Dean’s been rolling in it ever since.
Since then, the only guy-shaped dude Dean’s played was Cole Trenton—the guy was enough of a douche that he might have even been using his real name. And that particular piece of work tried to take a pool cue to Dean’s head after Dean’s neat little inside cut shot, sinking the 7-ball, should have stripped him of his underwear. Guess he might’ve thought he had something to hide.
Dean’s play bonus after that match was impressive, though. Seeing Dean wrestling down a kicking, spitting, punch-throwing former military dude wearing nothing but tightie-whities, and in the end, pinning Trenton down with a cue to his neck, apparently really did it for a couple of people out there.
Dean doesn’t actively communicate with any of the people who bet on him, who watch the pay-locked underground stream, but Crowley does. After one or two stories that Crowley’s shared, trying to ‘entice’ Dean into ‘interacting with his viewers,’ well, Dean just plain doesn’t want to know. This isn’t fucking OnlyFans, okay? He doesn’t take requests. There sure are some fucked-up people out in the world.
And no, squishing down someone who doesn’t want him on top of them isn’t the kind of thing that gets Dean’s rocks off at all. He likes willingness and enthusiasm, thanks. Lots of enthusiasm.
On the other hand, Dean does like putting idiots in their place, and Trenton agreed to the terms of the match knowing exactly what the terms of it were. Or have been, ever since Bela’s little attempt at ‘distraction’ got them the biggest livestream audience they’d had before that point. (To be fair: the only reason Dean won that one is that Bela fouled him on the 8-ball. The girl’s a fucking shark.)
Trenton, Dean’s pretty sure, was straight, and a ‘phobe, and just figured he could break and run: sink every ball in his set, one by one, and never even let Dean have a shot at the table. It was a totally clean game before Trenton lost his shit: no distractions, no feeling Dean up, not even a little lip-licking. It was almost refreshing.
Trouble was, Cole Trenton had a dry break, not potting a single ball even though he got the first strike at a perfectly set triangle to start. And Dean?
When he’s in stroke, Dean can run a table. Oh yes, yes he can.
Dean smiles at the memory. God, that game was fun.
Tall, Dark and Trenchcoated doesn’t smile back. He doesn’t stop examining Dean, either—those tired blue eyes boring hard into Dean’s, sweeping down his cheekbones, the bridge of his nose, flicking down to his hands. Dark eyebrows pinch together into a slight frown as he studies Dean’s cue, still in its beat-up plastic case.
It’s kind of intimidating, actually, the intensity of the stare, the focus: he’s stern, that’s what this dude is. Like someone who’s here to play, not to play.
Dean’s not used to seeing that directed at anything but a billiards table, even with some of the ball bunnies they’ve brought in to feel up Dean on camera on light weeks (most of them hold the cue, all right, but playing billiards isn’t exactly what they’re doing with it).
It's been a while—it’s been a long while—since someone came in here just planning to win, not playing to make Dean lose, and Dean’ll put money on that being this guy’s deal. No distractions, no games, no waggling titties or surprise sex toys or leaning on Dean’s back and rubbing the front of Dean’s thighs when he’s bent over and addressing the ball, his cue stick lined up.
Then, almost imperceptibly, those intense, dark eyes tick downwards again—towards Dean’s lips. And stay there for a beat of one. Two. The tip of his tongue wets a plush bottom lip and then darts back in.
Then the blue eyes jerk back upwards, the expression turning frowny and stern again so quickly that Dean almost misses it.
Huh.
Well.
That’s… unexpected. That’s new. What?
Maybe today will be different.
‘Cause if someone thinks that having some dude drool over Dean as he’s playing is going to disgust him or make him make mistakes? Well, joke’s on them, ‘cause Dean’s bi as fuck, and he’s got not a single damned problem with getting ogled by a hot guy.
Not that Crowley knows that. Not that their watchers know that.
Heh. Maybe Dean’s gonna be making even more bank tonight than he thought.
“Hi,” Dean says. He doesn’t hold out his hand. Rules are rules, the first time they touch—if they do—is on the floor, in front of the cameras. Builds up the anticipation or some shit. “I’m Michael.”
“I know. Your reputation precedes you,” the dude says, in a rough, dark grit of a voice, like a scratch of chalk against the tip of a freshly milled cue. Then, with a hint of a tilt to a dark eyebrow, “I’m Castiel.”
It’s a fake name, of course, just like ‘Michael’ is—though, wow, dude’s not even trying for plausible. So it’s sort of stupid that that name fits him—a little too big, a little too exotic, for what’s in front of Dean right now.
“Castiel, huh? You an angel of something?” Dean teases, then waggles his eyebrows. “Leave your halo at home today?”
He has no idea why that, of everything, gets him this little upward twitch of a smile at the corners of the guy’s mouth, trailing up into his eyes, but—
“Every day,” Castiel answers, his voice dropping.
Okay. Damn. Damn.
There’s something a little funny about the line of Castiel’s full, pink mouth, the arc of his cheekbones, a little wrinkly, worried fold between his eyebrows. Nothing should work exactly right—well, except for those blue eyes, shit, they really are pretty—but it all does. It’s not harmony; Dean’s not into that anyway. He’s not into things that are easy. Castiel being here, his looks, the way he’s staring at Dean: it’s a riff. It’s a minor chord, strumming along Dean’s nerves.
Okay, maybe Dean’s going to be a little distracted.
“Oh no,” Crowley says flatly, from behind him. The door slaps shut, and it’s so loud that Dean almost jumps, but Trenchcoat Castiel doesn’t. “No, no, no. Michael, we're going.”
Dean blinks. His eyes are watering. Oh, he hasn’t blinked in a while, has he? Well, how was he supposed to, when he was being stared at like that? “What?”
“Pack up your stick or your Q-tip or whatever it's called,” Crowley growls, stomping up beside Dean with way too much unnecessary noise. “We're getting out of here. Blowing this Popsicle stand, as you Americans say.”
“No one says that,” Dean points out. “No, seriously, what the fuck? Explain, man.”
Crowley opens his mouth. But then his eyes squint sideways over to the side where Castiel is still standing, calmly, like Crowley doesn’t have a look on his face like he’s going to try to throw Dean over his little shoulder and haul him out the door in a fireman carry (wow, that is not an image Dean ever thought he would come up with).
“Yes,” Castiel says, and there’s that eyebrow again. “By all means, explain. What’s the problem?”
Crowley closes his mouth, and a little tic starts just beside his right eye, twitching into his hairline. Which Dean doesn’t think he’s ever seen happen before. He didn’t even know that it was possible to shut Crowley up. Huh.
“Thought you said tonight was the biggest pot I've played for yet,” Dean presses, scowling.
“It is,” Crowley mutters.
Crowley’s a skittish, vicious little bird dog even at the best of times, but this is weird behavior even for him. “And you want us—me—to just... pack up my ‘Q-tip’ and leave,” Dean answers. “Because you just got a glimpse of this guy. Castiel,” he repeats.
Dean hasn’t heard of a pool hustler by that name, but the fact is, Dean’s been pretty far out of the aboveground lifestyle ever since he’s been doing this club gig every few weeks. He wouldn’t have been able to identify an up-and-comer by face, necessarily—Benny mentions people he’s pissed at or lost to, but Benny’s also good enough that he’s mostly legit these days. He’s also straight as an arrow and doesn’t actually describe what any of them look like, just how they play, and no one uses their real name when they’re going underground in a betting club like this.
Dean turns to give the dude a more comprehensive once-over, and nope, he can’t see it. “He don’t look very scary to me, Crowley.” Dean smirks at Castiel when he says it. Game on. Anyone who thinks that poker is the mindfuck game has never faced someone in a pool match where it’s all slow strokes and fast strikes and a matter of millimeters. “Just a baby in a trench coat.”
That particular sally gets him an uptilted, dark eyebrow, a lift of a chin, and a “Hmm.”
The little hum sounds amused. Or maybe a little annoyed. Since Dean can work with either or both of those, he grins wider and turns back to Crowley. Who’s looking at Dean now like Dean’s sprouted horns all on his own.
He and Crowley have worked together for a couple of years now, and it's been a mutually profitable relationship, all told. Dean gets where the squirrely little dude comes from.
That doesn't mean Dean likes Crowley, and he's pretty sure Crowley kind of hates his guts. They understand each other, though, and they’ve made a fuckton of money together. Thanks to Crowley getting them the in on games in this club, Dean’s got a savings account now, and a down payment, and a fucking mortgage. Sometimes, when he wakes up on his memory foam mattress and looks sleepily up at a ceiling that doesn’t have water marks—when Dean shuffles off his bed and onto a floor rug that isn’t that weird, gross shade of indeterminate motel orange-brown, and then goes into a bathroom where there isn’t any mold in the corners—he has to pinch himself.
But still, he and Crowley sure as hell are not friends, and Dean’s pretty sure that Crowley would, at any given point, climb behind the wheel of the bus he’d throw Dean in front of if that was what suited him best. Or knife Dean, if he thought it would give him a better payout.
So Crowley keeping secrets that could get Dean killed? Yeah, Dean doesn’t think of that as a probability, it’s a certainty. Crowley is dependable in his own sociopathic way, but that doesn’t make anything they’re doing legal.
“Do you two know each other?” Dean demands.
Crowley scowls. He doesn’t cross his arms, but his hands flex, release, flex at his sides, like he wants to but doesn’t want to give anyone the satisfaction of seeing it. “We’re… acquainted.” He sneers over Dean’s shoulder.
“You don't think I can beat him, do you,” Dean realizes, jerking backwards. “Seriously? What the fuck.”
And now? Now he is offended. ‘Cause you don’t have to be friends to make a metric fuckton of money for someone, and Crowley’s a fucking bite artist who doesn’t get to judge Dean’s skills against some rando in a trench coat. Not when he just called a pool cue a Q-tip.
“How much is the pot for this game?” Dean presses. “’Cause if I walk away now, we get nothin’, and we’re out the operational fee to play.” Which is not chump change either—10 grand a game? High roller shit, for sure. But they’ve always made it back in the long run. Well, technically Dean’s always made it back.
Crowley mutters a number that makes Dean’s mouth water and go sour in the back, tasting hard of the shock of adrenaline. It’s not quite more zeros to it than Dean’s ever made in a night, but it’s close, and the last time, there were two girls involved and that included the play bonuses afterwards. (He still has dreams of that evening. Mm-mm.)
“Still. Not worth it,” Crowley insists.
Seriously, what rabbit hole has Dean fallen down? He’d have put money on Crowley selling his mother for that much cash. (Actually, not a good comparison: Crowley’s mother is the scariest fence that Dean’s ever met, and she was the one who introduced them. Rowena would definitely be the one doing the selling.)
“And why not?” Dean demands.
Crickets. Goddamned crickets.
There’s a low chuckle. “I thought you said you’ve… what was it? Sold sin to saints for centuries, Crowley,” Castiel says, in that scratched-felt voice, completely deadpan. “Have you lost your touch?”
It’s the fact that Crowley glares fit to banish Castiel to the fiery pits of Mordor or whatever but doesn’t tell Castiel to shut his trap that really starts to peak Dean’s interest. “I’m unaccustomed to trying to do the right thing,” Crowley shoots back. “It’s giving me hives.”
“You’re just that good, huh?” Dean says, turning back to Castiel.
Castiel raises that fucking eyebrow again. “Crowley apparently seems to think so. But you won’t know unless we play,” he says, so serious. Dean feels the word rippling down his spine in a way that might be enjoyment, but might just be anticipation.
“And you’re a bit of an asshole,” Dean observes.
“I’ve seen you hustle, Michael Campbell. I don’t think you, of all people, should be taking that particular corner shot.”
Dean could point out that there’s no way he would even have this gig if he weren’t an objectifying asshole who likes to win, but that’s neither here nor there. Instead, he laughs. “Yeah, what kind of corner shots should I be taking, then?”
“We should find out,” Castiel says—and the tip of his tongue touches the corner of his lips again in a tiny flick.
Is he flirting with Dean? What exactly is happening here?
“I dunno, man, my manager doesn’t like you, and I believe in Crowley’s survival instincts,” Dean offers.
“Thank you,” Crowley huffs. “I knew you couldn’t always put emotion and your pretty looks in front of good old-fashioned common sense.”
Dean doesn’t turn around and tell Crowley that at least one of them has got the pretty looks, because he’s not that petty. And also, Castiel has raised his chin and straightened the slight slump he has in his back and shoulders, and him trying to make himself taller, more solid, should look ridiculous in the too-big coat and the too-big jacket.
It should.
“Allow me to sweeten the deal, then, Michael,” Castiel says, in a tone that reminds Dean of learning to play pool—back in halls where they shouldn’t have been letting him in, where all the threadbare felt carried the smells of cigarettes and a haze of smoke hovered at the top of the room, dulling the shine from bare light bulbs. “If you win? A forfeit. A personal one, from me. One favor, whatever I can provide—within the bounds of my abilities and resources.” There’s a brief pause. “Oh, and certain kinds of legality, too, I suppose,” he adds.
This time, Dean has to laugh. He’s currently standing in an underground pool hall probably owned by a branch of the Mafia, where he gets videoed getting flashed and groped as he plays billiards, and, once, memorably, watched a girl push a pool ball up into herself. All while rich perverts bet truly stupid amounts of money on Dean’s ability to keep playing billiards through all of that. The legality clause is probably smart, but it’s the casual disgust with which Castiel says it that makes him chuckle.
“Buddy, I don’t know you. How do I have any idea what you can ‘provide?’” Dean points out.
“You don't,” Castiel says, and his mouth firms in a tight, restrained way that is the prettiest thing that Dean’s seen in a long, long time—and he’s played against some lookers, lately. “You have no idea, do you? And that's what makes it a gamble. For all you know, I'm some Russian oligarch with an interest in billiards and I could arrange all your future games.” He shrugs—a small flick of motion muffled under his layers. “Or I could be an inveterate gambler wearing my last clean set of clothes who went to a loan shark to front the starter fee, and the best I'll be able to do is drive you to the nearest McDonald's afterwards.”
“So what you’re saying is that I won’t find out if you’re conning me until I take your cute little deal. Which could be completely useless to me,” Dean observes.
“Exactly.” Castiel arches an eyebrow. “Interested?”
Dean loves to gamble. Not money, though that's kind of nice too.
But this? It’s been a long time since Dean had fun. And he's not saying no to this.
And from Crowley's long, low, "Oh, you wanker,” behind him? Crowley knows it too. (Dean doesn’t know who Crowley’s addressing that comment to, and frankly? It doesn’t matter.)
“And what about if you win?” Dean presses. There’s got to be a catch somewhere, right?
“Then I get the satisfaction of knowing I beat the great Michael Campbell,” Castiel says instantly, like he’s thought about it. Like he’s been dreaming of it. Game on, Trenchcoat. “But...”
Of course there's a ‘but.’ Dean rolls his eyes and stuffs his hands in his pockets. “Come on now, daylight's a-wasting.” (Of course, there's no daylight in here. No windows, either. He’s surprised no one’s ever mentioned buying out one of the public clubs and playing their little games there, but it’s true that everything’s all wired for surveillance in their special little room. So the video quality’s probably amazing, and with all the right security settings for the live feed or whatever.)
“But we play by the same rules as you always do. 8-ball, stripes and solids. No artificial bridges or tools. Even match, no handicap.” Castiel takes his eyes, and keeps them again, sucking Dean back in.
Dean raises his eyebrows in surprise. Most people take at least a one- or two-stroke handicap with him. “Deal,” he agrees instantly.
“And during the match, I can attempt to… distract you the same way, under the same rules, as anyone else in this particular endeavor would,” Castiel continues, calm, so calm. Almost bored with it, if not for the fact his eyes are doing that thing again where his gaze seems to be hauling Dean’s own eyelids up, keeping him from so much as blinking.
Okay, Dean did not expect that. His spine prickles. His gut prickles. Pleasantly. So, so pleasantly. “Same rules for that, too?” Dean confirms. “One bit of clothing for every legal ball sunk… and all the skin privileges anyone could ever want?” He’s surprised his voice stays steady. Cool.
So. So the dude can touch him anywhere. Can be doing whatever—can have his hands on Dean when he shoots, as long as he doesn’t jostle Dean’s arm or his body during the stroke. If he fouls Dean’s shot, it’s an automatic loss.
“Yes. And, of course, the reciprocal is true, if you want to try to distract me,” Castiel adds, with a little tilt of his head. “You won’t succeed,” he adds, with a haughty, fucking adorable sniff. “But you can try.”
Maybe Castiel heard about the game against Trenton? But if Castiel thinks Dean’s going to be bothered by a dude stripping down in his vicinity—well, there’s all different kinds of bothered.
“And if someone bows out in the middle of the match, it’s a quarter of the pot to the remaining player, entry fee refund and permanent ban from the club for the coward. Right?” Dean confirms. He always thought that that was fair. Consequences and all that. A quarter of a lot of money is still a lot of money, and ten K back from a game they can’t win is still better than being left with diddly squat, especially for someone who’s a one-off player.
Castiel snorts, but he doesn’t look away. “I don’t know. Are you a coward, Michael?” he asks softly, low and rich. “Are you afraid?”
Fuck, fuckity, fuck.
This is a bad idea. Crowley might not be wrong about that, though Dean’s pretty sure Crowley has no idea why. Part of the reason this whole business works, part of the reason Dean keeps winning, is that sure, Dean likes girls plenty, and he likes tits. But he sees plenty of tits, gets plenty of pussy. He likes to look, but he’s not desperate for it, and he likes winning a real fucking lot.
But he likes a challenge even more, and it’s been a long time since Dean’s had one. A long time.
“I dunno, pretty boy, pretty sure I’ve got no reason to be. I’m gonna take you. Trench coat advantage or not,” Dean teases, ‘cause geez, all the layers.
“Perhaps. Perhaps I would even like it,” Castiel answers, and shit, shit, okay. Okay. Sprouting a semi right here in the meeting room? Yeah, no, nope, ahaha, oof.
Dean’s got no idea what it is about this strange, wrapped-up little dude, but it’s on.
“Fuck,” Dean says, admiringly. Then he grins. “So. Are we gonna flirt, or are we gonna play? ‘Cause I’m getting some real mixed signals, here.”
“Bollocks,” Crowley mutters.
Crowley doesn’t back out and leave Dean holding the bag on his own, but it’s a close thing. Mostly because Crowley knows a cash cow, even when he’s watching it walk itself to the slaughter, mooing.
And yes, that’s exactly how he puts it. Has Dean mentioned lately why they’re not friends?
Castiel gets the break, so Dean gets to set up the table.
Dean doesn’t try to rack the balls together tightly, swirling them gently in the triangle rather than using their momentum to get them settled evenly into the corners. The powers that be stopped letting him pattern rack a few months ago—which, bummer. But letting Dean arrange the balls exactly the way he wanted rather than in a relatively random way did make the matches end quickly, and some viewers probably complained. Dean’s good enough, consistent enough, that on a table he knows, he could nearly always splay out the solids and bunch the stripes on a pattern break. And then he can run the table, and game over; more than once, he didn’t have to take off one single sock.
Hey, it was fun for him.
But making sure that the balls aren’t resting together at even, close angles when he lifts the triangle free from the table, some of them gapping away from the other—which is exactly the opposite of what any experienced pool player would want—is a big ol’ dick move on his part.
What? He wants to see what the hell this Castiel guy is made of. And like they’ve all established: Dean’s an asshole.
Cas squints down at the loose, ugly arrangement of the stripes and solids squatting on the billiard table, then turns just his eyes back up to glare at Dean. His cue, cupped delicately in his fingers with the wrap resting on the floor, is a Jacoby, Dean would put money on it: premium everything, sniper tip, a beautiful shell inlay of white wings edged in delicate black down the shaft, blue wood-stain that matches Castiel’s eyes right at the end. Once he was done assembling it, Dean couldn’t even see the seams.
Shit, that stick’s either custom or a limited edition. It’s also warmed wood and shiny, with the gleam of long use from the oil of hands and handling—not just fresh out of the box, either.
(Dean? Dean uses a McDermott. It matches the battered plastic case he carries it in. American maple, classic as shit, and sure, there are fancy versions, but Dean’s is well-used, worn and cheap. Kind of like Dean, really, heh. So does that mean Castiel is expensive and slick? Dean’s gonna find out.)
Castiel’s cue stick matches the rest of the pool room, honestly. Dean swears they redo the felt and the backing of the table between every time he’s been here, because he’s never seen so much as a scratch on the fabric. There’s just one uneven area over there near the left corner pocket that has tripped up people less familiar with the table a time or two, but the rest of it rolls smooth as a glass tabletop. The lighting is really fucking flattering, the walls lit up with sconces all around the edges, highlighting the dark, even wood of the floor—no carpet. The wood on the floor is in patterns of dark and light in elegant hexagons, and the walls are bare of anything but more dark wood.
Everything looks expensive. Even the little minibar in the corner is ebonywood.
It's not the first time Dean’s thought about how badly he fits in here, with his jeans and his scruff and his flannel.
It’s also not the first time he’s thought about how he’s made this place his, anyway.
He owns this.
Dean waggles his eyebrows and brushes his fingertips alongside the uneven arrangement of the balls, without touching them, letting his nails scratch softly on the felt. “It’s no fun if it ends too fast,” he announces.
“Hmm. Yes,” Castiel says slowly, and slides his fingers down his pool cue, pulling them off one at a time. He tightens the joins with a twist of both hands. “I guess there might be some benefits to… taking our time.”
His thumb rubs in a slow, even stroke over the firm haft of his pool stick, like he’s testing the integrity and the smoothness of a seam that Dean can’t even see. Up, down. Up…
Dean only manages to tear his gaze away when Castiel picks up the cue ball and sets it down near the side rail of the table. Yeah, that’s what Dean would have done for a shitty rack job like this, too, rather than trying to take the lead ball head-on from the head of the table, the traditional way.
Then Dean’s eyebrows rise as Castiel makes a thoughtful noise and comes all the way around the table.
There’s all sorts of ways to start a game of pool. If Dean was looking at this crappy little bunch of grapes he handed Castiel, he’d probably be aiming to get his CB to strike the second ball on the right. (A left-sided break looks impressive as hell, but Dean’s right-handed and he’ll take his advantages where he can get them, thanks.) Little bit of a backspin or sidespin, maybe, rather than a head-on stun shot: this kind of break is never really a square shot, the way it would be if Dean were aiming for the point of the triangle. Sure, maybe some people can get some real force behind their strike from a sideways angle, but the amount of force necessary would send accuracy out into the wind.
So if Dean were starting this game, the best he would aim for is to shake things loose. If he was lucky, he’d sink a corner ball—purely from the energy fracturing through the triangle. It wouldn’t be clean. Most likely, it’s going to be a dry break, no balls into pockets, with just enough motion of the balls that they won’t have to set up and start all over again.
Luckily, Dean’s the one who did the setting up, not the one doing the breaking.
Yeah, Dean’s an asshole.
Castiel nudges up the sleeves of his trench coat and bends over the table on the left side. The far left side, all the way at the rail—he’s not even standing at the head of the table. What the fuck, he’s going to break from the side? Oh, the showoff. Dean snorts, but he stays right where he is, next to the corner pocket on the right side. The dude wants to ruin himself right from the beginning? “Side break? Really? It’s your panties, dude.”
“I appreciate that you think I wear panties,” Castiel answers—but then his eyes touch on Dean’s hips, in their jeans. “Do you?”
And with that little sally, leaving Dean with his tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth because what the fuck, Castiel sights and settles himself at the table, letting out a long, slow breath.
God, look at that form, though. The stretch of his spine is a neat, relaxed slope even under the ugly brown coat, legs slightly spread, one foot turned just slightly outwards as he lines up. Dean’s gaze fixes on Castiel’s big, ungloved fingers where they’re settled in a triangle bridge, his stick laying delicately between index and middle finger. There’s a little bit of shine to the skin where the cue must have rubbed and rubbed and rubbed against the insides of his fingers…
Castiel lifts his gaze again, and meets Dean’s eyes. He doesn’t look away. Dean only barely sees the sharp movement of the cue stick out of his peripheral vision.
Dean hears the break before he sees it: the sharp crack of the cue ball hitting the triangle.
But rather than the little pop of just a few balls coming off from the contact and leaving the rest in an ugly, complicated cluster, the way it should have been with a side break like that—there’s a familiar, beautiful, rich clatter.
Dean’s attention jerks from Castiel’s to the table as the balls go everywhere in an elegant scatter. And one—the 10-stripe—plops neatly into the opposite side pocket.
“Damn, Cas,” Dean murmurs. Okay, there shouldn’t be a rough, breathy tremor to his own voice. But Dean’s not sure he could have pulled off a power break on the shitty, loose rack job that he set up himself.
Again: damn.
“I don't recall giving you permission to call me by any sort of nickname,” Castiel rumbles. He straightens, sets his cue down and stares.
Shouldn’t have said that. Dean is going to call him ‘Cas’ now just to piss him off. It's going to be amazing.
Dean smiles. “Buddy, ain't no one gives me ‘permission’ to do anything,” he croons.
But that response doesn't give him a scowl. It doesn't even get him a frown. Instead, Castiel smiles—the faintest tip of the corner of his mouth.
“We'll see,” Castiel says. It sounds like a promise. Maybe a threat. Maybe Dean’s gonna find out which.
(He’s also gonna have to find out who set this game up, and, like, give them a big, fat kiss on the mouth.)
But Dean knows what Cas is waiting for. He starts on the buttons of his flannel. One at a time, from the bottom up. He unbuttons them one-handed, his other hand still holding onto his McDermott, and Castiel’s eyes follow the line of them flicking open.
Dean can’t see the guy’s Adam’s apple moving. Can’t see anything under all those coats and jackets. It’s not hot in here—they keep it a little too cool for comfort, actually—but isn’t he dying in those layers?
But when Castiel steps close, then closer, leaving his cue balanced to lean again the pool table, Dean swears he can smell the guy right through the coat and suit. Nothing cologne. Nothing stinky or sweaty. Just… guy, warm and rainy and present, and with his gaze still set into Dean’s as tight and seamless as the interlock on his pool cue.
If there were ever any doubt that Cas is as straight as one of Dean’s trick shots, it’s gone now.
“May I help?” he asks, and gestures to Dean’s half-open flannel.
“So polite,” Dean teases.
“I don’t see any disadvantage to being so,” Castiel informs him. He studies the front of Dean’s flannel like he’s contemplating Battleship strategy rather than looking at six stupid little plastic buttons.
“Yeah? ‘Cause most people ‘round here wouldn’t bother to ask.” They just take. They display. They dominate—or they try to. That’s what all of this is about. Pool’s a game of control—who has it, and who’s taking it back. Or trying.
Dean doesn’t ask why Cas thinks Dean needs help taking off his flannel. That ain’t the point.
“If I were ‘most people,’” Castiel replies, lifting his gaze, “You probably wouldn’t have agreed to play.” There’s a little tilt to the word ‘play’ that Dean can’t read. His deep voice goes a little quieter, and Dean finds himself teetering a little forward on his tiptoes to hear him. “As it so happens, I like to ask. You may not feel anyone needs to give you permission for anything… but I enjoy getting permission.” He blinks slowly, and Dean remembers that breathing is a necessity. “Because I would like very much to hear you say ‘Yes.’”
Okay, so maybe Dean can hear exactly what Cas is saying.
There’s all different kinds of control. Trouble is, Dean can’t figure out yet which of them has it.
“Yeah,” Dean hears himself squeak. “Yeah, okay.”
Seriously, what the fuck was that noise Dean just made?
But since Dean also can’t argue the point Castiel’s making, he sets his cue stick aside. He lifts his face as Castiel touches him there—not his cheek, though. He starts by stroking one fingertip almost playfully down Dean’s chin, and along the shivery, vulnerable line of the softness under Dean’s jaw. He touches so carefully—one side of Dean’s throat, then the other, sliding down Dean’s neck until his fingertips hit cloth—studying the motion of his own hand as he goes, his eyebrows a little furrowed like all of this requires serious concentration.
But he doesn’t try to kiss Dean when he’s doing it. Doesn’t try to settle any closer than they already are—just close enough that Castiel’s elbows are resting by his own sides as he starts on the buttons of Dean’s flannel, leaving air between them.
Dean doesn’t hold his breath, and he watches those big hands move with him as he inhales, exhales. Castiel isn’t touching Dean’s skin, not through his undershirt, but Dean sure as hell feels it when two hands reach into the open flaps of his shirt to rest on Dean’s chest and sweep up, up, into the shoulders of his flannel, calluses dragging gently on the outside of Dean’s undershirt as Castiel pushes the flannel off Dean from the inside out.
Not like people haven’t done this for Dean before—undressed him in this very spot, with the tiny, blinking red lights of the cameras like winking, teasing eyes around them.
But everyone else who’s done it has been doing it for the cameras. Because the motion of hands under cloth can look sexy, just as sexy as skin showing. Dean knows the power of a good, slow striptease. But it doesn’t feel like much.
Or it shouldn’t. Because, hell, Dean is wearing an undershirt. He can barely feel the warmth of those big hands.
But Castiel? Castiel drags the undershirt gently along as he extricates Dean from his top layer. He exhales deliberately as the soft, worn plaid cloth peels free of Dean’s biceps, his forearms, pulling down, down, down. His thumbs, his wrists, sweep along Dean’s arms, cupping his elbows, tugging delicately. He watches every motion like he’s watching fucking ballet, like it’s the panties they mentioned coming off and not a Goodwill flannel.
There’s no reason at all that Dean’s fingers should tingle as the well-washed cloth slides free of them. He should not be sporting a semi just from someone taking off the top layer of his flannel.
Castiel studies Dean with the cloth still held carefully in his fingers, dangling in front of him from both hands. “Very nice,” he says approvingly, so approvingly that Dean has to glance down to confirm that he’s still fully dressed.
Then, Castiel fussily tucks the sleeves back in so the flannel isn’t inside-out anymore, and folds it into a perfect rectangle with neat, minimalist flicks of his hands. He sets it gently back into Dean’s numb fingers—Dean doesn’t remember holding his hands out to receive it—and, reaching out for his cue, turns back to the pool table that, for one goddamned second, Dean forgot was there.
Fuck.
What’s going on here?
Doesn’t matter. Dean needs a boner-killer, like, now, and he knows the perfect one. He leans against the edge of the table again, resting his forearms on the side rails. Castiel prowls around the table, and then around him—Dean turns his head to follow him, watching those blue eyes eyes glancing over each of the remaining balls resting on the felt.
“So. Crowley really doesn't like you,” Dean points out, as Cas reaches the side of the table opposite him. He has to admit, he's been curious.
Castiel doesn't turn his head to look at him, but his eyes do a quiet flick sideways. “No,” he says. He doesn't sound embarrassed about it as he comes the rest of the way around the table, settling by the foot.
Dean knows which shot he’d call next if it were his turn and he were playing stripes: thirteen, into the corner, with a force follow stroke, a touch of spin to clear the cue ball from that little knot of solids and set it up to take the ten next.
Cas seems to be staring at the ten, though. Why? Sinking that motherfucker first would take a plant shot into the opposite rail—he’d have to hit the nine with the cue ball, and send it off on an angle to then tap the ten in.
Dean frowns and looks over the arrangement of the balls again.
Alright, that would get Cas set up to run at least another three shots if he’s any kind of player, but he knows that there’s just no good reason to take that kind of nonsense risk, right? He’s twice as likely to miss a plant shot as any other kind: it’s not as easy as it looks, using a cue ball to hit a ball that then shoots off and hits another ball at just the right angle to pot it. Especially not on a table that still has all the other balls on it.
Cas’s focus is all on the table, and it doesn’t look like he’s planning to go into any detail about Crowley’s beef with him while he’s concentrating on angles and shots.
“Any particular reason?” Dean prods.
“A few,” Castiel answers absently, rubbing his thumb up and down his cue in a way that looks like an old habit. Just as Dean’s about to roll his eyes, he rumbles, “He remembers that he got on my bad side, once.” His voice has gone low and flat in a way that sends a chill down Dean's back. He's not sure it's an unpleasant chill.
“Ooh. So you’re a bad boy. Should’ve known. Shaking in my boots, here,” Dean says, with a big grin.
Except Castiel turns his head and gazes at him, and then says, “Oh. Well, they're very nice boots. You wear them very well.”
Then, while Dean’s still blinking at the complete and total earnestness, all the wind taken out of his sassy sails, Cas lines up behind the cue ball and sets up to take the ten. Even just two shots in, Dean can already see Castiel’s aiming routine: fold, set himself, visualize, two ghost strikes, go.
Yeah, Dean’s played a lot of opponents.
But Cas takes the ten with one of the cleanest plant shots Dean’s ever seen: flat shot to the cue ball, hitting the nine just off-center enough to send it into a spin to the left, whispering past the 8-ball so close Dean’s surprised he doesn’t see it wobble, and tapping a soft, clean, dead center smack to the ten. The ten-stripe starts rolling its clean, merry way towards the left center pocket, moving in a diagonal across the table.
The completely full table.
Castiel’s already setting his cue stick down and turning his body towards Dean’s. Behind him, the ten delicately thumps into the pocket. Castiel isn’t even watching as it drops in.
Fuck.
Maybe Dean’s not going to be able to do something about his boner, because skin and jiggly tits are nice, sexy shit happening on a pool table is cool, but all of a sudden maybe he gets why some people might find watching him running the board to be really sexy.
“May I?” Castiel says again, his gaze flicking to Dean’s undershirt.
There’s really only one answer to that.
“Yes,” Dean says.
Dean was right: Cas takes the next three shots so cleanly that Dean doesn’t think he is going to be able to do anything about his boner. And maybe insisting that he’s going to take off his socks next, rather than his undershirt, was a dick move (Dean’s running asshole on repeat here, it seems).
But Cas slowly crouching at Dean’s feet and saying, quietly, “May I?” Dean doesn’t know what the fuck that is.
Dean finally gets his turn at the table when he’s down both socks and his t-shirt. Mostly because Castiel can’t seem to take his eyes off the stretch of Dean’s chest, Dean’s nipples.
Dean’s been distracted, but he doesn’t think he’s ever been the distraction before. He shouldn’t like it. He really shouldn’t. He definitely shouldn’t have reached up to thumb at the pink perk of one of his own nipples right when Cas was lining up for his shot.
“Cold in here,” Dean says. (It’s not the cold.)
“That’s intentional,” Castiel says absently. He doesn’t seem mad about fouling his massé shot, though—he was watching Dean and didn’t put quite enough curve to it, and the cue ball ticked off one of Dean’s solids rather than arching around towards the yellow stripe Castiel was aiming for. “It’s kept cold in here to help preserve the wood and felt, but also because people seem to have odd opinions about what it looks like when players sweat. Why else do you think I’m wearing a trench coat and a suit?”
Huh. That the temperature in here might be intentional never occurred to Dean. “You’re a smart guy, you know that, Cas?” he teases.
“Yes,” Castiel says simply, and this time, Dean has to laugh. What can he say? He likes the dude. He’s a bit of a weirdo, and seems to be, uh, kind of literal. Okay, very literal. But he plays some fucking good pool. And looks at Dean like he wants to eat him alive, one bite at a time, even though Dean’s just shirtless.
It’s not like Dean’s got a six-pack or big arms or huge pecs or pretty tattoos. He’s got nice shoulders, sure, and his arms are toned, but that’s it. His good-luck tattoo on his left pec isn’t any kind of fancy job, either.
But Dean’s laughter stops quickly, ‘cause it’s play time. Dean’s turn at the table now.
Dean lines up and takes the two and the six without turning around. He’s bent over and already aiming for the one when he hears the shush of cloth, and Castiel grumbles, “You’re going too fast.”
Dean twists his head to watch Cas struggling to get his suit jacket off, the trench coat already crumpled on the ground at his feet. Oh, looking a little grouchy and rumpled and hurried as he pulls off his clothes is a good look on Cas, a real good look.
“Maybe I’m just impatient,” Dean says.
Taking the next shot without turning his gaze back to look at the table is a dickish power move—but he knows from Cas’s little intake of breath, the satisfying crack and then pop as the one drops into the basket, that Dean was perfectly lined up already: he didn’t need to look. “You stopped,” Dean complains playfully, and turns the rest of the way around to face Cas, resting the butt of his cue stick back on the floor. Then he pauses and frowns, counting in his head. “Hey, wait, how many layers are you wearing, anyway?”
“I know the rules. A tie is an accessory and not a piece of clothing, it doesn’t count any more than it would if you were wearing a headband,” Castiel explains, earnest as fuck as he tugs off his tie in a low, luxuriant thwipp, then toes off one sock.
Well, sure, but that still makes—
“I’m not wearing underwear.”
Jesus fuck.
But Cas meanders over to Dean’s side of the table again and says, once more, “May I?”
Dean doesn’t know what the fuck he’s asking this time. It’s not Cas’s turn to shoot. It’s not his turn to help Dean out of his clothes, either.
There’s only one right answer, though.
“Okay,” Dean says.
But Cas just smiles and gestures Dean back towards the shot he should have been thinking about rather than staring at the oddly vulnerable sight of a guy wearing a button-down with the top button still done all the way up his neck, pants that would be too big for him if not for the size of his thighs, and just one sock, the toes of one bare foot pressing delicately into the wood flooring as he curls them.
The hand coming to rest on the small of Dean’s bare back as Dean settles downwards into position, bending over the table for the next shot, is smooth and rough in just the right ways. Dean doesn’t jerk in surprise—he’s a professional, okay, and he’ll say it as often as he has to until he believes it. But he doesn’t know why the fuck Cas needed all those layers: his skin is so warm.
“Your back is beautiful up close,” Cas murmurs. His fingertips tap, tap, tap. “Such lovely muscles, and all these subtle little freckles up here, in patterns on your shoulders. Like lickable constellations.”
Ah, fuck. Dean doesn’t know how this dude is for real. Is Dean blushing? Goddammit, he might be blushing. “That ain’t where most of my freckles are, and not into people licking my face, Cas.”
“Not even if I ask very nicely?” Cas asks, a little mournfully, his fingers venturing down the line of Dean’s spine. Tap, tap, tap.
Dean’s not entirely sure how he manages to pot the three-ball. Much less the four. He doesn’t even remember taking the shots. Not with Cas touching down his back so deliberately it’s like Dean’s spine is Braille for the meaning of life.
But the chest under that white button-down as Cas shrugs it off? That’s definitely for real. Castiel’s bigger than he looked under that coat and the baggy suit jacket. And maybe Dean does understand what Cas means about the spontaneous licking thing all of a sudden, because Cas has got lines of stark, twisting ink in lettering that Dean can’t read along his left ribs, the arches and curves of fine, elegant bone showing delicately through his skin as he moves and twists to get the cloth off his fingers, grumbling cutely about dress shirts. And Dean’s mouth is watering.
Dean can count. He knows that means Cas is down to just his pants, now. The pool table’s nearly empty in front of them.
“May I?” Cas says, approaching Dean again.
Dean knows the answer to this. Even if he has no idea what Cas is asking for this time, either. It’s still not Dean’s turn to take off any clothes. He looks down into impossible, earnest blue eyes and the tilt of a proud, dimpled chin upwards. No one should be looking at Dean like that over a fucking billiards table, on camera, when he’s wearing just his pants; no one.
And Dean finds he doesn’t care who’s watching. Who’s looking. Who’s seeing.
“Yes,” he says.
“Yes,” as Cas kneels in front of him and, slowly, so slowly, undoes Dean’s jeans with those big, warm fingers. It’s done just as deliberately as he touched each of the bones lining Dean’s spine—just as carefully as he rested both hands along the span of Dean’s shoulder blades, feeling how Dean’s back rose and fell with every deliberate breath before he took his shots. It’s just as slow, just as deliberate. Just as challenging.
Maybe this isn’t okay. Maybe other people haven’t dared. Maybe other people couldn’t cross this particular line.
Dean’s seen some girls do some kinky shit around here. But in front of him. Never with Dean. Never to him. They wouldn’t have risked the forfeit if they jostled his arm, his body. The red lights of the cameras pointed at the table, at Castiel, at Dean, blink, blink, blink.
But.
Dean looks away from them.
“Yes,” Dean says, as Cas leans in and breathes, inhaling, pressing his face into the clothed bulge at Dean’s open zipper, straining and aching and wanting.
“Don’t stop playing,” Cas reminds him. “Play the game, Dean.”
Dean has no idea what the fuck that means anymore, but sure, fine, fine—he sets up. He spreads his legs to put himself in position, the pull of his jeans along his thighs and his hips forcing his zipper further open. He—
Cas slowly reaches in and in and in and fuck that hand feels even better on the bare skin of Dean’s cock as he tucks Dean’s boxer-briefs downwards. And the tight heat of Cas’s mouth as he slowly, greedily, slurps Dean up bows Dean until he’s not poised over the table, he’s draped down over the edge of it, panting.
Cas is gentle about it—the heel of his hand sweetly, so sweetly, protecting Dean against the teeth of his own zipper… but his mouth is hungry. So fucking hungry.
Dean’s vision blurs, the cue ball and the table and the seven he’s supposed to be aiming for melting together into one pleasure-hazed color before he looks down—because he can’t not.
Cas’s eyes are turned upwards. He’s watching Dean from his position folded under the edge of the pool table, down on his knees in front of Dean’s clothed legs. The way those pink, pink lips look stretched out around Dean’s cock, the silky heat of him, the gentle rub of his tongue on Dean’s underside as he closes his eyes and takes Dean in—deeper—deeper—
Dean misses his shot.
He doesn’t give a shit.
The lube is the really good kind.
Dean knows this because he's ass-up, head down, a cock stuffed up his ass... and even though it's gliding in and out of him, slowly, so slowly, there's no hitch of snag or friction to drag him back and forth along where he's stretched over the edge of the pool table, gripping the rail with his fingertips digging into the felt of the bumpers.
Well, the fingers of one hand are digging into the felt.
The fingers of his other hand are still holding down his cue stick.
Dean wants to say he has no idea how he ended up in this situation, can honestly say he doesn’t give a fuck, because God.
Except he does know. He knows they’re both naked. He can see the two remaining balls in play on the table. One is Cas’s 15-stripe, one is the eight ball, and it’s Dean’s.
It’s the game-ender. This should be an easy shot Dean could take blindfolded—it should be so fucking easy to sink that eight ball, a straight follow shot, nothing fancy.
None of it feels that way—nothing feels like it should be easy—when the thick ache of Cas moving inside him is fucking perfection.
“It’s your shot,” Cas murmurs into his ear.
“Asshole,” Dean manages, because that’s about all he’s got left.
The next sound is the slick, messy smack of hips against the firm round of Dean’s ass, and Dean jolts as stars flash in his vision.
“May I?” Cas said, earlier, a hoarse echo, after Dean peeled his own jeans, and then, at Cas’s next shot, his sticky underwear down his legs, his spit-wet hard-on not responding to anything Dean had been trying to tell it about video cameras or eternal baseball games or even Sam’s burrito farts.
Dean had no idea what Cas was talking about. There was nothing left for Dean to take off. He was naked, nothing for Cas to help him with anymore. That asshole had fucking stopped, pulling off the tip of Dean’s cock with a long, wet, luxurious slurp even as there was no satisfying thump of seven ball into pocket, leaving Dean standing there so hard that he’d been able to feel his own pulse beating in his cock. After that, there could’ve been no way Cas could tease him worse.
Yeah, he was wrong about that.
Maybe he knew that. Maybe that’s why Dean said “Yeah,” again, anyway.
Dean still didn’t expect Cas to kneel in front of him again, easy and comfortable on his knees like no one Dean’s ever seen, not a fucking thing submissive about it as he spread Dean’s legs with a hand on each of Dean’s inner thighs… and then took Dean’s balls into his mouth—one at a time, with a low, delighted groan that Dean felt all the way into his fucking belly button.
Oral fixation, apparently, that’s Cas, and bless him, fuck, bless him.
Cas missed his next stroke to Dean leaning against the table beside him, one hand resting on the clothed curve of Cas’s firm, pretty little ass, and his other stroking himself, slowly, using the wet slipperiness that Cas’s mouth had left all over him.
Dean knew his cheeks were red when he looked up at the red, red lights of the cameras he could see, the slow, under-the-skin buzz of the ones that he couldn’t. For a second, Dean thought: fuck, they’re watching this. Everyone’s watching this. Everyone’s seeing me.
Dean should care. He should care that tens, hundreds, maybe thousands of people are watching this pretty guy make a mess of him. He should have cared that he was standing there and touching himself on camera.
But maybe he understood just a little better. Or maybe not, because Dean wasn’t thinking about distractions, or the prize pot. He was thinking about the game, and maybe not the one on the table. The only one he was seeing right then, the only one he was looking at at that moment, was Cas.
Yeah. Because maybe it’s not just the billiards. Maybe this, all of this, is Dean, too.
This was Dean really, really fucking distracted, jacking off standing and naked in a fancy pool club just to make a guy’s eyes drop to the slow, deliberate motion of Dean’s cock pushing in and out of his own big hand, and when the head of Dean’s cock peeked pink and inviting out of the other side of his fist, Cas’s stick skidded wide, knocking aside the cue ball in a way that should have invited at least one snarky comment from Dean.
Neither of them laughed.
When Dean took up his cue, he realized that his fingers were sticky on the wood with his own precome, and that should have been disgusting—not hot.
“May I?” Cas said as Dean bent over the table again. When Dean spread his legs for balance, settling his weight on just slightly bent knees, and realized for the first time just how that must look from behind, with him naked: open and vulnerable and bare.
Again, not Cas’s shot.
But again, Dean said “Yes.”
And he didn’t tell him to stop. Not when Cas squeezed his ass cheek with one hand like he’d test a peach—gently, his thumb pressing into the meatiest part of Dean’s body. Not until Cas ran that thick, curious finger down Dean’s back—and down one curve of his butt, then up the other, tracing that sensitive, sensitive little line where Dean’s legs meet his ass, tingling along Dean’s thighs so delicately that Dean felt his knees quiver, fouling his balance. He jerked.
“Hey,” Dean grumbled.
(He shouldn’t have said anything. Shouldn’t have let Cas know he was getting to him. That’s the way this game is played, isn’t it?)
But Cas stopped. He stopped, right there. He stopped with his thumb resting so close to the crease of Dean’s ass cheeks that Dean felt them flex, felt himself twitch. “No?” Cas asked. He sounded curious about it. Not upset. Not mad at all.
Yeah, Dean should have said ‘no.’ That was the out, right there. That was safety. Cas didn’t even ask if Dean was backing out—if he was forfeiting.
Except.
“Not what I’m sayin’,” Dean said, and put his head down, aiming, aiming, always fucking aiming—
“Oh. I see. You’re sensitive?” Cas whispered, in a voice that felt more like velvet than rough, textured, pool table felt. Both those big hands—big hands, fucking huge hands, the way they felt cradling the globes of Dean’s ass—gently pressed together, and then parted, splaying Dean wide open on the pool table like a fucking buffet as Dean held his breath and gripped his cue stick. “Keep playing,” he said, and Dean doesn’t take orders, not from anyone, not ever, but—
Just as Dean got himself settled again and in position, there was a delicate touch. So fucking careful—a fingernail up and down Dean’s crack, tracing the curving angle where the cheeks dive in and split, not enough, not nearly enough, the tickle of it almost driving Dean tightly up onto his tiptoes.
Then came a firm grip—spreading Dean open with one hand. A two-finger tap with the other, gentle and deliberate, right on Dean’s hole. A thumb, dry and easy, rubbing around, around. Dean’s hand spasmed on his cue stick.
“Such a pretty hole. May I?” Castiel whispered.
Those fucking words again. They were powering Dean’s own personal handbasket to hell, and Dean was the one who got to turn the crank.
“Yeah.”
Then Cas kissed him.
Not Dean’s mouth.
Fuck.
So.
Yeah.
Dean doesn’t know how he put the two-ball in a pocket after that, during that, with Cas’s lips moving up and down, up and down, the deep, lazy thrusts of Cas’s tongue trying to press, press, press into this dark, dirty part of Dean’s body. He sure as hell wasn’t proud of that miracle shot, didn’t dare be, because fuck setting up to run the rest of the table, he had no idea how he’d even potted it. The position he’d have to put his body in to be able to take the eight-ball after? Fuck.
But he knew that Cas hummed right into his ass when they both heard the swish. He knew that Cas didn’t draw back to take off his pants, his last article of clothing—not right away. He didn’t even look at the table. Dean knew, because Cas’s face was resting right between his cheeks.
“Just last ball left, and then it’s game,” Cas murmured, not raising his head. He didn’t sound worried. He turned his face from side to side.
“Yep,” Dean said, his voice rough at the feel of breath and speech against the insides of his spit-wet ass cheeks.
But what Cas answered, his voice low and thick, didn’t have anything to do with billiards at all. Nope. No. Instead, what he said was, “You’re so open, Dean, so loose—have you ever fucked yourself with your cue? Watched it disappear into yourself?” right into the sensitive arc on the inside of Dean’s left cheek.
Dean shuddered all over, imagining it—but he was the one who answered, “I like cock better.”
He almost cried when Cas slowly withdrew, with one last gentle kiss directly to Dean’s hole. But Dean turned to watch anyway: turned to look at him, watch the last little bit of striptease.
Cas wasn’t lying when he said he wasn’t wearing underwear. God, his cock was the thing that dreams were made of: uncut, thick through the head, even thicker through the middle, with a perfect upward curve.
But it was his spit-wet, pink-cheeked face, the way his lips were swollen as he pulled off his pants then straightened so that Dean could look at him, that made him naked.
Dean couldn’t have planned his next shot—the way he had to hitch his leg upwards and put his knee onto the edge of the side rail to get himself into position, because, yeah—no aids, no bridges. This whole game, Dean’s body has been the only way he could get leverage to get the balls into the position that he wants. And because Dean was fucking naked, well.
Not his fault if spit and precome got onto the felt. Not his problem.
But Cas’s low laugh behind him as Dean splayed himself out felt like a fucking invitation.
Cas’s dick is thick, but not too thick, moving inside Dean in slow little bumps—thank you God Goldilocks, slender enough to glide, thick enough to stretch. Dean wants to be offended Cas had lube on him, tucked into a pocket of the ugly trench coat. He should be pissed off that someone thought he could be this easy.
But Dean is this easy.
He is, because when Cas pressed a finger directly into him, just the tip, spit-slippery, into the sensitive little furl into which he’d been tongue-fucking Dean over and over and over, Dean’s whole body rocked. He tried to fuck his cock against the edge of the table he was splayed out over, his one leg up, his other still on tiptoes on the floor, his whole body vulnerable and open and not in the least bit ready for the game-ending shot he was supposed to be taking.
He is just this easy, because when Cas whispered, “I don’t have a condom,” against the small of Dean’s back, lips and chin still sloppy with the mess he made of Dean with his tongue, Dean growled, “Don’t fucking care.”
Dean is, he is exactly this easy, and Cas does a little careful something with his hips that jars Dean against the side of the pool table. He feels the little dribble of precome that just got fucked out of him drip down to the edge of the railing as Cas nails his prostate with a delicate pressure that makes the red lights of the cameras blur out to stars in Dean’s vision.
The viewers can’t see their cocks, can’t see Dean’s stuffed ass—not at this angle, not with with them bent over the felt together like this, stacked spoons balanced on the edge and Dean’s leg still propped high on the edge of the pool table.
But they sure as fuck can see Dean’s face, and he can only imagine what he looks like.
Then Cas pauses. He pauses, his hand stilling where he’s using Dean’s cock as a fucking handle to hold Dean still—keep him from moving, keep him from jerking his leg off the table, throwing aside his cue stick, and doing something truly, really stupid. Dean’s heard about cock cages, but he’s never heard of one that caged him in with pleasure—a cage of fingers keeping him pinned where he is, trembling on the edge of stillness as his ass gets used in gentle, careful deliberate strokes that are making Dean’s head spin with how much he needs more, more, more.
But Cas lets go. He lets go, and Dean could cry.
“The rules,” he says, and his own voice is gritty and dark and breathless, so there’s that, at least. At least Dean’s not the only one getting off on this. At least Dean’s not the only one helpless.
Seriously, what? What rules? Fuck the rules.
“I can’t—I can’t…” Cas heaves a breath and buries his face into the back of Dean’s neck. They’re both sweaty now despite the temperature here. Whoever’s watching them is just going to fucking deal with the unattractiveness of sweat and lube and red faces and open mouths, and fuck Dean wants to see it—wants to look over his shoulder, pull Cas out of the line of his neck by his hair—wants to see whether Cas is as taken-apart by this slippery, hot energy between them as Dean is.
He sounds like he is.
He sounds like he wants to be.
Dean’s still startled when Cas continues fucking him, after a brief, gasping pause and one more jolting, helpless thrust. When he pauses again, his thighs are trembling where they’re molded against the back of Dean’s. He’s so fucking near. “I can’t… can’t go any—can’t go faster. Can’t jostle you,” he gasps, and his voice is so gritty that Dean feels the rough rasp of it along his back. Or maybe that’s the way Dean’s shaking. “Can’t foul your shot. ‘Gainst the—against the rules.” He freezes, molded against Dean’s whole back. “Take it, take the stroke, please—please.”
It’s not a fair request. None of this is fair. Dean’s being expected to fucking play high-stakes billiards while he’s pinned to the table and he’s got a cock in his ass?
At this point? Dean doesn’t fucking care if he scratches on the eight ball.
If he misses, though.
If he misses, Cas pulls out.
If he misses, it’s Dean’s turn to distract Cas. Mm—he can just imagine. He can imagine so many, many things. He wants so goddamned much.
But Dean’s a professional. He’s a professional, and this is his game. He knows this. He knows it.
The whole world narrows to felt and the smooth, sweat-slippery stick in his right hand and the familiar, callused triangle of his left fingers, and the white and the black, the blur of the 8 in its contrasting white circle, and—
And the delicious, full pressure inside his ass.
“Call your shot,” Cas whispers into his skin. He rubs that little bit of scruff between Dean’s shoulder blades. Dean feels Cas’s cock twitch delicately inside Dean’s body like Dean’s a fucking cocksleeve. “Call it.”
“E-eight ball,” Dean manages. “Corner—left corner—”
That’s all he can get out. He breathes. He sights. He strokes.
There’s a nearly-inaudible tap of contact that Dean’s surprised he can hear through the rasp of his own breathing—or maybe that’s Cas’s, huffing against his skin. A tick, not as clean as he likes, of the cue ball striking the eight.
Then.
Pop.
Thump.
"Your win," Castiel growls into the back of Dean’s shoulder in that dark, deep, scratchy voice, and Dean comes all over the edge of the pool table.
~to be concluded~