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The first thing Dean notices when he finally hauls himself out of the tub is that his clothes are missing. He left them neatly folded on the toilet seat, and now there’s a plush bathrobe, such a deep blue it’s practically black, in their place. He stands there dripping on the tiles and stares at it for a few minutes.
It doesn’t take a stretch of his imagination to figure out who put it there, since Sam is the only other person Dean has seen for months—not even his brother’s pet demons have been allowed up here since his escape attempt. What bothers Dean is how, exactly, Sam managed the switch without alerting him. He knows that he dozed off for a while because the water was warm one moment and frigid the next, but he should have snapped awake at the sound of the door opening.
He’s been here too long. Gotten sloppy. Let his training slip.
More worrying is the why of it all. Sam liked the clothes Dean was wearing this morning. He knows because Sam had them laid out on a chair next to the bed when he woke up. In fact, Sam’s been dancing attendance on him all day—not unusual, but today he seemed … almost nervous.
Dean doesn’t really want to know what could possibly have set his brother on edge, but he suspects that he’s about to find out. There’s something in the air: some indefinable feel of cresting tension, like the moment before a tsunami tips and smashes through everything in its path.
And there’s the bathrobe.
After a few seconds of nervous fidgeting, Dean gets himself moving again: mostly because he knows that Sam will come fetch him if he doesn’t get his ass in gear. The last time Sam had to do that, Dean spent the rest of the night lying on the couch with Sam’s thigh pressed up against his crotch and his brother’s tongue mapping out his mouth. Sam’s way of reassuring himself that Dean was still alive and kicking, and of reminding Dean who he belonged to.
Once he has dried himself and dropped the towel on the edge of the tub, Dean heads over to the robe and runs his fingers across the fabric. It’s rabbit soft, and when he slips it on his skin aches from sheer sensuality. As far as he can tell, there’s nothing supernatural about it, though: it’s just finely made and expensive, same as everything Sam gives him these days. Dean belts the robe shut with brisk movements, ignoring the way his dick responds to the soft brush of fabric, and wishes that Sam had included a pair of boxers.
Sam keeps the place warm enough that Dean could stroll around naked if he wanted to, but he shivers anyway as he glances at himself in the mirror. Sam likes him best in blue, and Dean isn’t so stupid that he doesn’t know why. He’s well aware of what that color does to his eyes and his skin: of the way that it makes his green irises pop electrically and his pale skin all but glow. Dean knows how easily Sam forgets himself when he’s dressed in this shade, and how quickly his brother’s hands start to wander.
If Sam decides to get playful tonight, there isn’t going to be anything between his hands and Dean’s dick.
Maybe that’s the point, Dean thinks, and then shuts that train of thought down before it can go any further. It’s pointless worrying about it, anyway. Sam may be a hell of a lot more tactile these days, but there hasn’t been any below the belt stuff since the day Dean slit his wrist and almost killed himself by accident. Not since Sam decided to slip into that oversized tub with him and—
Dean realizes that he’s staring at the bathtub and jerks his eyes away with a muttered swear. Bad enough it happened. Doesn’t mean he has to keep thinking about it.
You don’t think it isn’t gonna happen again? a merciless voice whispers in his head. You don’t think it’s not gonna go further?
“He said he wouldn’t make me,” Dean mumbles. He realizes he’s having a conversation with himself, but really: who else does he have to talk stuff through with these days?
The potted plant in the corner?
The occasional pigeon that comes to roost on the ledge outside the window?
Sam?
The voice laughs. You trying to tell me you don’t want it?
“I don’t,” Dean insists, pounding his fist against the sink hard enough to bruise. “Fuck you, I don’t want any of it!”
The voice doesn’t respond this time. It doesn’t have to. Dean’s body is enough of a traitor, giving voice to the lie by the way it stirs at the thought of Sam touching him again. Of Sam doing more.
“Goddamn it,” he hisses, and punches the sink again.
“Dean,” comes the low call from the next room. A warning flicker of heat plays over his back. The cuffs warm on his wrists.
Dean laughs shakily and scrubs his aching hand across his face. “Yeah. Yeah, okay.”
It’s dim in the main room of the suite: all of the overheads off. A line of ornate candelabras along the walls bathes the room in a warm, golden glow.
A long, wooden table has been brought in, and there are gold plates laid out across it, each one a work of edible art. On one platter, plump, pristine strawberries are tumbled together with the largest blueberries Dean has ever seen. Thinly sliced pieces of steak are piled high on another. There’s also two roast quail, a ham skewered with pineapple and cherries, a platter of more cheeses than Dean thought existed, a multi-tiered tray filled with sauces, pears, peaches, mangos, cinnamon buns drowned in icing, dozens of other delicacies Dean doesn’t recognize and a chocolate waterfall as the centerpiece.
And the smell. Oh God, the smell.
Dean’s hand goes out to his side and blindly finds the doorframe. He clings to it, holding himself up.
“Hungry?”
Dean tears his eyes from the food to look at his brother and it’s painful how quickly his mouth begins to water. As distracted as he is, the irony that it’s Sam causing that reaction instead of the food doesn’t escape him. His body betraying him all over again, stuck in the past and still craving things it shouldn’t.
Sam gives him a lazy smile from his sprawl on the couch. The candlelight pooling across the exposed V of his chest like honey makes the red of his robe look even deeper: makes the sleek lines of his face more angular. Fox-like. In this glow, the golden gleam of his eyes might be nothing more than a reflection.
Swallowing takes Dean three tries, and his voice is still hoarse when he asks, “What is this?”
Sam slides to his feet and comes over. Dean locks his knees so he can’t run—running from predators only makes them more eager to catch you—and Sam makes a noise of approval as he draws to a stop in front of him.
Running his hands up and down the lapels of Dean’s robe, he murmurs, “I love this color on you. Makes you look good enough to eat.”
“Sam, what—”
Sam cuts off the question with a kiss, licking into Dean’s mouth and nibbling at his lower lip. Dean tightens his grip on the doorjamb as Sam makes a hungry noise and presses closer, turning them so that Dean is crowded up against the frame. He wants to push Sam away and doesn’t quite dare: hasn’t dared much of anything since his brother’s unnerving temper tantrum in the bathroom. It burns and twists deep down in his gut, but all he can do is stand there passively while Sam devours his mouth: while Sam’s hands drop down to toy with the tie on his robe.
After a few minutes, Sam pulls back enough to whisper, “You’re thinking too much again.” He doesn’t sound angry, but there’s an annoyed edge to his gaze. “Why can’t you just relax and let me make you feel good for once?”
His smile softens into something almost, but not quite, like Sammy's, and Jesus it hurts when he does that. When he twists his way around in Dean’s chest like he has a right to be there.
“Just for tonight, okay?” Sam murmurs.
“I don’t know what the hell you’re trying to do here, but no.” Dean pushes at his brother feebly with the hand that isn’t twisted behind his back. It’s a weak attempt, but it’s the most he’s tried in months, and when Sam doesn’t explode he feels safe enough to add, “I’m not in the mood.”
“What are you in the mood for, then?” Sam asks, tugging Dean even closer by his robe and letting his smile slip into something more seductive.
Ignoring the way his cock perks up at the sudden pressure of his brother’s body, Dean answers, “Little alone time would be nice.”
“We are alone,” Sam insists, ducking in for another kiss.
There’s no way of knowing if Sam is being deliberately obtuse or if he’s honestly unable to grasp the concept that Dean might be happier without him for a few hours. While Sam opens Dean’s mouth for him again, Dean considers trying to explain what he meant the next time he’s allowed air, and then abandons it as a useless endeavor. Either Sam already knows and doesn’t care, or he’s incapable of comprehending.
Dean leans his head back against the door, his mouth loose and accommodating as he lets Sam take what he wants. Sam’s tongue is intrusive and too hot, licking into him like fire. Sam’s hands slide up from the robe’s belt, pushing beneath the fabric and caressing Dean’s stomach: making his muscles jump in response.
Closing his eyes, Dean focuses on the cool, hard wood beneath his fingers. He reminds himself that, no matter what his body is saying—no matter how good it feels—he doesn’t want this. Not anymore.
Mustering the crumbling remnants of his will, he manages to force his mind away from the dizzying way Sam is kissing him and into a sturdier, comforting past.
Some empty lot behind an abandoned gas station. Grass growing through the concrete in a lush carpet and the flash of sunlight on broken shards of glass. Sam chubby-cheeked and watching from the backseat of the Impala, leaning out the open window with his head on his arms. Dad a steadying weight behind him, a shadow on the grass, a gruff voice in Dean’s ear. The reassuring weight of the gun in his hands: too heavy now, but he’ll grow into it, he’ll—
A snap of power jolts Dean back into the present and his eyes open. Sam isn’t kissing him anymore, which is good, but he’s regarding Dean with an expression bordering on wrathful, which isn’t. His hands are still underneath the robe and on Dean's skin, motionless but there: two points of heat that make Dean’s stomach turn uneasily.
“Where were you?” Sam demands.
Dean licks his lips and then tries, “Right here.”
It’s the wrong response.
Sam’s eyes flash and power pours into Dean through the tattoo. Suddenly, he can feel every thread of the too-soft robe stroking his body: can feel the grain of the wood beneath his right hand. He can smell Sam, can taste his brother in his mouth, and he’s hard so fast he can’t stop a little hurt noise from slipping past his lips. His legs give out and he sinks toward the floor.
Sam grabs him as he drops, controlling the fall so that Dean lands gently on his knees, and then tangles his left hand in Dean’s hair. He uses the grip to draw Dean’s head back, baring his throat in a humiliating, submissive posture. Even in the midst of his rising fear, Dean hates him a little for that.
“When I talk to you, when I look at you, when I kiss you, you’re here. Do you understand?”
Dean could try denying he was anywhere else again, but Sam wouldn’t believe him, and his brother is angry enough already. “Yeah,” he says, and then swallows. He can feel every minute twitch of his throat with his head pulled back like this and suddenly he can’t help but wonder if Sam is wearing anything underneath his own robe.
“Now I’ll ask again. Where were you? Who were you picturing instead of me?”
It’s such an unexpected—such a ludicrous—question that Dean can’t suppress the laugh that bubbles out of him. As if Sam has left enough room in Dean’s soul for him to want anyone else.
Sam’s eyes narrow and the pleasure tumbling through Dean’s body intensifies: Sam’s power pushing inside him until his back is full and aching with it. Until he’s trembling with the effort not to push forward and nose his way beneath that soft, red robe.
“Who?” Sam’s voice drips red, promising blood and retribution for whomever Dean names.
Jesus, he never used to be this jealous. Or was he just better at hiding it Before?
“Give me the fucking name or I’ll rip it out of your mind.” All but a snarl that time, slithering through Dean’s insides, and he really doesn’t want Sam any deeper in his head than he already is.
“Dad,” he bites out. "I was thinking of Dad."
The answer surprises Sam enough that the flow of power stops, although the hard on it caused isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
“You—I—what?”
Before Sam can work through his shock and back into a rage, Dean says, “I was remembering the first time Dad let me shoot. In that parking lot in … Nebraska, I think.” He pauses and then can’t stop himself from saying, “Back when I was happy.”
“Before us, you mean,” Sam says tonelessly.
“Yeah,” Dean answers, although that isn’t precisely true. He was happy after them, too. He was happy, for the most part, right up to the second Sam slit his left wrist open in the middle of the graveyard. Right up until the moment he understood that Sam was seriously going to do this.
Everything since then has been blood and ash.
Sam stares at him for a long moment and then slowly shakes his head. “You’re lying. We were happy. I made you happy. And if you’d just stop being so damned stubborn, I could do that again.” There’s a confusing mixture of hope and annoyance coloring his voice, and his grip on Dean’s hair loosens enough for Dean to lower his head a little.
“I don’t think so,” he tells Sam’s left hip.
The next thing he knows, he’s being yanked up from the ground and away from the bathroom doorway. Struggling is a ludicrous proposition—Dean is still shaky in the aftermath of his brother’s power, and Sam is built like a fucking bulldozer—but he tries. With his heartbeat high in his throat, Dean swears and twists in Sam’s grip as his brother drags him over to the couch. Sam casts him one molasses-heavy glance and then flips him down onto his back.
No, Dean thinks, and gets a hand on the side of the cushions to push himself off again. Sam crashes down on top of him before he do anything more, though, shoving all the air from Dean’s lungs and redirecting most of his attention to breathing. His hand worms down beneath their bodies and presses down on Dean’s cock through the robe. Dean immediately goes still and squeezes his eyes shut.
Sam noses at the side of his face: hair falling in a soft brush across Dean’s eyes and nose and mouth. His tongue finds Dean’s ear and traces delicately along the edges, making Dean’s already-cramped breath stutter.
“You talk a lot of shit, baby,” Sam whispers. “But the truth is that you and I were meant for each other, and I think you know it. I think you know that I can make you happy, and you’re fucking terrified that it’ll be even better than before.”
Dean’s mouth is bone dry; his pulse hasn’t been this erratic since the rawhead. He’s finding it difficult to think past his brother’s hand, which is moving against his cock with rhythmic pressure. His body is still sensitive from the rush of Sam’s power and the robe is impossibly soft against him and there’s that heavy press of Sam’s hand and Jesus Christ Dean’s in real danger of coming if this keeps up any longer.
“Sex isn’t everything,” he grounds out.
“No, it isn’t,” Sam says.
While Dean’s still trying to wrap his head around the fact that Sam just agreed with him, his brother cups his face with both hands. Dean thought Sam was resting against him before, but now Sam settles down more firmly and pushes him deeply enough into the couch that he can’t move. Can’t fucking move at all, cushions to every side and Sam over him, Sam stealing his air and fuck, he’s gonna start hyperventilating in a few seconds.
This kind of restraint is worse than being held still by his brother's power. Dean knows he can’t fight against something like that: he expects it. He never felt helpless against something that’s flesh and blood before.
Sam trails gentle fingertips across Dean's cheekbones. Ghosts one thumb across the bridge of his nose.
“If it was, I would have just taken you months ago,” he confesses, and then presses a sloppy, wet kiss to the corner of Dean’s jaw, tilting his head back for better access. “I would have held you down and made you remember how good I can make you feel.”
Dean’s body shivers at his brother’s words. He’s too fucked up to know whether it’s a shiver of dread or anticipation and that uncertainty makes him sick to his stomach.
“I want what’s in here,” Sam murmurs, running fingers through Dean’s hair. He shifts his weight up—not much, but enough for Dean to stop panicking about being smothered—and then puts one hand on Dean’s chest. Pushing beneath the robe, Sam moves his hand over until Dean can feel his heart beating against his brother’s palm.
“I want this.”
“No,” Dean says, but his voice sounds distant. Lost in the dark.
“You always give me what I want,” Sam replies. Contentment and certainty make his voice a warm, furred thing. “Sometimes it just takes a little while.”
No, Dean thinks again, but he knows it’s true. He can’t help himself when it comes to Sam: never could. Who the fuck is he kidding, trying to hold out when his entire life has been one long training session for this: for submitting to Sam and making him happy? Jesus, Dean couldn’t have prepared himself better if he tried.
This isn’t Sam, he reminds himself, I don’t have to give this asshole shit.
But is he sure? Is he sure of anything anymore?
Sam presses a single, almost chaste kiss to Dean’s temple and then pushes himself up. “Come on, the food’s getting cold.”
Dean is the furthest from hungry he’s ever been, but he’s defied Sam enough for one day. The thought makes him frown slightly. How long has he been rationing his defiance? How long has he been measuring his resistance in terms of ‘too much’ and ‘enough for now’? Those are a coward’s thoughts spinning through his head, and they go hand in hand with submission.
Is he that frightened of Sam? Of Sam’s retribution?
The terrifying answer is: no, he isn’t. Dean only allows himself a certain amount of leeway because he’s tired. These ‘discussions’ leave him feeling shaky and uncertain for hours; it’s so much easier just to give in and do what Sam wants. To let Sam kiss him, and hold him, and tell him that he loves him, that he’s beautiful and perfect.
Some day—maybe soon, maybe not for a hundred years, who the fuck knows—Dean just won’t have the energy left to say ‘no’ anymore.
“Dean,” Sam calls.
Sighing, Dean opens his eyes again and pushes himself up from the couch. As he makes his way over to the table, he moves with an invalid’s ginger steps. His cock is almost painfully responsive and every movement of the robe against it sends shudders through him. He wants to reach down and take care of things. Needs to.
Isn’t that how this whole thing between them started? With Sam’s eyes on him and Dean’s hand on his own cock and the fact that Sam wasn’t turning, wasn’t leaving the room once he realized what was going on. And Dean wasn’t stopping, either.
Don’t think about it, dumb ass, Dean berates himself, and bites the inside of his cheek as he quickens his steps. The minor pain isn’t much of a distraction, but it helps. It’ll have to be enough for now.
The smell of so much rich food is almost overwhelming next to the table. It makes the anxious, frightened part of him want to gag, but the tension in his gut begins to shift from sensual to starving. Sam makes sure he’s well fed, of course, but Dean’s never seen—never even imagined—something this extravagant before.
“What’s the occasion?” he asks, and Sam gives him an odd, slanting look.
“Tell you later,” he says after a moment. “Right now I’m starving. Here. Make yourself a plate.”
Dean takes the offered plate with a stifled sigh and puts a few pieces of food on it. When Sam looks up from his own foraging and sees him half-heartedly picking through the platters, his eyes darken in disapproval. Dean clenches his jaw and starts filling his plate, shoving stuff on it without really looking at what he’s taking.
In a different time and place, he’d be thrilled with the opportunity to gorge himself on high-class food. Here, he’s pretty sure it’s all going to taste like cinders in his mouth no matter how expensive or expertly prepared it was. No matter how much his stomach is starting to perk up. Something’ll fuck this sideways. Something always does, here.
Dean is staring down at something that looks vaguely like it might have been a mushroom in some past life, trying to look busy as he pokes it with a gold serving fork, when Sam steps up behind him and slides an arm around his waist.
“Ready?”
Not really. But Dean puts the fork down and lets Sam tug him away from the table.
He expects to be led back to the couch, which is where they normally eat, but Sam steers him toward the window instead. Dean glances at their destination and blinks, wondering how Sam could have caught his attention so completely that he missed the change in décor.
Large, silk pillows litter the floor. There’s a silver wine bucket off to one side with a bottle and two fluted glasses. Over everything is a velvet fall of red: the petals from a mind-boggling amount of roses, each one perfect and without blemish.
“Sam, what the hell is going on?” Dean tries as they come to a stop at the foot of the pillows. Now that they’re close enough, he can smell the roses over the food, and the strength of that scent is making him dizzy.
Sam takes the plate from his hand and nudges his shoulder. “Lie down. On your back and facing the window.”
That order can’t possibly lead anywhere good. Heart speeding, Dean whispers, “No,” and leans into Sam’s chest in an attempt to back up.
“Stop being an asshole,” Sam says, his voice fond. “We both know you’re gonna end up doing it anyway.”
He’s right, the bastard. Swallowing another protest, Dean gingerly steps forward into the pillows and lowers himself down. The rose petals don’t just litter the makeshift bed, he realizes, but rest on top of it in a deliriously thick blanket. When he lays back on them, crushing them with his weight, the rose scent gives a sudden leap.
Sam sets the plates down to Dean's right and then reclines beside them, lying on his side with his upper body propped up on one elbow. Dean does his best to stay still and quiet and docile, staring out the window at the distant stars. They look the same as always, and Dean finds he’s a little offended by that. Shouldn’t they be as twisted as everything else is, these days?
“So beautiful,” Sam murmurs, and his fingers brush Dean’s cheek. “But it’s not quite right yet.”
The wash of power he sends out brushes across Dean’s skin only incidentally because Sam is focused on the rose petals instead of him. He still shivers, though, as the tattoo catches the edge of it and sends warming, blissful ripples through his body.
Sam makes a happy little noise and grabs a fistful of petals. When he opens his hand again, they fall in a rain around Dean’s face—not bloodied crimson anymore but deep, midnight blue.
“God, Dean, you don’t even know how perfect you are,” Sam tells him reverently.
It’s times like this that Dean wishes he had developed some kind of disfiguring disease when he was a younger. Maybe taken a few direct hits to the face while hunting. Then again, it’s Sam, and it’s him, and he knows deep down that it wouldn’t have mattered if he’d been missing his nose and half his goddamned jaw.
Forcing himself to meet his brother’s eyes, Dean asks again, “What’re we doing here, Sam?”
Sam droops a little and the smile on his face fades. “I don’t want to spoil the surprise,” he says, picking at Dean’s robe. “Can’t you just let me do something nice for you?”
‘Something nice’ would be letting him out of this suite. ‘Something nice’ would be letting him talk to Bobby, or Ellen, or Deacon, or Jo. Talk to anyone human. ‘Something nice’ would be not trying to make him into someone he isn’t: someone he doesn’t even recognize half the time.
Dean closes his eyes with a sigh. “Fine. Whatever, man. Just get it over with.”
“Gonna love this,” Sam says, and in the darkness he sounds normal. He sounds like Sammy with a huge goofy smile and something up his sleeve that’s bound to make Dean laugh at the wrong moment and snort soda out his nose.
Somehow, a little soda snorting seems to be the least of his worries right now.
“Open up.” Sam’s voice again, but lower this time. Hitting registers that resonate through Dean’s bones and make his breath come faster as he complies.
He expects Sam’s mouth, but what he gets is something warm and juicy and fucking delicious. He bites down without thinking about it and can’t quite hold back a moan because this has got to be the best piece of steak he’s ever tasted.
Sam’s chuckle ripples down Dean’s spine. “Told you you’d love it,” he says, and Dean feels something else nudge his lips. “Try this.”
It’s weird as hell, lying on a bed of midnight blue roses while his brother feeds him bite-sized gourmet delicacies, but it isn’t precisely bad. Bit by bit, Dean finds himself relaxing until he’s almost enjoying himself. It’s stupid, he knows it is, but Sam has always been able to find ways of disarming him against his own will. He deliberately keeps his eyes closed, though. Partly because he’s feeling lazy, but mostly because he doesn’t want the expression on his brother’s face tensing him right the fuck back up again.
He can tell by Sam’s breathing that this is turning him on: can feel it in the way that Sam’s fingers sometimes linger at his lips, as if Sam is hoping he’ll dart out his tongue and lick them clean. Sam doesn’t push, though, and he doesn’t talk much once they get going.
Dean figures the noises he’s making are responsible for his brother’s silence, maybe for his arousal as well, but he can’t help himself. He didn’t know food could taste this good: doesn’t even have the words to describe what he’s tasting are aside from ‘perfect’, ‘delicious’, ‘heavenly’, ‘orgasmic’.
Dean is rolling the platonic ideal of all strawberries around in his mouth when Sam makes a frustrated noise. Before he knows what’s happening, his brother has dug his fingers into the corners of Dean’s jaw and dropped his mouth open. Sam’s mouth is so desperate against his that it’s clumsy: all sloppy spit and crushed strawberry between them.
Dean doesn’t know what the hell to do with the fruit at first, and then he realizes that Sam is licking at it in his mouth, stealing little pieces and swallowing them down. He swallows what’s left, hoping it’ll get Sam off him sooner, but Sam just groans and pushes down harder. Fuck, Sam is everywhere: swiping across the roof of Dean’s mouth, underneath his tongue, along the top of his teeth.
One of Sam’s hands is firm on Dean’s jaw, holding him open, but the other drops between his legs again. This time he doesn't just press, but cups and squeezes: rubs all that soft fabric along Dean's cock in pleasing undulations.
Dean claws his hands into the soft, soft petals and feels them rip under his fingernails. That rose scent is all around him, spinning his head around, or maybe that’s Sam’s doing. He lets his legs fall open further with a sob that never makes it past his brother’s tongue.
“Tell me,” Sam pulls back enough to order. “Tell me you want this.”
God, he does. Right now all he wants is for the orgasm unfurling in his gut to take him. He wants Sam to shove the robe aside and jack him for real: wants Sam to crawl over his orgasm-lazy body and push up between his legs and lick him open. For a few seconds, he wants that so badly he can almost feel Sam breaching him.
But.
But he’s watched Sam eviscerate people with his bare hands. Has seen him torture and maim and smile while he did it. He’s felt his brother’s power burning inside of his own body as Sam drags him toward this: as Sam fights to make Dean lie down and spread his legs like nothing has changed.
As if Dean can continue to love this new Sam, who has systematically gone about destroying everything that’s good and pure in the world. In himself. In Dean.
When he manages to pry his eyes open again, Sam’s eyes are burning, and the gold in them pushes through the arousal tensing Dean’s muscles and lodges in his gut as a cold, nauseous lump.
“F-fuck you,” he chokes out.
He’s sure that he’s going to come anyway despite the nausea: despite the horrified denial pulsing through his body. And when he does, Sam is going to take that as evidence that he was right all along: that Dean wants this, maybe even craves it. Dean isn’t sure that his brother wouldn't be right to.
But then Sam’s hand is gone, and no matter how good the robe feels, its light brush just isn’t enough to finish him. Near mindless with frustration, Dean reaches for himself and the cuffs come to life and pin his hands at his sides. Swearing and trembling, he struggles against his brother’s power.
“Shhh,” Sam soothes, loosening his grip on Dean’s face. “Shh, baby. Calm down. Deep breaths, okay?”
“Bastard,” Dean gasps. “Just let me—let me, damn it, I’m—fuck, I need—”
“All you have to do is ask,” Sam tells him.
Dean wants to point out that he is asking—he’s fucking begging—but he has drawn back from the edge enough at this point that he knows what his brother means. If he wants to get off tonight, then it’s going to be because of Sam’s hand, or Sam’s mouth, or Sam’s cock. It’s blackmail, pure and simple, and that fact alone is enough to ground him a little more. No way in hell is he gonna give in to such a crude tactic.
Turning his face away, Dean lies there while his cock aches and his wrists burn. He focuses on the nausea—on how much he doesn’t want what Sam’s doing, not now, not ever again—and feels his cock finally start to lose interest.
After a few minutes, Sam releases Dean’s jaw and starts to stroke his hair. “Sorry,” he says. “I wasn’t planning on doing that, but you—Jesus, Dean, the noises you were making.”
Dean laughs incredulously, but the thing of it is that he agrees with Sam. This one is all his fault. He should have kept his guard up: should have known better than to trust anything that didn’t immediately hurt. There are always shining bits of barbed wire hidden in the candy Sam hands out these days. He was stupid to let himself ignore that.
He doesn’t say any of that to his brother, of course. Just swallows once and then asks, “Are we done here?”
Sam uses his hand on Dean’s hair to draw his face back around. Dean doesn’t bother fighting him. Whatever’s coming is nothing more than his penance for trying to take a little enjoyment out of his situation. When he looks up at his brother, he can’t read anything in Sam’s expression, but his eyes are hungry. Oh, so hungry.
Deep inside where it doesn’t show, Dean shudders.
“I haven’t eaten yet,” Sam points out.
Right now, the idea of feeding his brother like some kind of harem girl in a gold bikini is about as appetizing as the idea of having open heart surgery without the benefit of any anesthetic, but what Sam’s proposing is still better than anything Dean was expecting. I deserve this, he reminds himself, and reaches for his brother’s plate.
Sam flops back against the pillows as Dean picks up a sliver of pear drizzled with raspberry sauce. His eyes track Dean’s hand as it drifts toward his mouth, and his lips part slightly. There’s just enough room to slide the pear sliver inside, and when he’s got it in far enough that it won’t fall out if he lets go, Dean starts to pull his hand back. Sam’s expression doesn’t change but there’s a warning press of power along the tattoo and Dean hesitates.
A moment later, he’s rewarded by Sam’s tongue darting out and sliding over his fingers, lapping the smears of raspberry sauce on the pads of his thumb and forefinger clean. He expects Sam to let him get another piece of food now, but instead his brother shifts forward and closes his mouth fully around Dean’s outstretched fingers. Locking eyes with Dean, he suckles at them: all warm heat and tongue.
It feels like there’s a line of scalding liquid running from the fingertips in Sam’s mouth down to Dean’s cock. He bites the inside of his cheek to keep from moaning, shifts his legs, and starts to let his mind drift. A tendril of power brings him back into line and Sam pulls off with one last, lingering suck.
“We just talked about that, Dean,” Sam reminds him, stroking his fingers around the slowly warming cuff on Dean’s wrist.
“Sorry,” Dean mumbles.
“Are you?” Sam isn’t looking at his face anymore: is staring at Dean’s hand in fascination as he turns it over and drags one fingernail across the palm. Tracing his lifeline.
“Yeah.”
Sam nods and then leans in and places a lingering, soft kiss on the pulse point of Dean’s wrist just above the cuff. “Don’t do it again.”
When Sam releases him and lies back, Dean immediately turns his attention back to his brother's plate. His stomach is already tying itself in knots from his near miss, and he really doesn’t want to give Sam any more excuses. He seems to be in a generous mood right now (God only knows why), but that that could change at any second.
Dean doesn’t want another lesson in how fucking helpless he is tonight.
Eyeing the plate, he tries to find something a little less messy than the pear was and realizes with a sinking feeling that it’s piled high with things that are going to stick to his fingers every time. And, from the way Sam is watching him with a slowly widening grin, the bastard did it deliberately.
“You gonna just stare at it all night?” Sam asks.
“I dunno: is that an option?” Dean mutters, and Sam laughs, big and wide and open.
Dean can’t quite stop himself from flinching at the unexpected sound and Sam’s smile dims a little.
“I'm not going to hurt you,” he says, sounding wounded. He glances down at the pile of pillows and trails his fingers through the rose petals. “I would never hurt you.”
Sam hurts him every day, but Dean knows that his brother doesn’t understand that. Is incapable of understanding that. He shifts his gaze to the side and then refocuses on Sam when his brother touches his cheek.
“Hey,” Sam says. “If you don’t want to do this, we can skip this part. I just thought it’d be nice. I want to make you feel good.”
He looks so sincere—so Sammy—that Dean can’t help but try yet again to get through. “Sam, I—I know this is hard for you to understand, but I don’t want you to make me feel good. I don’t want anything from you.”
For a few moments, Sam just looks at him and Dean begins to think that he’s actually gotten through. Then his brother shakes his head.
“You just think you don’t,” he says. “But you love me.” He edges closer, nuzzling at Dean’s throat, and it turns out that the death of hope is as painful the five hundredth time as it is the first. “You need me. I can feel it inside you.”
As one of Sam’s hands slips inside Dean’s robe, Sam’s power slips inside of Dean: rolling around his insides, purring like a feral cat. As devastated as he is, Dean’s breath catches at the intimacy of the sensation. He barely notices Sam floating the plates out from between them and moving closer still.
The power catches on that tiny, mostly-buried part of him—on the part that is going to love Sam even when his brother is tearing open his ribcage and crushing his heart—and fondles it. Encourages it.
Oh God, Dean shoved that into the dark for a reason. He grabs blindly at Sam’s shoulders, head falling back and body shivering with things he doesn’t want to feel—things he can’t feel anymore: not after what Sam has done. But they’re still there. Sam isn’t making this shit up, and Dean knows it.
They both do.
“Yeah, there it is,” Sam murmurs, and bites down on Dean’s earlobe.
It tears a gasp from Dean’s throat and he sinks deeper inside himself. Sam’s power is everywhere, coaxing and gentle for once instead of demanding, and he can’t help but respond. Distantly, he knows that Sam is rolling his body down onto his back again and undoing the belt on his robe, but he can’t actually do anything but shake.
“You’re mine, baby,” Sam pants in his ear. “You just don’t want to admit it because you’re afraid, even now, of what Dad would say.”
That’s not why Dean’s resisting, is it? He’s refusing because of Sam: because of what he’s become. Right?
“Got a newsflash for you,” Sam continues, relentless. His hands slowly brush the undone robe open, baring Dean’s chest … his stomach … lower …
“Dad’s dead. He isn’t ever going to find out. He isn’t going to care. There’s just you and me … just like it should be.”
Sam’s power gives a particularly strong pulse and Dean is bombarded by warmth. Warmth and need and love filling up all the empty places inside of him and scattering light across the ache of despair and making him moan.
“Take off the robe,” Sam whispers.
It doesn’t make sense at first because Dean can feel the air on his skin: feels Sam’s huge hand stroking his stomach. Then Dean realizes that the robe is open but still on his shoulders: still hiding his arms and his back. Sam wants to see all of him.
Muzzily, he struggles with the fabric. He doesn’t get anywhere until Sam stops touching him long enough to help, but a few moments after that he’s lying naked on an ocean of rose petals while his brother’s power rides through him in soothing, blissful waves. Through half-lidded eyes, he watches Sam strip off his own robe and toss it aside.
His brother is as beautiful as always, with those broad shoulders and fox-slanted eyes. That wide, cherishing smile. But suddenly Sam is frowning down at Dean like he’s doing something wrong, like Dean is displeasing him in some way.
Before Dean can properly begin to worry about that, the flow of his brother’s power cuts off abruptly. Clarity hits him like an uppercut to the jaw and he drags in a horrified breath.
He was—Sam was making him feel—God, he would have done anything Sam wanted, anything—he would have—
Dean starts to scramble away, his only thoughts of hiding, of escape, and Sam’s power locks down on his muscles. This time Dean's mind remains intact, though, and he struggles against his brother’s hold like a butterfly pinned on a mounting board.
“I’m sorry,” Sam breathes, curling up against his side. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have. I just wanted you to enjoy yourself, I didn’t think, I didn’t mean it—God, I’m so fucking sorry, Dean.”
Dean wants to believe him—needs to if he's going to keep it together—but he doesn’t think he can anymore. Now that Sam has released his hold on it, the part of him that is chained to Sam until death rolls them both under is receding at the speed of light, leaving him filled only with disgust and fear and a steadily growing panic.
Jesus, if Sam can do that anytime he wants, then what … what the fuck’s the point? That wasn’t even Sam putting thoughts in his head: that was just Sam amplifying something that was already there until it filled him with white noise and left him pliant and eager to please.
“Never again, I promise, okay? Dean? I promise?”
Sam’s crying: Dean can feel his brother’s tears on his shoulder. For once, he’s thankful his brother is holding his body hostage because otherwise he’d be curling his arm around his brother’s shoulder and pulling him in for an embrace. Gut reaction. Instinct.
Why the fuck can’t he rip that part of himself out and kill it as ruthlessly as Sam killed that demon in Dean’s old bed? Sam wouldn't be able to do this to him then: wouldn't be able to turn him into some glorified lap dog. And now they both know he can do it: he can have Dean, body and mind and soul—or as good as.
Just like flipping a switch.
Sam lifts his head, his face earnest and desolate all at once. The golden glow in his eyes is muted with something Dean refuses to call regret. Sam doesn't get to regret what he just did.
“Forgive me,” Sam begs. “Please, you have to. Dean, you’ve gotta forgive me, man.”
Sam babbles at him for a while before realizing that his power is making it impossible for Dean to respond and then the restraining tension vanishes instantly. Dean's newfound freedom doesn't do anything to soothe his panic, though.
He isn't going to be able to sleep tonight. He's going to be too strung out wondering when Sam is going to get fed up with waiting and do that again: when Sam is going to yank that vile, perverted, hopeless devotion up from the dark where it belongs and lock it into place at the front of Dean's mind.
Dean is pretty sure that he's crying and it only makes him more desperate. He needs to make Sam believe he's okay. He needs to stall his destruction for as long as he can.
“S’okay,” he rasps, sloughing of pieces of himself with every word. “You didn’t mean it. It was an accident.”
An accident. This time it was. When Sam does it again, it's gonna be deliberate. And permanent.
He's terrified that Sam is going to see right through the lie, but his brother's expression brightens. The set of his mouth is so hopeful—so innocent—that Dean has to look away to keep from screaming.
“Really?” Sam says. “You mean it? You forgive me?”
“Yeah.” It's all but a sob, but Sam doesn't seem to notice. He's almost certain Sam doesn't notice.
“Look,” Sam whispers, snuggling closer. There's an edge of desperation in his voice. “Look up, okay?”
Muscles aching with the strain of holding still, Dean obeys. The night sky is black for a few seconds and then there’s a sudden explosion of noise and light: a green burst of shimmering flame against the darkness. A second, slightly lower shower of electric blue follows, and then the entire sky is lighting up in brilliant sheets of color.
“Fireworks?” he says, confused enough that the panic recedes a little.
Sam tosses an arm across his stomach and tension knots through Dean’s gut like a cramp. “You always liked them when we were kids. Do you—is it nice? Do you like it?”
Dean feels that deeply buried part of himself stir again, and this time it isn’t because Sam is prodding it. It’s because his brother is hugging him like an oversized teddy bear while the most extravagant fireworks display Dean has ever seen bursts across the sky.
I'm so fucking screwed, he thinks, horrified.
"Dean?" Sam prods.
“Yeah,” Dean chokes out. “I like it.” He isn't lying. Oh Jesus, he isn't lying. Is that Sam's doing? Fuck, is Sam manipulating his thoughts right now?
He thought rape was the worst of his worries, but he was wrong. He was so fucking wrong.
Sam laughs softly. “At least I got something right.” He angles his head up to kiss Dean’s throat and then murmurs, “Hey, Dean?”
Dean croaks out something that might pass as a response, his thoughts moving even faster as they disintegrate into frantic bits of nonsense. Fuck, he can't breathe.
“I want you to forget about before. Just remember now. Just remember what I got right.”
Dean stiffens, eyes widening and chest clenching so painfully he thinks he’s going to have a heart attack. No, don’t, he tries to say, I won't be able to protect myself if I don't remember, I won't—
But Sam’s power is already rolling through him, washing gold across his vision, and when it fades he’s lax and calm. Filled with a faint feeling of contentment.
Things with Sam can get pretty fucked these days, but sometimes … sometimes they go all right.
He doesn’t know how long the fireworks display goes on, but it feels like a long time. Dean floats in it, not really minding the mild brushes of Sam’s lips across his chest and only tensing slightly when his brother dips low enough to lick into his belly button.
“Mine,” Sam whispers, and then curls up against him again with a tiny, happy sigh.
They stay like that through the rest of the display, and as one final, swift series of explosions light the sky almost to day, Dean realizes that he’s playing with his brother’s hair. For the first time in what seems like years, he feels happy. Safe. It won’t last, he knows that, but today was … Today was nice.
“Thanks, Sammy,” he says after a moment.
Sam presses a chaste kiss to his chest and nestles closer. “Happy Valentine’s Day, Dean.”