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The drive to Vegas hadn’t been the best. Rain, traffic, three different collisions to get around, and Sam and Castiel had both spent the whole time either asleep or complaining about the homework they were being forced to neglect. Dean was glad when he steered Baby into the parking lot of the hotel he’d made reservations at. Two rooms – a regular one for him, and the honeymoon suite for Sam and Cas. Sure, they weren’t married yet, but… Vegas. He wasn’t expecting it to take long.
Sam rolled his eyes when he heard where he and Cas were staying. “Seriously, Dean? You’re ridiculous.”
“Why? Come on, dude, don’t act all shocked. Just enjoy it.” Dean handed Sam the key. “Now, come on, go drop your gear and get back down here, we’re in Vegas, time to go find some fun!”
“Whatever, dude.” Sam took the key with a glare. “Cas, can you tell Dean not to be an idiot the entire trip?”
“I could,” Castiel said. “It wouldn’t do any good, and would be more likely to backfire and cause him to be an even bigger idiot than usual. Are you sure you want me to?”
Sam shuddered. “Good point. Never mind.”
“Hey, I’m not an idiot!” Dean protested. He decided to reserve his thoughts about Sam and Cas right now, since they’d likely figure it out when Dean got them to the casino – with its attached wedding chapel. They could get the ceremony out of the way immediately and spend the rest of the week on a honeymoon.
That… was a bit optimistic of him, Dean realized. It didn’t help that as soon as they got into the casino, Sam and Castiel split up. Sam headed for the blackjack tables, and Castiel for the slot machines. Dean had to shake his head. What was wrong with good old-fashioned poker? He and Sam were both great at it, and they’d gotten Castiel pretty good too once he moved in with them. Also, they hadn’t even noticed the wedding chapel.
After an hour at the poker table, Dean decided to go check on his brothers. He ended up stopping himself shortly before getting to Castiel and backing up to stare at one of the guys on another slot machine. He could swear the guy looked familiar. Then he realized where from. “Oh shit. Loki?!”
The guy’s head snapped to the left, and he looked Dean over for a while before responding. “Not Loki. I get that a lot, though. Name’s Gabriel. Who’re you?”
“Dean. Sorry, man, but… you and Loki could be twins! Which you probably know.” Dean gave his head a quick shake. “Sorry to bother you. Especially since you aren’t him.”
“Not a problem!” Gabriel winked at him as he pulled the lever on the machine. “Nice to meet you. Here by yourself?”
“Not exactly. Brought my brother and his boyfriend to Vegas to act on their temptation to drive here and get married.” Down the row, he could see Castiel staring at the two of them with a puzzled frown. Which, okay, he hadn’t known Castiel was into porn, but if he was a fan of Loki he obviously had good taste. He waved to Castiel.
Gabriel followed his gaze and broke into a huge smile. “That the boyfriend? Please tell me that’s the boyfriend?”
“That’s the boyfriend,” Dean confirmed, although he had to wonder why Gabriel was so invested in some stranger’s brother’s relationship. “You know him?”
“Know him?” Gabriel’s entire being lit up as Castiel approached. “Oy, Cassie! Wasn’t expecting to see you in Vegas… ever…”
“Blame Dean,” Castiel grumbled with a poisonous glare at Dean. “It’s good to see you, Gabriel. I’m not the least bit surprised to meet you in Vegas.”
“Cassie and I are cousins,” Gabriel explained to Dean. “I am so glad you mistook me for Loki now!” Castiel tilted his head with the confused squint, and Gabriel raised an eyebrow at him. “Gotta tag along, at least long enough to meet your brother, now.”
To Dean’s surprise, Sam absolutely refused to leave the blackjack table, even to meet Castiel’s cousin. In the three years they’d been dating, he hadn’t met any of Castiel’s family, something Castiel explained as his family being a bunch of drama queens who kept acting like a perfect Stepford family in public and, in private, doing everything they could to undermine each other – up to and including murder. Castiel had chosen to take his chances on his own, moving to Palo Alto the day after graduating high school. Which, now that Dean remembered, had him a little more hesitant about Gabriel tagging along with them. On the other hand, Castiel didn’t seem to mind a bit. He and Gabriel had moved off to talk quietly, but when Castiel came back, Gabriel was with him.
“Cas, is this okay? I know you avoid your family…” Dean murmured.
Castiel shrugged. “Gabriel’s a runaway too. He’s fine. If I’d thought of it, I’d have called and let him know we were coming, really. You’ll like him. He put himself through culinary school and now runs a bakery that specializes in pies.” That was a pretty damn good reason to like the guy, really. Dean relaxed about him tagging along.
“Three, actually. Only one where I’m the actual main baker, but the other two use my recipes and follow my rules.” Gabriel ruffled Castiel’s hair. “Give it a few years, and wherever this guy ends up, I’m gonna open another one. Leave Vegas, relax. Annoy my cousin and his husband.”
“Gabe, we’re not…” Castiel started to protest, but he was cut off by a wave of Gabriel’s hand.
“Not now, but are you seriously telling me that you’re gonna take, what, six years to put a ring on Sam?” Gabriel looked at Sam, who was studiously focusing on his cards and diligently ignoring everything happening near him. “You’re in Vegas, Cassie, why wait six hours?”
Castiel glared at Gabriel, but didn’t answer. Sam sighed. “Thanks, guys. Thanks so much for making it so that I can’t focus on the game.” He cashed out, and Dean’s jaw dropped when he saw how much Sam had won.
However, there was a plan. “I’m with Gabe. Why wait? There’s even a chapel right here, might not even have to wait six minutes!”
Sam rolled his eyes. “I’m hungry. Come on, let’s go find some dinner.”
After dinner, Dean pointedly drove by at least three wedding chapels on his way to Gabriel’s bakery… which turned out to be called Heir Pies. “Seriously, dude?”
“Why not?” Gabriel asked. “Runaway or not, I’m an heir to a family that tends to have large fortunes, I bake pies…” He got out of the car, and waited. “Besides! I just love the look on people’s faces when their datefriend says they’re gonna get them some Heir Pies for their birthday! Now… what kinds am I supposed to get?”
Sam looked a little ill as he got out of the car. “You all right there, Sammy?” Dean asked. “Looking a little green.”
“I’m… sorry, Gabe, but I’m gonna pass on the pie. Not feeling so good, man.” His face twisted a little. “Do you have a bathroom in there?”
“Yeah, you’re family…” Sam looked like he was about to interrupt, but again, Gabriel waved it off. “Close enough. You can use the employee bathroom. Come on.”
Dean’s original plan was to mock Sam – the name wasn’t that bad – but then he could feel his stomach telling him that Sam wasn’t faking it. If he ate pie, it just might come back up, and that would be a tragic waste of delicious goodness. He looked to Castiel, who looked fine still. “I thought those tacos tasted a little funny… soon as Sam’s back out here, you okay with going back to the hotel?”
“Sam’s ill. Of course we’re taking him someplace we can care for him.” Castiel’s glared softened. “Are you ill as well?”
“Yeah… not as bad as Sammy seems to be, yet anyway, but I’m gonna want to spend the rest of the night in my room with a toilet close by instead of at a casino, so…” Dean gave Castiel a wry smile. “Hope you and Gabe feel okay. Either of you get the tacos?”
“I did not. Are you sure it was the tacos?”
Dean shrugged. “Only thing Sammy and I both ate today. If this were viral, you’d be sick too, so that just leaves food.”
As it turned out, Gabriel had not eaten the tacos – or whatever it was that had made Dean and Sam sick. This was a good thing, because Dean couldn’t deny he was seriously ill. He needed someone there to take care of him, and Castiel couldn’t handle both Winchesters at once.
After the fourth round of vomiting seemed to be over, he took the water Gabriel held out to him. “I dunno, won’t it just set me off again?”
“Maybe, but unless you wanna go to the hospital and get an IV, this is the only way to keep you hydrated.” Gabriel patted his shoulder sympathetically. “I’d give you a beer, but there’s no way you’d keep that down, and it would just make things worse anyway. So drink up.”
Dean opened the bottle and took a sip. It tasted like water with residual aftertaste of barf. It wasn’t even cold. And yet, it was probably the best drink he’d ever had. It didn’t immediately come back up, or even make his stomach roil, so he was willing to call it a win. “Thanks, man. Sorry to ruin your night like this, you got no reason to be here. Not gonna die… no matter how much I might be wishing for it at times.”
“I have a reason. You’re in distress, your family can’t take care of you, I can. And I’ve heard of people dying from choking on their own vomit. Usually from being too damn drunk to notice until too late, but it could happen. And that would be tragic, because you are too pretty to die.”
“Family motto, live fast, die young, leave a pretty corpse,” Dean mumbled. “Come on, how can you find me pretty like this? Don’t bullshit me, dude. I look like crap.”
“Well, yeah, right now you look like death warmed over, but that’s because of the sickness, not because that’s how you look normally. Which is why you can’t die from this. See? I’d have to figure out how to bring you back so that you could actually leave that pretty corpse.”
“Huh. Might be worth dying. It’d cure this, right? Dead people can’t be sick? And then when you bring me back I’ll be alive again and not sick. This toilet won’t be my best friend anymore.” Dean handed the now-empty bottle to Gabriel. “Got any good leads?”
“Nope. All the ones I know of there’s some kind of ridiculous cost attached, and I’m sorry, but I’m not going to Hell so you can avoid some throwing up.” Gabriel winked at him. “Going to Hell for a million other reasons, but no sense shortening the time I have.”
“Damn. Guess I’ll just have to deal.” Dean struggled to his feet, and Gabriel gave him a shoulder to lean on as he staggered his way toward the bed. “Not exactly how I’d planned bringing someone back here for the night…”
“Yeah, I wouldn’t think so. You’d have gotten two beds. Food poisoning’s not contagious, mind sharing?”
“Go ahead, if you don’t mind the risk of getting… stuff… on you. If I don’t wake up in time to stop it.”
In the morning, Dean woke up feeling a little better, anyway. Still not well enough to go out on the town, but he thought he could keep some pie down. Gabriel disagreed, and Dean reluctantly let it go and got some toast from room service. Sam was also feeling better. He insisted he was better enough to go play some blackjack.
“The hell? Since when do you love blackjack so much, Sammy?” Dean asked when Sam brought it up. “You’re up. A lot. Shouldn’t you just leave it there? Stay in, or if you have to go out at least go do something you don’t have to think about?” Like get married, for instance.
“Can’t. I have a goal. I still have a way to go to meet it, and if you thought I was bad on the way up here… you do not want to be in the car with me if I can’t get this done.” Sam turned and headed for the hotel doors.
Castiel stopped him. “Sam, as much as I hate to say it, Dean’s right. You’re still too sick. You may feel clearheaded now, but you’ll be tired in an hour or two and start making mistakes. That will set us back even more than taking today off to recover.”
Sam sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. Dean rolled his eyes. “He’s right and you know it, Sam. Whatever this goal of yours is, it can wait. What is the goal, anyway?”
“We, uh…” Sam and Castiel had a non-verbal conversation while Dean waited for an answer. “You know Cas and I have some pretty damn huge expenses coming up over the next four years. Medical school, law school…”
“Thought you both had full ride scholarships,” Dean interrupted. “You forget to tell me something?”
“No,” Sam snapped. Dean almost smiled at the fire in his voice – Sam sounded so much better in that moment. “Thing is, those scholarships don’t cover rent, food, electricity, gas… I’ve got some savings, Cas has some, and if we’re careful and lucky enough to avoid major expenses like broken bones or car wrecks, we’ll have enough that we won’t need to take out loans.”
Dean crossed his arms, glaring at Sam and Castiel both. “Okay, you know you have me and I’m working and perfectly happy to help you guys out, right? That’s something you factored into your budget calculations?”
“Sort of?” Castiel said. “We know you’re happy with us for now, but we don’t want you to feel like we need you and you can’t go live your own life if you meet someone or get an opportunity away from us.”
“Well, you’re both idiots, then. I’m not going anywhere.” He let his arms drop, shaking his head. “So the big deal about the blackjack money is…”
“Well, uh.” Sam and Castiel had another nonverbal communication. “Cas and I want to get married. Anything we win while we’re here is the wedding budget. That way we can justify spending the money on something relatively frivolous.”
Gabriel coughed. “Frivolous? Did you just call your wedding frivolous? What the heck?”
“Well, you know… we know we love each other, we’re not looking to try to adopt kids until we’re done with school anyway, we already have our financial aid sorted out… we don’t need to get married now, and even if we do, we don’t need to have the rings or fancy wedding…” Castiel tried to explain.
It took Dean a couple minutes to recover from the stupid, but when he did, he exploded. “For fuck’s sake. Seriously, Sammy? Cas? Not doing it today, because I don’t want Sam getting married when he looks like crap in the wedding photos because he’s sick, but first thing tomorrow we’re going to go pick out some rings and then I’m taking you two to a chapel.” He turned to Gabriel. “Where the hell did I go wrong with them?”
“Dunno, dude.” Gabriel reached out and swatted Castiel’s head. “I’m coming with you guys, and boys, you are not going to argue when I pay for it. I owe Cas four years’ worth of birthday and Christmas presents, plus both you guys a wedding present, and this should cover it.”
Sam and Dean were both nearly fully recovered the next morning. Gabriel brought Dean a cherry pie for breakfast, even. With a promise from Sam that he and Castiel would not run off or try to get out of the marriage or letting Gabriel pay for things, Dean graciously agreed to at least let them choose the chapel themselves instead of just dragging them into whichever one he found first.
Naturally, they found the weirdest one Dean could imagine. “Didn’t Hades kidnap Persephone and force her into the wedding?”
“Well, yeah, in some accounts, but in others, she was a willing participant looking to get away from an over-controlling mother. Anyway, it’s an enduring myth, life and death forming a cycle, and there are a lot of people who think it’s a nice way of saying ‘screw that till death do us part bit of the vows, I’ll see you in the afterlife, honey.’” Sam looked over at Castiel, a fond smile lighting up his face. “Really, I just wanted to see your face when I said this one, but I’m serious. This is where we’re getting married.”
Well, Dean may have found it weird as hell, but he did promise Sam any chapel he wanted. Gabriel thought it was hilarious. The wedding itself was reasonably normal – although Dean did notice that the officiant didn’t say “till death do us part” but “even into Death’s waiting embrace.”
After the wedding, Dean took the happy couple out to lunch, and then back to the hotel to go celebrate things being official now. “So… what do we do now? Original plan was for me to hang around gambling or looking for babes, but I’m open to other ideas.”
“Well…” Gabriel winced and rubbed his neck. “First off, there’s something I need to come clean about. I lied to you earlier.”
“Oh? If you’re gonna tell me you’re not really Cas’s cousin or you didn’t actually pay for anything, I’ve got a million questions now, and might have to hit you.” If it was the first one, the first question was why the hell Castiel would play along.
“Nah, not either of those. Cas is my cousin. My dad and his dad were brothers. Both assholes in their own ways, too. And you watched me pay cash for everything, so… not seeing where you’d think that didn’t happen.” Dean just shrugged. He couldn’t think what other lie Gabriel would feel the need to come clean about. “It’s just… see… I get really sick of people who hit on me because they want to live the fantasy of sleeping with Loki. So I tell them I’m not him. I am. I’m not ashamed of my career or anything, it’s just that I’m retired. Loki’s gone. I’m a pie baker, not a porn star.”
“So you didn’t lie. You’re not Loki, you’re Gabe.” That he’d been Loki was a technicality Dean was perfectly happy to let slide. After all, Gabe was family now. “Why bring this up now?”
“I always do come clean eventually if it looks like someone’s gonna stick around. Cas is already a little ticked at me because he doesn’t want to blow it for me. Not sure if you’re interested in me like that, but even if you’re not, you’re Cas’s brother-in-law now. So, you get the truth.”
“I, uh…” Dean took a minute to let his brain catch up. “Yeah, I’m interested, but isn’t it kind of weird if we’re family?”
“Nah, people hook their siblings and cousins up with their partner’s siblings and cousins all the time. Enough degrees of separation that no one cares. So… date, or bed?”
“Bed’s good. Then more pie.”