Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Who doesn’t have warrants in Mexico?  If we start avoiding places because we’ve got warrants we’ll never leave the house.” Dean’s ears perked up at what sounded like a southern twang approaching from the hallway to the back of the bar, but he kept his eyes focused on the amber liquid in his glass, pretending not to hear a conversation that was probably supposed to be private.

“Alice…” He could hear the change in the man’s voice, southern twang replaced by something more controlled--tense.  “I thought we were supposed to be closed.”

“This customer had money.” Dean could see the woman bounce, a little blonde who had looked very pleased when he plunked five twenties down on the bar and asked her to keep the scotch flowing.

“Haha, yeah” The man’s laughter was fake and Dean wondered again at the emptiness of the bar, which he’d originally decided not to sweat because he was pretty well armed. “You know, I’m real sorry about all this, but we’ve got a private party coming in.  Why don’t you take this whole bottle—on the house?”

The man tried to take the bottle of scotch from the woman’s hands, but she yanked it back and the two of them began mumbling at each other, a mix of ‘give it’ and ‘we don’t give things away’ until the man grabbed the bottle so fast that Dean wondered if he was human.

“You know where I could get a good monte cristo?” Dean looked quickly between the two of them, but the only reaction he could see was that they were both looking at him as if he'd said something crazy--it was probably the same look they'd have given him if he'd told them why he was in the bar trying to block out his memories in the first place. Angels are dicks, demons are dickier. Okay, so there was no evidence of demonic nature in either one of them, but he repeated for good measure. “Christo?”

“Um…no.” The man pushed his hair back off of his face and Dean wanted to ask him what the deal was with that look, but he’d just come off of a hunt and wasn’t exactly in the mood for a fight.  “Look, buddy, there’s a bar down the road, full of girls that’ll be more than happy to help you through whatever’s bringing you down.”

“Not really what I’m in the market for tonight.”  Dean’s smile was visibly pained as he contemplated the fact that after everything with Anna he hadn’t been in much of a mood for random hookups.  Or relationships.  Or anything outside of a drink and whatever he could salvage of his connection with his brother…maybe even his connection with Cas.

“Gay bars.  There are lots of gay bars.” The blonde perked up, turning her head to look at him from the corner of her eye and quickly pouring a bit more scotch in his glass.  In Dean’s peripheral vision, he could see the man give her an eye roll that could rival one of Sammy’s.

“Point is,” The man switched on a practiced smile and Dean recognized it as one he’d use on a family he was trying to get out of a haunted house, “We’re closed.  Now I get that you’ve got something going on, but you’re not gonna resolve that here.”

“Well maybe I just like the company.” Dean reflected the other man’s smile back at him, getting tired of being treated like someone too stupid to know something shady was going on.

“Oh, that’s so sweet.” The girl chimed in, hugging the bottle of scotch to her chest.

“Alice... Alice,” the man raised his voice until the girl took her eyes off Dean and her face shifted into a pout at whatever she saw when she looked over Dean’s shoulder.  “Why don’t you see how far along our guests are…I’m thinking they’re about fourteen minutes away.  And lock that front door while you’re at it so we don’t have to deal with this again.”

The girl twitched her nose, looked between the two men and snaked her hand out to grab the bottle back and take it with her as she left.

“Alright, I don’t want any trouble, but more importantly, you don’t want any trouble.” The man’s hair bounced as he spoke and Dean laughed at the absurdity of this guy trying to intimidate him.

“Not looking for any trouble.  I know, how ‘bout you throw in some tequila with that scotch there.  Got a thing for those Mexican drinks.” Dean took a slow sip and reveled in the narrowing of the other man’s eyes.

“It’s time for you to go.” The man dropped all pretense of courtesy, on guard now—maybe he thought Dean was a cop, maybe a blackmailer.  But Dean was a hunter, and that meant he’d investigate when something wasn’t right. Who knows, maybe that's what he'd stumbled onto in here, could be crashing someone else's hunt. The girl wasn't typical for hunters, but this guy had the look--he could be helping her out. Okay, Dean could respect a hunt, offer to help out if it seemed like a good idea to him and if this guy was someone who knew when to play nice.

“You a hunter?” Dean made full-on eye-contact for the first time that night.

“A hunter?” The man paused, squinting at Dean and obviously trying to adapt to whatever this new angle was.

“Yeah, do you hunt?”

“No.  I don’t hunt.” The man was visibly irritated.

“What do you do?” Dean shifted around, resting his elbow on the bar, but keeping his left hand in a position to grab the knife in his waistband if necessary.

“I own a bar.” The answer was too sarcastic and Dean laughed.

“You’re about as much of a bar owner as I am an FBI agent.”

The man’s lip lifted into a sneer, raising his voice a bit as if warning someone hidden nearby, “This some kind of a set-up?

“Sounds like the words of a man who has something to worry about.” Dean saw when the man moved to lunge, and he was fast enough to jump to the left, but the man switched his trajectory and was still able to grab him by his jacket. “Looks like the moves of a man who does more than own a bar.”

“Who are you?”

“Name’s Dean,” he answered, wondering if this man, or this creature, had heard of him—wondering how far spread the news about him had truly spread, figuring that a last name wouldn’t be necessary if his assailant was in the loop.  “But, I’m not the interesting one here.  What are you?”

“Name’s Hardison,” the man paused and the tiniest of smiles crossed his lips before he continued, “But you can call me Eliot.”

“Didn’t ask who you are, I asked what you are.” Dean tried to punch Eliot in the ribs, but his arms were both grabbed before he made contact.  “You’re pretty fast.”

“You’re pretty armed.” Eliot nodded down and Dean saw that his shirt was raised enough to show the handle of one of his knives and the butt of one of his guns.

“Like I said.” Dean eyelids lowered and his words came out in almost a growl. “I’m a hunter.  What.  Are.  You?”

Eliot squeezed Dean’s wrists and he quirked an eyebrow at the hunter.  “I don’t know what this is about, but there’s a five year old girl who’s gonna get screwed out of a new heart if I don’t get you out of this bar in three minutes.”

“What is that?  Some werewolf thing?”

“Werewolf?  What the hell are you…goddamnit!  Stall him!...agh, fine.  Look, I need to go back there and be the owner of this bar for the next two hours—”

“You some kind of psychic?” Dean twisted around, but he wasn’t able to get Eliot to release his grip.

“This is going to be a disaster,” Eliot sighed just as the bartender rushed back in from the back hallway and unlocked the front door for a group of four men and two women.

“Ah, Gavin,” a British woman on the arm of an overweight older man giggled as she walked towards them, “My step-brother could find a pretty boy in the middle of Antarctica.”

Eliot leaned in slightly, attempting to make Dean’s captive position look less adversarial.  “Yes…I sure can.”

“Gavin’s boyfriend likes scotch!” The blonde noted happily from behind the counter and Dean looked over to see her nodding happily.

“Don’t really think he’s gonna go along with this.” Eliot hissed barely audibly and Dean realized that he must have been communicating with at least one of the other people in the room.

“Of course I do!” Dean shouted a bit too loudly before leaning in closer and dropping his voice to a whisper, “I’m gonna stay here, and I’m gonna find out what you are and what you’re up to.”

“Whatever, just don’t go trying to sell the boyfriend thing too hard.” Eliot whispered back.

“And miss the opportunity to run my fingers through that hair of yours?” Dean smirked, keeping his eyes on Eliot, but he could hear choking laughs coming from several people in the room.

Chapter Text

“I’m telling you, ever since that damn movie came out you can’t be a gay cowboy without looking like kind of a dick.” Dean raised his half-empty glass of Jack Daniels to accentuate his statement. His goal for the night no longer involved getting smashed beyond oblivion though, so he was careful about how much he actually drank.

After sitting back long enough to get a handle on the back-story Eliot and his people were selling, he had fallen effortlessly into his role as Gavin’s Boyfriend, playing off of Eliot’s drawl, stressing his own Midwestern accent, and acting like they were just a couple of cowboys out for a good time.

He had picked up on who among the group were in on the con and who among them were marks. Eliot, who was calling himself Gavin, seemed to be working with the bartender Alice, the British woman who was supposedly his stepsister Sarah, and the doctor who’d been sipping ginger ale and aggressively avoiding the bottle of gin next to him all night. The doctor was named Nick or Rick or Dick or something like that, but it didn’t really matter. Dean didn’t put much stock in anyone’s names being real anyway considering his “boyfriend” had been “Hardison,” “Eliot,” and “Gavin” over the course of about 20 minutes.

The more Dean watched, the more Dean realized there was somebody else communicating with Eliot, Alice, Sarah, and Nick. He didn’t know if it was a psychic link or simple human tech, but there were moments were they’d all subtly react at the same time—a smirk, a frown, maybe an exchange of glances. They were definitely getting intel from somebody who wasn’t in that bar. Maybe somebody calling the shots, maybe just somebody feeding them information.

The hefty man with his arm draped over Sarah’s shoulder laughed the hearty laugh of a mark who didn’t question the sudden coincidences that brought certain people into his lives. Dean laughed along with him, then winked at the chubby redheaded woman who hadn’t taken her eyes off of him that night. She definitely wasn’t in on the con—and if she was, she was damn unfocused.

“Doesn’t stop him from wearing the cowboy hat though.” Dean placed his hand on top of Eliot’s head and gave it a gentle tap. Eliot’s smile was tight and he didn’t bother trying to hide the murderous glare he was shooting in Dean’s direction. He could feel the other man tensing up and Dean laughed to himself wondering if he was just worried Dean would follow through on his promise to stroke his hair like the big doll that he was.

The rest of the group had taken his addition to the mix in stride, but Sarah was kind of brilliant at it. She’d introduced him to the two Chinese men beside her in what could have been perfect or horrible Mandarin for all Dean knew, then she’d asked Hefty to play nice because Dean could be her future brother in law. Dean had eaten the whole thing up, curious about what was going on, and intrigued by how well everyone was adapting to his presence.

Everyone but the man who was stealing opportunities to shoot death glares at him, of course.

Even Dean wasn’t sure why he was being so casual about taunting a man who clearly knew how to handle himself in a fight and who seemed a good pick for not being all human. It was reckless for sure, but then again so was getting so drunk that he couldn’t handle a fight with a duck if it came at him, and he’d been ready to do that not long ago.

More than anything, it was probably being asked to leave earlier. Dean was the hunter, the mystery-solver—he was the guy calling the shots and getting civilians out of the way. If anything, he was kind of offended that Eliot hadn’t recognized that in him.

Jerk.

He went ahead and ran his fingers through his hair like he'd promised.