"So where do we go from here?"

He raises an eyebrow and swipes his hand across his chin. "look, here's the thing okay? You have no value to me as an asset, or even just as a pawn in this game I'm playin', you hear me?"

Beth frowns and sits up. "So you're telling me I'm just some useless basic bitch who got messed up in something bigger than a small time gang operation? Thanks a lot." She rolls her eyes and looks back up at the black marks on the ceiling.

"Nah... well yeah but also..." He trails off and grabs either side of her head so she looks at him. "Look I don't know why I'm readin' you in or why I even want you to think I'm on the right team, but I do. I'm not sayin' I'm a good person or that I'm clean as a whistle or that everything I've done in this job isn't morally ambiguous... I'm just sayin' gimme time okay?"

"Why?"

His hands slide into her hair and she shivers in fear and something else. Half and half.

Definitely not thirty-seventy.

Jesus. He's licking his lips and his eyes flit down to her lips and she doesn't know what to do other than wrench her head out of his grasp and get up off the couch. "How do I know you're legit and that thing in your wallet isn't just something you made in Photoshop? I could make shit like that in fifteen minutes."

He runs a hand over his scalp. "I guess you'll just have to trust me."

She snorts. "This s ridiculous. What am I going to do with Dean? He hasn't done anything and now you've got him mixed up in all of this00000!"

"Yeah, he's done absolutely nothin'." His smile is wry and he shoves his hands in his pockets. "Look, tell him you weren't aiming for him, you were testing to see if the gun was loaded. He got a concussion his eyes are pointing in all kinds of directions."

"And we're just going to ignore the fact you beat the shit out of him?"

Rio flings his arms wide. "Dude walked in like that, I was just takin' advantage of the situation.'

She narrows her eyes. "How about you?" She points at his knuckles and the scrapes on his face.

"Are you forgettin' that you got me arrested?" His voice is loud now, and she shrinks back towards the stairs. "The parking lot of the local Cloud Nine ain't exactly the most comfortable place to get wrestled to the ground by a bunch of feds."

"You know what? Go unlock Dean and get the fuck out of my house."

He digs into his pocket and pulls out some keys. He thinks for a moment and she wonders if he's going to toss them in her face like she did to him, but instead he steps forward. She hadn't realized she had curled her hands into fists until he takes one and unfurls it, placing the keys in her palm.

"Do it yourself."

And then he's gone.

...

Dean is asleep when she undoes the handcuffs. She looks down at him for a few moments at his bloody face against the striped bedspread and frowns. He's bled on one of the cream parts and it's already dried. She must have been out to it for longer than she thought.

She thinks about leaving Dean be, but doesn't want to risk him waking up and calling the cops, so she prods him hard in the ribs.

He moan loudly. She prods him again. 'Owwww, they're fractured stop it."

"I need to discuss something with you." She grabs the chair she tosses her coats on from the corner of the room and sits down next to the bed side.

He cracks an eye open. "Did I dream it or did you try to shoot me?"

"I didn't try to shoot you, I shot at the wall. I was testing to see if it was loaded." She pauses for a moment thinking of how to sell it. "Although I wanted to shoot you. How could you lie about having cancer, of all things?"

"That's what you're focusing on? I was being held hostage."

"Oh don't be such a baby he was just testing me out to see if I would kill him if I had the chance... I kind of got him arrested." She crosses her arms and sits back.

"Why would you not take the chance? I'm not sure I mentioned but he was holding me at gunpoint and now you tell me you got him arrested... what part of opportunity to kill the guy didn't resonate with you?"

"The gun wasn't loaded, Dean." She scratches at her temple. "Besides we have a... thing."

Dean recoils.

"Not like that."

She reaches into the bedside table and takes a packet of aspirin out, tosses them on the bed and leaves.

...

She's pressed up against the shower wall, legs trembling as he runs the flat palm of his hand down her spine. The water beats hard against her shoulder she can feel the spray against her cheek. His lips are on her neck, the side that isn't being massaged by the water, and his teeth nip at the taught tendons exposed as she cranes her head to the side to beg him for more.

She can feel his cock against her hip. It's hard and smooth, and she wants desperately to drop her hand from the shower wall and squeeze it, test how thick it is and what it feels like to jerk him off, if he would shudder against her or stay his stoic self.

His hand has stopped running up and down her back now, and instead is slowly sliding between her buttocks. She whimpers as he presses his middle finger against her clit, and then lets out a loud almost angry moan as he moves backwards a little and presses it into her along with another.

"Fuck... R-"

"Shhhh, don't say my name."

She shivers and gasps, and he presses his long lean body against her side, kisses her hard and messy, and she comes as he presses his fingers hard against just the right spot.

For the second time that evening Beth wakes flushed and unsettled.