A/N: After a fair share of requests, here is the companion series(?) to Keeping Close! It isn't exactly necessary to read Keeping Close to understand all of this, but I'm afraid you might miss some of the particulars without first having read it. :]

p.s. I'm admittedly a bit confused with how this fic corresponds to the canon plotline, but I've tried to do my research correctly. So just try to ignore the particulars (they drive me nuts) and enjoy the fic!

~o~

Chapter One: Hit or Kiss

Sam would never live this one down. Dean and Bobby were making that painfully clear. It wasn't like he had intended to get sent flying through a wall and down a well-shaft. That damn ghost was sneaky! Even so, Sam admitted (only to himself) that maybe he could have been a little more careful. It definitely would have helped his situation with Dean, given that his older brother wasn't exactly being sympathetic toward his current invalid status. Since coming back to work alongside his brother, things between them were strained. Sam remembered the almost effortless manner in which they had functioned before – before he got killed and Dean traded his soul. That was the axis point that changed everything. Over the months, once Sam met Ruby and crept towards the "dark side," there was a shift. Sam couldn't determine an exact event that pushed them apart (there were honestly too many to count), but it was as if one day, he looked up and his brother was a stranger to him.

Now, what with his recent tumble through a farmhouse wall which resulted in a sprained ankle and a slight concussion, Sam had plenty of time to sort out he and his brother's relationship. Since their reunion after Sam's volunteered holiday, there was clearly something different about Dean. Sam could see it in the way his brother talked and behaved, even in the way he moved. If they were the sort of people for it, Sam would have accused Dean of falling in love while he was away. According to the silver screen, Dean was showing all the symptoms of being deeply infatuated. It was a ludicrous concept; Dean had never been in love nor did he ever show signs of wanting to be. Sam's brother was a simple guy with even more basic desires (when it came to sex, anyway).

Sam could hear Bobby knocking around in his study downstairs. He fidgeted, trying to get more comfortable on the creaky old mattress in Bobby's spare room. It was nearly two in the afternoon. He only noted the time because Dean was supposed to have returned with lunch an hour ago. Sam wasn't anxious over Dean's absence because of his own hunger, but really he was worried. He didn't like the thought of Dean being out on his own, for obvious reasons.

The sound of someone coming up the stairs broke Sam from his thoughts and sent his heart into an absurd hammering. When none other than Dean entered the room, Sam had his hand around a knife.

"Plannin' on gutting me, gimpy?" Dean said around a mouth full of cheeseburger. He rolled his eyes and tossed a grease-stained bag of food onto Sam's stomach.

Sam tucked the knife back under his pillow. "Uh, plannin' on giving me a heart condition?" he said, peeking into the bag. He lifted out a massive hamburger that weighed at least a full pound.

"What? It's got all the major food groups," Dean objected. "You've got your bread, protein, dairy, vegetables. Oh, and bacon."

"Okay I know you're a drop-out and everything, but newsflash: bacon is not a food group." Sam peeled off the four strips of bacon and a majority of the cheese before taking a tentative bite.

Dean only rolled his eyes again and sat down at the cluttered desk pushed against the wall, after stealing Sam's bacon, of course. He finished off his own burger and clapped his hands together to knock off the sesame seeds. "How's the leg?"

Sam shrugged. "Fine. Bobby thinks it should be healed by the end of the week. The sprain wasn't that bad. The concussion was the real problem."

"Good, good." Dean ran a hand over his face, seemingly bored now that his bacon cheeseburger was no more.

"So, mind telling me why it took you so long with the food? You've been gone, like, two hours. Did something happen?"

Dean looked up as if he hadn't caught what Sam had said. Why was he so distracted? "Huh? Oh, no, everything's fine. I was just, uh, tryin' to get ahold of Cas."

"He's still not answering his phone?"

"Bingo."

It wasn't unlike Castiel to go off on his own little angel missions – namely, his quest to find God. This wasn't the first time that they'd gone several weeks without hearing a word from him, which in Sam's opinion was a good thing; Cas had a habit for being the bearer of bad news. But for some reason, this particular lapse in contact was getting to Dean. Even though Dean's attitude had been lately improved, Sam could see a dip in his brother's mood whenever Castiel was mentioned. What had happened while Dean was working alone? He'd mentioned that Cas helped him out with a coven of vampires up in Oakland County, but aside from that, nothing appeared amiss to Sam. And knowing Dean, even if something truly terrible and horrific had happened while they were apart, Dean wouldn't be telling Sam any time soon, if only to avoid a conversation about anything real. This damn guy and his feelings, Sam thought, you'd think that after wendigos, poltergeists, and friggin' Lucifer, he'd be a little less afraid of telling me what's really happening in his head.

After teasing Sam appropriately for his injury, Dean stood and said that he was going to go out back and work on the Impala. He made sure that Sam had taken his pain killers and instructed his little brother to get some sleep because he badly wanted to be back on the road. Sam had a sneaking suspicion, as he watched Dean leave, that the only appeal that the road held was a distraction. A distraction to what, he didn't know.

~o~

Only after setting himself up with all of his tools, Dean admitted to himself that the Impala was uncharacteristically in perfect repair and in need of no tinkering. It was a disappointing discovery, because he was begging for something to do with himself. Cabin fever was setting in.

All this time to himself was leading to too much thinking and one too many dumb decisions.

Dean hadn't told Sam what he'd really been doing for so long in town, aside from leaving three messages in Castiel's inbox. In fact, he'd sort of skirted the question. But in complete honesty, Dean had gone into town that day looking for sex. Okay, normally he would have just owned up to it (actually he would have bragged), but this time was different.

Dean had sex with a guy. In town. In the back of some dusty little book shop. He couldn't even remember the guy's name.

It was a stupid impulse, something that he'd known he would regret and now did. At the time, though, it had seemed so right. He'd gone into the shop after seeing the cashier in the window. The guy was obviously gay; Dean could tell that at a first glance, even despite his pitiful "gay-dar." The way the cashier's dark hair sort of stuck up at odd angles, falling in just a few strands across his forehead, it had made Dean change course and enter the shop without a second thought. It was like he'd recognized someone he knew, but obviously that was impossible. Last time he checked, Castiel had never worked in a book shop.

~o~

"Oy, idgit! There's someone here to see ya!"

Dean looked up from the engine of Bobby's truck – after almost pleading with the old hunter to give him something to do, Bobby had conceded to let Dean do some work on it. "Huh?" he said, wiping the back of his hand absently across his cheek, leaving behind a thick grease stain.

Bobby scoffed at him and wheeled himself back inside, letting the door hang open as Dean's cue to follow him.

Dean set his tools down on the rag slung over the edge of the hood. He realized as he glanced up at the sky that the clouds were growing pink. Somehow he'd managed to kill another day.

The inside of the house was quiet, not that Bobby's house was ever particularly loud. This stillness was unique, though. It made Dean think something was wrong. It was the same type of silence he remembered from the nights that John would return late from a hunt with a subdued sort of terror in his eyes. The memory sent the back of his neck into apprehensive tingles and itches.

Bobby was sitting in his chair on the edge of the kitchen, facing his study. There was a set, hard look on his face and a certain white-knuckle way that he was gripping the armrests of his chair.

"Bobby, what's—?"

Dean halted just inside of the door of the kitchen as if he'd been doused in cold water.

"Hello, Dean." It was Castiel.

The angel looked characteristically composed and tranquil, despite the fact that he was covered in dirt and what look like blood. His trench coat was torn in places, and his tie was gone completely. Despite his hair always having an Einstein-esque quality, it was especially ruffled. Castiel seemed not to notice any of this.

"Wh—what happened?" Dean felt the gears in his brain halt and stutter, much like the very same engine he'd just been repairing. He glanced wildly around the room, noticing only then that Sam was sitting at Bobby's desk, his bad foot propped up on a chair. Sam's expression wasn't giving any clues, and so Dean returned his attention directly back to Cas.

"I am sorry for not returning your phone calls. I still cannot figure out how to listen to 'voice mail messages'," Castiel began. "I was in the midst of searching for my Father, and along the way I ran into some-," he looked down at himself, as if only then noticing that he looked like a hobo, "-trouble."

Dean crossed his arms. Where did this angel get off ignoring him for almost three weeks only to show up now looking like something that had crawled out of a storm drain?

"Well did you find Him?" Sam said, breaking the illusion that Dean and Cas were alone in the room.

What could have passed as a smirk crossed Castiel's face. "If I had found my Father, you and your brother would have been the first to know." He looked back to Dean, a sort of electric current running through them and making them utterly aware of the other. For the briefest moment, Dean feared that Castiel would say something to blow their cover; more than anything he did not want Sam or Bobby to know about what had happened back in Oakland County. It had to remain a secret. Dean didn't think he could bear the mortification of listening to Sam get his jollies out of taunting him. As for Bobby, well, Dean had the sneaking suspicion that the old hunter would be more than a little uncomfortable with the thought of man-on-man/angel sex.

Luckily, Bobby cut in before Cas could say anything else.

"Mind cleanin' yourself up, there? You're drippin' God-only-knows-what all over my damn rug." Bobby wheeled himself around and went into the kitchen for a beer.

Castiel looked down at himself again, making a displeased face. "Yes, maybe I should clean up," he said. When he looked back up, his clothes were totally clean, as if they'd never been dirty. Dean blinked several times, trying to sort out if he'd ever even seen the angel looking muddy to begin with.

"Neat trick," Sam said, chuckling.

Castiel looked over his shoulder at the younger Winchester. "Thank you. I am sorry about your leg. If I still had my powers of Grace, I would be able to heal it for you."

Sam shook his head. "Don't worry about it. I'm good. Dean's been getting antsy, though. And by antsy I mean bitchy. Anything you can do for that?" He smirked at Dean, who was rubbing at his forehead, suddenly aware of the grease stain there.

Dean paused, catching Castiel's eye. A smirk tugged the corner of his mouth which he quickly brushed aside; he was still annoyed at the angel, after all.

"I don't know about that," Castiel said.

"Cas, come outside with me, will ya?" Dean said. "I've gotta finish up Bobby's truck but there's something I wanna talk to you about."

Cas moved to follow him outside when Sam called after them. "Aw come on!" he said. "Don't tell him anything important!"

"Cool your jets, Sammy. You're supposed to be sleeping, anyway." He felt a little too much like an over-bearing mother upon saying this, but he shook it off and stepped outside.

"I am glad to see that you're safe," Castiel said. He stood close behind Dean as he made a show of rearranging his tools. Every nerve in Dean's brain was telling him to turn around and either hit Cas or kiss him; hit him because he'd disappeared off the face of the earth and strolled right back in like a stray cat, or kiss him because, well, it was Cas, the subject of way too many fantasies and lost hours of sleep over the past few days.

Dean wiped a rag over his hands, chuckling. There were a dozen things going through his head that he wanted to say, but he fished out the simplest one.

"You're a dick."

That made Cas withdraw somewhat. "If you are angry at my absence, I assure you it was necessary."

"And exactly what sort of trouble did you run into?" Dean said, facing Castiel. The sun was setting quickly now, and Dean took a moment's reassurance in the fact that they couldn't be seen from the house.

Castiel seemed almost saddened by the response. "I crossed paths with one of Heaven's messengers. He was not very pleased with me at my disobediences. I had to fight to get away and avoid being sent elsewhere."

That, Dean could almost understand. He knew messed-up family lives enough to empathize with a guy who was facing the pissiest relatives in the universe, and Castiel's case was at the very far end of extreme. Keeping this in mind, Dean managed to look the least bit sorry for him.

"You're alright, though?" he said.

Castiel nodded, smiling softly. "Yes. Better, now, in fact." His hand brushed Dean's as he nonchalantly reached out to touch one of the engine parts. The truck fired into life, running as if it were brand new, despite the several key components to its mechanics lying on the ground.

Dean jumped back from the vehicle, startled. "What the hell?"

"I fixed it for you. Now may we go somewhere more private to talk?"

For a nerdy, angelic bank accountant with serious social issues, Castiel knew how to get Dean's attention. The man laughed, moving unconsciously closer to Cas, almost touching him. "I'd say it's pretty private out here," he said.

Castiel glanced around, seemingly in agreement. "I assume you have not told your brother what happened the last time you and I were together?"

Dean chuckled dryly, his hand going absently to the side of Castiel's face. The feel of familiar stubble was oddly reassuring. "No way. Sammy doesn't need to know everything about my sex life."

"And why not? He did before." Touché. Castiel raised a challenging eyebrow. It came across smug and haughty, with an unmistakable touch of really-friggin'-adorable.

Dean mentally noted himself to stop teaching Castiel new tricks; for being such an old dog, Cas kept taking him by surprise.

"Shut up," the man said. In one smooth movement he reached around the back of Castiel's head and brought him in for a deep kiss, almost groaning out loud at the relief of having Cas so close again.

They pressed flush against each other, hands working independently of thought to push aside any easily reachable layers of clothing to touch whatever skin they could find. The kiss was almost exactly like their first, in that it was desperate and sloppy, but neither man could call it anything but extraordinary. Dean was backed up against the far side of Bobby's truck as Castiel took on a hungrier determination. The engine on the truck shut off at once when the focus of Castiel's attention shifted away from keeping it running and toward making Dean as aroused as possible in the next several moments (it was working, Dean noted).

"Hey," Dean breathed, breaking the kiss. He put one hand to Castiel's chest to keep him just far away enough to allow for speech. "We can't do this right now, okay? Not exactly the best time or place."

Castiel looked for a moment like a child denied his favorite treat. "Why not? You said it yourself that this location is private enough."

"Yeah, well, even on a gimpy leg I wouldn't put it past Sammy to spy on us."

Castiel glanced over his shoulder as if expecting Sam to appear from behind the rusted barbeque or one of Bobby's junk cars. "Perhaps you're right," he said. "But what should I do about this?" Castiel took Dean's hand and pressed it against his own groin, where a considerable hard-on was well formed.

"Damn," Dean said, chuckling softly. "Now you're just makin' it difficult for me."

The angel leaned in to whisper in Dean's ear. "That is the plan." He kissed Dean's earlobe gently, and never before had Dean been so turned on by such a simple move. It was apparent to him then that if he didn't get Castiel in bed within the next hour, his dick would explode.

"So maybe we could—"

Castiel drew away, holding up one hand to cut Dean off. "No, you are right. Doing this now would only present ramifications for you later. I'll go now, if you'd like." He took several steps backwards and turned on his heel.

Dean had the sudden urge to kneecap Castiel and pin him to the ground. Friggin' cock-tease angel douchebag.

"Oy! Get your lily ass back here!" Dean said as loudly as he dared. He caught Cas by the arm and dragged him unhindered toward the thick of Bobby's junk car forest.

"I take it you've missed me?" Castiel said, allowing himself to be led by the hand.

Dean scoffed and glanced over his shoulder. "What makes you think that?"

"The fact that you had anonymous sex with a book clerk today," Castiel replied as if he were commenting on the weather.

Dean nearly tripped over his own boots. He pulled Cas behind a rusted-out minivan. "You mean you saw that?"

Castiel looked ready to burst into laughter. The way his mouth quirked into a smug grin made Dean want (in equal parts) to hit or kiss him again.

"Voyeurism is not one of my finer points," Cas said, "but I will admit I enjoyed watching it. I am an angel, Dean. We are by nature voyeuristic beings." He cocked his head to the side, watching Dean bite the inside of his cheek. "If you'd like to hit me, you may."

Dean became aware that his face was hot with embarrassment. It was absurd to be so flustered over being caught doing it with another guy, but it was the brash way in which Castiel talked about it that made Dean uneasy.

"I'm not gonna hit you," Dean said. "I'd pro'lly just break my hand, anyway. But, you do owe me for the spying thing."

Castiel raised an inquisitive eyebrow. "Oh? And how shall I repay you?" he said, as if he couldn't figure it out on his own – Dean would be willing to bet he couldn't.

"On your knees," Dean said.

Without another word, Castiel gripped Dean by the shoulders and spun him around until the man's back hit the side of the mini-van. With Dean pressed squarely against the metal, Castiel moved down his body in a line of kisses and feather-light caresses. As he lowered himself onto his knees, he glanced up at Dean and the two smirked at each other. Dean wondered how much more of this it would take before some hole opened up in the ground labeled 'Heaven's Rejects' and swallowed Castiel whole. This sort of activity could not have been a good note toward Castiel's angel merit badges.

With deft, hasty hands, Castiel undid Dean's belt and loosened his pants. He slid the man's length out from his underwear, taking it into his hand and running one thumb over the tip while the rest of his fingers kneaded against the shaft. Dean grunted, closing his eyes. Blindly he felt Castiel tease his cock with his hands, using the precum as a lubricant. When Dean sensed that Castiel's lips were half an inch from taking him in, he forced himself to open his eyes. He couldn't miss the irony of having an angel on his knees before him, but decided not to venture down the road of any wanna-be God fantasies.

"I still don't know how you have sex better than you operate a cell phone," Dean said on the end of a chuckle. Castiel shot him a half-hearted glare. To compensate, Dean ran his fingers through the angel's ruffled hair as tenderly as he could. It seemed to placate him.

The first swipe of Castiel's tongue along the underside of his shaft made Dean grit his teeth against a sudden outcry of pleasure. Even so far from the house, echoes were still a problem. Castiel seemed to notice Dean's caution and chose to exploit it as much as he could. Languidly, the angel engulfed Dean's length in several licks and swirls of his tongue around the head. He dragged on the taunting pleasure until Dean was forced to tug on his hair, giving him an 'if there is any mercy in your heart, put my dick in your mouth now' type of look.

Chuckling under his breath before he did so, Castiel slid Dean's cock into his mouth.