Title: Pet

Author: OpheliacAngel

Pairing: Dean/Crowley

Genres: Hurt/Comfort/Angst/Romance

Rating: Teen

Summary: Crowley was offering his services, whatever the hell that entailed, and Dean couldn't be alone, not right now.

A/N: Fill for h/c_bingo Round 7 for the prompt 'arrest'. Post-The Purge.

Soundtrack: A Perfect Circle's 'Pet'

~Pay no mind what other voices say

They don't care about you, like I do

Safe from pain and truth and choice

And other poison devils

See they don't give a fuck about you, like I do

Just… stay with me, safe and ignorant~

The knock on the door wasn't Sam's.

For one thing, Sam wouldn't come to Dean on his own; either Dean would have to force the issue or Sam would have to patch things up in his own way, taking weeks at least to get there. Another, the knock didn't sound anything like Sam's: a soft rapping, barely there at all. And Sam probably wouldn't knock either, since privacy had always been null and void between them.

Headphones shoved to the side before he could even put them on, Dean grabbed his gun not hidden even remotely well-enough under the pillow and pulled the door open slightly. He deflated and stood aside when he realized it was none other than Crowley, who had recently acquired a habit of popping up whenever the hell he felt like it and when Dean least wanted to see his meddling ass. That, and Crowley was supposed to be searching for the First Blade right damn now, so Dean could kill Abaddon already and move on with his worthless life, as Sam had helpfully suggested.

"Thought the king of hell didn't knock?" Dean stated dryly. He was itching for a drink, or three, just as every bit of his good sense decided to flee and allow Crowley to enter. Dean's first ever room was still a private thing, upset even by Sam's presence and gum-chewing habit that only appeared when he was in this exact room, but to Crowley it might as well have been his throne room.

"And I thought Winchesters didn't sulk. Oh, that's right, that's Samantha."

Dean sighed, eying the door warily as Crowley closed it and sauntered into the room as if he owned it. One more thing Dean couldn't have. Dean had adopted Sam's love of closed doors lately, but that didn't mean he wanted to be trapped in a room with a demon who had been his enemy far longer than his unwilling and even more unreliable ally.

Rather than asking Crowley what the hell he wanted, since he didn't really give a damn, he held up the only bottle of scotch in the room - making a mental note to restock sooner rather than later - for Crowley's approval. Not that he gave a flying fuck about that either.

"Whatever's good enough for my favorite Winchester is good enough for me."

Dean took a long swig from the bottle, then refilled his glass before even touching Crowley's. "Thought you and Sam had that whole bonding thing going on?"

He didn't care to read the demon, so he stared intently down at the half-empty bottle instead. Regardless of Dean's feigned distraction, Crowley took both glasses from him, slowly enough that Dean could have done something about it. He wondered what that inaction meant. If he didn't fight for a drink then how could he have the strength to fight for anything more than that? Even though Sam stripped him down to the worst parts of himself, he should still be up and swinging, downing his brother's words just as easily as a glass of scotch, letting them absorb into his brain and vanish just as well as the less than potent alcohol did into his bloodstream.

Dean had never been good with words; no, that had been Sam's territory.

He just wished Sam would stop using words against him.

Crowley's hand moved around him to procure the bottle next, the one that Dean's hand was still wrapped around. It slipped free without a thought, hand tingling at its absence; then again, it could have been the Mark. These days, anything he felt could be the Mark.

"Sit down, Winchester."

Dean's mind first rebelled at the thought but then there was dark and brittle laughter in his head, almost escaping from his own lips with how quickly it had caught him off guard. Nothing made sense anymore: he had a demon in his bedroom and he wasn't allowed to drink anymore. What seemed like hours before he had Crowley wrapped around his little finger, at his beck and call. Now Dean was relinquishing everything and it was laughable because it was so far off the radar, off the course Dean had rigidly set for himself.

"Here to give me a piece of your mind?"

"Something like that," Crowley played along, one hand lightly pushing Dean backward. Dean's head turned, noticed Crowley was trying to get him to sit down on the bed. He was... sorta okay with that. It was better than falling down into some bottomless pit, even though Dean was doing that by himself just perfectly. At the moment he felt more off balance than usual, instructed himself to take Crowley's advice before he fell down on his ass and proved just how weak he was. Still, his body wouldn't budge unless Crowley pushed him again, which he did as if on cue.

Dean sprawled back easily, letting himself land where his body wanted to and not bothering to scramble for the energy required to protest. As far as he was concerned his will was all but sapped out, replaced by a base need to drink and black out, or at least the latter. Afterward he didn't move, didn't reposition himself because no position was comfortable anymore.

If the Mark could make Sam's words cut deeper and dirtier than that was what it was doing; those words had been placed on some nightmare tape loop and not even the strongest damn liquor in the world could release him.

And if he talked to Sam, well… he'd just say Dean had brought this on himself. Which was entirely too close to the truth.

Oddly, Crowley hadn't interrupted him. Dean tuned into him now, watching him almost as an afterthought, like it was completely normal for the guy to be stealing his booze and taking over his room. "I'm not in the mood for games, Crowley."

Crowley eyed him from head to toe several times over, as if deciding which part of him to devour first. Dean was so used to the look it didn't even creep him out anymore; he felt two feet away from his own rotting skin anyway.

The demon's gratuitous stare only made him feel strangely appreciated, though in a distant sort of way as if he were heavily drugged, and Dean almost prayed he was on that blissful edge of passing the fuck out. He didn't give much thought to the scotch being drugged somehow, realized he didn't need to be drugged for his body to start shutting down. Realized he wanted it to. Yet the thought that at least someone still appreciated Dean plucked at him for emphasis, sending a spark of color dancing through a world only recently gone gray.

"No, you most certainly aren't. Anything you want to get off your chest, darling?"

Dean did laugh at that, laughed until he started choking, until he couldn't remember that train of thought anymore. "Couldn't find enough souls to torture or demons to gank? Decide to head over here and psychoanalyze me?"

The silence could have been some weird time slip then, where Dean's mind regressed back to a recent point in time. Then again, he could have just taken Crowley off guard. The first sounded infinitely more realistic, especially taking into account that Crowley never ran out of things to say.

And then it was like Dean's mind sped up, dozens of swirling emotions and half-trails of thought pieced together that made no sense. Who even knew if he was conscious anymore? The world accelerated, and the voice crawled like something sticky and heavy and sharp out of the darkness that was Dean's own black hole of a head.

"It's alright, pet."

It could have been the words or the tone or any freaking degree of other things, but something inside Dean slipped out from underneath his carefully controlled walls, like a switch had been flipped, or Dean had been squeezed too tightly until he had to let go of something before he exploded.

He sat up, got as far as settling back on his elbows. He gritted his teeth at the abrupt movement, his body sore like he had just ran a marathon.

"Don't," he warned, hands clenching, entire body vibrating in anger and exhaustion and misery. Crowley put down his glass and sat on the bed in between Dean's legs, moving them apart so that he could fit there but not have to continue to make physical contact with Dean. Still, he did just that next, hand settling on Dean's thigh, the other on top of his shaking hand. I just need a drink. That's what's wrong with… just need to drink this whole goddamn life away for a while. Not like it works.

Crowley's voice brought him back again; Dean hated it but not as much as he hated himself, hated it but needed it. "As often as you and your brother have neglected my needs, I fear yours have been neglected far longer."

"Crowley," Dean warned again, but it was already too late. He was still fighting it with all he had: losing control, but he was crumbling, faster and faster.

"I am a good shoulder to cry on, light years ahead of Moose." Dean let the demon he knew better than he had ever wanted to push him again until he was back to laying down. He stared up at the one person who still remembered him and cared, or at least had the heart enough to pretend he did, despite Dean being soaked in booze and drowning in half-shed tears and need. He didn't know what he needed, but he was afraid of going off the deep end if Crowley left. Not like he'd ever ask him to stay.

Crowley pulled back, his shuffled footsteps louder than the beat of Dean's heart. "Wait."

Dean watched Crowley turn, all the weight leeched out of him quickly like a balloon loosing its helium as he realized the demon was merely topping his drink off. "Easy, darling. Just refilling my glass." The sound of liquid on glass lasted forever, that time slip thing again, until the hunter's skin itched incessantly and he wondered if he was ever coming back.

"Does Sam know you're here?" Because it was only then that Dean realized that Sam was still probably in the bunker, and Dean would be able to offer no explanations as to why Crowley was in his room. As the seconds ticked by, it only seemed more pressing that Crowley leave, even though Sam could go screw himself if he thought he could dictate Dean's time and priorities now that they weren't brothers anymore.

"What Moose doesn't know won't hurt him. Much," Crowley added, with an affirmative noise at the back of his throat. Dean had to agree, for the time being. Crowley was here and Sam wasn't, and never had Dean thought he'd say those words but here they were. The Mark heated up at them but Dean would be damned if he brought it to Crowley's already intense attention. "Mark itching again?" So long to that theory.

"I don't want to talk about the Mark."

Even though Crowley was the only person he could talk to about this damn mark on his arm.

"No," Crowley offered, just one long drawn out syllable. He strode back over to Dean, sat beside him this time and lifted one of Dean's hands, appearing to examine his nails, or rather, the dirt under them from the hunt three days prior. Give me a damn manicure already. "And I suppose you don't want to talk about your brother figuratively ripping you to shreds, even though that's what I'm here for. Hmm… everything is literal to you, isn't it?"

Gee, he never thought about that.

"He never...," Dean shook his head. He should be telling Crowley to piss off, not sharing life stories. "He's been pissed at me before, but never like that. Sometimes, I don't get where his anger comes from."

"Especially when it's directed toward you," Crowley finished. He finished the glass too but didn't get up to refill it this time. Dean was grateful, since he doubted he could have stopped himself from yanking at Crowley's sleeve. It wouldn't have been him if he had. "Sam does have a tendency to cut deep, take moi for instance. I'm still recovering. But enough about me... unload! All your heart's desires. All those pesky fears you keep locked up tight. I have...," he checked his watch, glanced back at Dean with some vast as of yet untapped interest. "Correction, I have all the time in the world."

The guy at least smelled pretty damn good, even with that god-awful scotch on his breath.

Dean figured Crowley was lonely, that maybe it was the motivating factor behind this visit. If Sam was here in his place then Dean wouldn't have half the problems he had, but the other half would still be here like some Jack-in-the-box screeching up out of its box unpredictably yet way too often, its relentless handler Sam, the one person he could never stop.

And none of it mattered because Crowley was offering his services, whatever the hell that entailed, and Dean couldn't be alone, not right now, not while the Mark itched and laughed and burned and the echo of Sam's words was louder than Dean's own inadequate thoughts, and all those people Dean had killed were backing his brother up, egging Sam on for more.

Was Crowley the only one on his side these days?

Said demon slid the headphones over Dean's ears, leaned over him to fluff the pillows and managed to look ridiculously domestic and docile while doing so. He even made a halfway decent effort of dragging Dean up onto said pillows, face pulled taut in outrage when Dean growled, more than capable of dragging himself up the last few inches. It turned out to be more graceful, hell, even normal in his head than the reality. Luckily, the inches were only inches.

As if attempting to save Dean from the embarrassment he had only brought on himself, the demon's hands busied themselves by pushing up Dean's Henley slowly, seductively, like he really had nowhere else to be.

"No demonic STDs right?" Dean shouted over the heavy beat of Metallica screaming like an old friend into his ears. Crowley shot him a glare, gaze sliding down until his mouth was pressed tight up against Dean's stomach, tongue cool against his heated skin, body almost moving rhythmically against Dean to the sound of the music, even though the demon couldn't hear it. Could he?

The song ended, paused a moment to allow a necessary shift. Dean heard his name, and it wasn't coming from the headphones.

He told himself to stop thinking, to lie back and relax and let someone take care of him for once. If that was the price to pay to have someone stay with him for just a little while, other than holding his hand and sharing more of his feelings, then he would pay it.

One thing Dean realized he liked about Crowley was that it took him a while to get down to business. Still, he was good at both: pleasure and business.

"Jesus, Crowley," he gasped, arching up off the bed.

And Crowley's smile was all teeth and all blood as the song climaxed.

Crowley was gone the next morning, even though Dean had asked him to stay the night before, something which heated his cheeks uncomfortably now.

There was, however, a note on the pillow Dean's cheek wasn't currently stuck to with days old sweat and drool. He dimly remembered drifting off into oblivion with his head somehow on Crowley's chest, however the hell it had gotten there, and hoped he hadn't drooled over him. Dean picked up the note with less shaky fingers than yesterday and read it several times over until the words sunk into his alcohol and sex fuzzed brain.

Business to attend to, darling. Stop by for a chat soon.

Love,

Your King

"Ass," Dean related, but it was with a smile.

He felt better than he had last night, because even though Crowley was no longer locked up in the dungeon or stretched out in Dean's bed complaining about the scotch or the company (one of which Dean knew he meant and the other he knew he didn't), he would be coming back.

And unlike Sam, he would be coming back for Dean.

FIN

A/N 2: First, thank you for reading!

Second, a note on the term 'arrest' which, in addition to seizure, can also mean to attract and/or engage one's attention, or to slow someone down or stop them outright; I like to think both apply to this fic. After 'Roadtrip' and during 'First Born', Dean needed to slow down, which Crowley didn't exactly help him with. After 'Sharp Teeth' and 'The Purge', Dean was definitely in a need to be distracted, and while Crowley is usually of the all talk variety, I figured he'd jump at the chance at getting Dean to cave and help him, in his own way, to displace himself from other areas of his life.

And… the title refers to Dean's need to be treated (somewhat) like a pet, his need for choices stripped and his needs dictated by another, in this case Crowley.