“Jesus, look at that queue!” Lars said. He could easily see over most of the guests who had lined up at the bar beside the buffet table in the hotel’s dining room.

“I think I’m going to die if I have to wait that long.” Dean grabbed his elbow. “I’ll even drink fucking tap water right now.”

Lars glanced around, but even the resident hovering waiters with their trays of champagne glasses were nowhere in sight.

“I’ve got a plan,” Lars said, ducking conspiratorially close to Dean so he could murmur to him. “I got access to the kitchen. Let’s see what they got in back.”

“Sonofabitch!” Dean clapped a hand over his chest.

Lars quickly wet his lips before turning to lead the way. Was it just the weed, or was he getting some seriously bi vibes from his guy?

True, they were both stoned as fuck, but there was something about him…

Lars pushed through the back of the dining room and into a small servant’s hallway that led straight to the bowels of the hotel. He’d been this exact way earlier, when Ana had disappeared to the kitchen for something and he’d had to track her down to get the guest register from her.

Two waiters came past them, both loaded down with more food for the buffet.

None with anything liquid.

Christ, his mouth was cork-dry.

Dean’s shoes rang out on the linoleum floor. Here, the hotel looked almost brand new with its freshly painted walls and industrial flooring.

Lars pushed through the double swing doors leading into the kitchen, blinking as light blazed into his eyes. Several chefs and kitchen staff bustled past carrying steel trays. The air was humid with the smell of roasting meat and garlic.

Glancing over his shoulder, Lars beckoned Dean through the throng of people and down a narrow passage. The door of a cold storage unit appeared on the right. He opened it, gesturing Dean inside.

Their breath misted, cold clamping over Lars’s body like a glove.

“Take your pick,” he said, waving at the row upon row of liquor, wine, and mixers. “And hurry—I’m about ten seconds away from getting blue balls, and not for the usual reasons.”

Dean laughed, and grabbed the closest bottle of mix—soda water. Then they hurried out of the fridge and stood for a moment toe-to-toe in the passage outside.

“Uh…where—” Dean began, looking hesitantly back to the kitchen.

Too noisy. Too busy. He wanted quiet right now. Quiet, and half that bottle of soda water.

Lars pointed to the right. “That door goes outside.”

“Yeah, perfect,” Dean said, and headed straight for it.

Cool air washed over Lars as they stepped outside. The sun had set, but the sky hadn’t yet turned dark purple. The evening star was out, along with a bloated moon hanging low in the sky.

“Full moon,” Lars said.

“Perfect timing, what with it being Day of the Dead and all,” Dean said. He twisted open the bottle of soda water and chugged at it, lifting the bottom half of his mask to do so. Then he handed the bottle to Lars.

“Guess we don’t need these,” Lars said, lifting his mask off his head. It was giving him a head ache, anyway, much as he loved the way it looked on him.

Dean shrugged. “Isn’t it like bad luck to take off your mask at a masquerade?”

“Doubt it,” Lars said through a laugh. “Else no one’s getting head.”

It was an idiotic thing to say, of course, but the words fell out of his mouth before he could stop them.

Dean had been looking at the moon, but he dropped his head when Lars spoke and then slowly turned back to him. “Yeah, I guess,” he said, sounding a little uneasy. “So, uh…”

Fuck, had he ever been wrong. “You wanna head back inside?” Lars handed back the bottle and turned for the door.

Dean caught him just above his elbow. “Actually…”

Lars turned back, frowning. It was weird, trying to suss someone out when they were wearing a mask. All he had to go on was the guy’s eyes.

Those hazel eyes shifted. “I, uh…I wanted to know if, maybe—”

The kitchen’s back door flew open, and Dean cut off as a woman in a hair net stormed past them with a garbage bag. She took them in with a hesitant smile, tossed the garbage in a nearby dumpster, and headed back inside as she slapped her hands together.

“Hey, over here,” Lars said. It was his dick doing the talking, of course, not him. He had Cora and Finn and…well, Bailey too, waiting for him inside the hotel, but he’d always been a slave to his curiosity. It had gotten him into the worst messes of his life—but, at the same time, had been responsible for some of the best times of his life too.

A blessing and a curse.

Lars led Dean around the corner. Here, a wall soared up behind them and, a few paces away, the wire link fence surrounding the hotel’s grounds. Weeds and grass fought valiantly for the space between the flagstones. The closest windows were those on the first floor—and each of them dark and desolate in the deepening twilight.

Fuck, maybe this place was haunted.

“You were saying?” Lars asked, as soon as they both came to a stop.

Dean looked away, toying absently with his bottle of soda water. Then he reached into his pocket and pulled out the gift box again.

“Do you think I should give this to the capo, or is there like a gift table or something?”

Lars’s mind reeled for a moment before he could figure out what the guy was asking.

“Oh,” he said. “I…I don’t think there’s a table.”

“You know the capo, right? The one whose birthday it is?”

“Yeah,” Lars answered without thinking. “I mean, everyone does,” he correctly lamely.

“I don’t,” Dean said through a laugh. “But I’ve heard some pretty fucked up shit.”

“Yeah?” Lars grinned. “Like what?”

“Hold up,” Dean said, rummaging in his pockets again. He took out a joint, but it was poorly rolled and looked like it had only barely survived Nam and a tour through Iraq.

“It’s cool,” Lars said, touching his fingertips to Dean’s hand and pushing the joint away. “I got another.”

“More of that shit we smoked earlier?” Dean asked, sounding in awe.

“Yeah,” Lars said, voice muffled around the joint. “Cartel weed rocks.” He lit it, took a long drag, and handed it to Dean, the cherry pointing back to himself.

Dean took it, their fingers fumbling around the small joint, and drew another one of his impressive lung fulls.

“So, I heard she offed El Guapo,” Dean said, voice tight as he held in the smoke.

Lars hit the joint, and gave a nod. “She sure did.”

Dean watched him for a second, and then blew out a huge cloud of smoke. “Wait…you were there?”

“Fuck yes,” Lars said, still nodding. “It was brutal.”

“What did she…I mean, I heard she carved out his eyes.”

Lars laughed. And then couldn’t stop. He tried handing the joint back to Dean, but they fumbled the pass and the joint dropped between the flagstones.

They both bent to pick it up, and knocked their heads together. Which sent both of them into a fit of laughter that had Lars leaning a hand against the wall so he wouldn’t collapse. Dean had his head back, body flush with the stained concrete as their laughter tapered down.

“Christ,” Lars murmured, wiping his eye with a knuckle. “That’s what you heard?”

“That was after she cut off his dick.”

This sent Lars into another fit of laughter, Dean right behind. Lars turned, his back to the wall, and slid down so he could sit before his legs deposited him on the ground.

Dean sank down beside him. “But seriously, she didn’t do that?”

“No, Jesus,” Lars managed. He cleared his throat, beckoned for the bottle of soda water, and nearly emptied it. He handed the last inch back to Dean as he let the liquid fizz away in his mouth. Then he swallowed hard and said, “She stuck him in the heart, sliced his throat, and then kind of skewered one of his eyes.”

Dean’s eyes were wide behind his mask. Lars thought this would bring on another laughing fit, but instead the man took a somber drink of water, lifting his mask and revealing a wide, curving mouth. He looked young, perhaps only a few years older than Lars.

“Mother have mercy…now I really want to meet her,” Dean said, tossing the now empty soda bottle over the chain fence. “Is she as hot as everyone says?”

“Yeah,” Lars replied, sobering. “That she is.”

“So you like, work for her?” Dean asked.

He looked at the man, feeling a prickle of unease working its way down his spine. But then Dean’s eyes glittered as he smiled, and he realized he was just getting paranoid from the weed again.

“I do,” Lars said.

“Could you…could you introduce me?” Dean asked, sitting forward a little like a kid who couldn’t wait for Christmas morning.

“Nah…” Lars waved a hand. “I would, but tonight’s supposed to be very—” he tapped the mask where it rested on the top of his head “—anonymous, you know?”

“Why?” Dean asked. “I’d have thought the two new capos would want to show off. Let everyone know who’s in charge. That kind of stuff.”

Lars shrugged. “I think they’re still feeling out who’s loyal and who’s not.”

“Ah, like El Guapo’s crew. You think some of them are still around? Like lank pissed ‘cos the new capo offed him?”

Lars nodded, and rubbed his eyelids with his fingers. He wouldn’t be surprised if his eyes were bloodshot. Dean’s looked a little red, as much as he could see through the mask’s eye holes.

“Oh, hey…” Dean lifted a finger and stuck a hand in his suit again. “You feel like partying?”

The man pulled out a small zip lock bag, barely an inch across. Inside were several small off-white pills.

“Molly?” Lars asked, taking the bag from him and inspecting the pills through the plastic.

“Yeah. Good ones, apparently.”

“Shit, I really shouldn’t…” Lars began.

Dean snatched the bag back from him, peeled it open, and took out one of the pills. “I shouldn’t either, but I’ll be fucked if I’m going to hang around here all night sober.” He stabbed a thumb behind him. “You hear that music playing earlier?” He put his hands into fists and twisted his shoulders, mimicking dancing where he sat. “It’s calling my fucking name.”

Christ, it was calling his, too. Lars licked his lips, staring down at the bag where it dangled from Dean’s fingers.

“Yeah…maybe just—”

But he’d been too focused on the drugs, and not on Dean. The man had slipped off his mask, baring a strikingly handsome face. When Lars looked up, he froze.

Dean gave him a coy wink, popped a pill in his mouth, and darted forward.

Their lips met in a violent kiss that Lars reared back from in surprise. But Dean’s hand found the back of his neck, dragging him back.

Bitter pharmaceuticals mingled with weed-sweet saliva as Dean’s tongue slid between his teeth.

Fuck, why the hell wasn’t he pushing this guy away? What was wrong with him?

But his body refused to obey the frantic signals for him to retreat. Instead, he grabbed a fistful of long, dark hair, and ground his mouth harder against Dean’s.

Dean tipped his head forward, breaking off their kiss as they both panted for breath.

Bitterness filled Lars’s mouth, and he hurriedly swallowed the pill Dean had left behind before it would make him puke. As it was, a shudder tore through him, his fist clenching reflexively in the man’s hair.

God, he was one sick puppy. How was he ever going to make this up to Cora? To Finn? He tried to untangle his hand, but Dean moved his head, coming up for a second kiss. Gentler this time. Teasing, almost.

“I can’t—” Lars began, speaking through their kiss.

A hand slid up his leg, cupping his dick. “I don’t know…” Dean murmured. “It definitely feels like you can.”

“No, it’s not…I mean—”

“What’s she wearing tonight?” Dean asked, his lips sliding over Lars’s jaw and brushing against his earlobe.

“Who?”

“Eleodora.” A tongue ran over his ear, sending a wave of hedonistic anticipation flooding through him. “What’s she wearing? A mask?”

“No,” Lars said, and he had no idea why. In fact, he didn’t know why any of this was happening. Sure, the guy was hot as fuck, but he had more willpower than this. Tons more. He had a hard on, but it felt distant - like it belonged on someone else.

The world grew soft around him. The air thick and cloying.

Ecstasy didn’t kick in this fast.

“What…” his mouth wasn’t working properly. His lips were sluggish. “What did you give me…?”

Dean pulled back, hazel eyes darting over Lars’s face before settling on his mouth. He drew an audible breath, letting it wash over Lars’s face as he exhaled. “Fuck, I wish I had more time. We could have had so much fun together…you and I.”

His voice was different. Even the way he spoke.

Why was everything so dark? Was it night already?

Lars tried lifting a hand, but it batted clumsily against Dean’s upper arm. He grabbed Lars’s wrist, manipulating his hand so Lars was grabbing his dick through his suit.

It was as hard as his was.

“Maybe we’ll run into each other again,” Dean murmured, eyelids fluttering as if Lars’s limp touch was turning him on even more. “Of course, you won’t remember me, will you?”

Why wouldn’t he remember this guy? He’d never be able to forget such a handsome face. Such mesmerizing eyes.

Dean stood, groaning as he yanked his suit pants straight. “Fuck,” he said, and then drew air through his teeth.

Then he crouched again, all in a rush.

Lars would have pulled back if he could, but his body was no longer responding to him. It was growing colder, too. Darkness creeping in from all sides.

Dean grabbed his chin, tipping his head back as he washed a warm, lascivous smile over him. “Simon says, go to sleep.”