Gift for Tammyrenh
Title: Once there was a way
Gifter: Blackrabbit42
Pairing/Characters: J2
Word count/Medium: 2100 words
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: prostitution, mentions of mafia-related violence
Summary: Every day since Jared left home he’s drifted farther and farther away from his own expectations. He’d come to Chicago looking for factory work; instead he finds himself tending bar in a whorehouse. Then the extra hours at the stockyard. And now this. He tells himself it’s for the money, but he's not fooling anyone, least of all Jensen.
++++++++
Jared takes a deep breath and steps through the door of L’Ultima Cena. The warm smell of simmering tomatoes, basil, and fresh baked bread greet him, making him weak in the knees for hunger and thoughts of home. It almost makes him turn around and walk out the door. Vincente, the ancient waiter, does not get up from his seat at the family table as he nods at Jared. Two of Jensen’s mafia soldiers sit at a table further back, playing briscola and drinking aqua minerale. They glance up from their game as Jared approaches.
“Hey, Jared. What you doin’ here?” It’s Paulie.
In truth, Jared is asking himself the same question. He’s shitting himself, is the short answer. Taking one hell of a risk is the longer answer.
“Business,” is the answer he gives.
Paulie grunts, and the other one, Jared isn’t sure what his name is, just nods towards the back and returns his gaze to his cards.
Jared takes one more deep breath and knocks. At a sound from Jensen within, he opens the door. He might not walk back out of that room, but he has to do what he has to do, and putting it off isn’t going to make it go any easier.
Jensen “The Razor” Ackles sits at his desk, poring over a ledger, cross checking figures against a little black leather book. A tumbler of Cutty Sark sits by a bottle of the same, seemingly forgotten by Jensen’s elbow. Jensen’s coat and hat are off, hung neatly on hooks behind his desk, and the sleeves of his immaculately pressed white shirt are rolled to his elbows. His brow is furrowed in concentration, and he holds up one finger without looking up at Jared.
“One minute,” he says, noting some figures in the ledger. He does not invite Jared to sit down.
The office is spare, a lesser quality of wooden paneling, wooden floors than in the dining room out front. Jensen’s desk is neat, but aged. Worn edges glow in the last of the evening’s rays that flood through the western facing window. Other than the desk and a chair on each side there are no other furnishings. It is not an inviting place; it does not pretend.
Jared stands patient and waits, trying to calm the frantic racing of his heart. He knows Jensen a little now; he’s calm, deliberate. Even likable, if you don’t think too hard about what he’s known for, and by now, Jared can’t help but think of it. It’s part of Jensen. Jared has never seen him angry. Never even heard him raise his voice, and yet, there’s this thing underneath. Jensen’s is Chicago’s deadliest enforcer. Not the most ruthless, nor the most violent. He doesn’t have a taste for suffering. But if he’s got an order with your name on it, your days aren’t numbered; your hours are.
And underneath even that, buried deeper, is something Jared hopes he hasn’t misread. Jensen is always polite to Jared, but serving Jensen drinks at the bar is a far cry from what he’s here for today.
That’s how it has gone for him. Every day since he’s left home he’s drifted farther and farther away from his own expectations. He’d come to Chicago looking for factory work; instead he finds himself tending bar in a whorehouse. Then the extra hours at the stockyard. And now this. He tells himself it’s for the money. They need it bad back home.
But even if he does scrape together enough money to help them out, he can’t go back. Not now that he understands what happened in him the first time he laid eyes on Jensen. That part of him has no place back in farm country, with its grassy, sunshine girls. Not now, not ever again.
“Yes, Jared?” Jensen says, breaking into his thoughts. “It is Jared, isn’t it?”
“Yes, Sir,” Jared answers, and he’s relieved to find that the words come out strong, steady.
“Did Ms. Huffman send you? Is she having any trouble?” Jensen asks, leaning forward a little. “Is there anyone she needs me to talk to?” He glances at his watch and Jared can imagine him doing a mental calculation; let’s see, if I have a murder at 4:30, will I still be able to make the meeting I have in Vernon Park at six?
“No, sir,” Jared says. “I’m here to see you for more personal reasons.”
Jensen raises an eyebrow.
“I’ve seen you at the house. And I’ve come to the conclusion that you’re not a satisfied client.” He watches carefully for a reaction, but Jensen’s face betrays nothing. “And I’d like to do what I can to fix that.”
Jensen makes a noise low in his throat that may have been a laugh, may have been a growl and turns his attention back to his ledger. “I’m not interested in the services at Ms. Huffman’s. I thought she understood that. Tell her not to w-”
“I know,” Jared interrupts, “that you’re not interested. That’s why I’m here.”
Jensen looks up sharply. Jared isn’t sure if it’s because he isn’t used to being interrupted, or because he understands what Jared is implying. Probably both. There’s no going back now. He walks around Jensen’s desk and drops to his knees beside Jensen’s chair.
Jared looks up to meet Jensen’s inscrutable gaze. “I think that you need to have an outlet.”
Jensen swivels his chair to face Jared. He still looks composed, unruffled. His expression reveals nothing. It chills Jared’s breath in his chest, but there’s definitely no turning back now. Not now that he’s got on the floor in front of this man.
“I think,” Jared continues, and now he put his hands on Jensen’s knees, “that you need something hard to push up against. That the girls are too soft. That you need someone who’s going to push back and push back hard.”
Jensen hasn’t moved a muscle, but he looks down at Jared with something like detached curiosity. It gives Jared courage to say the last bit.
“And I think that someone is me.”
Jared runs his hand up Jensen’s thigh and freezes when his fingers brush over something hard. A razor. The Razor. In Jensen’s pocket. He snatches his hand back as if he has touched something unexpectedly very, very cold. A hint of a smile twitches at the corner of Jensen’s mouth.
“Go on,” Jensen prompts. “You come in here telling me what you think I need? Hai i coglioni, I’ll give you that. But you’re going to need more than courage- you’re going to need conviction.”
Jensen grasps Jared’s wrist and pulls it back towards him. Presses his hand down over the slim metal shape in his pocket. “If you’re in, you’re in.”
The razor is smaller than you’d think, just a little bit of nothing steel with a hinge. Jared has seen it twice, and both times that it had temporarily come out of Jensen’s pocket the entire bar had gone silent. The nickname for the razor is One-Hundred Percent and that’s all anyone needs to know about it. Jared runs his fingers over it through the smooth linen of Jensen’s trousers and thinks about what Jensen has said. Conviction. He might not have had it when he walked in the room, but the fact that he’s still breathing through his mouth rather than a slash in his neck gives it to him now.
Three buttons. Jared’s hands does not shake as he undoes the top three buttons on Jensen’s trousers and the bottom two buttons of Jensen’s spotless white shirt. He’s never done this before. Of course he hasn’t. Before he came to Chicago, it would have never even occurred to him that this was a thing people did. He is surprised to find how easy it feels. He’s surprised how immediate his own response is when his fingers first find Jensen’s cock. Surprised at how easy he brings it to his mouth and takes it in.
But nothing compares to the surprise he feels when Jensen’s hand cups the back of his head, and firmly pulls himself deeper into Jared’s mouth. That connection, that acceptance. It’s that same stirring he felt inside him the first time he laid eyes on Jensen… this. He hadn’t known this was inside him. But he recognized it in Jensen; that same sense of reaching out for something that was never there, until now.
He is not timid. When Jensen nudges him down, he opens wider, and works this throat around the head. He raises up on his knees to get a better angle and learns on the spot what works. What makes Jensen groan. What makes him tighten his fingers in Jared’s hair and suck his breath in through his teeth. When Jensen’s hips start rocking forward, he stays with him. Jared finds he’s hungry for it. Instantly addicted to the power he feels, the ability to make Jensen feel something so intense. Playing with something deadly, and finding out he’s good at it makes Jared’s stomach curl with a dark pleasure he would have never suspected.
He pushes back, hard, and gives Jensen everything he asks for. It doesn’t take long for Jensen’s strength to begin to abate, his body relinquishing control to Jared’s giving mouth and stroking fist. That’s when Jared goes harder, forcing Jensen back into his chair, unable to do more than thrust up wordlessly, one hand cupping Jared’s jaw, the other resting now on the back of his head.
When Jensen throws his head back and comes deep in Jared’s throat, Jared holds on. Grips Jensen by the hips and sees it through to the very last shuddering end.
The room is so quiet, broken only by the sound of Jensen’s ragged breath, that Jared can hear dishes clattering in the kitchen two rooms away and the low chatter of the two soldiers outside the door. It seems impossible that what just happened occurred without the notice of the rest of the world. It thundered in Jared’s world; stripped away everything that was not him and Jensen and this. He stands, and his height over Jensen, who is still recovering, eyes closed, mouth slightly open and catching his breath, thrills him.
“You can consider that on the house,” Jared says. “You can negotiate with Ms. Hoffman for future-”
“No,” says Jensen, and stops Jared’s heart.
“I-”
“If you and I will be doing business, then you and I will be doing business. It has nothing to do with Ms. Hoffman.” Jensen stands and buttons up his pants, his shirt. In a moment, he looks as if nothing had ever happened. “If she gives you any trouble, tell her to take it up with me.”
Jared nods. Ms. Hoffman will have better sense than to pick a fight with Jensen about this. “You know where to find me when you want me.” He turns to leave.
“Wait.”
Jared stops, but doesn’t turn around. His shoulders tense. He needs this. For more than just the money. If Jensen changes his mind, he’s not sure where that leaves him.
“I expect I will be your only client,” Jensen says. “I’ll make it worth your while.”
“Understood,” Jared answers, and leaves the room before his nerve fails him.
++++++++
Dear Ma and Pa,
I got the message from Uncle Terry about the bank. If I hear of anyone looking for work out of the city, I will send them down to you, but I won’t be able to come home. I’ll be able to give you a little more money now, I took on some extra work.
It’s not much colder here in the winter than it is back home. They may call it the Windy City, but they’ve got nothing on the storms that whip across our fields. And the buildings are much tighter. I stay pretty comfortable at the boarding house, although the food hasn’t improved any.
Pa, don’t get suckered into selling any of your stock to up North. They pay pennies compared to the prices you’d get in Kansas City. That being said, you’ve never seen so many cows and hogs in your life. Far as the eye can see, nose to nethers in the stockyard.
I know you are worried I will take up drinking. Well don’t worry about that at all. There is a lot of that here in the city, but I’ve seen it ruin too many good men. That won’t be me.
Give Moxie a pet for me. I miss you all like fire.
Much Love,
Your Son Jared
He thinks about what Jensen said. I’ll make it worth your while. He’s seen more money in that man’s wallet than his parents see all year. It might just help. It might fix everything. But he’s lying to himself if he thinks that’s all there is to it. Once there was a way to get back home, but not any longer.
Gifter: Blackrabbit42
Pairing/Characters: J2
Word count/Medium: 2100 words
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: prostitution, mentions of mafia-related violence
Summary: Every day since Jared left home he’s drifted farther and farther away from his own expectations. He’d come to Chicago looking for factory work; instead he finds himself tending bar in a whorehouse. Then the extra hours at the stockyard. And now this. He tells himself it’s for the money, but he's not fooling anyone, least of all Jensen.
++++++++
Jared takes a deep breath and steps through the door of L’Ultima Cena. The warm smell of simmering tomatoes, basil, and fresh baked bread greet him, making him weak in the knees for hunger and thoughts of home. It almost makes him turn around and walk out the door. Vincente, the ancient waiter, does not get up from his seat at the family table as he nods at Jared. Two of Jensen’s mafia soldiers sit at a table further back, playing briscola and drinking aqua minerale. They glance up from their game as Jared approaches.
“Hey, Jared. What you doin’ here?” It’s Paulie.
In truth, Jared is asking himself the same question. He’s shitting himself, is the short answer. Taking one hell of a risk is the longer answer.
“Business,” is the answer he gives.
Paulie grunts, and the other one, Jared isn’t sure what his name is, just nods towards the back and returns his gaze to his cards.
Jared takes one more deep breath and knocks. At a sound from Jensen within, he opens the door. He might not walk back out of that room, but he has to do what he has to do, and putting it off isn’t going to make it go any easier.
Jensen “The Razor” Ackles sits at his desk, poring over a ledger, cross checking figures against a little black leather book. A tumbler of Cutty Sark sits by a bottle of the same, seemingly forgotten by Jensen’s elbow. Jensen’s coat and hat are off, hung neatly on hooks behind his desk, and the sleeves of his immaculately pressed white shirt are rolled to his elbows. His brow is furrowed in concentration, and he holds up one finger without looking up at Jared.
“One minute,” he says, noting some figures in the ledger. He does not invite Jared to sit down.
The office is spare, a lesser quality of wooden paneling, wooden floors than in the dining room out front. Jensen’s desk is neat, but aged. Worn edges glow in the last of the evening’s rays that flood through the western facing window. Other than the desk and a chair on each side there are no other furnishings. It is not an inviting place; it does not pretend.
Jared stands patient and waits, trying to calm the frantic racing of his heart. He knows Jensen a little now; he’s calm, deliberate. Even likable, if you don’t think too hard about what he’s known for, and by now, Jared can’t help but think of it. It’s part of Jensen. Jared has never seen him angry. Never even heard him raise his voice, and yet, there’s this thing underneath. Jensen’s is Chicago’s deadliest enforcer. Not the most ruthless, nor the most violent. He doesn’t have a taste for suffering. But if he’s got an order with your name on it, your days aren’t numbered; your hours are.
And underneath even that, buried deeper, is something Jared hopes he hasn’t misread. Jensen is always polite to Jared, but serving Jensen drinks at the bar is a far cry from what he’s here for today.
That’s how it has gone for him. Every day since he’s left home he’s drifted farther and farther away from his own expectations. He’d come to Chicago looking for factory work; instead he finds himself tending bar in a whorehouse. Then the extra hours at the stockyard. And now this. He tells himself it’s for the money. They need it bad back home.
But even if he does scrape together enough money to help them out, he can’t go back. Not now that he understands what happened in him the first time he laid eyes on Jensen. That part of him has no place back in farm country, with its grassy, sunshine girls. Not now, not ever again.
“Yes, Jared?” Jensen says, breaking into his thoughts. “It is Jared, isn’t it?”
“Yes, Sir,” Jared answers, and he’s relieved to find that the words come out strong, steady.
“Did Ms. Huffman send you? Is she having any trouble?” Jensen asks, leaning forward a little. “Is there anyone she needs me to talk to?” He glances at his watch and Jared can imagine him doing a mental calculation; let’s see, if I have a murder at 4:30, will I still be able to make the meeting I have in Vernon Park at six?
“No, sir,” Jared says. “I’m here to see you for more personal reasons.”
Jensen raises an eyebrow.
“I’ve seen you at the house. And I’ve come to the conclusion that you’re not a satisfied client.” He watches carefully for a reaction, but Jensen’s face betrays nothing. “And I’d like to do what I can to fix that.”
Jensen makes a noise low in his throat that may have been a laugh, may have been a growl and turns his attention back to his ledger. “I’m not interested in the services at Ms. Huffman’s. I thought she understood that. Tell her not to w-”
“I know,” Jared interrupts, “that you’re not interested. That’s why I’m here.”
Jensen looks up sharply. Jared isn’t sure if it’s because he isn’t used to being interrupted, or because he understands what Jared is implying. Probably both. There’s no going back now. He walks around Jensen’s desk and drops to his knees beside Jensen’s chair.
Jared looks up to meet Jensen’s inscrutable gaze. “I think that you need to have an outlet.”
Jensen swivels his chair to face Jared. He still looks composed, unruffled. His expression reveals nothing. It chills Jared’s breath in his chest, but there’s definitely no turning back now. Not now that he’s got on the floor in front of this man.
“I think,” Jared continues, and now he put his hands on Jensen’s knees, “that you need something hard to push up against. That the girls are too soft. That you need someone who’s going to push back and push back hard.”
Jensen hasn’t moved a muscle, but he looks down at Jared with something like detached curiosity. It gives Jared courage to say the last bit.
“And I think that someone is me.”
Jared runs his hand up Jensen’s thigh and freezes when his fingers brush over something hard. A razor. The Razor. In Jensen’s pocket. He snatches his hand back as if he has touched something unexpectedly very, very cold. A hint of a smile twitches at the corner of Jensen’s mouth.
“Go on,” Jensen prompts. “You come in here telling me what you think I need? Hai i coglioni, I’ll give you that. But you’re going to need more than courage- you’re going to need conviction.”
Jensen grasps Jared’s wrist and pulls it back towards him. Presses his hand down over the slim metal shape in his pocket. “If you’re in, you’re in.”
The razor is smaller than you’d think, just a little bit of nothing steel with a hinge. Jared has seen it twice, and both times that it had temporarily come out of Jensen’s pocket the entire bar had gone silent. The nickname for the razor is One-Hundred Percent and that’s all anyone needs to know about it. Jared runs his fingers over it through the smooth linen of Jensen’s trousers and thinks about what Jensen has said. Conviction. He might not have had it when he walked in the room, but the fact that he’s still breathing through his mouth rather than a slash in his neck gives it to him now.
Three buttons. Jared’s hands does not shake as he undoes the top three buttons on Jensen’s trousers and the bottom two buttons of Jensen’s spotless white shirt. He’s never done this before. Of course he hasn’t. Before he came to Chicago, it would have never even occurred to him that this was a thing people did. He is surprised to find how easy it feels. He’s surprised how immediate his own response is when his fingers first find Jensen’s cock. Surprised at how easy he brings it to his mouth and takes it in.
But nothing compares to the surprise he feels when Jensen’s hand cups the back of his head, and firmly pulls himself deeper into Jared’s mouth. That connection, that acceptance. It’s that same stirring he felt inside him the first time he laid eyes on Jensen… this. He hadn’t known this was inside him. But he recognized it in Jensen; that same sense of reaching out for something that was never there, until now.
He is not timid. When Jensen nudges him down, he opens wider, and works this throat around the head. He raises up on his knees to get a better angle and learns on the spot what works. What makes Jensen groan. What makes him tighten his fingers in Jared’s hair and suck his breath in through his teeth. When Jensen’s hips start rocking forward, he stays with him. Jared finds he’s hungry for it. Instantly addicted to the power he feels, the ability to make Jensen feel something so intense. Playing with something deadly, and finding out he’s good at it makes Jared’s stomach curl with a dark pleasure he would have never suspected.
He pushes back, hard, and gives Jensen everything he asks for. It doesn’t take long for Jensen’s strength to begin to abate, his body relinquishing control to Jared’s giving mouth and stroking fist. That’s when Jared goes harder, forcing Jensen back into his chair, unable to do more than thrust up wordlessly, one hand cupping Jared’s jaw, the other resting now on the back of his head.
When Jensen throws his head back and comes deep in Jared’s throat, Jared holds on. Grips Jensen by the hips and sees it through to the very last shuddering end.
The room is so quiet, broken only by the sound of Jensen’s ragged breath, that Jared can hear dishes clattering in the kitchen two rooms away and the low chatter of the two soldiers outside the door. It seems impossible that what just happened occurred without the notice of the rest of the world. It thundered in Jared’s world; stripped away everything that was not him and Jensen and this. He stands, and his height over Jensen, who is still recovering, eyes closed, mouth slightly open and catching his breath, thrills him.
“You can consider that on the house,” Jared says. “You can negotiate with Ms. Hoffman for future-”
“No,” says Jensen, and stops Jared’s heart.
“I-”
“If you and I will be doing business, then you and I will be doing business. It has nothing to do with Ms. Hoffman.” Jensen stands and buttons up his pants, his shirt. In a moment, he looks as if nothing had ever happened. “If she gives you any trouble, tell her to take it up with me.”
Jared nods. Ms. Hoffman will have better sense than to pick a fight with Jensen about this. “You know where to find me when you want me.” He turns to leave.
“Wait.”
Jared stops, but doesn’t turn around. His shoulders tense. He needs this. For more than just the money. If Jensen changes his mind, he’s not sure where that leaves him.
“I expect I will be your only client,” Jensen says. “I’ll make it worth your while.”
“Understood,” Jared answers, and leaves the room before his nerve fails him.
++++++++
Dear Ma and Pa,
I got the message from Uncle Terry about the bank. If I hear of anyone looking for work out of the city, I will send them down to you, but I won’t be able to come home. I’ll be able to give you a little more money now, I took on some extra work.
It’s not much colder here in the winter than it is back home. They may call it the Windy City, but they’ve got nothing on the storms that whip across our fields. And the buildings are much tighter. I stay pretty comfortable at the boarding house, although the food hasn’t improved any.
Pa, don’t get suckered into selling any of your stock to up North. They pay pennies compared to the prices you’d get in Kansas City. That being said, you’ve never seen so many cows and hogs in your life. Far as the eye can see, nose to nethers in the stockyard.
I know you are worried I will take up drinking. Well don’t worry about that at all. There is a lot of that here in the city, but I’ve seen it ruin too many good men. That won’t be me.
Give Moxie a pet for me. I miss you all like fire.
Much Love,
Your Son Jared
He thinks about what Jensen said. I’ll make it worth your while. He’s seen more money in that man’s wallet than his parents see all year. It might just help. It might fix everything. But he’s lying to himself if he thinks that’s all there is to it. Once there was a way to get back home, but not any longer.