#bethdeanrio

but they’re not. rio just came over to drop off something and beth was about to serve dinner and she offered and he figured fuck it why not and it was good. and then dinner was over and dean was supposed to be there to pick up the kids but he was running late so beth ushered the kids upstairs to go play and rio could tell she was exhausted and he knew she still had a long night ahead of her so when she went to start putting dishes in the sink, he turned her away, saying, “i got it. go get some work done.”

it’s not like he had anywhere he needed to be and it didn’t seem fair that she did all that cooking and then had to do all the cleaning too; besides he’s been trying to be more accommodating and understanding or whatever (and if secretly he just likes being there, around her, nobody has to know). it was a little annoying when she looked at him like she didn’t trust that he wasn’t going to use her kitchen to perform a ritual sacrifice but when dean came strolling in, two hours late, making some dumb comment about elizabeth putting him to work, like he had no concept of shared responsibility, a few more pieces of the elizabeth puzzle slid into place

and it’s not like rio goes out of his way to make her life easier after that but... well the milk in her fridge was expired and he was on his way over anyway and, you know, why make her come all the way to the city to do a drop when he’s going to be on that side of town dropping of marcus anyway? it’s not for her. it just makes sense is all. 

has nothing to do with the way she looks happy to see him when she opens the door and sees he’s the one standing there these days.

still haven’t decided what the best scenario for rio to learn about beth’s new boyfriend is for maximum hilarity potential:

beth asks rio to come over and he thinks it’s maybe for romantic reasons but it turns out she just needs a babysitter (i’m jk this would never happen but g-d could you imagine)

rio runs into beth while she’s out to dinner with the guy and it very clearly isn’t a first date

rio shows up at her fancy city council office and starts rifling through her stuff (as he has no sense of personal boundaries) and reads the card that came with the big beautiful bouquet of flowers sitting on her desk

rio shows up to knock on beth’s side-kitchen-door thing at the same time that her new boyfriend knocks on the front door

or my personal favorite: beth and her new boyfriend run into both rio and dean at the same time at some sort of function/party/gala/whatever and nobody knows how to act like a normal human being and the new boyfriend is not an idiot so he knows shit is uncomfortable but he doesn’t really know why. he’s Just Some Guy so he doesn’t know about the crime-ing or the sordid history the three of them share. he thinks they’ve just run into beth’s ex-husband and one of her business associates. clearly, he’s missing something. beth is mortified (but also—and she’ll never admit this to anyone—she cannot stop picturing what it would be like to slink away to the coat closet she saw down that one mostly empty hallway and get rio to pin her up against the wall while her ex-husband and her boyfriend are waiting out here none the wiser and jesus what is wrong with her and why won’t rio stop looking at her like that she needs to get a grip)

regardless of how rio learns about it, he obviously is seething with jealousy but will not admit it under any circumstances, not even to himself. instead, he just starts doing this weird thing where he like... aggressively takes care of things around the house???? like a worried ex husband???? and becomes overly invested in making her children like him???? and just like... always being around until one day she comes home and he’s cleaning out the rain gutters and she just loses it like WHAT ARE YOU DOING YOU LUNATIC and he’s like ME? WHAT ARE YOU DOING? and she just sort of shrieks I LIVE HERE! and yes he knows that but he can’t back down now so he comes back with WELL YOURE DOING A SHIT JOB OF TAKING CARE OF YOUR RAIN GUTTERS and what the hell is she supposed to say to that?? so she just throws up her hands and goes inside but he can’t let her get the last word so he follows her in and yells some more about her rain gutters and she yells back about him being crazy and it devolves into the world’s dumbest fight until he’s got her half-naked on the kitchen counter, thrusting into her, his face buried in her neck and finally he just admits, “you gotta break up with him.” 

living for your tags as per usual

hmmmmm that's a really good question! to be honest, i'm not sure the when matters so much as the circumstances. so much of their attraction stems from the way they get under each other's skin and surprise each other and i don't think that would happen if they met under normal circumstances, regardless of what beth knew about dean's transgressions. there's gotta be something else there—something that makes them both take a beat and say hey wait a minute (a la beth's "you're an idiot" speech and rio in his element in the warehouse). there's gotta be something that allows them to be able to see past any initial physical attraction and the masks they wear to move through polite society, so to speak (and it could be a very small moment, even under "normal" circumstances; it wouldn't necessarily take much tbh; just a moment of intrigue that there's more to this person than what they seem).

conversely, i think if beth met rio, and saw everything he was capable of, and experienced him seeing her, that spark would be there, even if she was still in the dark about dean. i mean, stan said it best: "got ignored for so long in your own home, now all you want to do is matter." ouch, but like, yeah.

i'm not saying beth would invite rio to rail her in the bathroom while dean was paying the check if she didn't know about his affairs and the financial situation he got them into, but i do think rio would awaken something in her that she wouldn't be able to put back to bed, and ultimately her marriage would still fall apart, because at the end of the day, dean doesn't see her and he doesn't want to, and how could she possibly be satisfied with that after meeting someone who does?

My prompt is anything that makes it obvious Dean is the third wheel and that he's incompetent and insufficient lmao

"Mind if I cut in?"

Rio's gaze is on Elizabeth when he says it, but he can still feel the incredulity radiating off of that jackass she married. It would be entertaining if Rio hadn't given up a weekend with Marcus to fly all the way out to Chicago for this damn conference, if he didn't feel the need to come check in on his business partner just to make sure she didn't do something stupid.

If she didn't keep giving him reasons not to trust her.

Still, there's a part of him—somewhere deep inside he doesn't want to acknowledge—that's pleased by the way she immediately gives him her full attention, the way the shock of seeing him standing there melts into anger, melts into resignation, melts into curiosity, melts into something more.  

Her husband is getting ready to open his mouth, to make a big ol' scene probably, but she blinks back over at him, fixing him with those wide Bambi eyes, playing up the innocent housewife role she's so good at, that whole fragile white lady victim complex her husband keeps buying into, even though he's gotta know by now she's doing this cause she wants to be doing this.  

"Dean," she warns.

And it's interesting the way she makes it sound like she's reminding him that Rio's dangerous, when really she's just afraid Dean's going to embarrass her. He's like a damn toddler being handed a lollipop just to stave off a tantrum. And it's something Rio still can't figure out because him and Elizabeth? They don't need the guy for any of this—his name’s not even on the paperwork. And Elizabeth doesn't love him—shit, she doesn't even respect him—but she won't leave him. It must be exhausting–paying the bills, taking care of the kids, running a house, and still she has to do all that pretending for someone who's supposed to be her partner.

Rio doesn't feel sympathy for her, not anymore, but if he did, it might be for that. For the loneliness she's clinging to just to placate whatever part of her can't let go of that perfect life she envisioned for herself. Sometimes he wants to crawl into her brain, pick it apart piece by piece just to find whatever memory—whatever feeling—it is she's clinging to so desperately that's got her stuck in this limbo between normalcy and potential.

But. Well, whatever motivates her's not important to him, not as long as she holds up her end of their arrangement.

So he just keeps giving her that camouflage smile for anybody watching, knowing she's smart enough to recognize there's poison dripping from his teeth.

"It's just a dance, Dean," Elizabeth says with a sigh, taking a step back from him. "Just... order some drinks and I'll meet you at the bar."

Dean doesn't let go of her hand, doesn't do anything but stand there open-mouthed and slack-jawed, eyes moving slowly between her and Rio, and Rio's patience is wearing thin.

"Bourbon, on the rocks," he instructs, eyes still on Elizabeth.

Her husband splutters, says, "Yeah, right, I'm not ordering a drink for you."

And Rio can see how much restraint it takes Elizabeth not to react, can see the pink start to slowly creep into her cheeks, and he wonders if it's from embarrassment or shame, if it’s from being married to a man that misses the implication altogether or just from being married to someone that never learned her drink, never learned her at all.

Whatever it is, she swallows it down, sends one last pleading look to her useless husband and the relief on her face when he finally backs away, when he starts to make his way over to the bar should feel like a victory but it pinches at something in Rio, stings in a way he can’t put his finger on.

He ignores it, slipping into the empty space in front of her, and snakes one arm around her waist, hand settling against the small of her back, holds up the other for her to take, and she does, gingerly placing her much smaller, much softer hand in his. Her skin looks extra pale in the dim lighting of the ballroom, stands starker against the backdrop of the black and dark fabrics adorning the people moving all around them. He trails his gaze along the line of her exposed skin, from the tips of her fingers resting in his palm, past the elegant twist of her wrist, up to the soft curve of her arm where it disappears beneath a deep shade of green, one he's never seen her in before. It looks good on her, even if the style is meant to downplay what she's really working with, meant to hide her away.

"What are you doing here?" she asks, body tensing when he pulls her with him as his feet begin the familiar box step of the waltz he learned when he was in the ninth grade.

"It's the Eighteenth Annual Conference for Midwest Spa Retailers and I'm a midwest spa retailer," he deadpans, casually drifting to a section of the dance floor more obscured from the bar, just to really get her husband all worked up, get him straining his neck to see what's happening.

"Funny," she says, like she thinks it's anything but. "I didn't see you once all day, you know, during the actual conference part, but of course, now that there's a chance to have a pissing contest, here you are."

Her grip on his shoulder is tight, like she thinks she's the one leading, but the rest of her body is starting to relax, going easily where he guides her.

"Why don't we just find a ruler and get this over with already," she chides, flippant as hell, provoking that part of him that can't leave it alone, that has to push back.

"Oh baby, you think I'm worried about size?" he asks, planting his feet so that her body collides with his, then holds her tight against the length of him, tilting his head to murmur into her ear. "Size don't mean nothing if you don't know how to use it. That a contest you really wanna have tonight, darlin’?"

Her throat bobs but she doesn't answer, doesn't try to move away either. He wants to lean back, wants to see the look on her face, see how hard she's trying to hide the truth. Instead he presses in closer, angles his hips just enough to make his point, and brushes his lips over the shell of her ear. "You remember how I felt inside you, yeah? How wet you got just on my fingers? You were begging me for more."

The hitch of her breath tugs at his core, has heat pooling low in his stomach, and he should just leave it at that, but she shifts against him, just a little, like she wants to grind down on his thigh, like she needs the friction, and fuck, he wants her to. Wants her to need it so bad she can't control herself, not even here in front of all these people.

In front of her husband.

"You still think about it?" he asks, bending his knee to let his thigh press into her, just enough for her to feel it, for her to want more. "'Bout how good I filled you up?"

"Yes," she whispers, voice barely audible over the din around them. He wasn't expecting it, goes straight to his cock and he knows she felt it—the twitch against her hip—by the way her voice comes out stronger when she asks, "Do you?"

And he knows they're not teenagers, knows they’re way too old to be doing this, but fuck he wants it, any way he can get it, even if it's just for a few more seconds. He hums, nodding his head where it's bowed down and ignores the way her hair catches in the stubble on his jaw.

"Think about the sounds you made," he admits, voice low, swaying their bodies just barely, feet not moving at all."'Bout how good you tasted."

"Yes," she breathes, an answer to a question he didn't ask, and he has to close his eyes.

"Think 'bout how good you looked when you were coming."

And shit, he means it. Never seen anything so perfect as the look on her face when that pleasure exploded through her body. Like a fucking religious experience, watching that release, the way her back arched and her body froze, how she floated there, suspended in time. If he hadn't know any better he'd have thought it was the rapture. Even now, just the memory of it is enough to make him want to get down on his knees.

It's dangerous, this power she has over him.

"Wanna make you come again," he confesses, relishing the way her whole body shudders against his, and that's the thing. He hasn't even touched her, not really, but just the suggestion's got her trembling, panties soaked, knees shaking and shit. Hell, even he's hard enough it's gonna be an awkward ass walk back up to his room but this kind of thing doesn't just happen. She might be married to someone else but for all of her sanctimonious bullshit, she's still right here in the dirt with Rio.

He gives himself one... two... three... seconds to revel in the moment. Then he opens his eyes.

"See, darlin’," he says, sliding his hand off her back. "It don't matter who's bigger. Ain't room for nobody inside you but me anyway."

He drops her hand, and takes a step back. There's a flush in her cheeks and a glint in her eye. She looks alive in a way he hasn't seen in a very long time, and it sends a thrill through him, the idea that maybe he's not the only one who's risen from the dead.