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Dean looked up. “It’s not for you?”

Sloane squinted. “Is this one of those traps everyone keeps telling me I need to look out for?”

Dean stared at him for a moment, then laughed. “Oh God, I didn’t even realize how that question sounded.”

Sloane grimaced. “You know that you and I are a big deal. You’ve always been a big deal to me. Just so happens that now I’m paying better attention. You still mean everything to me, but now everything covers more ground than before.”

“Doesn’t everything mean it was already covered?”

“Alright, smartass, throw it back in my face.”

Dean grinned, pressing his lips to Sloane’s jaw. “I know what you mean, and I can never explain how happy it makes me to hear it. I just want to make sure that I?—”

Dean fell silent, and Sloane let him wrestle with his thoughts. As much as he wished he could take Dean’s problems from him, Sloane knew it was impossible. Just as he knew he couldn't take back how much pain Dean had endured, wanting what he never thought he’d have. Dean refused to talk about what it had been like when they’d been best friends, and he’d cravedsomething else. Sloane could only imagine how hard that had to be, especially when he’d seen how great it was being with Dean.

His mother’s voice interrupted. “Sorry, but I have your hot chocolate.”

Dean brightened immediately, taking one of the steaming mugs with childish delight. “Thank you. God, that smells amazing.”

“She makes it herself, none of that powder stuff,” Sloane told him. “And with her own recipe.”

“It…” his mother began, but Sloane cut her off before she could spoil the surprise.

Dean made a soft noise of happiness as he breathed deeply and took a drink. The noise he made next made Sloane wish his mother wasn’t standing behind them. A few seconds later, Dean’s eyes widened, and he stared down at the steaming chocolate.

“Is there chili in here?” Dean asked in a soft voice.

Sloane smirked. “Chili she grows, dries, and treats herself.”

Dean turned to her, a slow smile spreading over his face. “This is absolutely delicious. Maybe you should adopt me.”

Sloane winked at his mother. “White boy he might be, but he can eat spicier things than me.”

His mother swatted him. “Just for that, you can help me do the dishes. Dean, you stay right there, and after you’re done, Shawna wants to give you a few lessons. Best to get her to teach you while she remembers.”

“I’ll be sure to do that,” Dean told her.

Sloane sighed, extracting himself from the couch. “I should probably go do the slave labor I’ve been volunteered for.”

Dean glanced over his shoulder to make sure she had retreated. “The labor she totally didn’t plan to have you help her with from the start.”

Sloane winked, appreciating Dean’s perceptiveness as always. It was one of the biggest reasons he was regarded as such an apt medic, both on and off the field. Dean could suss out a person’s motivations with an ease that Sloane envied and respected, and he was adept at reading another person’s moods. Then again, considering he was a military doctor, there was the fact that Dean brooked no shit, which was a convenient skill to have sometimes.

“Alright, I’m here,” Sloane announced as he entered the kitchen. “Put me to work, o’ great master.”

His mother shoved a dishtowel into his hand. “You dry and put away.”

“If I can remember where everything goes,” Sloane said, looking around the kitchen now twice the size it had been when he’d been growing up.

“I’m sure you can figure it out,” she told him, taking the first plate from the soapy water and scrubbing.

“I’ll manage,” he said, waiting until she was done before taking it.

“He’s a little shier than he was the last time he was here,” his mother noted.

“Is he?” Sloane asked casually.

She nodded. “He’s more at ease with you but doesn’t seem to know what to do with us.”