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Derek was in the produce section, squinting at a 4-for-$5 deal on avocados, when he smelled it.
He acted without thought -- just turned and seized the other werewolf by the throat, slamming him up against a cooler of bottled smoothies.
The guy dropped his basket, choking out, “Please --”
Derek squeezed until the word turned into a gurgle. He spent a couple of moments watching an ugly flush darken behind the guy’s freckles, just to make sure his point was getting across, then said, “Whatever you think you’re doing with him, don’t.”
The guy nodded frantically, eyes beginning to roll back in his head. He wasn’t even fighting, just hanging there. Even for a beta, that was pretty docile.
With a slight frown, Derek let go.
The guy slid down the smoothie cooler to the floor, ending up slumped and splay-legged among his fallen onions, like a sad clown.
“I mean it,” Derek said. “Stay the fuck away.”
“Yeah, bro, I got that,” the guy rasped. “No problem.”
.
When Derek got home with his groceries, Stiles was on the stoop, gangly knees up around his ears like an awkward gargoyle.
Derek considered just stepping over him, going inside, and closing the door, but instead he stopped and stared with the most hostile expression he could summon on short notice. Most people at least had the decency to look uncomfortable, but Stiles just tilted his head and said, “So I just had an interesting morning.”
Derek narrowed his eyes, wishing he could close his nostrils like a seal. This close, Stiles reeked at least as much as the other guy. Probably even more. He was also wearing a t-shirt that said Haikus are easy/But sometimes they don’t make sense/Refrigerator.
“Brady came back with zero breakfast food and an urgent desire to talk about my safety. Specifically, he thinks that in the interest of said safety, I should strongly consider filing a restraining order against my violent, psychotic ex before shit goes all Hospital Massacre.”
“You really fucked a guy named Brady?” Derek demanded.
“Correction. I fucked a guy with a nine-inch dong and a zero-second refractory period between now and --” Stiles looked at his lunar watch. “Thursday.”
Thursday was the full. “So you do know he’s a werewolf.”
“Wow,” Stiles said slowly. “Is that suddenly a problem for you? You know, I’m pretty sure Loving v. Virginia could be extrapolated to cover --”
“I’m not a bigot,” Derek snapped. “Obviously.”
“So what the fuck? Is there a reason you choke-slammed my bologna donor?”
“I thought -- I’ve never seen him before.” He was starting to feel embarrassed, which pissed him off. When a strange werewolf rolled into Beacon Hills, failed to make himself known, and got familiar with Stiles, foul play was a completely reasonable assumption.
“That'd be 'cause he just got into town yesterday, dude. He was hanging around the vet's office talking to Deaton when I picked Scott up from work, so I told him I knew the territory holder and I'd introduce you guys in the morning. But hey, good job, you already took care of it.” He held up his hand for the world's most sarcastic high five.
Derek batted it aside. “You met him yesterday?” What Derek had smelled in the store struck him as more of a three-day fiesta of fornication, held somewhere with intense humidity and no running water.
Stiles was scowling. “Yeah? So?”
“I wasn’t -- whatever,” Derek cut himself off, because he was pretty sure if he heard the words jizz swamp coming out of his own mouth he’d have to put the grocery bag down, get back in his car, and drive into an overpass pillar. Belatedly, he added, “I hope you told him I’m not your ex.”
“I did, actually. Weirdly enough, that didn’t seem to alleviate his concerns. In fact, if anything --”
“Well, sorry I tried to protect you from stranger danger. I’m sure if you explain to him how many murder sprees we’ve had to deal with in the last few years, he’ll understand why I might be on threat alert.”
Stiles sighed. “Nah, that horse has sailed. Booty calls come with an automatic ‘get out of weird free’ card, and you definitely made shit weird. Anyway, he's peacing out on Friday.”
“Probably for the best, then,” Derek said.
“Incorrect. He’s a competitive swimmer. What those guys don’t know about breath control isn’t --”
“He called me ‘bro,’” Derek interrupted, leaning over Stiles’s head to put his key in the lock.
Stiles scrambled up, joints cracking. “He goes to Ohio State. It’s not his fault.”
“Really?” Derek opened the door. “I’m surprised you had time to learn anything about each other in between all the --”
“Fuck you,” Stiles said.
“-- bologna sandwiches,” Derek finished, and went inside.
.
“I don’t know if this works like chasing the dragon or what,” Derek said, hands paused on his zipper, “but I still don’t have a nine-inch dick.”
Stiles shook his head. “No, believe me, a little de-escalation is welcome. It was nice to look at, but let me put it this way -- I hope you don’t have all your hopes and dreams pinned on anything going up my ass for about the next forty-eight hours.”
Derek resumed undoing his fly. "I'm sure that between the two of us we can put our heads together and come up with a workaround." He loved it when Stiles looked at him like this, eyes narrowed, unable to figure out if he was making jokes on purpose.
When Derek kicked his pants the rest of the way off, Stiles shook himself and looked down. “Yeah, there we go.” He reached out to squeeze Derek's hard-on, experimentally, like he was checking the ripeness. “How’s your refractory period coming along?”
“What refractory period?” Derek said, smirking. Waxing gibbous was a good time. He extended the claws of his right hand and hooked one in the collar of Stiles’s ugly t-shirt, pulling it down a little and then a little more, weighing the temporary satisfaction of tearing it right down the middle, saving himself from ever again having to look at it, against Stiles’s Olympic level grudge-holding.
“You better not,” Stiles hissed, so Derek did.