Author's Note: While I'm working on getting my Castle Ficathon story ready to start posting, I thought I'd upload some short prompt responses that I've recently done on tumblr.

Prompt: "8x07 kiss happens pre caskett. (Like, Kate comes over and when she turns around Castle just kisses her. Or vise Versa)"

Setting: 3x13 "Knockdown," before the final scene

Castle stood in his loft, whiskey glass in hand, blearily contemplating the day's events. His knuckles throbbed gently inside their bandage, but the pain hardly registered any more. His mind was only on Beckett and the intense sense-memories of the kiss they had exchanged earlier that night in a dark alley, a dumb idea born out of desperation to save their friends and colleagues. With Ryan and Esposito safe, the kidnappers behind bars, and his hand securely bandaged, Castle was free to lose himself in the smell, feel, and taste of Beckett that seemed to linger all over his skin.

A soft knock on the door startled Castle out of unfocused contemplation of the bottom of his glass. Blinking, he set it down and went to open the door, startled to find his partner on the other side.

"Beckett?"

"Hey," she said softly, giving him a tentative smile. "Your hand any better?"

"Oh…yeah." He flexed it lightly inside the bandage. "Fine. Everything okay?" He gave a sweeping arm gesture to invite her in.

"Fine," she echoed, lifting a paper bag into view. "Um, we kind of missed dinner in all the excitement, so I thought you might be hungry." She stepped over the threshold with a shy smile, handing him the bag as she walked past him.

"Remy's," he exclaimed, "perfect." The smell coming from the bag was delicious, but not nearly enough so to distract him from the unexpected presence of Beckett, here, in his loft, so late at night.

"Um, Rick," she said as she turned back toward him, "I just wanted-"

He cut her off with the sudden press of his mouth against hers, feeling her gasp and tense up as his free arm came up around her back. But she didn't pull away. Her lips softened under his, and when he broke contact briefly to take a breath, she was the one who leaned into him, her mouth seeking, finding his again.

He kissed her slowly, deliberately, and heard her make that same noise again: the tiny moan he had heard in the alley, which would surely figure in many of his dreams from this night forward. That, and the sweet taste of her mouth, the touch of her tongue to his, the feel of her body pressed against him–

But she pulled away, of course, and blinked at him, saying a little hoarsely, "Wait…"

"It's okay," he murmured, stepping back, holding the bag of food up like a barrier between them. "I mean, I'm sorry." He had just needed so badly to know what it would be like: to kiss her without pretense, without fear, without their friends' lives hanging in the balance.

Now he knew, and he suddenly wasn't sure he wanted to. Because she was with someone else, and that was all going to be so much harder on Castle now. He sighed a little and opened the bag.

"Did you bring me curly fries?" he asked, and watched her relax ever so slightly.

"Of course," she said softly. "And extra pickles on your burger."

"My hero," he smiled, and backed away.

The next "chapter" will be a continuation of this...stay tuned.