This is going to be a collection of one shots in which Castle and Beckett's friends and family are going to find out about their (hopefully future) relationship in different ways. I'll just be adding to it whenever I get a strike of inspiration of if I'm bored.

Disclaimer: I don't own Castle or any of the characters.

The Big Reveal - Pancakes

Beckett woke to find herself sprawled across a very comfortable pillow that she liked to call Castle. Said pillow was just as naked as she was and was staring down at her smiling with a glint in his eye. She fought the urge to fall back asleep as his fingers were combing themselves through her hair, massaging her head. Her arm that was wrapped around his waist tightened as she lifted her head to kiss him softly on the lips.

"Morning, Kate."

"Morning, Rick."

They had been dating for about three weeks. Castle had finally confronted his feelings about her after Josh had been gone a while, much to his liking. He was obviously over the moon that she felt the exact same way. They'd been on their fifth date the night before, a smiple dinner so they could get away from the trying case at the precinct and not surprisingly, Kate had asked him up to her apartment, which was how the got to where they were now, and as expected, it had been pretty damn mindblowing. Not that Kate would admit that to him just yet. His ego was big enough without making it explode.

"Night, Rick."

"Night? It's 7AM. Time to get up, Kate."

"Mmmm. Shh. Going to sleep."

He should've guessed she wouldn't be a morning person with what little sleep she gets. Luckily for him, he had the perfect bribe.

"If you get up now, I'll make it worth your while..."

His hand went lower down her body to caress her lower back with his fingers. She shivered under his ministrations, but wasn't quite ready to give in to temptation.

"What do you mean by that, Mr Castle?" She had a small grin on her face, ready to accept his offer. He retracted his hand and ruffled her hair.

"Pancakes of course. You know full well that I can create a mean pancake, and you even get a choice of topping." He jumped out of bed and looked around for his boxers and pants to put them on. "Chocolate chips, chocolate sauce, marshmallows, blueberries, raspberries or plain. Or I can even make you a smo-"

"No smorelettes. Alexis warned me about your deadly creations, and just because you can do delicious things to my body, it doesn't mean that I'm gonna give in."

"Aww, but smorlettes are delicious too." He raised an eyebrow trying to convince her. He should've have known better than to try when a pillow hit his face. "Remember what Esposito said. I need to thank you sooo much for last night."

She turned on to her back and pulled the sheets up to cover her chest whilst biting her lip. "And this morning."

"Nothing has happened this morning." He looked at her confused, pulling the zipper of his pants up when she jumped out of bed, letting the sheet fall to the floor, leaving her stood there without anything to cover her up. Castle swallowed loudly when she grabbed his zipper and pulled it back down whilst pushing him towards the bathroom door.

"Trust me, Ricky. With all the time we've got to make up for, you're gonna be needing a lot more pancakes."

With all the noise that they and the shower were creating, they didn't hear Kate's phone beep to signal an incoming text message.

Half an hour later, they were sat at the table in her apartment wrapped in towels and eating the pancakes that Castle had made. Much to his dismay, there were no fancy toppings unless he liked furry bacon on his food.

"These are good. You could become a chef if you ever give up on writing."

"Nah. I love writing too much. Plus, I don't get the excuse of needing to follow you for research, even if you are amazingly tasty."

She blushed at his comment and heard her phone start to ring in her bedroom. "I'll be right back. No stealing my food whilst I'm gone."

He watched her ass as she walked to her room, her hips swaying more than usual. Not that he'd looked before of course. He was biting into his last pancake as there was a knock on the door and he wouldn't be Castle if he didn't investigate to see who it was. Looking thorugh the peep hole in her door, his eyes went wide. He could see dark skin and black hair belonging to the one and only Lanie Parish. Ohhhh, this wasn't good. No one knew about their relationship, and Kate wouldn't appreciate it if her best friend was to find them both wearing towels with wet hair on the morning of their day off.

He turned around to run to Kate quickly but aslmost knocked her over as she came hurtling towards him, her hand clutching at the towel to keep it covering her. They both uttered there explanation at the same time, whispering to keep the woman in question unaware of Castle's presence. Kate held her phone up for him to see the text Lanie had sent.

We're going shopping as it's your day off. Be there in 30. L x

"Crap," he whispered, "She's gonna kill me when she finds me here."

"Kill you?" She hissed. "What about me. We've been together for three week and I didn't tell her. Besides, she isn't going to find you."

"Seriously. She can smell a man from a mile away. I think we're doomed." He saw the glare on his girlfriend's face. They hadn't talked about telling everyone they knew, but it was obvious that Kate didn't want Lanie to find out right now. "Fine, I'll go hide in the closet or under the bed or something."

He tip-toed theatrically to the bedroom, causing Kate to surpress a small laugh. Even at a time like this, he managed to make her smile. She was in a towel, but it was only Lanie at the door, she wouldn't mind. Grabbing hold of the handle and taking a deep breath, she pulled the door open to find Lanie stood there. But she wasn't alone. Javier Esposito and Kevin Ryan were stood behind the ME, wide eyed looks on their faces and mouths open in shock. This wasn't the kind of situation you prepared yourself for. Seeing your boss practically naked at her front door wasn't in the handbook, so there was no protocol.

"Jesus, Lanie. You could've told me Tweedledum and Tweedledee would be here." She shut the door so it was only open an inch and retreated to the bedroom to put on some clothes. She heard her friends walk in get comfortable on the sofa. Opening her closet to get some jeans and a sweater she was face to face with a naked Castle, his towel by his feet. She gasped and looked him up and down before turning around to grab his clothes from the floor and throw them at him. "Castle. Put some clothes on and stay hidden." She closed the closet once again after giving him a short but passionate kiss, leaving him shellshocked and slightly aroused.

After getting changed, she retreated back to the main room and asked if her friends wanted a drink.

"Why are you guys here?"

"Well, we're going shopping. Javi wanted to go over to Castle's for a few hours of XBOX so I said I'd drop him off. Of course, Kev wanted in and I had to pick him up along the way." Lanie stopped before taking a sip of her coffee. "So when are we gonna meet the guy who's got you glowing this morning?" She raised her eyebrows casually as she drank from her mug to hide the smile.

"That good, huh? We'll be talking about that later. And Javi of course."

"Oh, I'm so honoured." Esposito turned around from talking to Ryan about video games.

Lanie got up after a few minutes to put her empty mug in the kitchen and caught sight of the two plates of half-eaten pancakes on the table. Obviously, they'd rushed to make sure that Lanie wouldn't find them. The ME turned to Kate who had followed her into the kitchen.

"You know, girl, I'd almost say that you didn't want me to know that you had a guy here. You know you can tell me, right?"

Kate wasn't in the best of moods considering her male colleagues had turned up to see her scantily dressed, her boyfriend was hiding half naked in her bedroom closet, and her best friend didn't know that said boyfriend existed.

"You didn't tell me about Esposito for a good few weeks. I wanted to keep this to myself for a while. I wasn't trying to be secretive or anything."

Lanie smiled at her. "In that case, I'm gonna go drop the boys off at Castle's and I'll be back in 30. Meanwhile, you can get rid of the hunk that you've got hidden in your apartment and I'll wait until you're ready to tell me about it, okay?"

"Thanks, Lanie. Just give me time." She hugged her friend for a few seconds before they moved to the sofa.

"Okay, boys, we're off to Castle's while Kate gets rid of her man candy in the bedroom."

"Ew. Too much. We're just gonna phone Castle before we set off so that we can make sure he's awake and not entertaining if you know what I mean." Ryan took out his phone and pressed the number to dial the writer. At that exact moment, Kate saw Castle's phone on the chair and went to sit on it to hide it, hoping that he had put it on silent for some reason. No such luck. Kate sat back, nibbling on her finger nails and she heard the muffled sound of RING RING. All eyes turned to look at her as she pretended to be oblivious to the sound.

Lanie spoke first.

"No way."

Lanie stood up quickly and made her way to Kate's bedroom with the femal detective hot on her heels. She entered the bedroom but saw no one. She checked in the closets but saw nothing. Kate breathed out in a sigh of relief, but was still worried that she'd be found out, even if she didn't know where he had moved to. She saw Castle's clothes on the floor of her closet, which meant he was still unclothed somewhere in the apartment. Lucky for her, Lanie didn't notice.

"He must have left his phone here. He came over last night so we could go over the case before I got ready for my date. He went home around 7 and I had my date at 8."

Lanie looked her up and down. She could tell she was hiding something but chose to say nothing. "C'mon, boys. We're going to Castle's."

Kate mouthed thank you. She remained in the bedroom until she Lanie and the boys had gone. She started to look around for Castle when she felt someone grab her foot. She screamed loudly before kicking about. Looking down, she saw Castle's head sticking out and smiling and his hand around her ankle.

"Damn it, Castle. Don't do that."

Just as he got out from under the bed, still naked, she heard the door open and footsteps across the floor. Acting quickly, Kate moved to stand infront of Castle to hide the front of his body just as Lanie ran into the room.

"What happened Kate? I used my emergency key when I heard-"

Castle raised his hand waved casually at her. "Hey, Lanie."

She dropped her mouth open and grinned widely.

"Oh. My. God."

"What is it, chica?" Esposito and Ryan appeared behind her and high-fived. "Dude, you owe me fifty."

"You both owe me a hundred each." Lanie was looking rather smug and holding both her hands out.

"Do you guys think you could give me a minute? I'd like to get my clothes on."

Esposito and Ryan disappeared quickly not wanting to hang around. Lanie turned to go and reached the end of the hall before going back. "You've got 15 minutes Kate and then we're leaving to go... Damn, girl. You got plenty to play with there."

Kate had moved to the other side of the room leaving Castle bare to Lanie's inspection. "Lanie! Get out!"

Several minutes later, Castle and Beckett joined the rest of the guys by the sofa, waiting for their interrogation.

"So how long have you been holding out me, girl?"

Kate sighed. "Three weeks, that's all. We've been on a few dates and last night... well, you know."

Lanie couldn't hold in her happiness much longer. "God, Kate, I'm so happy for you guys. It was only a matter of time before you too finally saw the light."

While the girls were hugging, Ryan and Esposito confronted Castle. "You hurt her, and we hurt you. Understand?" It was quite comical that both detectives were shorter than the writer, but he figured now wasn't the best time to mention it.

"I wouldn't dream of it." He looked over to see Kate smiling over Lanie's shoulder. He turned back to the boys as they broke out in identical smiles and patted him on the back.

"We're happy for you, bro, but you cost me 50 bucks."

"Hey, he cost me 150 bucks."

The boys got wrapped in an arguement and Lanie released Kate fom her death grip. Castle sat on the arm of the sofa and pulled Kate towards him to stand in the V of his legs.

"Sorry they found out like this."

"Don't worry about it. You know what this means, right?"

He stood up and kissed her. "What?"

"Make-up sex." She pressed a key into his hand and pushed him back so he was sat down. "Lock up on your way out."

Lanie laughed as she and Kate left the apartment to go shopping.

He ignored the amused looks from the detectives.

"I need more pancakes."