A/N: I included the last little bit of Jane Doe chapter fifteen just in case you've forgotten where we were at with that. If you want to skip it, head for the line break. This fic bridges the gap between chapter fifteen and chapter sixteen of Jane Doe.
Jane Doe - Chapter Sexteen
Dinner passes quickly, most likely because Kate is so horrifically nervous about what comes next. They talk quietly, heads bent together and laughter flooding into the spaces between them. Once they're done eating and they've paid the bill, Kate slips her hand into Castle's again and grins up at him, leading him with her towards the door of the restaurant.
Out on the street, Rick looks to her for some clue as to what to do next and she offers him a shy smile, squeezes his fingers in hers. "Do you mind if we walk for a while?"
"Sure." He says back, his whole face so tender and gentle and Kate doesn't know how much longer she can keep it back. More than anything, she wants to see the look on his face.
They walk aimlessly, pointing out things of interest to each other. Rick weaves stories for the people they pass by and Kate joins in as best she can, managing to surprise him a couple times with the twists she throws in.
They make it to a park, a small section of greenery tucked away next to the meld of concrete and glass that is their city, and Kate tugs him with her along a path and to a bench, guides him down to sit with her. Turning to face him until her knees bump against his, Kate lays her arm along the back of the bench and brushes her fingertips against the sensitive skin at his neck, delighted when his eyes slip closed and he shifts a little closer into her touch.
With his eyes still closed, Rick lays his hand over her thigh and his thumb circles, distracting her enough that the words she had had right there waiting just behind the barrier of her teeth fall away and she can't do more than just breathe.
"Do you have any idea how gorgeous you are?" He says, voice thick with awe and something that might be disbelief.
God, he's so beautiful. "Rick. I love you."
His eyes pop open and he stares at her, fingers suddenly pressing harder into the flesh of her thigh. She can see the pulse jumping erratically in his neck and his jaw goes slack, his other hand trembling until he curls it into a fist and rests it at his knee. "Kate. . .you remember?"
"Oh." She huffs a breath. "No. No, I don't remember. But I love you, Rick. More than I ever could have imagined."
She's startled when a few tears slip free and skid down his cheeks but then he crashes into her, their faces aligned at forehead and nose and she can already taste him, joy and relief and adoration all rolling over her in waves. "Kate. Kate. You love me. God, I never thought I'd hear you say that again."
"I'll say it whenever you like." She laughs, tipping her chin up to catch his mouth. It's brief, just a glance of her lips off of his, but it's the very first time she can remember kissing him where neither of them has felt guilty or bad about it. No. It's just wonderful. "I love you."
And then his mouth is slanting over hers, his tongue slick and hot inside of her mouth and she gasps, fists a hand in the collar of his shirt and palms the back of his head with the other to drag him even closer to her. It feels amazing, better than she possibly could have imagined. The kissing, yes, but also the sheer relief of having said those words out loud to him. It feels good and right, as if her world has finally been set straight again after so long being just slightly off kilter. Rick's hands come to frame her face and he wrenches his mouth away from hers to stare at her, his chest heaving.
"I love you too, by the way. You're gorgeous and extraordinary and my wife." He shakes his head in disbelief, and the laugh he lets out is almost childlike in its jubilation. "I thought you'd never be able to love me again."
"No, Rick." Kate soothes, her thumbs brushing over his cheeks, underneath his eyes to erase his tears. Leaning in again, Kate kisses him because it's her new favourite thing in the world and she never wants to stop. "How could I not have fallen for you again? You've been so incredibly good to me."
His mouth is warm underneath hers, his lips soft and gentle and his hands and oh god, she can feel the delicious spirals of desperate need winding up her spine and through her ribs, her whole body tight with how much she wants him.
When Rick pulls back this time he grins at her, a little sheepish, absent-mindedly stroking a fingertip back and forth along her cheekbone. And then he leers, and her heart races, and he tilts his head to look at her intently. "You know, Kate. . .my mother texted me earlier and said she was gonna bring Mal to her place for a sleepover tonight. So the loft is going to be empty."
"Oh really?" She lifts an eyebrow at him, leaning in to drop a burst of a kiss against his mouth before she pulls back and grins, wide enough that her cheeks ache with it. "Well then, what are we waiting for?"
It's a little embarrassing, sure, that Rick's mother seems to have figured out exactly what's going on here. Or at least enough that she knows to give them the loft to themselves for the night. But Kate can't actually seem to care at all.
All she cares about is her husband, and getting his naked body in close proximity to hers as fast as they possibly can. Rick tugs her up from the bench with him and pauses to steal a long and devastating kiss from her mouth, his hand slipping down to palm her ass and drag her hips against his, before he steps back and grabs for her hand again.
"Let's find a cab. Now."
Tumbling into the back seat of the taxi cab, Rick does everything he can to keep his hands on his wife. She's giggling and stumbling and then she half-falls into the car on top of him. He leans forward to give their address to the driver and then sits back in his seat, chokes on a gasp when Kate hooks a leg over his thigh and arches forward to skim her mouth over his throat.
It's so strange to have Kate touching him like this, as if she's desperate to learn every part of his body and claim it for her own. He knows exactly how to touch her, where to put his mouth and his hands to make her come in a handful of minutes.
Probably not the best idea in the back of a cab as they crawl through the evening traffic to head home. Rick pulls back enough that he can grin down at her, leaning in to kiss her. He keeps it soft and tender, all too aware that restraint is not a specialty of his and Kate's.
Well, actually. . .sometimes they're very, very good at it. But in terms of not giving in and getting each other off in entirely inappropriate settings, they are truly terrible. Rick slides across the bench seat of the cab to lean against the opposite door and clasps his hands, traps them between his knees.
He's stupidly proud that they manage the rest of the journey without touching each other. Rick pays the cab driver and they spill out onto the street, stride into the lobby of their building. He loves walking hand in hand with Kate like this. They're both tall, attractive people and his ego is inflated enough that he basks in the looks of admiration sent their way.
In the elevator, Rick takes a full step away from his wife and the delicious, narcotic feeling of her body close to his. They are so close to being home, where they'll have the space of the whole loft to be as loud and as creative as they like. He can hold off another thirty seconds.
The keys to the front door are in the back pocket of his jeans and Kate knows it; her slender fingers snake their way inside and she squeezes his ass as she collects the key. He yelps, and as the frissons of delight and awareness rush through him he gives up. In. Whatever.
Nudging his wife against the wall, Rick crowds her with the force of his body and drops his mouth to her neck, his tongue slick and hot over her pulse. She shivers - a whole body thing - and he does what he can to capture it in his hands, skimming them over her even as he works to make her do it again.
"Rick." She pants, her head rolling against the wall. Somehow, she manages to get a hand up between them and then she's shoving at his chest and he's stumbling backwards, completely thrown off of his game by her. "Let's get inside before someone sees and we get arrested."
He gives her the space to unlock their front door and tumbles through after her into their home, closing the door and snagging Kate's wrist in his fingers. Spinning her into him and around, he backs her up against the door in a single move that's all liquid fluidity, something he might be proud of if he had the brain cells to spare for that.
Rick's wraps a hand at her neck, thumb at her jaw so he can feel the work of it, the power humming below the surface of their kisses. Pushing a knee between her thighs, he slicks his tongue past her lips and Kate gasps, her own knees giving out so she falls against him.
Her hips rock against the hard edge of his thigh and she whimpers, head falling back against the door. Rick sucks a breath through his teeth, his chest heaving with the exertion and the overwhelming brilliance both. "Our first time was just like this. Against this door."
"Did you fuck me against the door, Rick?" She says, mouth quirking up into a grin even as he pops the first two buttons of her shirt and drops his head, circles the puckered circle of skin where a bullet burned through her chest with his tongue.
Lifting up again, he presses a trio of careful, tender kisses to the ripe bud of Kate's mouth, just as he did all those years ago. And then he laughs and reaches for her hand, knots their fingers together. "No. I made love with you in our bed. I didn't fuck you until the third round."
That gets a laugh from his wife that bursts free from her, loud and uninhibited. Tugging on the join of their hands, Rick leads her to their bedroom and flicks on the lamp on his nightstand. For this - even though they've done it countless times before - he wants to see her.
When he turns back around, Kate is still standing over by the door and her eyes take their sweet time tracking upward to meet his. Uh-huh, yeah, her gaze was definitely not anywhere north of hIS waistband just now. Rick leers and stalks towards her, slow enough that he can watch the erratic jump of her pulse in her neck as she waits for him to reach her.
"Come here." He murmurs, sotto voce although they have the whole apartment to themselves and no one could possibly overhear. And he's glad for that, even if he's not sure he'll be able to look his mother in the eye tomorrow.
Oh yes, Kate Castle. He wants loud.
Somehow, three of the buttons of Kate's shirt are still fastened and he drops to his knees in front of her and unfastens them one by one, splitting the fabric in two and revealing the creamy, so-soft plane of her stomach. Rick presses open-mouthed kisses to her skin and both of her hands drop to fist in his hair, something close to a sob bursting free from her mouth.
Grinning against her, Rick tongues her navel and is already there to catch her when she buckles into him, his arm tight around her waist. "Jesus." She huffs, groaning when he doesn't let up his detailed explanation of her abdomen. "This is so unfair. You already know everything that does it for me."
Propping his chin at her stomach, Rick gazes up the line of her body to her face and grins, wide and probably a little lecherous. "Yes, and think of the fun you can have relearning me."
"Mm, yes." She hums, eyes fluttering closed. God, she's gorgeous like this. And thinking about it, he's never known Kate to be shy when they do this. Even that first night, after she bit her lip and led him to his own bedroom, she was confident and sexy and not at all ashamed of how much she wanted him.
While he's here, on his knees for her, he figures he may as well divest her of the rest of her clothes. Rick pops the button on her slacks and draws them down her thighs to pool on the floor, leaving her panties on. They're black, silk and lace and he huffs at her, opens his mouth over the fabric. "You've been wearing these all day. You've known, all day, that we were gonna do this."
"I've known I was gonna tell you I love you all day. The rest of it I was just. . .hoping."
Hearing her say those words again chokes him up, makes him pathetic and needy and he gets to his feet, settles his palms at the parentheses of her waist to draw her in to his kiss. Kate seems to realise quite suddenly that they are decidedly unbalanced in terms of clothing and she gets that adorable frown on her face, the one that puckers her forehead and juts out at her bottom lip.
He bites at it, growling and then suckling at her mouth as she skilfully unfastens the buttons of his shirt and tugs it down his shoulders and off. Kate unbuckles his belt and tugs it through the loops of his pants, tosses it aside and concentrates on palming him through the fabric of his slacks.
Jerking hard like a marionette with the strings cut, Rick sort of half-collapses into her until his forehead meets hers and he can stare down at the work of her hand. Really, he should capture her wrist and pull her off of him, because it's been a long time and he's very close to embarrassing himself already, but he simply doesn't have the strength.
Instead, he lets her unfasten his pants and push them down, her hands coming around to cup his ass. They both step out of the pools of fabric at their feet and move to the bed; Kate sits at the end and shuffles backwards, her eyes dark and nebulous as Rick crawls after her.
Kate lifts her hips and he hooks his fingers in the waistband of her underwear to pull them down the length of her gorgeous legs, throws them somewhere behind him. And then, before Kate gets a chance to so much as fist a hand in the sheets, he lowers his head and opens his mouth over her.
When his mouth touches her it's like a livewire; for a moment Kate thinks she might actually come right out of her skin. It's so good, amazing really, and the things he's doing to her are completely sinful and blowing her mind over and over with how delicious they are.
It's a disconcerting feeling. Rick takes her apart so skillfully, knows exactly where to touch and what to do to have her writhing in the sheets. And this is a mystery to her completely; she has no idea how he's going to react to anything at all.
Anyway, she has no brain cells to spare pondering it right now because Rick's mouth is open and his tongue is laving at her clit and then he slides two fingers inside of her and curls them and she can't think of anything past the obscene things his mouth is doing to her and how absolutely incredible it feels.
"Rick, god, please." She's a little alarmed to find herself begging, but she can feel him grinning against her - the smug, adorable asshole - and then he sucks harder at her and adds a third finger and she's coming apart around him before she even knows what's happening.
It rolls over her in waves, this first orgasm she can ever recall receiving from her husband, and he doesn't let up until she fists her hands in his hair and drags his mouth away from her. She expects him to slide up her body and kiss her mouth, but instead he wriggles further down the bed and nips at her ankle, the back of her knee.
She gasps, propping herself up on her elbows to watch him, and to see the involuntary spasms of her entire body every time his teeth catch in her skin. "That's so unfair. I didn't even know about that one."
"Oh, Kate. My beautiful wife." He shakes his head at her, crawling up the bed until he gets his mouth at her ear. "There's so much for me to teach you."
"Right now, Rick." Kate says seriously, palming his cheek and dropping a kiss to his mouth before she carries on. "I just need you inside me."
That makes him smile and kiss her harder, the bruising force of his mouth making her squirm. When he pulls away she's really hoping that he'll settle himself in the cradle of her hips and slide inside of her and thrust until she forgets everything that isn't him.
He doesn't. Instead he sits up and rids himself of his boxer shorts, pulls the elastic taut in his fingers and then releases to launch his underwear halfway across the room. When he turns back to look at her she laughs, but then her eyes trip downwards and her mouth goes dry.
"There's no reason we can't do both. On your knees, Beckett."
It's not like her, not really, but she finds herself obeying his orders without question. She gets to her knees and lets him guide her, his hands on her so utterly distracting that she hardly notices him turning her around until she's braced against the headboard and the fronts of his thighs are brushing at the backs of hers.
She can feel him, hard and ready for her, and she bites her lip and drops her forehead to receive the cool comfort of the wall before he curses behind her, his body going still as a stone. "Shit, Kate, I don't have any condoms. We threw them out. We're supposed to be trying for baby number two."
"I don't care." She grits out, astonished to find that she truly doesn't. They already have a son. So if she does get pregnant. . .it would be alright. "Rick, I really don't care. Please."
He doesn't ask if she's sure, doesn't say anything at all, and for that she's grateful. Instead he slides into her on one smooth thrust and Kate arches, her whole body thrumming with tension. Rick's arm slides around her stomach in support and she lifts up, drops her head against his shoulder.
His mouth opens at her forehead in an almost-kiss and he starts to thrust. Slow, drugging rolls of his hips that eventually get faster and harder until she's panting and moaning and writhing, falling forward into the wall again because she can't even catch her breath, let alone remain upright.
Now that he doesn't have to support her weight, Rick's hands are free to move and they do so, migrating from her stomach. One slides down to circle over her clit and the other moves north, pinching and rolling her nipple between two fingers until she cries out. Kate brings her own hand up to tease her other nipple, the two of them working towards her pleasure and her toes curl in the sheets, her body poised right at the precipice of cascading pleasure.
It hasn't ever been like this before. Usually, Kate works for her own pleasure and trusts that whomever she happens to be with will find theirs, but not this time. This is her husband, and she loves him, and she wants to make sure he feels just as good as she does, so Kate clenches her internal muscles as hard as she can and huffs something that might be laughter when he chokes out her name.
His thrusts get a little sloppier and his breath washes over her ear, his name all tangled up in it like silvery threads. "You're close. I know you are. I want you to come, Kate. Come for me."
She does. Hard.
Kate's whole body seizes up and she shudders with it, her eyes screwed tightly closed as her husband keeps moving behind her and she just concentrates on breathing. It's so good, more than she dared hope for, and then Rick is coming too.
His teeth catch in the muscle at her shoulder and he growls, long and low, and he isn't wearing a condom. Kate has never done this before - been with someone without that protection - and it feels strange and amazing and so good that another wave washes over her and she gasps.
Somehow they collapse together on top of the sheets, their bodies slick with sweat and melting together. Rick's kiss comes gentle and sweet and his hand skims up and down her spine, his joy flavouring everywhere they touch. "Was that as good for you as it was for me?"
"You're kidding, right?" She snorts, frowning at him. "You really have to ask?"
She still can't even move, approximately 90% of her brain still preoccupied in its reeling over the magnitude of what just happened. The sex itself was amazing, yes, but the intensity of their emotional connection far surpassed it. Kate has never trusted anyone the way she trusts the father of her son and it made everything so much more.
"I guess not. And for the record, Kate? I love you."
"I love you too, you big sap." She grins, alarmed to find herself nuzzling at his bicep. God, she's so glad that they're doing this now. She has missed sex, she's not ashamed to admit.
And finally, finally, she can be for him everything that a wife should be.