This idea has been yelling at me since somewhere midway through MQ and I dedicate it to (and sorry for using your twitternames) DefiantChic and jadedromantic13 for their enthusiasm, kind words and strange conversations ;)
Midnight Queen : Post epilogue.
The Retaliation.
"She likes to take her time
More than fortunate, form of torture."
Castle drags a hand through his hair, ruffling the water from the strands and backing through the door of his bar. He lets it slam closed behind him before he locks it, his feet carrying him swiftly across the room, heading for his office.
It's wednesday so the place is closed, but his customers have begun to drift back gradually, casually refilling their old seats and booths after news of the shooting and the raid at Ace in the Hole started making the rounds.
It's been a week since they closed the case, a week since they fell into bed and he's seen Kate maybe three times since, three times alone that is.
Gates has kept them snowed under with a heavy stream of paperwork, new rules because of his little...punching incident, and a knowing look that follows them from room to room, giving them no leeway with each other at the precinct at all.
But every single one of those three glorious nights make up for the office politics they are now forced to play. And the change in their relationship hasn't lessened the intensity.
If it's at all possible the tension that existed between them before has amped up a notch...or five.
Every time they escape the confines of her job, sneaking home together, they just barely make it to the bed, every time he stops mid way across the room and picks her up, or feels her climb up his body in a hurried rush.
Both absorbed by the needful ache to collapse in a fiery heap amidst the sheets, one of them straddling the arching body of the other, legs wrapping, hips aligning as they work off mutual frustration.
Pent up desire finally set free, love and passion owned and explored openly, and it is more than enough compensation for the lack of time together. They make the most of the time they have, the night stretching out almost endlessly before them as they revel in the reactions of each others bodies.
But right now, as the memories and urges burn vividly through his imagination, Castle is at a loss as to why he's here.
He's got some notes on his laptop that he has somehow again managed to leave in his office. And Kate's sudden need of them has dragged him away from the new case they are working. He can't see that they are relevant personally, and yet she all but shoved him into the elevator. Like she wanted rid of him.
No.
He shakes it off, not wanting to torment himself with that thought right now, he's seeing issues where there are none, his blood just a tad too zingy from the constant restraint.
The fact he spent four years not touching her doesn't make it any easier now, somehow it actually makes things tens times harder, him ten times harder, to know every inch of her body is just waiting for his exploration.
It keeps them clinging to that knifes edge of desperation and lust.
The ability to touch each other when alone has somehow magnified every scrape of skin on skin. It makes the heated stroke of fingers in an elevator feel like the brush of their lips. Holding her hand has the same intensity as removing her shirt and kissing her mouth, lips parting around his invading tongue holds the same level of feeling, the same pleasure, the same flare of fire that the culmination of their joining bodies brings.
Three times in a week is nowhere near enough to take the edge off, three times a night wouldn't even do it...hasn't so far anyway.
He huffs, rolling his shoulders against the spark of tension that is riding his body already, just from thinking about her, and Castle flips a switch, revealing his secret office space, his feet falling heavily as he makes his way down the stairs.
He could use a drink, but technically he's on the job, and ok he might not be an official member of the NYPD but it's 11am...coffee will have to do, he'll make a run before he heads back to the twelfth.
Castle drops down the last step of the staircase, closes his eyes, dips his forehead to the door breathing deeply, shrugging it off all over again before he flings it wide and steps into the sanctuary of his office.
"How the hell did I beat you here?" She drawls, voice molten once again.
Castle's head snaps up, his eyes bursting open wide with unmasked shock.
And she's sitting on his desk.
Kate Beckett with her tousled hair, pink cheeks and smokey eyes. Leaning back with her ankles crossed in front of her and an almost smirk...a grin...something , playing over her lips.
She's perched on the edge of the hard wood of his desk like she owns it, and she does...for the moment the entire room is held transfixed by her very presence and she twists a little, slides her feet apart and Castle finds his eyes drawn to the long line of her legs.
The denim of her jeans tight and clinging to every curve it holds, but, Castle breathes deeply, it's stretchier than it looks in certain positions, especially when he starts sliding it from her skin, and the fact he knows these things now does nothing to dampen down the sudden flare of heat through his stomach. The tight clench of his abdominal muscles.
And he's suddenly suspicious, this is all a little suspicious.
Her desperate need to get him out of the building, the importance she placed on the notes he had made, notes that were barely more than half hearted musings and crazy theories.
Yet she made him leave.
"How did you get in?" He asks narrowing his eyes warily, because the door was definitely locked when he got here.
"I'm a cop." Kate drawls, a slight shrug of her shoulders drawing his eyes to the fact that she's unbuttoned the top three buttons of her white shirt.
"You broke in." He guesses, his eyes widening, feet glued to the floor.
"I did." She smirks, "Picked the lock."
"That's hot."
"Mmhmmm, it's not the only thing that's hot." She smiles, long and slow as it eases it was across her face with confidence. "You look a little warm Castle, heated, burning up... smoldering in fact."
He gulps, clearly he has reason to be suspicious.
"Are you hot ... Rick?" She tilts her head, moves her arm and he notices the bottle swaying precariously between her thumb and forefinger.
There is a snap and crackle of electricity that darts between their connected eyes, firing random jolts of liquid lightning through their systems.
"I think that's a matter of opinion." He finally manages, the words a little rougher, a little heavier as they come to rest between them. Bantering just that much harder than it should be when all his blood is suddenly changing direction, but the tease of their words so much a part of the foreplay, "What do you think Beckett?"
Her eyes blaze, she's gotten used to him calling her Kate in such a short space of time that throwing out the casual 'Beckett' when they are alone sends tendrils of fire leaping out of her heart and unfurling through her body. They touch at the tips of her fingers, the ends of her toes and it reminds her of years of wanting and needing and the inability to claim him when she ached to do so desperately.
But now she can.
"I think you're hot," Kate states darkly, without hesitation. "In fact I think you look a little feverish."
Lifting herself away from the desk raising a bottle up in front of her face, swaying it back and forth, she walks towards him slowly, surely, capturing his attention and his imagination like she always does.
Always has.
"I do huh?" Castle tries not to smile as she steps closer to him, playing along, slipping into their typical back and forth so easily. It still amazes him they can do it in the bedroom, in the midst of sex, as easily as they can at the murder board with coffee.
It's completely and wholly their thing.
His eyes focus on the movement of her graceful legs, elegant lines and the added sway of her hips forcing her thighs to brush, her calves to catch each other in passing.
It's sexy.
Skin sliding over silk clad skin.
And Castle's jealous of her own body, the incidental way she touches herself as she marches towards him.
His office isn't huge, but she makes that walk count, striding, her lips kinked into a wicked smile, and it's not until she thuds into his chest, her hand sliding up, fingers curling around his neck, that he truly registers the glass bottle in her hands.
She raises herself higher, tilting her head forwards to catch his eyes, smoldering with amber flame and she ignites under the simple touch when his hand caresses her shoulder.
She can't contain the moan that leaves her mouth or the pleasure bubbling from within as her teeth crash down hungrily on her bottom lip.
Wishing it was his.
It will be, soon.
The hand holding the bottle remains curved at his neck, holding him in place as the other caresses his forehead as if assessing his temperature. Kate tilts her head as she determines he's hot enough to need a cooling off, her fingers toying with the top buttons of his shirt.
Castle leans heavily into the door until it thuds closed at his back, taking the weight of her body with him.
"Yes you do," She breathes, grinning, leaning back enough to lift the tequilla up in front of his face. "And it's your turn."
"What?" Castles swallows harshly around the word, disbelieving and incredulous, it still catches him off guard when she's this straightforward...it's refreshing, and it's a little terrifying.
She looks...possessed...hungry...wanton, and her eyes are trained on his mouth, barely blinking between breaths, smokey, sultry when she speaks.
"You and I..." Kate murmurs darkly, "have unfinished business."
"We do?" Castle's lips feel numb, his words stupidly obvious as they trip past his tongue, he is aware of everything she's saying, the meaning behind it. Of course they have unfinished business, it's been unfinished since the moment she held her badge in front of his face and barked her name at him, smirking at his stupidly uttered offer to sign her chest.
He has always accepted it's an inevitability, but surely...
"Yes," Her hand slides up the front of his chest, dropping the bottle to one side so she can lift the other hand and push the leather jacket that has become, and will remain, a stable part of his wardrobe, with an almost regretful sigh.
"I closed the case ten minutes after you left Castle, handed it off to the boys," Slowly moving it down his arms she lets the jacket fall to a heap at their feet, "I'm done for the day." Her voice deep with want, reverberating passionately, demandingly through his ears, "Take off your shirt."