SPOILER ALERT FOR 4.05

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This fic relates to the pics of Rick snogging Lady Art Insurer against the wall with the lead piping. Initially, I was going to write a fight situation, where Beckett was livid about seeing Castle kissing Lusty Lehman, but then I thought a bit about what she's withholding from him. The fact she knows he loves her. Even in a fit of jealous rage, it (arguably) would be unfair of Beckett. This is what resulted, and yep, the story (and the episode) could really go any number of ways.

It's the only analogy he can think of as the idea spreads into his brain and licks at him to react to a sticky situation. Even if he closes his eyes, which he doesn't for reasons all his own, this kiss is like butter.

It's soft enough in parts. It's pleasant enough on the palate, but too much of it would coat his tastebuds in a blob of nothingness. It would probably melt at high temperatures, but the chill in the air prevents that. The coldness has nothing to do with the lusty lady in the red dress and the fact that she's typically hot. The fridge factor has everything to do with the state of play, his need to act, and an inability to think of any other ploy that's fitting enough to distract a woman.

Castle needs to work on his distraction repertoire.

Kissing has worked before, it should again, especially if he uses his own body to block any vision from the front, so whoever — or is that whomever?— is coming through the door thinks that they're just a couple going for it rather than participating in something clandestine. That they're just a couple. Going for it. That they're just a couple ...?

But. They're not.

If he closes his eyes, would he be able to shut out the colour of blonde? The taste of buttery, high-cholesterol, potentially heart-damaging yellow stuff? The feel of glitzy red clothing rather than classic, earthy tones and fathomless eyes? Castle could shutter his lids and smell cherries, taste coffee, feel his heart flutter-by and seize up and stumble about in its attempt to finally burst. He could step into a darkened night, snatch at a hand reaching for a holstered gun and haul her close. He could feel more than he's ever felt before. That's what he should be doing, but by pressing this buttery kiss into the wall of another, all he can think about are other walls. Other times. Other places.

Castle really needs to work on his distraction repertoire.

He's the only person distracted by this entire scenario, and when he finally feels arms around him, a warm body seeping towards his chest, he moves to break the kiss despite his intentions to continue the ruse to the very end.

It had been ... nice, and he's had nice kisses before. He equates them with the ordinariness of a blended scotch compared to the thrill factor of an aged, single malt and Speyside hit of eroticism.

As he pulls away from the wall, wishing all the bricks of another would tumble at his feet, he knows Kate is there as surely as he knows his actions have caused her to frown.

She's seen. She's watched him. Suddenly Castle needs her to know that the kiss was like the cold spot in a hot, bothered bed, the plainness of a plastic lei compared to the fresh flower one on Hawaiian soils. That it means nothing, that she means nothing, and that he never, ever wants a buttery or deep fried twinkie kiss again.

It meant nothing to me ... she means nothing to me ... but then he sounds like a hairless old philanderer, explaining to his wife of thirty years why he screwed his coworker at the Christmas party.

Damn it, Kate, give me something. Not just words, not maybes that don't have my name on the gift tag, even though I'm pretty sure the present is for me. Something concrete, definite..

He wants to fling it in her face, but he stands with his arms askew, his hair astride, his feet open and appealing. Castle wears his best confused look. Somehow, it might help explain just how he's feeling, or in the worst case scenario? That his distraction repertoire includes only one move when there's a female involved, and it's not enough.

Because if this kiss is like butter, he wants the cake. This batter has been whisking too long.

She wears her mistake like he's wearing the smear of red butter on a lip-smacked mouth. The professional voice in her head tinkers away about the kiss being an emergency part of the plan, a tactic of time, space, logistics ... lips of a leggy, breasty blonde who has been looking at Richard Castle over the last few days as though she wants to insure his prized pieces.

The detective words are battered down by more womanly wails. Slut! Bastard! Sex addicts! Betrayer! Salivating, smutty beyotch! Horny, disloyal dog! Tramp, manwhore, fuckfaces!

And it's not just the machinations of a kiss, the placement of lips, the smishing of faces, the meeting of mouths that's provoking Beckett's fizz. It's the inclusion of a wall! The pressing and poking and damnable intimacy that it all evokes. The trapping of bodies, the strain of desire, the means to take it further, the probable want of a red-blooded man to rut and ravage and—

'Beckett?'

Esposito interrupts her thoughts and Kate is immediately aware that she's standing, looking at the dishevelled ones with her own mind awash with fear, rejection, anxiety. It's all warring with police intellect and intel.

He was kissing her. He was in her space, reciprocating her moves, initiating his own. Kate wonders how it differed to the time when they—

'It's best if we all go back to the twelfth. Take your statements there.'

It strikes Kate that Esposito is assuming control of the situation and this notion fires her resolve. Although she feels like she's wearing the vision of that kiss like Eve wore a fig leaf — she knows it was needed to cover nude spots in the plan — Beckett has to focus. If she can pantomime through her job, she'll still be head bitch in charge. If she has control, she's running the operation. If she's running the operation, she can write the kiss off as strategic.

Beckett dons everything detective, right down to her poker face and heels that allow her to tower over the perky one. She avoids eye contact with Castle, runs rings around questioning, releasing and advising the suspect. She even allows the tramp to collect her things while warning her that the matter is still 'very much under investigation.'

For the final couple of hours of the working day, she ignores Castle's gaze, answers his questions with monosyllabic indifference and bites down on the tongue that longs to lash out in annoyance and her own deep-seated lust.

'You're angry.'

Eventually, she's alone at her desk. It's dark outside, the precinct is emptying and Castle hasn't gone home with a blonde attache case. Kate's not surprised. Neither is she delighted. She's just north of limbo, walking the fine line between what she's said and what she wants, and her mixed messages are written all over his face.

She looks down at her files and shuffles them for something to do with her hands.

'I ...'

She finds it difficult to speak with a mouthful of issues, a heart filled with emotions bumping into a brain that's still loading the image of him. With her. Against the wall.

'Do you want to talk about it?' Castle asks, sitting in his seat, leaning forward slightly so that she's sure he can hear the buzz of her mind. 'I do. I want to talk about today. If you're upset, I need to hear it.'

She sighs. It feels better for a second, loosens the tension round her chest, her forehead, but the slump hits back the next instant and buckles the stress through her body again. Kate stands, checks her watch. She's gotta leave but can't quite leave it this way.

'Castle, I ... yeah.' She knows what she has to say, but it's getting her mouth to synch with her emotions that's difficult part. 'Yeah, I was upset.'

He smiles, but there's nothing triumphant about it. It's a quiet, small smile angled upwards, that digs at her chest and inflicts an entirely different pain than a single GSW.

'The kiss?'

His words are whispered in a voice so low, she's undone by the combination of his uncertainty and grave sincerity. She had wanted to rant about the fact that he's supposed to be in love with her, and he's kissing another woman against a wall! She can't. She has no right, but the awkwardness of the situation is excruciating.

She folds her arms across her chest and stands straight. 'The kiss took me by surprise And yeah, it upset me. It was ... surprising. I didn't expect to be ... to feel ... to be surprised.'

Why are words harder to deliver than a kick to the groin? Why are emotions more difficult to apply than a pair of handcuffs to a monster?

Castle remains seated, but in a move that places her on the back foot, he reaches up and takes her hand in his. 'It was all I could think of to do,' he says, holding her palm between two of his own. 'I was trying to think on my feet and it was just ... awkward. As soon as it happened, it felt, um, surprising?'

Beckett feels herself melt just that little bit. He's the only one that can do this, it's like he has her frosty-frame on autopilot and whenever she tries to freeze him out, he flickers heat round her edges.

'You did what you thought was best,' she nods, running her thumb over the back of his hand. The warmth is there. It radiates from him in slow combustion quality and takes her mind beneath his bedding. There'd never be a cold spot in there. No wonder she gently saps away whenever it's like this.

'Beckett?' he says, standing suddenly, propping his hip on the corner of her desk and finding her other hand to hold. He doesn't draw her in, but she has to squash a smile that's threatening to curve around the memory of him kissing someone else. 'I need you to do something for me.'

'What's that?' she asks, unable to look away, unable to maintain her anger about the kiss, unable to think of much else besides the kiss. And kissing.

He jiggles their united hands and grins, as though reading the change in her mood. 'I need help with my female distraction repertoire. There's only one thing I can think of to do when I need to distract a—'

Surprising herself, she steps forward and kisses him. It's simple and soft and she has to physically stop herself fast-forwarding towards a time when they can trigger tongue and teeth to inflame the proceedings. For now, it's sweet. It's 'hello', 'I'm sorry', 'thank you' and cake frosting. It's 'I'll never wait 3 months to call you' and 'I want a hell of a lot more of this, but not here. Not now.' It's everything a first kiss can be at work, and everything a first kiss is not at work.

And he gets it. Somehow, he surprises her and reciprocates just enough, before they both smooch-off as though by some preordained agreement. Doesn't mean she's not that tiny bit flustered as she steps away. Doesn't mean he's not smiling and checking out her mouth, or hoping that she'll come out for dinner, come home with him, come—

'I've gotta be some place, Castle,' she says, before realizing that might cause him unnecessary anxiety. 'Therapy. Just doing some follow up work, you know?'

Castle nods with an approval that softens her centre that little bit more. If there wasn't a sudden flurry of cops heading home, Beckett would sneak back in for another, more emphatic taste of that mouth. She picks up her coat instead.

'Can I call you later? Just to talk?'

Kate feels the insides of her cheeks concave against her teeth as she attempts to suppress a smile of delight. 'Yeah. You got my number?'

'Somewhere, probably.' His smile is almost as wide as his shoulders. 'Hey? I am sorry, you know? About that kiss.'

She stops half-stride as she's walking away, turning to him for the hundredth time since they've been reunited at the precinct. 'You are? I thought you liked what just happened?'

'You know what I mean, Beckett.'

Kate nods to indicate that she does know, and that they should wander to the elevator together.

'So. Detective. About that other thing, I'm—'

'No, you know what, Castle? I'm sorry,' she says as they walk in the coordinated cadence they've recently developed. They're falling into step in so many ways. 'I don't think I'd made myself clear enough.'

He swallows against the bobble of this throat when she doesn't elaborate after a beat. 'That you don't like me kissing other women in public?'

'Well, there's that,' she says, grinning sideways at him as they wait for the elevator.

'That you don't like me kissing other women who are part of an ongoing investigation?'

'That too.'

'That you don't like me kissing other women in public, who might be dressed in red and are part of an ongoing investi—'

'Shut up, Castle,' she says, and as the elevator door closes on them, Rick obliges by swooping in for a kiss that rocks the precinct floor like an earth tremor.

It tastes seismic.