A/N: Happy Thanksgiving everybody!
She comes over for Thanksgiving dinner.
She comes over for Thanksgiving dinner and brings her dad and an enigmatic smile and a huge apple pie that she apparently baked herself.
He's beyond joyous.
"You bake?" he asks privately into her ear as he helps her shrug out of her black pea coat, getting a nose full of cinnamon which may or may not be the leftover aroma of pie baking.
Kate Beckett, baking a pie. All he can think about is her cute nose covered in flour, her hair in a messy bun as she flits around her kitchen in an apron. He thinks he'd rather watch her bake a pie than eat a pie himself, and that's saying something.
"So many things you still don't know about me, Castle."
Her grin is wide as she steps past him, embracing his mother as he takes her father's hand with a friendly shake, and then they're right into it, wine and laughing and stealing little tastes of all the food that isn't quite ready yet.
She helps his mother set the table too, easily making her way from cabinet to cabinet because she knows where everything is. The cups, the plates, the forks, their favorite coffee mugs, tucked into the cabinet above the coffee maker. He can't stop watching her.
She notices, of course.
"Castle, you just gonna stand there and watch?"
She's grinning at him as she carefully sets down her last plate on top of the cranberry colored placemats, and doesn't move away as he approaches her, one hand wrapping around the back of the nearest chair and the other sliding in at her waist.
"Sorry, you just look really good in my kitchen."
She rolls her eyes but he can see her cheeks pink a little bit. He says things to her all the time now, things he's always wanted to say, or things he's never thought of but needs to get out now that there is absolutely no reason not to. She's still not used to it, adorable twin dots of embarrassment flaring to life underneath her makeup. It makes him want to kiss her.
She beats him to the punch though, leaning in impulsively to press her lips against his, but then she's gone again, grabbing for the basket of warm biscuits while he uselessly leans himself against a chair and tries not to pinch himself to see if he's actually dreaming.
They all overdose on turkey, even Beckett, miss not-everyone-overeats-on-holidays-Castle, which is how they find themselves lethargic on the couch, tryptophan making everything groggy and comfortable. She's leaning on him, the soft sounds of the faucet in the kitchen running as the adults and Alexis take care of the dishes, leaving he and Beckett alone to bask in their post meal comas.
"Ugh," she groans uncomfortably, as she shifts against him, her cheek flat against his shoulder, legs half curled up underneath herself.
"I thought you knew how to pace yourself at holiday meals?" He's biting back his smug grin but he knows she can hear it in his voice, which is why she half-heartedly punches him in the leg at the question.
"Shut up, Castle."
"Poor baby."
She only huffs at that, eyelids drooping as he moves his arm around her, helping her to drop down into his lap, almost fully horizontal. The glossy waves of her hair fan out over him as he lets his fingers drag through them softly, his other hand slowly descending to her hip, playing at the hem of her sweater, and then he's sneaking under it, rubbing softly along her stomach.
She tries grabbing at his wrist weakly, half asleep as he soothes her like a child. "Ugh Castle why are you touching my stomach, I ate like twelve pounds of turkey."
"Shh, I know, I'm trying to make you feel better."
He watches the lazy grin tug at the corners of her mouth, her expression so open when she's three seconds from falling asleep, and then her fingers are sneaking up under her own shirt too, lacing their hands together against her belly.
"Mmm thanks," she mumbles as she finally drops off, leaving him watching her with a moony expression on his face.
He's just so thankful for her. It's Thanksgiving and it's the most clichéd, but she's laying in his lap, comfortable enough to fall asleep on him, in the presence of both of their families, and he really just feels like the luckiest person to be currently walking the planet. Or the luckiest person to be currently curled up on his warm couch with his warm homicide detective slash partner slash everything in his lap, his belly full of turkey and the pie she made him still to come.
So much still to come.
He can't wait.