For darling KT, whom I will love #ForeverAndDever
Your clear eye is the one absolutely beautiful thing.
I want to fill it with color and ducks,
The zoo of the new
Whose name you meditate -
April snowdrop, Indian pipe
Child, Sylvia Plath
The Zoo of the New
"Morning, beautiful."
Castle sits up in bed and rests his weight on his elbows, his hair mussed and flopping over onto his forehead. Kate gives him a soft smile over her shoulder, towelling the ends of her hair.
She tosses the towel into the bathroom and disappears into the closet, hears him grumbling about having to get up. There's a thud and a muted curse, and then he looms in the doorway, a great immovable figure, and she comes back to him, sliding her hands around his waist to lace her fingers at his spine.
"Hey handsome."
He snorts at that and leans in to kiss the end of her nose, still delighted when it makes her eyes flutter closed. She hums, honey-soaked and content in the lazy warmth of the morning.
Rick cradles her cheek in his palm and Kate shifts so the rise of her cheekbone presses more firmly, skin and bone moulded to fit against him.
"Have I told you lately how good it is to have you here?"
"Every day since the day I moved in." Kate says, but she can't find any trace of spice or even vague annoyance past the musk of him where it fills her lungs.
"It's still true."
She arches her neck to get her mouth at his, sighing into it, and Castle brings his other hand up to skim the curve of her spine, fluid and ever-changing. This thing between them different every day but still, always good.
The trip and fall of her cell's ringtone startles them both, Castle clutching at her shoulders like they're under attack. Kate smirks and eases his hands off her, goes to fish her phone from the nightstand.
Damn, Esposito.
She was hoping for a slow, easy morning. No body. Breakfast at the counter with Castle trying to pour more syrup on her pancakes and getting it on her skin instead. How he'd lift her wrist to his mouth with such reverence and lave over her, lips and tongue and maybe a startling press of teeth.
But no. Murder beckons.
Kate hits the button to answer the call and sinks to sit at the mattress, holding a hand out to draw Castle in to her. He stands between her knees as the call connects and she puts them on speaker as Castle drops a kiss to the crown of her head.
"Good morning, Auntie Kate." Javier's voice rings out and Kate laughs, sharing a look of bemusement with Castle.
"You didn't tell me you were pregnant, Javier."
"Ha ha, Beckett." She can hear the eye roll in his voice and really Espo, she totally has the monopoly on that.
Castle gets his hands at Kate's waist and grips hard, lifting her up and sitting down again so she's straddling him. She presses her laughter to the shadowed place at the underside of his jaw, scraping her teeth over the patch where his stubble doesn't grow.
"Is that Castle? What are you doing?" There's a pause, and then Javi's spluttering in his haste to interrupt her. "Wait, I don't want to know."
"It's all PG, Espo." Rick grins, even as he's sliding his hand underneath the hem of Kate's towel, exposing the milky skin of her thighs to his ministrations.
She clutches at his shoulders and bites back a gasp, shifting in his lap. "What's the address?"
"No address. No body, Beckett, unless you count the six pound one currently in the arms of our good friend Detective Ryan."
Kate almost drops her phone, barely managing to rescue it as she and Castle gape at each other. "What? Javi, the baby?"
"A girl. They're at Presbyterian, and baby girl is very excited to meet her aunt and uncle if you guys want to come see her."
The emotion swells thick in Esposito's voice and Kate finds her own eyes filling, not surprised to see the rich and ancient blue of Castle's eyes flooding too. She swallows hard and drops her forehead to Rick's shoulder, the phone still caught between them.
"We'll be there in an hour, max. Jenny's doing good?"
"She's great. They're both great. See you guys soon." And then Esposito's hanging up, leaving Kate to grin at Castle, the arc of her smile so wide her cheeks ache with it.
He slides her off of his lap and kisses the dip between her collar bones, his chin resting next to her scar as he looks up at her. "Get dressed, Kate. Let's go meet our niece."
They're quiet in the elevator, Kate's hand cool and fragile in his. Castle's heart beats against his ribs, so full that he feels it might burst through the spaces in the ladder of bone.
He knows Kate can feel his pulse jump in his wrist, but it's good. She's excited too; he sees it in the careful way she holds herself as if she might crumble where she stands if she doesn't concentrate.
The doors slide open and he lets her lead him out and down the corridor. They find the Ryans' room and Kate stops him with a hand to his chest, her fingers curling in his breast pocket. She looks up at him, something shy and new in it, and then she smiles.
"Hey. I love you."
His face splits open in a grin and he leans in to kiss her, smiling so wide their teeth clash and he has to pull back again.
She says it more often now, more and more ever since that day with the bomb. But even so, it's good to hear. It floods his whole body with a beautiful, clean light. Like a divinity in his cells, a chorus of adoration.
"I love you too. Let's go."
He nudges the door open slowly, peeking inside to make sure they're not interrupting anything. Jenny's asleep in the bed, Ryan by her side. He's smoothing his thumb in circles over his wife's palm like he can't quite believe they're here, his face awash with a deep-seated contentment Castle can't remember ever having seen before.
"Hey there, Daddy." Rick grins and drops Kate's hand, moving to shake Ryan's instead.
The younger man grins up at them, standing from the chair with a last press of his mouth to Jenny's cheek. "Hey guys. Thanks for coming."
Kate leans in to hug him, pulling back just far enough to meet his eyes. "Of course. Where else are we gonna be?"
Castle moves in to wrap an arm around Kate's waist, needing her close. Here's Ryan, looking so whole and happy, and that's what Kate does for him. Beautiful, gorgeous Kate who laces her fingers through his at her stomach and leans back against him.
Rick takes a moment, lets the amniotic tranquillity of this moment settle, and then he clears his throat. "So, introduce us to your daughter, Detective Ryan."
"She's with her uncle." Kevin grins, nodding to a corner of the room swathed in shadow.
Javier's settled in a chair, his niece cradled in the crook of his elbow. And, wow. She's so tiny. He can't remember Alexis ever having been that tiny.
Kate gasps and leads Castle over to Esposito's side, reaching out to run her fingertip over the curve of the girl's cheek. She stirs, a tiny fist coming up to rest against Espo's chest, but she doesn't wake.
"Hey guys. Beckett, wanna hold your niece?"
"Oh, yes." Kate breathes, letting go of Rick to ease her hands under the tiny, perfect little person in Javi's arms.
And no one even has to tell her, she just seems to know exactly where to cradle, how to set the baby against her. Kevin's daughter.
Espo stands to let Kate sit down and Rick sinks to his knees next to her, at eye level with their brand new niece. He reaches out a finger and touches the beautiful soft of the girl's palm, sucking in a breath at the curl of tiny fingers around his own.
"She's gorgeous, Kevin. Congratulations." Castle says, nodding at the detective and gritting his teeth to keep the emotion back.
Ryan grins and moves back to his wife's side, and Rick can't help but be transfixed. By the baby, yes, the dusting of fair hair and the lashes drifting like shadows, but also by Kate.
She glances down at him, eyes like the birth of a storm, and she traces the shell of the baby's ear and then his own. "She's so tiny."
"Yeah. It's crazy, right?"
"It's beautiful." Kate leans in to him, her palm carefully cradling the baby's head, and she lets her mouth brush his.
And it feels. . .so exactly right. Kate kissing him and a baby in her arms. So close to perfect.
The girl squirms in her arms, perfect mouth opening and a helpless mewling spilling out that tears at Rick's heart. In the bed, Jenny stirs, already alert to her daughter's distress.
She sits up slowly and manages to fight back the exhaustion and find a smile. "Hey Kate, Rick. She hungry?"
"Yeah." Kate stands and cradles the baby to her chest, moving to hand the girl to her mother.
Rick gets up too, drawn to Kate's side again. He leans in to kiss Jenny's cheek and shake Ryan's hand again, remembering all too well how it felt to be overrun with visitors in those first precious days, How he'd wanted time alone with his wife and his baby girl.
"We'll leave you two in peace. Call us when you feel a little more human."
The Ryans laugh, but there's gratitude there too. Castle laces his hand with Kate's and leads her out of the room, already on the phone to the flower company. In the corridor, she waits for him to finish up, their hands still clasped.
He pockets his phone and cups Kate's cheek, moving in to kiss her. "You okay?"
She bites her lip but she's nodding, her eyes hot on his. "Yeah. Just. . .thinking."
"About?"
"How amazing it felt to hold her. About Kevin. He's a cop, but he can still be a parent." She lifts a shoulder in an approximation of a shrug, the too-big sweater she'd thrown on in haste this morning now slipping down so the apex of her shoulder rises up, calling for his mouth.
Castle rests his forehead against hers, their noses brushing too, and he takes a moment to breathe her in. A shard of absolute truth and sheer, startling beauty in the middle of a hospital corridor.
"Are you saying what I think you're saying?"
"I never thought I wanted it. I was so scared of doing to them what my mom did to me. And I never found anyone who I wanted to do it with."
Kate fists her hands in his shirt, something so vulnerable about it that it chokes him, makes him suck in a breath through his teeth. "Kate-"
"I want it with you, Rick. This. A life. Everything."
He nods, scraping together enough presence of mind to kiss her again, have her not doubt. No doubts, Kate. None.
"Oh God, Kate, I want it too. Kids with you, Kate Beckett. I want nothing more. Except-"
Castle pauses to kiss her again and again, and then he finds he has the courage to say it.
"I want to marry you first."
Tumblr: katiehoughton
Twitter: seilleanmor