For judygrimes on tumblr, belatedly.
(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun's birthday; this is the birth
day of life and of love and wings: and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)
i thank you God for, ee cummings
"Hey. Wake up?"
He groans, bats his hand at the noise, the heavy, too-hot mass of skin at his back. Annoying. He is trying to sleep and the thing won't stop wetting him, circles of moisture again and again on the back of his neck, a sharp catch of the flesh over his very top vertebrae.
What the hell, thing? He is sleeping. Crouching thing, sleeping Castle.
"Come on Castle. Wake up."
No.
Go away, unknown thing. Smells good. Mmm, good. Like the honeyed and ripening buds of the flowers that line the path in springtime-
"Castle."
And the dust of sweet, sweet skin over his own, musk and sweat and rhythm and-
"Rick. Up. Come on."
"Kate." He gets an eye open, finds the early morning filtering through the gaps in the blinds and painting her with lines of luminescence to cut through the swathes of shadow that curl in wisps around her gorgeous, gorgeous body.
"Hey sunshine. You awake?"
He groans, rolls over just to hook an arm around her waist and take her with him. "Uh huh. Time s'it?"
She laughs, that beautiful full-bodied thing that tips her head backwards, her neck a path to the pooling joy at the base of her throat. "Eight. I let you sleep in."
"In?" He scoffs, takes her earlobe between his teeth in indignation. "This is out. So out, Beckett."
"Hey, you've had an extra hour." She arches in his bed, her stomach kissing his even through the so-soft cotton of her shirt. On purpose, the minx. He gets his hands underneath her shoulders and scoops her up, clutches her to his chest. His most precious thing.
His mouth finds hers, their hips bumping gently as he takes from her. He tastes mint at the back of her throat, his kiss cracking into a grin. "Not enough, after what you did to me yesterday."
"You're getting too old to handle it, huh?" She smirks at him, that half-curl to her lips, eyes alight on him.
He kisses her again to show her, sliding his palms over her thighs, careful not to crease her slacks. "Not old. Wise."
"Wise?" She snorts, so much delicious teasing this morning. Mm, feisty Kate. "Sure. Whatever you need to tell yourself."
"Are you going to the precinct?" He gentles his hands at her spine, tugs her ever closer. And it's not like she's trying to escape, not as if she's even resisting, but he finds himself clutching at her.
He just-
He loves her. So very much.
She kisses the precipice of his jaw, her teeth a sharp press to the bone that jolts him and makes her laugh. "Yeah."
"Aren't you late?"
Kate sighs at that and slips a hand down to his waist, her fingers cool and fresh as water. "Espo's covering for me. I didn't-"
She stops, bites at her bottom lip, and he can't help but soothe it with the warm and tender press of his own mouth. "You didn't what, love?"
Shit. Maybe shouldn't have said that.
But in fairness he's only a little awake. Parts of him very much more so than others. And she doesn't seem to have noticed the endearment. "I didn't want you to wake up without me."
"Oh, Kate. You should have just woken me an hour ago." He cradles the back of her head and she presses her temple to his neck, her weight against him this gorgeous sort of heavy that he'll happily bear the rest of his life.
Her nose dips into his clavicle, her mouth open to taste him, but she's pulling away before he gets a chance to try and keep her there. Her fingers come up to circle his wrist, keep his palm at her cheek. "No. Sleep is such a precious commodity to you."
"You are infinitely more precious to me, Kate Beckett."
She flushes at that, dips her head to hide it from him. So very much like that first morning, nearly eleven months ago now. "Yeah?"
Wow. Needy Kate this morning, huh? He'll take it, take her, any way she'll let him.
He sits up a little more in bed and reaches for her, careful not to crease her button down as he brings her in against him. She settles at his chest again, her head resting on his shoulder and her arm coming up to band around his middle, fingertips skimming his ribcage.
"Yeah."
He kisses her then, a soft and somnolent exploration of her mouth. It starts careful, but she doesn't seem concerned about his morning breath as she strokes her tongue inside and so he lets himself slide his hands underneath her shirt and paint the gossamer skin of her back with his together-coloured pilgrimage.
"What time do you have to go?" He says against her mouth, his hand cradling the back of her head to keep her close to him.
She sighs, a fluttering thing that tastes like mint and reluctance. "Espo said he told Gates I'll be in at lunchtime. So we have about four hours."
"You don't have to cut work for me. You can go and I'll catch you up."
"No. I want to be here. I made breakfast."
She laughs, shakes her head at herself and he kisses her again, dusts his mouth at the end of her nose, that freckled patch under her eye. He wants to traverse her, dedicate his life to the cartography of her bone structure.
"You did? Give me it." He swats at her, ushers her out of his bed and falls back against the headboard to watch her retreating form, the swing of her hips and those pants.
Castle finds boxers and a shirt, tugs them on as she comes back with a tray. He straightens up to take it from her, leans in to press his mouth to hers with breakfast caught between them.
"You made coffee. And pancakes." He grins, kisses her once more and then he slides back in to bed with the tray against his knees.
She follows, settling cross-legged at his side, her palm flat and entirely distracting against his thigh. Her fingers are dangerously-
Shit, Kate.
He splutters, captures her wrist to return her hand safely to her own lap, well away from his breakfast. "You want some of this?"
"No, all for you. Enjoy."
Kate shifts as if she's going to move away and he sets the tray down on the nightstand, chases her body until he's got her pressed beneath him, her chest brushing his with every startled breath. "Where are you going?"
"The precinct." She laughs, arches her neck to brush her mouth over his, her fingers lacing behind his neck.
"Uh uh. No you're not." He slides his hands up either side of her spine, curls his fingers around her shoulders and rolls so she ends up straddling his hips. "You took the morning off. You stay here."
She leans down to kiss him, her palms at his chest so she doesn't fall in to him. Not that he'd be opposed to that. He starts to arch his neck and then thinks better of it, huffs a sigh as he sits up. His arms band around her back and she leans into them to get a look at him, her face breaking open with that slow-spreading smile.
"Yeah, okay. I'll stay. Eat your breakfast."
Castle laughs at that, lets her go to gather his tray again. She made him breakfast. Holy crap. He takes a sip of his coffee, can't help staring at her over the rim of his cup. She gazes back at him, her hair spun through with gold and her face soft and open.
"Hey Kate?"
She hums, folds her legs underneath herself and snags her own mug from the nightstand. "Yeah?"
"Thanks for breakfast."
He really needs to stop looking at her like that.
Yes, okay, they have until lunch. There's time for-
But she wants to wait. Until tonight. When she can do slow, have him gasping her name into her mouth. She wants to savour every slide of his hand, every curl of his fingers, the measured and shattering circle of his thumb.
She takes a sip of her coffee, hums her delight at the taste and almost chokes on her laughter as Castle's fork clatters back to the plate, his hand slack.
"You okay?"
"No." He groans, shovels his last bite of pancake into his mouth so he can push the tray aside again and come for her.
Oh. Well, hmm, yeah. That too.
"You are an evil woman."
"Oh really? Are you going to make me pay?"
He nudges her back against the pillows and she lets the grin spread wide across her face, cradles his cheek in her palm as he blinks down at her. So much rich and beautiful love in his eyes that it stuns her, has her pulling him down for a kiss.
Her tongue snakes out to taste him, syrup and coffee caught at the corner of his mouth. His hand slips down between them, searching for the button on her pants and she arches, gasping up into him.
"No, no, wait. Castle, wait."
He sits up, his eyelids slamming closed at the sight of her open and wanting under him. Castle climbs out of bed, takes a faltering step away like he doesn't trust himself not to take her anyway, in spite of her protests.
"Wait. Why?"
Kate hums on a laugh and gets up to go to him, knots their fingers together before he can escape. "I wanted to give you something."
"I thought you were doing that already."
She shakes her head at him, smiling again. He grins back, but there's some confusion there. He never wants to wait, his body always singing with desperate need for her. She knows that, wants him too. But she wants this more.
"Are you turning down a gift?"
"No, never. I'll take it."
His gift is in her nightstand, has been all week. He lets out a squeak of surprise when he sees where she had it and she has to bite back a laugh before she can face him.
"Here."
He's not like her. As soon as he gets it in his hands he's tearing the paper off, dropping it at their feet. She bends to get it, comes back from the trashcan to find him cradling the book in both hands.
Their eyes meet, his creased at the corners with confusion. "Kate? You got me a second hand copy of my own book?"
"Open it."
He does, his face completely still despite the startled breath he sucks through his teeth. She watches him trace the words he wrote there for her. Ten years ago now.
"I signed this for you?"
"Yeah. I stood in line for hours and it was so worth it." She shrugs, bites at her bottom lip hard enough that the taste of iron floods her mouth.
"I can't believe I wrote that. Are you sure it was worth it for ten seconds of me being a sleazy jackass?"
"Yes, I'm sure." She laces their fingers together, uses the grip to lead him back to the bed. Kate pushes him to sit at the edge of it, watches him settle before she joins him. He turns his head to kiss her temple, stays a moment that swells with his rich and forever love.
"Castle, my mom loved your books. She said there was something real about your characters, that she cared about what happened to them. And when she died, I found comfort in your words. I felt close to her."
"Kate-" He clutches tighter at her hand, tremors that wreck the civilisation of her bone structure, leave her a changed thing in the wake of his need.
"Rick, your books took care of me until you could do it yourself."
His mouth opens but there's nothing, nothing, only his eyes filling with water and love, so much that it floods down his cheeks, pools at their feet.
"Oh Kate. Kate. I love you."
"Happy Birthday, Castle."
Twitter: seilleanmor
Tumblr: katiehoughton
Thank you to my darling berkielynn for proofing