Two onion peels for the price of one...

Enjoy.

Chapter 2 - "Not So Comical"

"Now there's a sight that never in my life I thought I'd see."

Beckett raised her eyes and smiled sheepishly as she glanced over at her fiancé. There he stood, leaning against his office doorway, arms crossed against his broad chest with the sweetest grin lining his lips.

"Hey," she beamed.

His eyes twinkled as he gazed lovingly at her, sitting there, curled up on the couch, her body encased in one of his larger t-shirts, with his issue of The Many Deaths of the Batman on her lap.

"Be careful with that one," he pointed as he approached the couch, "it's really rare."

"Don't worry. I know…" she hummed.

"Oh yeah, forgot who I was talking to for a second there," he mused as he sat down beside her, picking up her feet and laying her legs across his thighs.

She couldn't suppress the slight moan that escaped her throat as he began to knead the arches of her feet. God, those fingers of his were magical.

"You like that?" he teased.

"Mmmmmmmmm… don't distract me," she muttered, trying desperately to restrain herself from sighing as he applied such welcome pressure to the balls of her feet. "I'm trying to read…"

"I noticed," he smirked, raising his eyebrows suggestively. "Finally decided to peruse my collection, did you?"

"Yeah…" she retorted, face buried in the comic. She quickly shot a sly glance over the top of the pages as she added, "and it's smaller than I imagined."

"I don't think you could handle anything bigger, Kate," he countered, voice deepening.

"Oh, I think we both know I can handle anything you put in front of me..." she grinned, head tilting slightly, eyes darkening.

He couldn't restrain himself any longer. Pulling her legs, he drew her body towards his as he looped one arm around her back, his other hand quickly removing the comic book from her grasp and placing it on the coffee table - his eyes never leaving hers. Lips collided hungrily, giving as much as they could and taking whatever they had to give in return. His pulse began to throb, her breathing became heavy and erratic. His hands roamed down the length of her torso, gripping the bottom of her shirt.

"Richard, when you and Katherine are finished, would you mind giving me a hand?"

Their mouths parted quickly as Castle buried his face into Kate's neck. Kate pursed her lips together as she leaned her face into the back of the sofa. Taking a deep breath, Castle turned his head to find Martha midway up the stairs flaunting several hats.

"How might I be of service, Mother?" he inquired, voice laced with impatient sarcasm as he attempted to regulate his breathing.

"I have my students working on scenes from As You Like It and I want them to find their characters through their clothing… so I need you to get me that large box of hats that I keep on the top shelf in my closet," she explained, turning to make her way back up the steps. "But don't rush, darling," she added with a nonchalant wave of her hand. "I can wait until you and Katherine are done."

Kate bit her lip playfully, letting loose a soft, slightly embarrassed giggle.

"Don't worry," Castle muttered under his breath as he rolled his eyes, pushing himself off the cushions. "We're done."

Descending the staircase, he was met with the image of Beckett, curled up into the corner of the couch, face once again buried in the comic book. He could do nothing but beam at the sight of her. His fiancée... Sci-Fi lover and comic book geek.

"Why comic books?"

Her sultry voice woke him from his reverie. "What do you mean?"

"Comic books," she repeated. "Why do you love them so much?"

"You first," he nodded, wiggling his eyebrows playfully.

"You already know why, Castle," she grinned.

He sat down on the couch, laying one arm across the back of the cushions, and shot her a sly smirk. "Not everything."

"Fine," she relented, closing the comic and laying it carefully on the coffee table. "But if I tell you my reason, you have to tell me yours."

"Deal. And which ever one of us has the better story gets breakfast served to him or her in bed tomorrow morning," he added.

She didn't even pause to think it over. "Agreed."

Castle quickly made himself comfortable, leaning forward, attention rapt as Beckett gathered her thoughts.

"It's not all that interesting, really," she began, eyes glancing down at the rug. "My parents were lawyers. From a young age, that's what I dreamed of being as well. They instilled in me a thirst for justice. A desire to seek the truth."

She took a deep breath and continued. "But the justice system didn't always work. I remember them complaining sometimes about cases that were lost due to a lack of solid evidence even though everyone knew that the criminals were guilty. And so the bad guys would go free. And I hated that."

She slowly raised her head to face Castle, her soft eyes sweeping over his face to find his eyes tenderly staring back at her, completely captivated by her words. By her.

"The idea of the vigilante superhero appealed to me when I was a teen because I was starting to appreciate my parents' frustration. I liked the idea that even if the system couldn't put the bad guys away, they would still be punished. That the victims would have their justice one way or another."

"Why Sin City?" he inquired, his voice tender, curious.

"I remember picking up A Dame To Kill For off the shelf at Comicadia and flipping through it quickly. I was only fourteen, but Miller's work really spoke to me. He questioned the nature of good and evil, justice, redemption. He showed me that nothing in society was ever as black and white as I'd like it to be… as I thought it should be..."

Her voice trailed at the end of her thought, eyes glazing over. She felt Castle's fingers lace through hers, waking her from her trance.

"I picked up that graphic novel again a few years after I became a cop," she sighed heavily. "It certainly wasn't the same story I'd read when I was a kid…"

She felt Castle squeeze her hand gently.

"A lot of things that happen in our childhoods help to define who we become," Castle stated, voice low and comforting.

"What happened to you?"

He took a deep breath.

"Mother did her best, but it was tough," he exhaled, glancing over at their entwined hands that rested on the back of the couch. "We didn't always have enough money, we moved around a lot because she had to go where the acting jobs were. I didn't really have any friends. And nothing really changed when I enrolled at Edgewick Academy."

He glanced over at her, a peaceful and encouraging smile on her lips.

"Comic books were my escape. I could relate to Peter Parker, Clark Kent… the dorky, friendless guys who tried so hard to be normal..." he choked slightly as his voice cracked, "To be accepted... who just wanted to belong. Guys who hid behind one persona because they didn't want people to know who they really were. How broken they were. How lost."

He felt Kate's slender fingers tenderly caress the side of his cheek. He looked up, gazing into the depths of her hazel eyes, reading both sadness and admiration.

"...and Batman?"

"I idolized Bruce Wayne. He was brooding, handsome, rich, intelligent… he had all the coolest toys," he smirked slightly before getting serious again. "He was everything I wasn't."

Beckett leaned forward wrapping her arms around his chest enveloping herself around him, tucking her head in beneath his chin. She felt his broad arms snake around her back, pressing her body flush with his. They allowed the silence to wrap around them as they simply held each other, peace and comfort filling the room.

"So there you go…" he eventually whispered, his lips pressing a gentle kiss into her soft hair. "Judge away."

Hearing her own words used against her, she smiled into his shoulder. "No judging here... But I do have one more question."

"What's that?"

"Who won the bet?" she sighed.

They went to a diner for breakfast the next morning.

xxxxxxxxxxxxx

This was my first attempt at writing Martha... still not sure if I got her right.

But I gotta start somewhere... )

Again, if you have any suggestions, feel free to throw them into a comment.