One more after this. Thank you for your patience.
"How does someone put something like that behind him?"
The words shock her into movement, her heart shoving her forward, ready to finally latch onto its missing piece.
Tonight's been all kinds of crazy. Zombies, stings, subtext, almost making out with Castle…
But something happened tonight that makes her want to take a bigger step forward. Uncertainty clouds her thoughts, but her chest burns brighter than any doubt, brighter than it has in a long time. Every part of her is overwhelmed at the emotions she's feeling. Tears begin to well up, and Kate's forced to take a deep breath, tries to steady her nerves before she does something stupid…like kiss him.
Why is that stupid again?
"He's gonna need therapy."
"It helps," she finds herself saying. And by some good grace gets the courage to continue opening herself up to him, exposing herself.
"In a place where I can finally accept everything that happened that day."
She swallows, looks him right in the eyes because where else can she look? She wants to live in the warmth of those eyes and the joy in that smile. He's everything. He's her everything. And it's about time he knows it.
"Everything," she whispers, biting her lip and holding her breath. She waits for his next words, for a signal, a sign that he understands what she isn't saying.
His gaze never wavers from her own, intent on letting her see everything he feels for her. His desire illuminates his eyes, and she's dangerously close to acting on her own feelings. Her heart beats a thousand times a minute. She is so ready, so ready to have him, so desperate to have him that she finds herself opening up even more.
"And that wall I was telling you about? I think it's coming-" He takes a modest step closer, makes her want to reach out to him, curl her hands around his pink cheeks and run them through his hair now that it's matted down from the wig. "—down."
Kate releases a measured breath, trying to maintain some semblance of control.
"Well I'd like to be there when it does."
Yes, Castle. Oh, yes.
"Yeah, I'd like you to be there too." She takes a daring step forward, her lips part prepared and eager for just a taste of him, just a taste to satisfy her hunger.
"Only, without the zombie make-up," Castle jokes, a slight smiling sporting his lips and it's just enough to ease the tension, to break their heated gaze.
Tilting her head to the side, she flicks her eyes up at him once more, a teasing smirk making an appearance. "I kinda think the zombie make-up suits you, Castle."
"Yeah, I make it work," he responds, head tilted down to watch his foot kick at nothing but air.
The laugh she gives is genuine, but it feels like so much more than that. It feels like the floodgates to her heart have been reopened, waves of want just gushing to the surface, ready to spill over the rim, and she's right on the brink of confession. Her throat opens up to let it all flow freely, to let everything she's been stuffing away finally see the light of day.
With mouth ajar and fiddling hands, Kate Beckett finally puts a voice to the thoughts swirling around in her head. Although, they're not quite what she was expecting.
"Do you wanna do something tonight?"
Bowling.
They're going bowling.
She's taking him bowling.
When he asked her what it was she had in mind, she had to stop herself from saying something like rip each other's clothes off, and bowling was the next alternative.
Kate hasn't been bowling in years. Not since college at least. She's just as baffled as he is at her suggestion.
"Ye-yeah. Kate, I'd love to." Despite the last minute offer, Castle smiles and it's contagious, happy. She can't help mirroring his affection. It's been way too long since she's made him smile, and now that she's getting this kind of smile-full of warm affection, joy crinkled in his eyes, a chipper lilt to his voice-she wants to only make him smile from now on. "Just, can we stop at my place? Don't think going as a zombie is very wise."
It's quiet when they arrive at the loft. No sounds of music or footsteps, no one on the couch or in the kitchen.
"Where are Martha and Alexis?"
"My mother is out doing her thing I guess," Castle responds shrugging off his coat and draping it across the arm of the couch. "Alexis is probably fretting about where she's going to spend the next four years of her life. She's been doing so much research."
"She hasn't made a decision about college yet?" Kate asks, watching him as he rolls up his sleeves and walks towards his office. She sighs, shuts her eyes for a moment.
Those arms. God.
"Oh, she will. She's smart and I believe in her. She just needs to believe in herself."
Kate nods, follows right behind him into his office until she's forced to come to a sudden stop when he turns to face her.
"I'm sorry. I'm being a bad host," he says, his smile a permanent feature upon his face. "Can I get you anything?" You. "Need to use the bathroom?"
She shakes her head. "No, I'm fine."
"I'm gonna try to get this gunk off my face. Shouldn't take too long I think," he jokes, flashing her another grin. Once he's out of eyesight, Kate flops down on the couch in his office, runs her fingers through her hair, frustrated with herself, with this whole situation. It's crazy because she could have sworn that just yesterday morning he was speaking as if this was his last case and now here he is, acting and talking as if nothing has changed between them, as if the past few weeks haven't happened at all. If Kate doesn't get some answers soon, she might just scream.
Taking off her jacket, Kate waits for Castle to finish in the bathroom.
Asking him out had come at a complete surprise for her, but all she could think in that moment was keep him, don't let him get away. They haven't spent nearly enough time outside of work together and the more she thinks about it, the better this spur of the moment idea seems to be. This can only help them find each other again, work their way back into their regular dynamic after the mess of the last few weeks.
After Jacinda and Hunt, Slaughter and sinning in silence, she's more than ready to move over the next hurdle in their relationship. Even if that means dipping her toe in the pool of her feelings that she's been steadily avoiding this year. It's long overdue anyway. She wants her partner back.
"Kate." The sound of her name jerks her back to reality. Before she can rise from the couch, Castle's standing in the doorway looking boyish and guilty, with half his face smudged by dried make-up. "I didn't think it would be this difficult to get it off."
"Make-up can be a bitch. But I figured you knew this?" She says, her voice raising at the last bit, teasing.
"Yeah, well I knew that, but...but," he stutters, glances at her with nervous eyes. Neither of them speak for a minute, caught up in what he isn't saying. The tension from their moment in the parking lot is still palpable, lingering in the air between them, putting them right back on that precipice of something great.
Kate bites her lip, bows her head. "Need some help?"
It's awkward. Kate thinks it's because Castle seems to know exactly what she's thinking at every moment now, and if so, he knows she's only holding on by a thread.
Giving in to her impulse would be so easy. So very easy to just lean in and take what she desires. A little bead of perspiration forms on the crown of her head. Castle went to get some of Alexis' make-up remover, and she's standing between his legs once more, only this time Kate's avoiding his eyes like the plague. She just needs to get the gunk off his face and then she can get some relief. But standing so close to him, touching him has her mind all in a daze, her senses overwhelmed with the dazzling sensations of him. His warmth, his smell, his everything.
Castle's eye level with her chest when he sits on the toilet seat, so when he lifts his head to meet her eyes, the tip of his nose grazes the side of her chest and she sucks in breath, eyes shooting down to meet his.
"Sorry," he says, the red in one visible cheek burning brighter by the second. "So, uh," he starts, clearing his throat for a moment before meeting her eyes once more. "Something you said at the hospital has been bugging me for a while."
Looking away and closing her eyes for a brief moment, Kate sighs, tries to get her breathing under control.
She knows where this is heading.
"Really?" Her voice falters anyway, too stark in the quiet room for him not to have heard.
"Or rather something you didn't say."
"You have a question about something I didn't say?"
"When I–" He swallows, twines his fingers together to have something to do with his hands. "-said people remember life altering events? You didn't deny it."
Kate can hear what he isn't saying. Loud and clear. And it's this moment where it's all put into perspective, she sees everything she hasn't these past couple of weeks. Why he's been acting out, pulling away, and seeing other people. He knows. Knows.
It feels as if the ground she's standing on is beginning to shake.
"Why?" he asks.
"I can't speak for everyone, Castle," Kate supplies after a few silent moments, hand still gentle as she swipes the make-up off his face. Furrowing her brow, Kate bites her lip, meets his eyes again. "For me at least, um…" It feels as if the temperature just skyrocketed. The little bead of sweat on the crown of her head grows, drips down the back of her neck and coats it in a thin sheet of liquid. Wearing a turtleneck was a really stupid idea. "Yeah, I uh, agree."
"You agree?" As Castle sits up straighter he places both palms on his knees, intrigued by her statement. Titling his head to the side, she notices his entire body shifts slightly to the left.
"Yes. When something tragic happens, people remember."
"And is there something making you," he clears his throat, "them feel unsafe?"
The floor starts to crack right under her feet.
Kate sighs and tosses the wet wipe she's using to the side and takes a deep breath.
"Castle." She looks down, her hair curtaining her face and her voice timid, the murmur of his name drawn out, Casssssle.
"I remember," she continues. "I remember what you said to me when I was shot."
A moment passes while she waits for a reaction to her words, but none come. "But I'm guessing you already knew that."
Castle rolls his lips in, goes to stand but she stops him with a shake of her head.
"Yeah," he breathes. "I know."
The ground cracks open even wider and she's standing on the edge now, can see right down into the dark rabbit hole.
"And I don't know how you knew or how you figured it out, but I hope you can forgive me for lying. That-" she swallows, "you know it doesn't mean I don't…," she watches him suck in a silent breath, waiting, always waiting, for her to continue. "Feel the same."
"You do?"
"This is why you've been different, right?" Okay. She's bolder now that she's said it. Now that she's put her heart out on her sleeve, confessed her true feelings, she can talk. Okay. She can work with this. "Because you're angry with me for lying?"
Castle nods. "I thought you only lied because you-."
"- didn't feel the same," she continues, understanding clearing the fog from her head.
Kate scoffs and shakes her head, takes an infinitesimal step nearer. Tucking her hair back behind her ear, she fixes him with earnest eyes, and whispers, "How could you think that?"
Kate plucks a new wet wipe out of the container and places two gentle fingers on his chin to begin swabbing at the black lipstick staining his mouth.
There was a hole beneath her on the ground, directly under her toes, but now it's slowly sealing. And she's above it, above the danger, above the fear, above the unknown.
"After everything we've been through together to get here, how could you think something so stupid?"
"I'm sorry," he chokes out.
"Don't be. You have every right to be angry with me, Castle."
"If I had known how you felt...I know we talked on the swings but I-I just wasn't sure. And when I got it in my head that you didn't feel the same, I saw everything that had happened since then in a different way."
Like she was placating him.
Just," she sighs, sets the dirty wipe on the sink. "It's my fault. I haven't been clear in my feelings, I know." Kate bows her head for a moment before lifting her back to him. "And I'm sorry for that. But, you have to know that everything I've done since the shooting, including the lie, has been to get better. I wanted to be better, both physically and mentally, for you. Because you are it for me. This," she gestures between the two of them with her finger before carding them through his hair. "Is end game for me."
"Really?" he mouths, unable to form words, but his hand finds her thigh and tugs her a little bit closer so their faces are mere inches apart.
Kate nods, her hand in his hair coming over to cup his cheek, the other finds solace on the back of his neck. "It always has been."
The hand on her thigh is bleeding warmth into her skin and it spreads like a wildfire throughout her body, igniting her. It sucks up all the oxygen between them so all they can breathe in is each other.
Kate isn't sure who moves first, but next thing she knows, his lips are on hers. Feather light and delicate, it still has her body erupting in goosebumps.
She's kissing Richard Castle.
Her best friend, her partner. And it's so good. He tastes like warm baths and lazy Sundays, uncontrollable laughter and hot coffee. He feels like finally.
But then he deepens the kiss letting the tip of his tongue graze the roof of her mouth and it sends shockwaves echoing through her nerves. Her grip in his hair tightens and Kate finds herself wanting to get closer, for their bodies to dance together.
Castle's hands climb up her body, his fingers burrow under her shirt, and slide up her skin. Kate can feel a weakness ascending her legs, settling in her knees, and she sinks down into his lap, grinds herself against him as she opens her mouth even further. Drinking him.
She hears herself moan, but it gets lost in translation when she gasps at the hardness she feels beneath her. Castle groans as a result of her movements, both hands coming to rest on her thighs once more, as if he's about to lift her.
"Castle," she whispers in between breaths, but he gives her no time for air, just presses his mouth back to hers with fervor.
The next thing she registers is being in the air, the strength of Castle's muscles carrying her over to his sink and setting her down. Legs wrapped around his waist she immediately makes haste of unbuttoning his shirt. Castle leaves her mouth to begin working at her neck, growls in frustration when he can't get to it because of her sweater. Kate doesn't know whether to laugh or cry. All she knows is that she wants those lips on her body, everywhere.
"Take it off," she pants. "Just take it off."
When his fingers start to lift her shirt her chest begins to rise and fall faster, the thumping of her heart increases tenfold. He takes his time with it too, revealing her skin inch by inch until he reaches her breasts.
Kate watches his eyes darken and it makes her curl her toes in anticipation because she knows he's about to pounce. It's in the way his tongue peeks out his lips, the way his fingers caress her skin, and he looks up for permission.
She nods, lifts her arms and arches her back so he can take her shirt off all the-
"Hahahahaha!" Someone yells and then there's a loud blasting sound coming from the side of the shower and all Kate registers is the sight of Alexis jumping into the room.
Both Kate and Castle yell in surprise, but Alexis screams when she realizes what she's interrupted. Kate rushes to pull down her shirt and to jump off the counter, but Castle is too stunned to take a step back, even when his daughter and her blazing hair make their exit.
"Castle," she grunts and shoves on his arm, knocks him out of his stupor.
"Umm, I- I uh," he clears his throat before he meets her eyes and she knows what he's thinking before he speaks again. The true implication of what they were about to do, the lines they were about to cross. Oh. She wants it. She still wants it.
"Should go talk to your daughter."
"Yeah, yeah I should." He wraps a secure arm around her middle, tugs their bodies even closer. "But what about-"
"I'll be here. Fine." And she flashes him a nervous smile, hoping that he'll believe her.
"One second," he promises before he's leaning in to kiss her cheek (she blushes, admittedly) and heading out the door.