His body shudders as she does it again.
She makes the noise and his knees almost give out under the weight of holding himself up, the weight of keeping her with him – every step of the way.
She doesn't even realise she's doing it. She's stifling moans, catching them on her tongue. He can hear the hitches in her throat, her mouth so close to his ear that he can hear every single noise, even those she strangles them and they die before they reach her own lips.
He disrupts their rhythm when he hears it, the stifled moan, realising what caused it and how he can repeat it. He traps her hard against the door, stopping the roll of her hips, the bumps and the grinds.
He's delighted with himself as she gasps, shocked for half a second that he's disrupted their rhythm, but her shoulders slacken against the door, a distinct rattle, and he knows she's regained some of that control at the sound.
She jerks a little as she comes into contact with it, like she forgot the door behind her was there. "Shift so-"
He cuts her off, stealing her mouth once again as she squirms beneath him a little, too enticing and completely deliberate in the tease – he's sure. "Not moving, don't care." He huffs the words into her mouth after he's slid his tongue over hers, finding the edge of her tongue sliding back into his mouth, following his words.
He wants to shudder as she dances her tongue through his mouth, lets him continue to keep her pressed so tight against the wall, hands under her arse preventing her movements while he continues his own.
She chuckles, a stifled moan creeping out the edges of the noise reverberating through her chest and his. A sound deep with arousal and a contentment he can't quite place.
"If someone-"
He interrupts again. "They'll know, Kate."
She presses her ankles hard against his arse, levering herself so she can move too, join the pace he's managing to maintain, around words – so many words. No lingering looks, just noise, audible noise. It's so rare for the two of them.
They're not quite being direct, though they are most certainly to the point.
Her breath hitches, still in his mouth, as she drops her weight down, sliding her body those few inches down the door, the material of her dress slick along the wood.
She huffs a breath as he lets her slide but nothing more. Doesn't unwrap his fingers from her skin or loosen his vice of a grip.
"How will they?" She sounds disbelieving.
He drops his mouth to the skin under her clavicle, trailing along the curve of the bone, chin grazing her chest, her sternum too, as he moves across. "Door," he manages, brushing his teeth over skin, dragging his lower incisors across a rib, lip hitching, stopping, as he grows lazier, lingering with the taste of her skin.
"It's not… You think someone's waiting?"
"Ha," he says to her skin, muffled by the fact he's dragging his chin across the edge of her bra, following the strap he half flicked off her shoulder. "Don't care," his voice is soft as he slides his tongue across the fat, the connective tissue, finally able to brush his teeth across skin and catch it between them, nip and soothe it with his tongue.
She doesn't say anything just inhales, dragging her chest upwards, angling it under his mouth, like she's urging him to continue to taste the skin she's exposing with her movements, the skin he's slowly revealing with his own.
He drags his mouth across every inch skin beneath it in a two second dash back to her mouth.
She swallows around his tongue, taken by surprise. Good, she ought to be.
And she shows it, dropping a hint she is almost unaware of.
"Again," he mutters against her lips, her tongue stealing the words, drinking them in.
He feels her open her mouth to respond, become distracted as she tries to speak through his swift motion, too well timed – he knows her too well.
Her body arches beneath him, hips jostling the door as she lifts to press against his body, legs clinging so tightly to him he can't think straight. Her shoulders are heavy on the door and he slides his hands up her back, skimming the small, dancing across the skin, exploring the dip.
Her body goes slack again, chasing his as he retreats, heavy and content as he moves to do it again.
He hears the way she forces control, steals her voice before she speaks. It's completely silent, but still so audible, to him – he hears everything she doesn't say, always has. "I told you…" she manages but then she abandons speech, discontinues it in favour of a response, to another well-timed movement.
He's trying to catch her off guard, and to his own surprise, is succeeding.
The noise that escapes her mouth sounds more like an 'oof' than a moan.
She's containing them, hiding them from him. Still.
But no more hiding.
Half-naked in a restaurant's restroom is not exactly a time for modesty.
"Relax," he mutters.
"I am." The protest is soft, she knows it not true just like he does. But she forges on. "If you don't think I'm-"
He wants to laugh at her, defiant and stubborn and as sexy as she's ever been, arching beneath him, body beginning to twitch in time with his own, so in sync he can't tell who is causing which movements. But she's fighting it, holding on and holding out.
She needs to stop, he understands why she is hesitating, but she's not helping either of them.
Not right now.
"Kate," he mumbles, interrupting. He feels her shift beneath him again, arch against the door again – how they're holding a conversation is beyond him, but this comes so naturally. He's waited so long, considered all the possibilities, that this defiance is one thing he'd thought of years ago – once he cracked her shell, realised she was more than this mysterious woman who wouldn't give an inch, not when he asked for something and most certainly not when he begged. His mind worked from scenarios of fulfilling need, quick and dirty – kind of like this, to more slow, exploratory as he maps which areas of her body he will explore, the ways he will use his mouth and body to make her writhe beneath him – how he will later.
"Uh-huh," she responds.
Seems she's not so good with words in this moment, a sign in of her fight, how her reasons are crumbling around her, despite her efforts to guard herself. The words are caught in her throat with the moans, with the orgasm she's stifling, pushing back while she hesitates – a little late for that now and he knows she realises that.
He does suppose she has a point, once it happens, once she quivers around him and beneath him and slides down his body and her feet hit the floor, they have to right themselves, head back to the table, either making excuses to leave or behave and stay.
Her quip with Lanie makes him think they'll be leaving. Or she will be, and if she doesn't freak, doesn't run, she'll be taking him with her.
But she doesn't seem to be… running.
"Castle," she bites. In this moment that should be the way she says his name, harsh and breathy. But the reasoning isn't right. She's grabbing his attention because he was supposed to be making a point.
Right.
He closes his mouth over hers, quickly, flicking his tongue over her mouth, touching each corner, each crevice.
He withdraws and she presses her shoulders to the wall, her head too, meeting his gaze, curious, flushed and-
He is getting distracted again.
He grunts as she lets him crash her against the door (again) with another noise – an improvement but not enough.
"What's stopping you?"
She looks taken aback.
But he doesn't exactly have time to dance around the issue, prolong this inevitable conclusion and he wants her there too. And she is, already – he's almost certain she's been holding it back since she arched the first time.
"Exactly," he answers for her, "nothing."
She chews her lip and he joins her, nips at her top lip so she drops the bottom one. He slides his tongue over it, soothing and nipping once or twice, for good measure.
She forces her tongue between his lips, sliding between teeth still holding her lip, defiant and certain.
Then she shakes her head against his. "Words," she manages.
He arches a brow, and like she can see it, she responds accordingly.
"Talk to me," she says softly, a noise itching in the back of her throat.
He can't refuse that, he can't deny her anything – but words… that he can do.
"Hmm," he says softly, "what do you want me to say?" If he's going to do this, talk to her, she needs to clarify what she wants, which words – he has to be certain, he can barely form a coherent sentence, let alone weave her an image, tell her a-
She shudders under his mouth.
"Anything," she groans and arching against him, rocking her hips, setting a pace he's more than happy to match.
"So the sound of my voice…" He's curious, kind of teasing. He has to make the most of this, right? She'd think less of him if he didn't.
"Shut up," she bites, the butt of her heels drawing him as close her body can manage as soon as he draws back, just a fraction. Her fingers are deep in his shoulders, clinging.
"Oh well then I'll just stop-"
"Don't," she gulps around the word
He hums and sets his mouth to her neck, against the larynx that's rising and falling. "Well then stop interrupting."
"I'm not…" she huffs a breath, lifting hair off her cheek, skirting his as it rises and falls.
"You are. Because that's what you do, what we do. We finish each other's sentences. We fight," she quivers, "but you enjoy it. You like when I give you some crazy theory. You like my books-"
She opens her mouth and the noise … that noise was significantly less strangled. But still, she's not there yet.
"- but I'm pretty sure," he trails off.
She grunts at him, a huff and a protest.
"I need…"
"What?" she asks, forcing air between her teeth.
"A second," he bites, the words and with his teeth, a soft nip – a coax and a plea.
"Speechless?"
He huffs, agreement to her skin.
"Words."
"Really?" he asks.
She hums, a tease.
He groans and finds her ear, sliding his tongue along the soft skin of the shell, skirting edges, following boundaries. "if you don't stop fighting this-" he thrusts against her then withdraws completely "-then you are going to be left-" he crushes her body to the door, the body that chased his back in his retreat "-very, very frustrate-"
"No."
He swallows, flicks his tongue behind her ear, exhaling harshly onto the wet skin of her ear, folded awkwardly beneath his cheek.
"Yes," he corrects. "Because if you-"
His head whips around as soon as her mouth drops to his jaw, meeting her as she draws back for breath.
"If you," he speaks softly into her mouth, "don't-"
She sinks her teeth into his lower lip.
He groans and withdraws from her, almost completely, and she stops too, waiting.
Their stubborn wills have meet more times in the last week than he cares to recognise, but in the entirety of their partnership, this has to be the longest she's ever held out, especially when he was so sincere, so attuned to her need and so ready to give her everything she needs and wants and doesn't even realise. Sure it started with coffee, but the edge she's skirting – she needs to stop being so stubborn.
She sucks his lip into her mouth and he feels the twitch of her ankle at his arse, insistent and trying for control. But she lacks the upper hand, and she knows it, so she draws his lip deeper into her mouth and nips at the edge, quick and agile – using what she can.
But he doesn't flinch, except the gush of air that rushes out of his mouth, a hitch in his own throat.
She opens her mouth to –
He doesn't know what she was going to do. It doesn't really matter.
He takes another opportunity and brings her flush against him again, clinging as she arches against him, his mouth and clings to his body. It shouldn't work, but it does.
They work, when they shouldn't.
But he's succeeded.
Finally.
The groan she emits, the clench of her teeth on his lip and hers, as she relinquishes control, drops a battle and starts at his arse again, her ankles instructing, has him following her lead.
Finally.
She drops his mouth and pulls his head to her ear.
"Ugh," she huffs. "Again."
He chuckles as soon as she begs, already obliging – she doesn't need to ask, not when she's succumbing, quivering and twitching, writhing against him.
She nips his earlobe as he withdraws, sucking the flap into her mouth.
Waiting, preparing, for repetition.
He makes her wait, until she has to breath around his earlobe (luckily she's more than short of breath so it only takes a second for her to release the flap of skin) and snatch it back between her teeth, he waits until she groans with it – frustration of her own.
He interrupts half way through, giving her more than enough reason to justify the change in her pitch, the hitch in her voice as she loses the voice to convey it.
And her control.