Misconception


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She can't lift her head or tears will fall and she's been so good at keeping it together.

She just has to breathe.

He shifts; she can see his shadow against the counter. He sighs. "And I guess I'm breaking your heart too?"

She chews fiercely on the inside of her cheek. "Yeah. Little bit." Her voice is steadier than she expected.

"I think that's going to happen, Kate. We're both strong-willed people who have complicated lives. But I think it's a good sign - having a heart to break at all - because it means we care. And if you're afraid of that, well, I can name a hundred more frightening things. Dying in childbirth, that scares the shi-"

"God, Castle," she groans, dropping her head into her hands. She's shaking. "Like I need one more thing."

"Sorry, sorry," he says, but he doesn't sound sorry. She lifts her head and he's coming around the counter and wrapping his arms around her, cupping the side of her face to chastely kiss her temple.

They both freeze with the naturalness of his movement, of how real and true it feels to be doing this right now when all they've really had of each other is a night she took because she was selfish.

And yet he kissed her and now holds her to him like they've done it before, forever. She wonders if he's had the same dreams she has, dreams where it's easy and they touch each other, dreams where she can reach out to him and not fear the consequences. His embrace makes her think maybe so, and that fills her whole world with hope again.

She turns even as his arms loosen and fall away, but she puts her hands on his waist, lightly, keeping him close.

"We have to talk about this," she whispers.

"Giving birth?" he says, a wild look in his eyes.

"No. What you did - have done for me."

His face grows mulish, his eyes slide away.

She tightens her fists in his shirt and tugs on him, dragging his attention back to her. "Castle. Can you at least agree that we make a good team?"

His grin slices fast across his face and licks through her like lightning, a rush of heat and want that makes her glad she's hanging on.

"Yeah," he says, wolfish. "We are very good together. You were right - I had no idea."

The heat is liquid under her skin, and suddenly she doesn't want to talk at all. Not unless she's saying dirty things to him and making him come undone.

She wants him. Like that night, but for more. For the rest of - for however many nights she can have. Every day she manages not to ruin them, she wants those nights, body to body, wants it so very badly. Him.

"We're very good together," she hums, taking one more step closer, her body almost touching his. "You and me. Partners."

She can see the effect on him, more than ever before, and maybe because suddenly it's not necessarily a tease. She could actually take him by the hand and lead him back to his bedroom.

She's never been in his bed. Not his bed. She really wants to do that. Tonight. She wants this to end well for them - or not end - and she knows he does too.

See where this might go.

"Castle?"

"Partners," he gasps. "Partners."

"Promise me," she says. It's underhanded, and she knows it, but-

"Promise," he says, fast, his throat thick so that his voice is eroticism itself. "I promise, Kate. I do."

Already practicing.

"Then I promise, too," she answers. "I do too." And it is a promise. To try this, to really try, like he asked. "Even if - anything. If anything, if hearts get broken, I promise."

He looks both turned on and incredibly relieved, and she almost hates to do it to him.

"And if we're partners - because we're partners - then my mother's case, and this deal you've made? If it's too dangerous for me, then it's too dangerous for you. Or - or we both investigate it, like we should, like we ought to do. Partners. Smith gets all or none, Castle. Both of us or none of us."

His face falls as he realizes what she's done, what he's promised.

"You tricked me."

And she's pregnant. With his baby, his future too here. She's tricked him all the way around.

"Maybe I did."

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