He did, of course, because who was he to resist her? Castle flicked the phone onto speaker, set it on the bedside table where it stood like a sentry.

His arousal throbbed almost painfully, pushing against the restraint of his underwear, and he couldn't hold back a hiss as he ran the tip of one finger over himself through the silken fabric, propped himself up against the headboard of his bed.

"Do it. I'm not going to last." she commanded, bossy.

"What - ahhh - makes you think I will, Beckett?" he pulled his erection free from his boxers, thumbing the head roughly.

There was a beat of silence in which he teased his length with one finger, slowly, the way he'd told her to touch himself. She was quiet, too, and it took a moment for him to realize that she was listening to his swiftly quickening breathing.

"Shit," Beckett hissed down the line, saying the word like a prayer. "You really are enjoying this, aren't you?"

"That would be an understatement." Castle replied, keeping his touch on himself light, because he was wound up a lot tighter than he'd anticipated, and as embarrasing as it was, it really wasn't going to take much at all.

(Somehow, this whole situation was colored by the fact that he missed her. Not just missed her in that way - which, of course, he did - but he missed the mismatched fuzzy socks she always wore at night and then left scattered around the loft, how she let him plait her hair when she was tired, the way she talked so easily with his mother. He missed all of it. All of her.)

"I wish my mouth was where your hands are right now." God, her brain-mouth filter was a bit disconnected, probably because of a combination of exhaustion and ridiculous lust. He groaned, anyway, because he knew she meant it.

"And vice versa." Castle added, wrapping his fingers around his cock and stroking up, down, producing a raw kind of pleasure that shuddered through his entire body. "We should, when you I back. Both of us at the same time. We haven't tried that before."

It would be an incredible sensory overload, his mouth on her while her mouth was on him... he toyed with the weight of his balls with his free hand, rough fingertips against sensitive skin.

"Yessss.." He couldn't tell whether the exclamation was directed towards his suggestion or her fingers or both of them. Her fingers. Right.

"Two fingers, Kate. Slide them where you want them, crook them inside yourself the way that I'd do, so that you feel it, really feel it."

He heard the hitch in her breathing, the little "ohhh..." that slid from her lips, and he knew she was doing it.

"God, Castle."

"People do tend to get the two of us confused."

"Shut up and get me off." Beckett growled - growled! - at him. Her voice was hot, curling around the edges, like morning sex in the shower. He really, really wanted to get a plane ticket to New York right this instant, have her meet him at the airport, drag her into the nearest bathroom and not leave much of what he wanted to the imagination.

But for now? Getting her off sounded great.

"Faster. However fast you're going, go faster. Curl your thumb around, stroke it over your clit, rub circles the way I did the first time we fucked."

She made a muffled groan; her face was probably pressed into a pillow, mouth wet against the fabric, trying to stifle the noises she was making. He knew she liked it when he swore; there had been this one time where he'd let a few expletives loose in the interrogation room with a particularly obtuse suspect, and the next thing he knew, she'd dragged him into a spare closet and started sucking on his neck. Ohh. Good memories.

"No, Kate, don't muffle it. I want to hear. I need to hear."

"Castle, Castle, Castle." she husked, and he realised that the reason she'd been keeping quiet was because she was saying his name, over and over under her breath, a mantra, a chant. "Are you... how close, Rick?"

"Close. Uhh. Very close." Castle managed to choke out, his hand fisting tighter, speeding up as he worked himself higher and higher.

"Castle. Fuck. The thought that you're- at the same time I am - it's fucking hot." Well. He liked it when she swore, too. Somehow she could make the words sound better than they were, especially when she said them with her hand down her pants. "I wish I could see you right now. I've always wanted to watch you."

The last sentence piqued his interest. She'd always wanted to watch him. His hand pumped, faster, faster.

"You've always wanted to watch me?"

"I've always- oh. Shit, that feels good. - wondered about you. Wanted to know what you'd look like as you came. Wanted to know if you did it while you were thinking about me, the way I did about you."

"I did, I did... wait, you did? Since when?"

"Since a long time back, Rick, since before I was in love with you. Castle, I don't know how much longer I can-"

"Then let yourself go, I'll be right with you. Pump your fingers harder, stroke that special spot inside of you; you know the one. Press down harder on your clit, and know that if I could, I would be doing that - all of it - to you."

Then all that existed was the rasp of his breathing and the in-out-in-out gasping of hers, the blur of his hand on his cock as he felt the warm point of ecstasy growing, spreading through his blood like liquid fire in his veins.

It wasn't what he wanted. He wanted her, just like he will every day for the rest of their life, not just his own hand, but with the sound of her making tiny little moans that sound suspiciously like his last name, it was just enough.

He came in hot spurts all over the fabric of his boxers with a grunt of her name and a final buck of his hips.

They lapsed into a sated silence. Castle slid down the headboard of the foreign bed, his head falling onto a starchy pillow that smelled nothing like her.

"I love you." she said, first, and it surprised him.

"I love you too."

"No, I really love you. More than anything, ever." he loved her when she was sleepy and honest with him.

"I know the feeling, sweetheart." Did he just call her sweetheart? She didn't call him up on it, and the endearment felt suprisingly natural. "You should probably get to sleep, and I should, uh, go have a shower."

"'Kay." she murmured, and Castle pictured her nuzzling her smile into the pillow.

"Sweet dreams, Kate."

"They'll be of you."

Click.

And the line went silent.