Note: Spoilers for the third Richard Castle novel, Heat Rises.
He didn't sleep very well.
The opportunity was so rare; so achingly beautiful; so far beyond belief that his senses maintained their hyper-vigilance despite the best arguments of his tired mind. Every time she moved against him, his eyes would open, body alive and aware; every shift in her breathing would alert his subconscious and draw him out of whatever doze he had convinced himself to fall into. As if tonight had to last forever; as if it was all he had to carry him through what tomorrow may bring.
Kate, on the other hand, slept like a baby on his shoulder, unburdened and free.
Somewhere after dark and before dawn, his body finally gave in to the oblivion. He woke once, but the light hurt his eyes and his head ached from scant sleep. Turning away from the brightness, he found he had space to sprawl out as he snagged a pillow and buried his face; stretched his arms beneath the cool cloth. And gave in again.
When his head landed on the mattress, and sunlight was everywhere no matter which way he turned, he finally opened his eyes. Inexplicably, his pillow had disappeared from beneath him. He blinked, head sideways, noting this wasn't his room, or his bed - and that definitely wasn't his closet. Way too many heels. And suddenly everything went dark as the pillow folded itself over his head.
"Castle."
He dragged a hand in a wide arc up the sheets, slopped it across the softness covering his face and flung it behind him, grunting.
"You missed."
He smiled at the playfulness, at getting to wake up like this, at...everything. Just smiled.
"Castle - get up."
He heard the swish in time; managed to throw up an arm as he turned his head, blocking the blow so it rolled across his back and toppled off the edge of the bed. "Good morning to you too," he groused humorously.
"Do you always sleep like this?" Beckett gestured to his diagonal slant, the bed nearly stripped of sheets and blankets. "It's nearly ten." She was sitting against the headboard near the nightstand, her laptop angled across her thighs.
"So?" He picked up his head and rose onto his elbows to get a better view. "It's Saturday."
She looked at him and gave a begrudging hum, amusement flicking the corners of her mouth, something gentle in her eyes.
"What?" he asked, trying to give her steel and failing miserably.
"Mm," she smirked. "Impressive bed head."
He shifted his weight onto one elbow, scuffed his other hand through his hair. "Yeah, so?" Opening his mouth for a smart retort, he stopped as he registered her dark wash jeans and scoop-necked shirt, her hair pulled back in a loose ponytail. "So would you if you didn't get up at such an ungodly hour."
She huffed in disagreement, pressed her lips in a smile. "You made it worse."
"Well then," he returned, pushing onto his side and propping his head on one hand. "You come fix it."
"Really? That's your line, Castle?"
He shrugged. "A man can try."
Beckett shook her head, returned to her laptop as she flicked a finger across the mousepad and resumed typing.
He watched her languidly; the elegant play of her fingers mesmerizing in the morning light. She glanced at him - and his sleepy tongue tumbled, uncensored.
"What made you come find me, after the summer?"
Regarding him a moment, she slid her eyes away and shut her laptop. "A lot of things," she answered cryptically, lifting the laptop onto the nightstand. "Now get up...aren't you hungry?"
He yawned, rolled onto his stomach and rested his head on his folded arms. So sharing was a night thing; he would have to tread softly in the day. "My stomach hasn't woken up yet," he mumbled, stalling. He liked this playful morning pillow talk; liked the fact she had been sitting beside him while he slept, that she felt comfortable enough to smirk at his mussed hair. It seemed that if he stayed here, the day would never start; that they could exist in limbo and not have to define boundaries; that she wouldn't have the chance to push him away.
Her hips twisted awkwardly so she could nudge at his shins with her good foot. "Well I'm starving. So get your lazy self out of my bed and let's make some breakfast."
She had waited to make breakfast with him? "Okay," he mumbled, "I'm going." Dragging himself off the bed and yanking his t-shirt straight again, he saw her glide off the opposite edge and snag her crutches from the nightstand, deftly positioning herself between them. As he shuffled across the room, a belated thought struck him. "Hey -" he asked, turning in the doorway with one palm rubbing his eye, "how did you carry your laptop on crutches?"
She was close behind him, and brought the end of a crutch up against his knee, nudging him back around. "Don't worry about it. I'm pretty good with these things."
He grunted, turned, and padded into the kitchen.
Now that he was here, standing before the open fridge, he realized how empty his stomach actually was. Eggs, milk, orange juice, strawberries, there was a meat drawer - what was in it? Oh yes, he remembered...ham and roast beef, but no bacon, he didn't think...maybe sausage links?...no, that's right, it was a pack of hot dogs. So. Maybe she had a waffle iron. Alexis could email him his mother's recipe-
He heard punctuated clicking behind him: the sound of her crutches jiggling against their bolts.
"Hey - don't you think it's cold enough outside?" Her chin bumped his shoulder, eyes peering over his outstretched arm as he held the door open. "Would you mind shutting the fridge and stop racking up my energy bill? I can tell you what's in there."
"Oh. Yeah, sure. Sorry." He lost his train of thought at her voice so close to his ear, startled by her voluntary proximity. Maybe today wasn't going to be so tedious, after all. "So, lady, what are you hungry for?" he asked, turning towards her as he shut the door, wanting to see her face as he spoke.
"I don't care. Pancakes." She was hunched down to rest on her crutches with her shoulders pushed up to her ears, shrugging at him with big eyes and a clueless grin. Totally ridiculous. And completely adorable.
He laughed because he could, felt his smile surge through his heart and into his soul. "Oh, pancakes! I've already made you those - how about waffles this time?"
"You just want an excuse to use my whipped cream," she replied, tilting her head sideways.
If she got any cuter, he was going to sweep her up and kiss her right there. "Nonsense. I would use it on the pancakes as well." He crinkled his eyes endearingly at her. "Why don't you go put your foot up and I'll text Alexis for the best waffle recipe you've ever tasted." Pausing, he glanced over the counters. "Do you have a waffle iron?"
"Yes, I do; it's over here."
And before he could stop her, she had crossed the kitchen with one swing, popped open her pantry and nudged the door wide with a crutch before hopping closer and reaching in with both hands.
"Whoa, hey-" Castle quickly stepped up behind her and reached over her shoulders as she lifted the iron off the shelf, using his height advantage to pluck it from her hands. "Let me help you." Bringing it over her head as she dropped her hands, he stepped away and set it on the counter.
"Castle, I was just going to hand it to you," she protested as she swung back over, looking at him reprovingly.
"Okay - but you could have just told me where it was."
"Yes, but...that would defeat the point." She wasn't slumped down now, and her spine was rigid, holding her at full height.
Tilting his head slightly, he held his reply, sensing this was about more than waffle irons.
A sigh, and she was relaxed again. "So what goes in these oh-so-wonderful waffles?"
Alright, they needed to work on communication. But then, he already knew that. "Well..." he patted his thighs, realized he was still in his pajama pants. "I remember the ingredients...but I need to call Alexis for proportions." Glancing at the table, he frowned. "Where did I leave my phone?"
"It's over on the coffee table by the couch," she offered, pivoting and bobbing to the fridge she held it open with a planted crutch as she reached for the small box of strawberries.
As he walked towards the couch, it dawned on him that she needed to be empowered despite her injury; that she needed to feel she was contributing and not leeching. Realized he needed to stop doting on her and start including her. A part of him felt proud of himself for figuring it out; another part wondered what else simmered beneath the surface of their poor communication.
Whisking his phone off the low table, he dialed up Alexis and subsequently spun about, searching for - oh, there; Beckett was barking to get his attention, waving a pen in the air. Several minutes later, he laid his phone onto the kitchen table beside the scrawled recipe before stealing a couch pillow and tossing it onto one of her kitchen chairs.
"Ok. How about this." Walking up behind her, he crowded close and snagged a strawberry from where she was cutting them into a bowl. "You sit at the table-" he popped the whole berry into his mouth, "-'nd I'll giff you the ingredients." He reached again, was swatted away...and brought his other hand around her opposite side with a sneak attack, scooping a few cut strawberries from the bowl.
"Castle!" she laughed in reprimand, twisting her head to look at him hovering over her shoulder. "Leave some for the waffles."
Her eyes flicked - barely - but it was all the encouragement he needed. Wrapping a hand around her waist to stabilize her, he dipped to sneak a kiss.
It was quick, but the second one was slightly longer, more lingering.
"Mmph," Beckett pulled away, licking her lips. "Go brush your teeth."
He waggled his eyebrows and stole another juicy berry from the box as he retreated, dangling it in triumph. "Gotcha..."
She rolled her eyes; turned back to her task.
This was all too easy...too comfortable...he kept waiting for the hammer to fall, for her to ask him to leave, to let her think it over; nudge him home to Alexis. Yet, clearly she was content to have him near; seemed to be okay with this next step in their relationship - or rather, their giant leap: accepting his love.
What about her wall? Her mother's case?
He spit into the sink, washed his mouth out, stared at himself in the mirror. Indeed, what about her mother's case? It was fine. He was protecting her. No qualms about it.
Tossing his toothbrush back into his toiletry bag, he meandered back into the kitchen, found her opening drawers and collecting cup measures and teaspoons. And with a spike of frightening anticipation, he realized that today was the day: If she wasn't going to bring it up; he was. They had to name this dance; had to define some aspect of their roles and reveal a few expectations - or else they would each be stepping over the other's toes; neither leading, neither following; both confused at the direction of their spin and arguing their way through it.
Not how he saw this going.
He allowed her to load him with a mixing bowl, measuring utensils, and a wooden spoon before trekking to the table as she clicked-swished behind him. She settled into one chair and stretched her foot out to rest on another, sitting sideways to the table as she picked up the recipe and perused their plan of action. Castle trotted to his overnight bag; dug around until he found what he was looking for and returned to her side.
"Hey," he said, nudging his knee against her thigh where it cleared the edge of the seat. "I noticed you're only wearing one sock."
Beckett looked up from the paper. "Yeah - it was too much work to pull one on over all the bandages."
He whipped his hand out from behind his back and displayed his sock for her approval. "Well, how about we solve that, hmm?" He flipped it around, made a show of examining its qualities. "I think it's large enough to cover ankle 2.0 over there, plus it has extra stitching to reinforce the toe and the heel - so I'm deeming this as a highly qualified medical-"
"Okay - Castle, yes." She was giving him her pressed-lip smile, the one she used when she was trying to hide some deeper emotion or suppress some humorous affection. Her fingers reached up from her lap and pressed warmly against his upper thigh. "Would you go put it on for me?"
He grinned, encouraged by the light in her eyes as he turned and carefully worked the sock over the splint. "I wonder what the boys would say about me dressing you..." he mused, pushing up her jeans as he rolled the tube of the sock around her lower calf.
"It's a sock, Castle."
"...and in my clothes!"
"If they know about any of it, I'll nod to Gates and you'll be..." she snapped her fingers.
He glanced up at her, noticed the smirk of her mouth as he tugged the hem down. "Mm...secrecy. Heightens the tension."
She rolled her eyes, shooing him with the paper. "Go bring me the flour and sugar."
Walking back into the kitchen, Castle peered into the pantry and spotted the set of ceramic black jars on the second shelf up. Cradling one in each arm, he trucked back to the table and dropped them within her reach. "If you don't mind my asking, what were you typing up this morning?"
She was already popping open the lids and reaching for her cup measure. "Oh, just the incident report," she said, and then leveled her brow at him pointedly. "Boring paperwork. Figured I'd get it out of the way before you were awake enough to whine about it."
He was already back at the pantry, reaching for the salt and digging around for the baking powder. "Did you elaborate on my crucial role in identifying the suspect and rescuing a fallen officer?"
"No; I usually try and minimize the role of my shadowing civilian. Because he is supposed to be strictly observing."
He chuckled, didn't even try to defend himself. "Hey, Beckett-"
She glanced up, one hand dumping a cup of sugar into the bowl.
"-catch." The baking powder was already leaving his hand, making a smooth arc across the kitchen.
"Castle-!" She dropped the measuring cup into the bowl; shot her other hand out to capture it before the can sailed past her shoulder. "What are you doing?"
"Nice!" he laughed, ducking back into the pantry. "I heard you order Ryan to double the uniforms in that sector last night." He held up a small cylinder. "Salt?"
"No, don't-" and both of her hands reached to stop the tumbling object as it fired towards her face. "Castle, stop! I don't trust your luck."
"Luck?" He narrowed his eyes, reached in for the baking soda while holding her stare. "Skill, detective. Pure skill." Launching the box of soda, he felt a swell of satisfaction as it sailed towards her waist, falling into her waiting hands.
She lifted the box onto table, glaring. "I've got white Christmas all over my lap, Castle," she growled.
He craned his neck to see her over the counter; saw the dusting of soda across her dark jeans. "Huh. Guess you should of closed it when you put it back in the pantry."
She arched her eyebrows in mimicry. "Guess you shouldn't have hurled it across my kitchen."
"Just honing your reflexes while you are laid up: you are still fit for duty," he grinned, crossing over and offering a damp towel to soak up the fine powder. "So did any foul-smelling perps turn up?"
"Well you won't be if you pull any more of those brainless antics," she grumbled, accepting the towel and brushing it briskly across her thighs. "And no; I haven't heard anything. Now go mix up the wet ingredients," she ordered, tossing the towel up against his chest.
"Yes ma'am," he dipped his head in a mock bow, turned back towards the kitchen. "So we just wait?"
"For the most part," she sighed, measuring out a careful teaspoon of salt. "Now I've got two dead-end cases waiting on a fresh break."
Castle cracked a few eggs into a stainless steel bowl; measured in some milk. "I wouldn't say the Hammond case is dead-end. I've got a dozen theories on that one."
"Aliens or vampires?" she snorted. "We've already interviewed every family member associated with Victoria, as well as several of her best friends, without turning over any new clues. The only persons with probable motive are her husband and his cousin Irving, due to the legal case, and both of them have airtight, verified alibis."
Turning on the hand mixer, Castle churned through his memories of each interview; tried to align each of his more plausible theories with the array of facts. He added the vanilla; melted the butter and slopped it in. He found that inspiration often struck when he was doing something else with his hands; he'd been known to cook himself through writer's block. And as he scraped the sides of the bowl and finished blending the watery mixture, a small thread began nagging in his mind. "Did we interview Irving's son?"
"Mmm...yes. Ryan had that one."
"Who verified his alibi?"
Beckett frowned, stirring the flour mixture thoroughly. "I think just Irving. They said they were together, in a family counseling session, or something. The counselor said they'd been working on reconciliation between the two...but they weren't getting anywhere fast. He verified Irving's presence that day...but I don't think we specifically asked the counselor about the son, because frankly, the son's estranged from the family and not really a person of interest. Why?"
"I just got to thinking...Irving and his wife are finalizing a divorce, right?"
Her spoon stopped its circular motion as she tried to anticipate his train of thought. "Yes..."
Castle walked over and retrieved her bowl. "So why would he and his estranged son be working on reconciliation? Doesn't that seem odd - especially for this family?"
"They aren't very forgiving," Beckett mumbled, "But now that you bring it up - had Victoria won, the son would have lost a pretty significant inheritance, if he was still written into the will. There's a motive. Plus-"
"-the son blamed Victoria for his parent's divorce, because the legal battle was the catalyst that sunk his parent's marriage," Castle finished, folding the dry ingredients into the wet.
Beckett tented her fingers near her lips, twin thought lines appearing between her eyes. "I don't know...you think the counseling sessions were a cover for planning Victoria's murder?" She set her teeth against the corner of her bottom lip, pensive. "I wish I had the case files. I think the sessions started long before the legal battle...so I'm not sure they can be tied to Victoria's case." Narrowing her eyes, she pursed her lips. "Unless..."
"-Unless the son is the one who actually has the resources to keep the family's enemies in line, not Irving. No one suspects the son: he is an estranged black sheep with a bad relationship with his father. So Irving keeps up with the family politics..."
"...and the son does his dirty work. Victoria was just another hit in a history of intimidation."
"Exactly." Castle agreed, pouring batter across the hot iron and sprinkling mozzarella cheese into the dripping waffle before shutting the lid. "I'll bet, if you look into their correspondence, you won't find many phone calls or emails. Definitely not anything incriminating."
"Did you just put mozzarella on a raw waffle?" Beckett asked, slightly disgusted.
"Trust me. Secret ingredient."
She looked skeptical, but her brain was still clicking through the case. "So the two fight publicly to cover their tracks, but schedule a session any time Irving needs something done." Beckett leaned back in her chair and shifted her hips into a new position. "Hm. I should run the dates for their therapy sessions against our incident reports - see if any of their acquaintances called in a report of violence or intimidation shortly thereafter. That would be a start. And I should grill the therapist - he may be in on it...but I suppose he wouldn't have to be..."
Castle snuck a look at her face as he set two plates beside the waffle iron and grabbed a few forks. She was staring, unfocused, brow low and steady as she worked through this angle of the case. Perhaps he shouldn't have brought it up: she had thrown a switch and reverted them back to their casual work relationship, sidelining emotions and drawing them away from where he wanted to go.
He swiped the whipped cream from the fridge and picked up the sliced and sugared strawberries; walked to her side and reached across her outstretched legs to set the toppings in the middle of the table. "You want to go in today, don't you?"
"Aren't you curious?" she asked, surprise in her eyes at his neutral tone.
"Sure! It's my theory. But-" he jerked his head towards her ankle. "We argued our way out of a cast because we promised the doc you'd be good and keep it up all weekend."
"Oh come on, I'll be fine. Once I get to the precinct, I'll be bugging my eyes out on the computer going through lists of incident reports; my ankle will be up just as much there as it would be here."
Castle chuckled, turning back towards the kitchen. "Does a Saturday even mean anything to you?" he asked, opening the waffle iron and prying the crisped waffle onto a plate.
She looked at him stubbornly. "Yes. It's a day to accomplish unfinished tasks."
Yeah. Like the unspoken words concerning her feelings for him.
He poured a second waffle onto the iron, added the cheese and shut the lid. Sighing, he brought the steaming waffle over and set it in front of her, smiling gently at her upturned face. "It's a day I'd like to spend making you waffles and putting socks on your feet," he stated, reaching to graze the tips of his fingers along the soft skin beneath her chin as he ran the pad of his thumb across the ridge of her jaw. "We've got the murder board Monday through Friday, hmm?"
She blinked at him, startled; caught off-guard by the sudden intimacy.
Castle watched her eyes as they went from surprise to puzzlement to realization; watched her mind center around his words and collide her two worlds into one.
He was now both her lover and her partner; both her leader and her follower.
Running the backs of his fingers over her cheek, he tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, caressing the delicate shell and lightly thumbing the lobe as he withdrew his hand. "Just think about it. I'll be leaving to check in with Alexis; so if you really want them I could swing over and pick up the case files from the Precinct. I could even take a picture of the murder board," he added with a quirk of his mouth.
And then he thought about the way she was; about how he had been by her side for most of the last twenty-four hours. "Or," he added, "If you need some space...I could drop you off on my way to the loft, and pick you up for dinner." The last few words were more of a question than a statement.
Beckett cut to his eyes when he mentioned space; held them for an instant before she let her eyes fall and drift towards the warm waffle beside her. "We can figure it out later. This smells good."
"Taste it," he urged her, unsure of how to process her answer. She hadn't taken the out. But she hadn't turned it down, either.
So much guessing with her.
"Where's the syrup?" she asked.
"No," he replied, "just taste it naked."
She shot a suggestive eyebrow at him and reached for the waffle.
"Tsk, Beckett; you went there, not me."
"What?" she protested, widening her eyes in innocence.
Castle smirked. "But we can figure that out later too."
She gave a soft snort, placed the ragged piece in her mouth. "Mmm, wow. It's really moist."
It was his turn to waggle an eyebrow, unable to control the twist of his mouth.
"Oh for crying out loud, Castle! Go check on your waffle!" she declared, shoving against his hip.
He turned on a laugh; noticed her phone was chiming softly on the counter. "Oh, hey; it's Ryan." Lifting the phone, he extended his arm slightly as he focused on the screen. "What a dorky picture."
"Oh, good; bring it here."
He took a few steps towards her, stopped on an idea.
She saw something in his face, widened her eyes and sucked in a breath. "Castle, no. If you answer it, I swear-" she set her teeth, looked at him from the corners of her eyes in warning.
"You'll what?" he smirked, raising it for emphasis and pressing his thumb against the answer bar.
"Castle!" Beckett launched herself out of the chair, shoving off the table and hopping forward on one leg faster than he thought possible.
He should have moved to help her; but the sheer determination on her face coupled with the velocity of her approach caused him to jump back a step, releasing the bar unanswered. "Wo'ah, Kate!"
Her last bound brought her within reach - and with a flick of her wrist, she stood clutching the phone in one hand while twisting the collar beside his neck with the other. "Castle! Do you not remember?" Her eyes were like sparks, bright and intense and swirling with activity.
He didn't, actually.
"Pancakes? The amount of torture we had to suffer through that day?"
Oh, right. But she was pressed against him, all tight muscles and fiery expression... "You are so hot," he grinned, steadying her at the waist.
She flushed before she could control it, narrowed her eyes and shoved his shoulder to mask the effect. "And you are pathetically easy to disarm."
"I was more worried about this," he countered, sliding his hand down across the back pocket of her jeans and along her thigh, tapping to indicate her injured leg.
She dropped her face and made a show of checking her phone, but he caught the hitch in her breath. "I need to call Ryan back," she muttered, squirming away from his grasp.
He hid a secret smile, walked past her and retrieved the crutches. "Here. Be good. I'll bet it hurts now, hmm?"
"No..." she groused. "It was time to ice it anyway."
"Uh-huh."
"Your waffle's burning," she pointed her chin in the direction of the counter as she pressed the phone to her ear and rested on one crutch, the other pinned beneath the opposite arm as she hovered her bad leg above the floor.
He opened the iron, used a fork to lift the waffle onto his plate. It was a darker tone than
hers, but nowhere near burned. Walking past her as she conversed with Ryan, he set the plate on the table before stepping to her back, wrapping an arm around her waist and pressing his lips to the slope of her neck near her shoulder.
Because she knew; and he could.
She inhaled a silent breath, hunching her shoulder against her ear to break his contact. "...Yesss, thanks Ryan..." she said, shooting a smoldering glance at him from the corner of her eye.
The crutches were in the way; she couldn't get her elbow into his side as he breathed across the back of her neck and found the jut of her spine. She grunted a warning, rolled her head back to bump his face away.
"No that's fine, just make sure- uh-" her fingers clawed at his forearm as he slipped his hand under the hem of her shirt and skirted her abs, stuttering over her obliques. "-make sure they clear the transfer with...their captain." She twisted her hips, tried to turn against his arm.
He didn't let her; gripped her tighter and found that as his fingers pressed into her side she bent away from his touch, stuttered her breath.
"No, I'm okay, just - cooking." Holding the phone at arm's length, she gasped, dropping a crutch as she frantically tried to dislodge his fingers. "Stop - it!" she growled at Castle, snaking against him in an attempt to free herself.
He grinned. "You're ticklish."
She slapped the phone back to her ear. "Hey Ryan, I gotta go." Tossing the device haphazardly onto the counter, she arched into him and squealed as he found her sweet spot. "Castle - god - stop it!" she stuttered through laughter, one hand wrapping in a vise around his wrist as the other worked to block his fingers. "My - my ankle!"
"Don't cry wolf," he admonished.
Kate finally twisted enough to expose his side, rammed an elbow into the soft muscle beneath his ribs. With a grunt, he loosed his arms, letting her shove off his chest and hop-wriggle away. Standing on one leg, ruffled and trying to catch her breath, she looked radiant despite the glare in her eyes.
"You are walking a fine line, Castle."
He waved a dismissive hand. "I'm a creative. I don't believe in lines." Bending to collect her crutches, he stood to see she had already found her own way back to her chair. "Do you even need these?" he asked, laying them on the floor beside her.
"Aah...they're more for the open road." She reached for the strawberries, and he nudged them her way. "I am starving," she exclaimed. "Sit down so we can eat."
They tackled the waffles with gusto; she only reprimanded him once for the amount of whipped cream he was dispensing.
"So they got him?" Castle asked hopefully, halfway through.
"Oh, yes - a plainclothes from the 32nd ran in to him stealing donuts from a convenience shop."
"Ha! Lucky break. Or unlucky, depending on who we're talking about."
"Lucky for you. You'd have gotten more than an elbow if Ryan hadn't put me in such a forgiving mood."
Castle chuckled. "Lucky for you. Gates won't ream you on Monday."
She tilted her head in deference. "There is that."
The rest of their waffles disappeared; he gestured his fork at her empty plate. "Want another one?"
"Mmm. Maybe a half? You were right about the cheese."
"Told you," he said. "I'll split one with you."
Two waffles and a pile of clean dishes later, he convinced her to go rest on the couch as he returned the ingredients to the pantry and wiped down the counters.
They still hadn't talked.
But she hadn't brought up work either; hadn't mentioned a need for space.
That was something.
He meandered into the living room, found her stretched out on the couch with her eyes closed. When he stepped closer, she must have heard his socks swishing against the wood floor, because her lids flicked open, searching for his face.
"Are you tired?" he asked, standing over her.
"Mmm. I'm full." she mumbled, resting a hand over her stomach.
"When was the last time you indulged in this?"
She lowered her brow, squinting slightly. "In what?"
"A lazy Saturday where you ate a late brunch and took a nap."
"I don't know," she replied, drawing a slow sigh as if it didn't matter, as if nothing mattered except that she was lying here now, relaxed and content. "A while."
He smiled, inwardly purposing to bring her this peace every day of her life if she'd let him. Glancing at the nearby armchair, he wished he was brave enough to presumptively curl up with her.
"Castle." She extended a hand to tug at the knee of his cotton pants. "There's enough room on the couch."
Glancing at her face in surprise, he had a dawning realization. Could it be...?
He dropped himself carefully between the back of the couch and her supple frame, wedging an arm under her shoulder as she rolled into him and tangled her legs with his; held her loosely as she squirmed until she fit exactly in all the right places, wrapping herself around him as a weighted blanket. A liquid, living, luscious blanket.
And when she placed an open-mouthed kiss at the junction of his collar bones before letting out a hot sigh to wash his skin of her touch, he knew it was so.
Kate Beckett was a cuddler. A really, really good cuddler.
It shouldn't surprise him; he remembered observing the way she had let Demming handle her at the Precinct; remembered with glaring clarity how she'd wrapped herself in Josh's arms the day the city nearly died from a dirty bomb. But it did; perhaps because she'd held him at arms length for so long; left him perpetually standing on the other side of the wall.
No more.
Right?
He wrapped his arms tighter around her and buried his nose in her hair, pressing his lips to the crown of her head as he closed his eyes and tried to memorize every line of her body, every subtlety of her scent. Tried to push back thoughts of other men and their failures. They'd all followed this road...but he was different; they'd all touched...but he loved. Oh, howheloved.
Surely it was enough. Surely.
He noticed her hand rubbing circles on his back, soothing, heard her murmur into his shoulder. He was holding her too tight, again. It was just...he didn't know.
Loosening his grip on her lungs, he forced his throat to work. "Cranberry almond?" he said, hoping the humor would distract him from his insecurities. "Where the heck did you find such a wacky concoction?"
She laughed, and that did wonders for his mind. "I bought it from a little girl on the seventh floor. Her mom sells some line of natural hygiene products, and the girl was saving up for a trip to Disney World. She was so cute - and really persistent," she added, chuckling. "It's their Christmas blend or something."
"Ah. And how did you know her mom wasn't just using her for profit?"
She balled her hand into a fist at his back and tugged lightly on his shirt in reprimand. "Stop it. I was making a little girl's dreams come true."
"I know, I know," he smiled, curling downward and nuzzling along her cheek. "You're a softie, aren't you? Under the badge and behind the gun, you're a-"
She turned and took his lips, slicked her tongue along the hot roof of his mouth.
He let her, then broke her grip with a grin as he spoke into her lips. "-a big hearted, hopeless emotional sap."
Pressing her lips in a smile, she poked him in the ribs. "Takes one to know one, Castle."
"You know it," he mumbled, finding her lips again.
After she had devastated him with her subtle movements - after her murmurs and spontaneous hums had unraveled the fabric of his emotions - she slid down to rest her head on his shoulder, the beat of her heart against his stitching him back together, beat by beat.
He stared at nothing, realized lazily that he had no idea what time it was and really didn't care. Kate's jaw was tensing and relaxing against his chest; he thought she was probably worrying her lip; wondered what she was thinking about. Stroking a hand along her ribs, he bent to kiss the line of her forehead in silent support.
Her jaw stopped, and she spread her fingers over his chest in answer, smoothing his shirt beneath her palm.
"It was your book."
Castle furrowed his brow, trying to understand but unable to find the context. "My book?"
She hummed, rolled slightly off of him and looked at the ceiling. "Yeah. It was your book that brought me back."
"Oh." He'd learned to wait for her words, to listen and not lead her on.
Suddenly she twisted into him and pushed up, one hand pressing through the cushions and one planted on his chest. "It was good," she continued, "because it was more than a novel. It was...well, I knew. The subtext."
He opened his lips, but she shushed him, shook her head. "Wait." And then she shifted forward towards the corner edge of the couch, resting her chest against his shoulder as she reached under the frame; brought up a book with the dust jacket removed.
"You keep my book under your couch? Not sure how I should feel about that."
She laughed a little, hovering over him with the book on his chest. "It's a good thing. I was reading it this week."
"Ok. But I think it deserves more respect than that. It's a book."
"I keep my books stacked on my stairs; how do you feel about that?"
"I can forgive it on grounds of artistic expression."
"Mmhm," she dismissed, nudging his side with her knuckles. "Sit up a little."
Castle grunted and pushed himself up from beneath her, settled his shoulders into the cave of the arm. Careful of her ankle, Kate molded into his side beneath his outstretched arm, running a hand across the cover before inserting a finger and flipping it open to the dedication. "I wasn't sure if I was strong enough to read it after this," she murmured.
To Captain Roy Montgomery, NYPD. He made a stand and taught me all I need to know about bravery and character.
Castle knew the words: he watched the emotion flickering over her face instead.
Flipping several pages, Kate chuckled and paused at an interaction between the fictional Detectives Raley and Ochoa. "Have you ever asked Ryan and Esposito how they feel about their alter egos?" she asked.
"No. But after the first book Esposito gave me stink for combining the names into 'Roach.'"
She hummed laughter behind closed lips, flipped a few more. "Rook and Nikki...you split yourself between them. Rook is what we see, all flippant and optimistic; Nikki..." she trailed off, thumbed over a few more pages; found where Nikki was upset about Rook's failure to communicate with her. "Nikki is your heart. What goes on upstairs." She stretched and bumped her head gently against his jaw.
Making a noncommittal noise, Castle felt his stomach flip with unexpected insecurity. She was right: everything was between those covers – and he was, quite literally, an open book in her hands. And of all his books, Heat Rises was the most raw and transparent vehicle of his emotion. For her.
She turned the pages in sections, pausing for different lengths at familiar passages; sometimes smiling softly, sometimes re-reading in contemplative silence. At times she would trace the lines with a finger as she spoke, peeling away the fiction and excavating the reality of his frustrations, his joys, and his longings in their relationship. Other times she would simply murmur so he could barely hear, telling him the way his words had affected her; the way he had changed her perspective and given her new understanding.
He listened with fascinated awe, saw the familiar text only dimly as her words washed over his soul. At one point, he shivered as the gravity of what she was doing hit him with frightening clarity: she was reading his book as his love letter; telling him what she had discovered between the lines of prose. Revealing the subtext.
It had been two days, she told him, before she could pick it up again after his fictionalized version of the Captain's murder. And then she flipped to another page and laughed, dug her toes into his calf.
"'Rook's magnificent ass?' Castle - that's not even good writing. That's pure ego."
He laughed with her, shrugged. "So? It's true!"
She rolled her eyes, flipped over a large section -
and stilled, curling tighter around him.
"You didn't go into much detail here," she mumbled, the length of her fingers caressing the half-page that it took to write out the scene in which Rook took a bullet to the chest. "It was still too fresh, wasn't it?" She paused, rubbing a thumb over the page. "And you had no closure." Flattening the book under her hand, she turned her nose into his neck. "I'm sorry," she whispered, shifting up to hold her lips against his pulsing skin. "I'm sorry."
Castle couldn't speak; his vocal cords felt as if they'd cramped up and collapsed his airway. But he circled an arm tight about her waist, mumbled something incoherent into her hair.
After a moment, she lifted the book again. Laying her head against his shoulder, she fanned through the remaining pages and stuck her thumb into the last page, letting the book fall open from its own weight to the last scene. Where Nikki sits beside a comatose Rook in the ICU, waiting for him to come back to her.
"I was already a mess when I got here. But it was here, Castle…it was here that you broke me." And she ran her fingertips over the crinkled page, rippled from where her tears had dried in the fibers of the paper. "Because there wasn't much hope here. Just a line where Nikki wonders if Rook would make it." She stopped, took a breath. "You didn't know, did you? If I'd ever come back. If we'd make it."
Castle gently cleared his throat, found he could speak. "At the time, it was...no. I didn't."
Kate pressed heavily against him, humming a reassurance into his shirt before turning her eyes back to the pages. "And the last two paragraphs – you wrote those only for me. That was when I knew I had to find you." She touched the lines where Nikki began reading Castle of Her Endless Longing, one of Rook's medieval romance novels...featuring Lady Kate Sackett as the main character. "In these lines, you called out to me. And here -" with a soft rustling of the page she dragged her fingers down to the final paragraph of Heat Rises, where Nikki reads aloud of how a roguishly handsome young man rides up alongside Lady Sackett and offers to accompany her through the dangerous woods. "Here you made me a promise. That if I let you, you would stay by my side. Through whatever the woods may bring."
Kate closed the back cover, observing her hands as she turned the book over. "So, see?" she breathed, "It was your book that brought me back to you." There was a long silence as she traced the lettering embossed on the front cover. "And I know you've already made good on it, but for the record - because these woods are really, really dark - does that promise still stand? That come what may, you'll stay with me?
He was almost shaking with emotion; he didn't trust himself to unclench his jaw; thought he might cry.
She turned, saw his face; and dropped all her walls as her eyes suddenly filled with compassion and…
And something else he'd never fully seen displayed across her face; but it loosed his tongue and gave him freedom.
"Yes, love. It stands."
And now she was the one that trembled, fluttering her hand along his jaw and pressing a thumb to his ear as she wrapped her fingers about the expanse of his neck. "Then Rick - into the woods we go," she murmured.
He thought if time ended and the universe collapsed, he really wouldn't mind.
Then her lips crashed upon his, and he really didn't think at all.
A/N: WHEW! That was a long one. Sorry about the delay in update, but I hope it was worth it. SO - This is the last official chapter...but I am going to write an epilogue, so there will actually be one more little tidbit of fun. ;) Tell me what you thought - it was quite a sacrifice. (I may have just missed a flight because I wanted to post it so bad)
Wow, I am going to miss this story. Maybe I'll write another one...where Castle's secret comes out. How I wish I didn't have to sleep...Then I could write all night and work during the day. Oh wait. I already do that. I need to change careers.
THANKS SO MUCH FOR ALL YOUR AWESOME REVIEWS! I will definitely miss them in my inbox. :`(