It's bright the next day, unseasonably warm, and softly quiet around the loft.

It's late in the morning as he finds himself sitting at his desk again. After a morning spent with his mother and Kate over breakfast, laughing, poking fun, stories, and a genuine sense of family and togetherness that he hasn't felt in a lifetime, and the fact that he sensed it most of all from the woman he plans to marry someday is what has him questioning their timeline.

They still have work to do. Mistakes to fix, talks to have, apologies to soothe over, problems to rectify, and he's taking each step as they come, hopefully in stride as they move over each one faster than he anticipated. But last night made him certain that they will get there. He told her about his insecurities, his fears, and he still had to pry himself out from underneath her tight, selfish grasp when he woke up this morning. If anything, telling her all those things made that grasp tighter.

And the dream didn't help his patience about this any either. Dreaming of how radiant and beautiful she will look on their wedding day, if and when it comes, then not being able to speak, his voice literally not working as she took his hands and went to recite his vows, got him thinking. He didn't want to tell her that what he was writing when she found him were his vows, different rough drafts of what he would want to say to her on that day, wanting to whittle it down to a certain, small set of things about her and promises he wants to make to her that will actually mean something.

Because if he doesn't keep it small, he will end up writing for the rest of his life things he wants for them, things he loves about her and what she's done for him.

Then that got him thinking about what he will eventually do as the proposal, when he asks her again, knowing she'll say yes but still feeling terrified about asking her. He could actually put some real planning to it this time, like he did the ring. He spent hours on the ring, and having her meet him at those swings did seem… meaningful in the least, the writer in him searching for the poetic subtext where there probably wasn't any.

But now, sitting in the muffled silence of the loft, his mother fluttering around in the kitchen, Kate upstairs with a box of nails, hanging pictures and arranging everything to make it a home away from home, which is just what he was hoping to give her. And that she's taken it and is making an active effort to make it just that, to settle her things down, to take the time to make sure everything finds the right place, it tells him that she wants to and means to keep her promises.

He feels his smirk grow into a smile as he spins around in his office chair, his hand grabbing the handle of his desk drawer and pulling it open, starting to rummage through the dishevel of pens, paperclips, remotes, and papers to find that small box that's sat in here since he went in search for it after rocketing it across the loft that day. As his hand pushes the junk in his drawer around, his brow knots and he leans forward in his chair.

It must be in the other drawer somewhere.

So he pulls open the next drawer down and pushes the folders back and forth, not finding it but not knowing why he would in the file drawer, and then goes to the other side of his desk, pulling open the top drawer where he keeps mostly old cell phone chargers and USB cables, and the remote control to an RC helicopter that he still needs fixed. It was right here. "Where is it?" He asks out loud to nobody.

Maybe it was in a drawer in the kitchen. He shoots out of his office chair and is whisking his way into the kitchen, panicked. He can't lose that ring. He annoyed the jeweler far too much that day and wouldn't give him the time of day now, not after he bugged him as much as he did. "Where is it, where is it, where is it?" He chants to himself as he shoots past his mother and over to the junk drawer in the corner, pulling it open to find nothing but batteries, misplaced colored pencils, thumbtacks, a flashlight, and that rubber band ball he made a few weeks ago.

"Where is what, dear?" His mother asks him, still fluttering around the kitchen.

"The ring." He steps over to another drawer.

"What ring?"

"The ring… mother." He hisses, not wanting Beckett to know that he's looking for it this soon. "Beckett's engagement ring. I had it in a drawer in my office and now I can't find it." Until a thought occurs to him. He stops his panic for a moment as he leans against the island, his eyes closing, "Please don't tell me you took it to try and fool your friends into thinking you got engaged, Mother."

"Okay, now I am insulted, Richard. What on earth makes you think I would do that?"

He turns to his mother, giving her a deadpan look, knowing her nightlife antics far better than he should. "Well, it's not in my drawer. So unless Alexis took it-"

"Oh, Richard." His mother waves him off. "Don't you remember?"

"Remember what?"

She scoffs and rolls her eyes. "You had gotten into that scotch of yours and you were sitting in your office the night before your flight to DC, brooding and fantasizing about what might happen should you run into Kathrine on your trip, and you had the ring out, and you left it sitting out on your desk."

"So you did take it." He concludes, the memory of that night briefly flitting into his mind.

"No, I didn't take it."

"Well then who did?"

"Well… isn't it possible that Kathrine might have happened upon it?"

It strikes him as a possibility, but… no, she wouldn't have just taken it. She would have at least told him that she found it. "No… no, she would have told me."I

In what is slowly becoming her home office, she sits down in her chair and pulls herself back over to her desk, that's now sitting just off center of the room, facing the right wall so she has a view of both the window and the hall so she isn't blindsided should anyone come knocking. With the large picture that he gave her sitting in the right corner, she places the smaller one of her own in front of it, one of them on one of their few trips up to the Hampton's, sitting in a stone corner of an outdoor barbeque. She loves the way his eyes are tightly squeezed closed against her kissing his temple.

Maybe she could talk him into going up there this weekend, before she's back at the precinct on Monday.

There's still boxes that need unpacked, mostly of much less entertaining, menial office things. She's been focused on the fun stuff so far; pictures, memories, pieces of the happy times in her past that he knows all about. She wants to leave some room, space to fill with new memories of their life together, their engagement, eventually their marriage… their family. She feels a smile bloom across her face as she looks over the space.

Her eyes find the small box she's been working out of for the past ten minutes and stands up, walking over to the small ottoman that's against the wall behind her desk and sits down on top of it, next to the open box that's slowly being emptied, her hand finding the small box that's been hiding here since Alexis almost caught her with it.

Caught her with it. She really needs to put this back before he goes looking for it. She's actually surprised that he hasn't already. She thought it would be the kind of thing he would daydream over constantly. But… they've been busy lately, she smirks.

She pushes out a small breath and flicks the lid open without reservation, a smile glowing across her face at the sight of the diamonds again. It's beautiful, it's elegant, it's… something she could wear for the rest of her life. Her lip falls in between her teeth at the thought. She looks upward, contemplating for only a few seconds with the box clasped in her hands before she gives in.

It's not lost on her. This is something that he is supposed to put on her finger, that he's supposed to give her, that he's supposed to offer her right after he tells her that he loves her. But… she feels like a little girl dreaming about her wedding now. She breaks, tugging the ring out of the folds of the box and sets it down beside her, the ring now being held gingerly in her fingers.

She can't help but be dazzled at the dance and sparkle of the diamonds as she rolls the band around in her fingers. She holds up her left hand, her eyes flicking between the ring and the finger it's supposed to adorn. She lets out all her breath and gives in to the desire, knowing what it's going to feel like when it's all over with. But right now, the want and pull is enough to make her want to deal with the consequences when they come.

She holds out her left hand and slowly, nervously, and shakingly starts to push it onto her finger. She feels her smile split across her face as she feels the snug… the perfect fit of the band around her finger, her eyes quickly finding the ring on her finger and seeing what it looks like on her. Everything about this is perfect. If she had actually taken a few seconds to look at the ring, it would have been a hell of a lot harder to say no.

It even fits perfectly.

Her bottom lip gets bit between her teeth again as her eyes can't turn away from the ring wrapped guiltily around her finger, all her attention raptured onto the sparkle. "I hope it fits."

His voice slams her, blowing away the feeling in an instant as she looks up with scared, wide eyes, her fingers tugging the ring off as fast as she can and tightly squeezing it in her hand, looking up at him as he stands in the doorway with his hands casually in his pockets, a soft smile playing across his lips. "Castle… I-I uh…"

He shakes his head a bit and cranes his neck, stepping off the door jam and slowly making his way toward her as she stands up. "I guess we still have to work on you telling me things."

Her breath is sucked out of her as she rolls the ring into her fingers and looks down at it again for a moment before looking back up to him. "I-I didn't mean to steal it, I just saw it sitting on your desk, and…" She fades, waving the ring about in front of her nervously.

He just chuckles, "You can't steal something that's already yours, Kate." He… isn't annoyed, mad, even let down that she already saw it and put it on. His reaction is coming straight out of left field, and she doesn't know how to handle this exactly. And he can clearly tell. "It's yours, Kate. Just because you didn't take it when I offered it to you doesn't really change that."

She lets out a breathy laugh, a smile going across her lips for a moment as she feels herself relax against not being guilty of anything. She nods and lets her eyes fall back down to the ring being rolls round on her fingers. "I guess I didn't see it that way."

There's a moment of silence between them, both of them looking down at the ring in her fingers. She doesn't know why she's so attached to this already. He hasn't even asked her yet. "So you like it?"

She looks up with a smile and silently nods, her eyes falling back down to the gorgeousness of the stones as soon as they can. "Yeah, it's… it's gorgeous, Castle. It's…" She smiles and remembers the thought, looking up to him again. "It's exactly the kind of thing I could see myself wearing for the rest of my life." He smiles at that, that loving light in his eyes shining as brightly as the stones in her hand, which her eyes find after a few seconds. She chuckles, "It even fits perfectly." She looks back up to him, seeing pride leak into his smile. "How'd you know?"

He shakes his head dismissively. "You're going to think it's stupid."

"Oh, well you have to tell me then." She kids.

"Well…" He sighs, "I've spent so long absentmindedly playing with your fingers, I thought that if I felt the size, I would know it when I felt it, so… I spent about… an hour and a half playing with the jeweler's set of sizing rings before I finally picked one. And that was after I spent an hour playing goldilocks with the settings, trying to figure out something that seemed... you."

She feels her heart flutter, her love rippling through her in waves. "You did that?" If she had known that, she wouldn't have said no. He sheepishly smiles with another shake of his head. If she had known he was that thoughtful… for her… She shakes her head and looks back down at the ring, growing more and more attached to it with every ray of light that sparkles off of it. But then she remembers that it's not really hers yet. They need to do this right. "But you should…" She starts, the words feeling bile in her throat, "…probably hang onto it." She says, her hand weakly lifting up and handing him the ring. "You know, until we're ready."

He pauses for a moment before he takes the ring from her brings it close to him. She doesn't know why, but it feels like she just got a piece of her soul ripped out. The thought he put into the ring, the perfection of the ring itself… the room he's given her, the home he's opened up to her, that big heart of his that he finally opened up completely to her… "Although…" She starts, "I did promise I'd say yes if you asked me again." His eyes find hers again, wide and surprised as he gently rolls the ring in his fingers as she did. She looks back up to him and feels certain. "I like to try and keep my promises."

He rolls his jaw and nods his head, "Well… if I were…" He softly says, his voice low and gruff, "I wouldn't want it to be just because of the ring."

She shakes her head, her eyes now unable to look away from him. "Well, not just the ring. I-it would be the thought you put into it, and… the room, and the picture, and… and what we said to each other last night." She wants to just yell at him, grab him and end the subtext they're falling into. "And the night before that."

He nods again with a raise of his brow, "Well…" He starts again, "if I were, then I'd… want it to be something big… something you'd remember." His voice is so uncertain, so scared, "Give you a story to tell those kids you said you wanted someday."

She feels her heart soften, "I'd remember… and we can always just embellish a little with the kids, if need be."

He laughs breathlessly, his smile overtaking his face for a second, his eyes still down on the ring pinched in his fingers. "I'd still want it to be big."

She shakes her head. "I already told you I prefer something intimate, Rick."

He nods stiffy again, his shoulders relaxing and his smile softening. He looks back up to her, that same sparkling gleam in his bright, blue eyes shining over to her. "In that case…"

Her heart slams into her throat as her body tenses, watching with racing blood as he slowly kneels down, his eyes never leaving hers, lifting the ring up to her again.

"Kathrine… Houghton Beckett…" She's going to faint if he doesn't grab her up quickly. "Will you marry me?"

Her answer comes as quickly as it can tumble from her lips. "Yes."

END

A/N: Hope it was a satisfying ending.

Have another story planned, and this time, I did try and look one up that followed this prompt and couldn't find one. But if you know any stories that rewrite the last thirty seconds of Knockout (3x24), then feel free to send them to me. Other than that, I've had a lot of fun, and have too many scenes written in my head to let this other idea go. Thanks for reading. :)