Vice

She woke slowly, thick with unfinished desire and a deep sleep. Her eyes felt crusted over, her limbs heavy and trapped. She pressed her face into her pillow and sighed out a long breath, took a deeper one in.

Castle.

"Kate," he was murmuring.

She opened her eyes to find him hunched over her, out of bed, dressed. "Castle?"

"Uh, Kate. Beckett."

And then she was really awake. "What?"

He hedged, and that didn't look like a good morning kiss on his lips. She lifted up and pushed off the bed, tried to look past his shoulder but he looped an arm around her and brought her in close.

He smelled like toothpaste and maple syrup.

"Kate, it's nearly six."

Oh shit.

She scrambled to her knees and accidentally bumped into his chin; he huffed and rocked back, let her go.

"Sorry," she muttered, rubbing her head and trying to clear the shaky panic out of her blood. "Uh. Your - is Alexis-?"

"She's already downstairs. Early riser."

Kate nodded, avoided his eyes and the hesitance in them. She took a breath and scrubbed her hands down her face. "I have to be at work in an hour and a half."

"That's why I woke you," he murmured, and the fingers of his right hand circled one of her wrists and drew it down. "We forgot to set the alarm. The moment I realized-"

She wondered what the natural conclusion to that sentence was, could guess actually, and she didn't fight the sudden urge to prove him wrong. He was wrong. She wasn't that person.

"So," she started and uncurled her fingers, laced them through his. "I've got to shower. You making me pancakes?"

No pancakes, but he offered to make her some anyway, and she shook her head. He came back out into the kitchen while Kate took her shower, found Alexis reading a book at the bar.

"Hey, pumpkin," he murmured. "Kate's up."

"Hey, Dad," she murmured back, her eyes on the page. She might not have even heard him, so absorbed was she in the book. So that conversation was delayed a little bit.

He scanned his kitchen and figured he could make her eggs, toast, the usual. He and Alexis had cereal and fruit, and then on weekends he made big breakfasts for lunch, sleeping as late as they could and then lounging around until they got hungry.

"Alexis, you want some scrambled eggs? I'm going to make some."

"No."

"O-kay," he laughed and tapped the edge of her book, making it dip away from her eyes. She blinked and glanced up at him, let out a long breath like she'd been holding it.

She frowned. "Did you say Kate?"

"Yeah. She's taking a shower. You want anything else for breakfast? I'm going to make stuff."

"Can I have french toast?"

"Sure. Good idea." He moved to the fridge and pulled out the butter and eggs, flipped the stove top on with his other hand. He waited for Alexis to say more, but she didn't. He got ingredients together and started to work, found his own stomach opening up like a pit.

He wasn't sure if he was hungry or nervous.

He smelled her before she said anything, warmth and the faint impression of his soap and those cherries. And then he heard Kate take the bar seat beside his daughter, her soft-voiced good morning.

He stayed with his back to them, couldn't turn around if his life depended on it. He kept his eyes on the french toast, waited, didn't know what he should do at all, and this wasn't like any other-

Her arms around his waist made him jump, the press of her against his back made his heart pound. He glanced down, brought his hand to hers, covered it, felt her thumb stroke over his fingers.

He turned his head and found her kiss, surprise cascading through him like a warm bath, sluicing him clean.

"Good morning," she murmured.

When he opened his eyes, he saw she was proving something, she was fighting it hard.

For him.

He dropped the spatula and turned into her, wrapped both his arms around her and hung on, his chest tightening with the feel of her, unable to move away.

Over Kate's shoulder, he could see his daughter, still engrossed in her book, completely oblivious.

She was fine. It was fine. It was easy, and maybe that was what had her flipping out just a little bit.

She'd taken a shower just like she always had, dressed in her uniform pants and and another one of his shirts - she'd gotten a collection and really she needed to give them back, or bring her own clothes with her.

Pack a bag. Ohhh, no no - okay, leave that for later, Beckett.

She'd walked out into the living room and seen him making breakfast and Alexis reading her book, and it was just so easy. She slipped onto a bar stool and watched him resolutely not look at her, and then that pissed her off.

The so very tentative way he'd woken her this morning, the flash of nerves when she'd realized how late it was, and now he wasn't going to look at her?

So she'd gotten up and made him.

She might freak out big time later. But right now, it was just so easy.

How had it gotten to be so easy?

Alexis had to run back upstairs for her backpack; she'd forgotten it with her nose buried in her book. And then Kate had to leave first to make it to work on time from the subway; she had a spare uniform in her locker.

She'd left her gun and badge and everything else in there too, because she had probably known when she left she was coming straight here, somewhere in her subconscious. She'd pulled on her coat and said good-bye to Alexis, and then he'd walked her to the elevator.

She'd leaned in and kissed him, softly, an apology of sorts, and he'd taken it, his hand at her hip and hanging onto the pocket of her NYPD coat.

Like it happened every day.

And now she was going to throw up.

No. She wasn't. She just - she'd take this time in the subway to think about it, and she'd figure out what was going on, and she'd. . .know what the hell she was doing.

Except the whole subway ride went by and she never got any further than the way his back looked at the stove, so broad and thick and set against her, and how she'd made him turn and hold her and come back to her. How she'd eased his mind and made everything okay.

She'd done that.

She'd never been able to do that for anyone.

He wasn't expecting her to come home - ah, back to his loft - that night, and he found himself surprised when he got her phone call.

"Hey," he said, heard the surprise in his voice.

"You've ruined me."

He let out a relieved laugh, a little concerned, but the bit-back amusement of her tone was enough to make him relax. He shook his head at Alexis and plucked the book out of her hands. "Homework," he murmured.

She snatched the book back. "Already done."

"Don't be smart with me," he warned, lifting an eyebrow at her. He could hear Kate suppressing her laughter on the other end. "And you. Don't encourage her."

"How am I encouraging her? She can't even see me. Or hear me."

"Is that Kate?" Alexis held her book against her chest, like a brat, but when he took it from her again, she let it go. "Ask Kate to make me that list."

"Kate. Alexis says you're supposed to make her a list."

"Oh, I forgot. I'll do that tonight. Tell Alexis to stop being mean and play with her Dad. I can tell you're lonely."

"Whose fault is that?" he muttered, but instead of repeating her to his daughter, he gave Alexis the phone. "You talk to her."

Alexis's face lit up and she grabbed the phone.

And then she ran off.

I hate my life, she texted, I have a case.

She erased it before she sent it, pulled her lip between her teeth as she studied her phone. She couldn't say that. Yes, it was true she wanted to come over tonight, but she was more excited about the case.

Montgomery had been the one to call her off the street, pull her into it. It was weird. She wasn't sure how to explain the sensation she got standing in the bullpen, watching the detectives, but it was-

a Homicide.

And she couldn't help but feel like that meant she was going to be promoted.

Beckett glanced at the rolling white board planted in the middle of the room, and then she stepped to one side, shifted until she had a modicum of privacy in amidst the members of the task force, and then she called him.

It rang and rang; she was sent through to his voicemail.

"Hey, it's me. I - I got assigned to a case. A homicide. I'm gonna be stuck here. I think it's - I don't know. I don't know, Castle, but it's. . ."

She sounded like an imbecile. She grit her teeth and hunched her shoulders, turned to give herself a little more quiet.

"I'll call you later. I've got to go."

She ended the call and pressed her phone to her chest.

A fourth murder only hours ago had created a task force.

And she was on it.

It had a flavor to it. Something that tugged at her.

She trailed her fingers over the photos on the board; it was dark in the bullpen and the lead detective was sitting at his desk, pouring over financial statements of their four victims. A serial killer perhaps, but it didn't quite feel like it.

She wasn't sure why. Intuition maybe.

"Officer Beckett."

She jerked her hand back from the board and turned around, heat licking her chest as she saw the Captain standing outside his office, briefcase in hand. "Sir."

"What are you still doing here?"

She shot her eyes past him to the clock mounted just above the cage, saw it was nearly one in the morning.

"I was-"

"She was helping me."

Beckett turned her head to MacMillan, kept her mouth shut as he stood up. Balding, a thickness to his chest that suggested a college football career, a paunch that meant he'd been behind the desk for a while.

"You did send her up here to get hands-on experience, didn't you, Roy?" MacMillan strode forward, slinging his coat on as he did. "But it's time to call it a night, kid."

Kate narrowed her eyes at the name, clenched her fists to keep from rising to the bait. Everyone knew Royce had called her that, everyone knew she'd taken him down her second day when they'd sparred together in the training room because of it too.

"Yes, sir," she said instead.

"Mac, you got a handle on this guy?" Roy said, already turning and leading them both out.

"Not exactly. To be honest, not at all. The m.o. is the same, but there are all these differences. Victim One was laid out in an alley, carefully poised, but Victim two - an alley again, sure, but the flowers? I don't get it."

Neither did Beckett, but she kept her mouth shut. It fascinated her - the flowers strewn in the alley like the woman had been wined and dined, compared to the third victim with her dress hiked up and looking like a prostitute even though she was an accountant.

"Looks like Beckett's already sucked down the rabbit hole," Detective MacMillan laughed. "What've you done to her, Captain? Doomed. She's doomed."

Beckett jerked her eyes away from the murder board as they waited on the elevator. "It's - these are people. They have families. They deserve to know what happened. Why."

"Don't so much care about why," the detective said, slapping his hand against his thigh as the elevator started down. "Just want to stop him."

Kate pushed her hands into her coat pockets; she'd been gathering her things to leave almost two hours ago, had come back up to the Homicide floor for one last look.

She wanted to stop him too.

She wanted to solve the puzzle, but more than that, she wanted to put back the broken pieces, fix things somehow, make it right again.

Find the guy who did it, and even though it wouldn't be right, it would ease the way.

She was startled to realize that it was the same feeling she'd had when she'd greeted Castle in the kitchen. Like things were made better because of her.

He'd fallen asleep on the couch, not really intending to stay up and wait for her, but not going to bed either. He woke disoriented and scrubbed at his eyes, heard the door opening.

Castle lumbered up, blinking hard to focus on the DVD player's clock. Just past two. In the morning. Ouch, his neck was killing-

"You're up?"

He turned and shook his head at her, surprised to find her here, made a little dumb by the bag in her hand.

"Not, no. Fell asleep. Just woke up. What are you doing?"

She looked tired; she looked a little buzzed and jittery, but there was weariness under her eyes. "I - I just left the precinct."

He shook himself awake with an effort, reached out for her wrist. "Tell me. A case. I got your message; I was in a meeting with Black Pawn. You have a homicide?"

She nodded at him and her eyes shone with an animal brightness in the dark of his living room. He pulled her towards the hall, took the bag out of her hands.

"I wanted to leave for the precinct from here tomorrow-"

"Tomorrow's Saturday," he mumbled.

"I'm on a task force."

"Saturday is family day," he said, frowning.

She froze in his hall; he stumbled into her back, barely catching himself.

"Castle. Maybe we should talk about - about. . .this. I'm good, surprisingly good with breakfast the other day, and I know. . .Alexis likes me, which is really good. But I'm not - I mean family day?"

He laughed, laughed because it wasn't funny at all, and pushed on her shoulder to get her moving. "Relax, Beckett. I meant at the Dunes. Family day is tomorrow. You could visit your dad. But the task force-"

She spun around, her cheeks flaming, but her eyes desperate. "Tomorrow? I could visit him tomorrow? But I can't. I can't. Work - I have to-"

"Hey, chill out. You can go in two weeks. He still hasn't invited you, has he?" Castle nudged on her shoulders, practically draped over her as he pushed her towards the bed. He was exhausted and conversations about her father's rehab were mingled in with a conversation about his family, her in his family, and he didn't have the brain power for that right now.

She was quiet, too quiet he realized, and he tried to figure out what he'd said.

"Kate?"

"I'm tired," she muttered, but she had a hold of his hand as she slumped into his bed, drew him down after her.

He was confused, but he'd learned that her I'm tired meant she wasn't going to speak anymore. So he curled his arm at her shoulders only to have her shrug him off.

He sighed, eyes closing, but she was twisting into him, pressing her face against his neck, sliding her legs between his, shoving him back so that she was draped along his body.

"Kate?" he whispered, brushed his fingers through her hair.

"I don't - I don't know what to do. I know what I have to do. But I want - my dad."

"I know," he murmured. "But it really will be fine to go in two weeks. Let him have six weeks to feel strong, Kate. Maybe he'll invite you if you can just give him time."

She pressed her fingers into his collarbone, made her thumb brush the hollow of his throat. He swallowed at the sensation and then she was lifting up over him, her mouth at his but not touching.

"I missed you," she whispered, and claimed a kiss from him, and then so much more.