Misconception

X

Castle just keeps smiling.

It almost hurts, how much joy gets bounced around the kitchen from just that one, unstoppable smile. She looks up and he's smiling, and watching her as his daughter says something, and his whole being just beams. He's smiling so hard that his eyes are permanently crinkled, slitted deep against the lines of his face, and it does funny things to her insides, little butterflies and cartwheels and heat.

Maybe it's the stove top.

Kate has never been quite so domestic with him, but it's easy enough, browning chicken while Castle slices carrots and zucchini and squash with his daughter, adding ingredients to the stir fry as they're ready, trading off between jobs. She made breakfast a couple times when her apartment blew up, and it was a way to say thank you for last night, but only because she was staying here until she could find a place. She never let any of his family help (back when Alexis liked her, looked up to her somehow, those young eyes following her every movement, a little idol worship that made Beckett nervous).

It's comfortable, and comforting at the same time, to be back here in his kitchen with a few more years between them. But at the same time, their dynamic should be thrown off with the addition of a third, with his daughter here (who doesn't quite like her, and definitely has no lingering hero worship). And yet, Kate still knows what comes next, knows the next move. Castle gives little inclinations of his head or his eyes catch hers, and it's just like being at the Twelfth.

It's kind of scary how easy it is - working in sync.

When Alexis disappears after a handful of carrots, heading upstairs to change for her study group thing, the forcefully cheerful chatter falls off and it's just the two of them. The kitchen is replete but only with the sounds of vegetables in the skillet and the chicken popping in olive oil.

Kate wonders if this is how it starts to fall apart. Without the child in the room, will this awkward silence be their life together? With the baby to keep them, can they be kept?

She turns at the stove to look at him and Castle's face is still beaming. It's - kind of beautiful. His smile. She's the only one here with him, and yet such happiness radiates from every molecule.

"You're going to break something with that," she murmurs.

He glances down at himself - down! - and she laughs, caught by surprise with how quickly the whole thing has turned inside out and he hasn't even said anything. They've barely spoken to each other and still there's so much filling up the room. One rather suggestive gesture, and her heart beats too fast, eager to make his glance true.

Eager.

She releases the chicken to the pan and reaches out for Castle's wrist, tugging him by degrees towards her at the stove. He slides in next to her, places his hands on her hips, their bodies close but not yet touching. She's still surprised, constantly off-kilter tonight, and now it's because of how natural this is, how she doesn't mind being barefoot and pregnant at his stove (oh, God), doesn't even mind his hands on her and thumbs dragging against her skin under her shirt.

Because the look on his face now is nothing at all like the look on his face then, with a stewardess driving his car, coming in late to the precinct, ignoring Kate to talk loudly with the boys. The look on his face is joy and awe and a sweetness that makes her think that he thinks he loves her more than she can possible love him, and this is all so new - and it's for her.

It's only for her.

Kate slides her arms slowly up his chest and twines them around his neck, leaning back to keep his face before her, a fixture of her vision. Leaning back presses their hips flush, so nicely snug that heat blooms in her belly. His eyes dip down to her mouth, something heavy over-taking his face. Lust re-casting his visage so that his jaw looks hard and his mouth aggressive and his eyes - his eyes dark even as they're blue. So dark.

That's only for her as well. No damn stewardess gets that.

There's a moment of acknowledgment when he seems to hear her unspoken claim, and his hands tighten on her hips so that he grips her very bones.

Kate doesn't want to have to ask, doesn't want to have to give permission either. She doesn't want there to be a need for forgiveness, or jealousy, only-

He leans in all at once and presses his mouth to hers, and it's not chaste or penitent either. It's raw, wounds meeting, two people angry and hurt, all the emotion that was suppressed while they were forced to be grown-ups in the presence of a third person.

He tries to possess her, he grips the back of her neck with a knot of her hair, and his hand so wide he palms the side of her face as well. His other arm bands tightly at her shoulders to keep her where he wants her, and he takes his kiss from her mouth. She pushes back, surges in to throw him off balance, up on her toes to rub her body against his so that he growls and clutches her fiercely again.

She wants bruises on her hips. She pushes him back into the counter and his elbow jars the refrigerator, his breath knocked out of him. She wants bruises on his spine so that he remembers every damn time he gets in that Ferrari.

He pushes his fingers deeper into her hair, angles her mouth.

Kate bites his bottom lip, working it between her teeth as he breathes harshly, her tongue touching the round swell of-

"I'm heading out!"

They jump apart, her heart pounding and his hair mussed and eyes wild. She presses her hand to her chest at the wound - no, just a scar, just her scar, and it's throbbing - and his gaze tracks her movement.

The clatter of boots on the stairs and then Alexis, once more bubbling and filled with herself, appears in the living room. "I'll be back by midnight-"

Castle's eyes tear away from Kate, jerking to his daughter. "Call for a car-" he has to stop and clear his throat "-if you can't get a taxi that late."

"I will," the girl says hurriedly, oblivious. She leans in and kisses her father's cheek, makes a funny face as she pulls back. "You smell like chicken and-"

Alexis's eyes dart to Kate and all that self-important confidence drops off her face with a flush.

Kate lowers her hand slowly, trying not to attract notice, but Alexis knows exactly what they've been doing. The girl turns and reaches for her backpack on the bar stool, shrugs it on with jerky movements, not looking at Kate, but definitely looking at her father. She's not embarrassed then, no. She's... what? Cautious.

She's cautious. And she wishes they were too.

Little late for that.

"I'll - um - my test is early tomorrow so I'll be going straight to bed when I get home." She blushes fiercely when she says bed and Kate sighs, but she's also grateful for the warning.

There's no privacy with a kid in the house. She'll have to get used to that. Though when Alexis is in college and the baby is - an unknowing baby, well... it'll be close to private.

"Okay, um. Bye, Dad. Bye - Kate."

"Bye, pumpkin," Castle says, and Kate can only echo it, grateful at least that Alexis called her Kate.

And then the front door slams shut and the lock turns and they're alone.

Finally.

X