'Rich?'

'Hmm?'

'I love you too.'

Beckett lay on her side, the sheets tangle hotly beneath her body, still joined with her husband in the afterglow of their lovemaking. The dim light of the bedroom only served to make his eyes look even more intense. They were his tell, she thought, no matter how much he might say he was fine with something or feign being angry, his true emotions were in those deep blue pools.

She pecked his lips, then unhooked her leg from over his hip. 'Okay, we had our fun, now time to get ready for family and friends' night. Who will be here for poker night?'

'Just you, I hope.'

'Oh, Castle!' Beckett groaned laughingly as she retrieved her panties and socks, found comfy black pants and a warm sweater to wear to Alexis and Shane's apartment. 'That's disgusting.'

'I couldn't help myself, and besides you set me up so beautifully for it.' Castle sat up, found his boxers and his jeans. 'It'll be me, Dave, Shane, Cam and Esposito.'

'Be on guard, Esposito's been feeling really rocky this week.'

'That's what you said last night when I got home,' he recalled. 'Why, though? How is he like Victor Hammond? I met the man and even after one meeting you could tell he didn't respect his wife. Javier Esposito got snipped after four babies, no questions asked. That's a hell of a lot of respect for your wife.'

'Respecting your wife is more than getting your balls chopped.'

'Easy, Kate,' Castle winced, feeling a sympathetic twinge in his own giblets. 'That's not a nice way to talk about them.'

'You know what I mean.'

'I do, and that's a two-way street.'

'I know.' Dressed once more, Beckett stood up and gave Castle one final kiss. 'Just don't call him a girl if he gets needy tonight, okay? He is needy because he is craving the reassurance from his friends that he's a good man. We all know he really needs to hear it from Ryan to be fully okay but what you have to say won't hurt either.'

Castle nodded, followed her out the door to find that in their twenty-minute absence, RJ and Jojo were just as close to being ready to visit their sister as before their parents had indulged in some quick sex. 'RJ, Jojo, you guys ready?'

'In a minute, Daddy,' RJ replied, in a tone which told them both that RJ would be making no baby-making practice comments tonight. 'We have almost decided on our story-time books. Alexis is such a good story teller, we need to make sure we get the right ones to take to her house.'

'You know it's not a sleepover, right?' Beckett asked, and Jojo nodded vigorously.

'This-a be-fo' bedtime suh-tory, Mumum. No' fo' suh-leepy time.'

'Okay, then let's wrap it up because Daddy's friends will be here-' She was cut off when she heard the phone ring the doorman's tone, letting them know one of their guests had arrived. 'Soon.'

'I'll go see who it is,' Castle offered, heading downstairs.

'Okay. Come on, Jojo, time to put our treats in our bags.'

By the time they'd rounded up their gear and Beckett was ushering them towards the door for their coats and boots, not only had Dave arrived but Esposito as well, grinning when RJ told him he'd made something delicious called 'biscotti' just for Trini with lemons and almonds and Castle had to make sure Esposito didn't forget them when he went home that night.

'I promise, little bro,' Esposito reassured him, and they sealed the deal by feeding the birds. He stared after the boy as he chattered to his mother and sister about the story bokoks they were reading at school and looked back at Castle. 'Should I be worried he's always giving Trini sweets and pastries?'

'RJ is a lot like Meredeth, he likes to show his friends and loved ones he cares by going out of his way to make them something delicious.'

'That's a nice thing to do.' Esposito pointed to the reusable tub he'd brought with him. 'Meredeth made us calzones.'

'Sweet. Any vegetarian?'

'All vegetarian. Some are cheese, some are cheese peppers and onions.'

'You are one lucky bastard,' Dave commented, snagging a pretzel from a bowl.

Castle watched in fascination as Esposito visibly bristled, rather than take it in stride the way he usually did. Even more troubling was the fact that he didn't reply with a smile but a tightly-set jaw and he realized Beckett was not kidding - Esposito was most definitely in need of reassurance he wasn't a man who took his wife for granted.

Cracking open two beers while Dave hit the can, Castle sipped his and gave Esposito a contemplative look. 'Kate filled me in on what's been happening with you this week. Did you know I actually met Victor Hammond?'

'Really,' Esposito said numbly as he sat down at the card table and began to unpack the poker chips from their case.

'Really. And him as a husband resembles you in the same way a bicycle looks like a pomegranate.'

'Rick, come on-'

'Did you know we were already making wagers that you'd marry Meredeth the first night we met her,' Castle barreled on. 'We all knew it from the moment we saw you comforting her after she had that night terror. We'd seen you before with other girlfriends, but you that night with her, that was seeing someone take care of their soul-mate, Javier.'

'Soul-mates,' he repeated, reaching for his beer. 'We hadn't even been together a month.'

'And yet when you heard Alexis shout for me, you knew, even before you saw it, that Meredeth was in trouble. What do you think Victor Hammond would have done if his wife had been having night terrors like that?'

'I don't know.'

'Would Victor Hammond have paced the hallways frantically outside the OR waiting to hear news on his wife's emergency surgery that was saving both her life and her unborn son's?'

'No.' Esposito shook his head firmly on that one. 'No, he wouldn't have been, because he was too much of a control freak he wouldn't let her have babies.'

He thought of the night he'd taken a piss-drunk Gil Mazzara to Meredeth's townhouse - that had been just a month before they moved in together, not even - and Esposito had tucked him in on the couch, then gone upstairs to ask Meredeth if she would still love him if they couldn't have babies. He'd told her that night he'd wanted four and they'd gotten their four, he realized, only the twins hadn't been identical boys, they'd been Leo and Trini to go along with Tessi his little turtle-loving cop and Max the bespectacled professor.

'A man like Victor Hammond, had he deigned to give up any of that control in his carefully ordered world, would have wanted all boys wouldn't he?' Esposito asked quietly. 'He wouldn't love all his children for their uniqueness, he would want them to be as uniform as his Giant Schnauzers.'

'Exactly, right, bro.' Castle nodded, pursing up his lips. 'You have four beautiful children that you love for their individuality, which is particularly important since you have twins in there. What do you think when you hear Tessi's name?'

'Little mother, turtle-lover, already a cop.'

'And Leo and Trini?'

'Goofy loveable protector and little miss personality.'

'What about Max?'

'The great inquisitor, my little Carl Sagan,' Esposito laughed. 'And Meredeth is my Danish angel. What the hell I did to deserve that beautiful, exquisite creature who loves me and bore my children, I'll never figure out.'

'There you go. Now, prepare to lose your shirt.'