29: Fatal attraction
At six p.m. on Sunday evening Beckett searches thoroughly through her pretty new possessions and selects carefully. Okay, so they're still mostly pastels, but they're attractive, and, when she puts a set on and looks herself up and down in the mirror, extremely flattering. Worth their extortionate prices, certainly.
She puts a dress on, stops, sits down on the bed, and chews her lip nervously. She's considering something that scares her silly. She's considering actively inviting Castle to do as he pleases with her. She looks at the necklace in the nightstand drawer into which she'd tidied all the – um – items, looks away again; looks back, picks it up, puts it down, closes the drawer, reopens the drawer, picks it up again, draws it through her fingers, stares at it as it dangles from her hand.
What if that's the wrong thing to do? What if… what if she isn't supposed to? He'd said if you say gold I'll know you need me, so maybe she is able to start the game; but he'd disciplined her for trying to push him into taking her back to bed. That had been part of the same game, though, and he'd said that if she said she needed it he wouldn't refuse but he'd choose how. Seek permission, or ask forgiveness? Or is it going to end up as both? Anyway, she'll have all of dinner to work it out. Nothing's going to happen till they arrive back here. But what if taking this step is wrong? What if she fails? She can't stand failing with this too. She's got little enough as it is, and if she loses this – him – she'll have nothing.
She takes a very deep breath, clicks the necklace shut around her neck, slips on heels, and leaves for dinner.
Castle is happily concocting another well-balanced and nutritious meal, heavily disguised with a chocolate and raspberry dessert which is probably capable of inducing heart failure if he so much as looks at it. Alexis is buzzing round being helpful – chopping salad ingredients, mostly. Her conversation is not particularly helpful, since she's teasing him about Beckett and the precinct, and becomes still less so when his mother joins in.
"Hi, Grams."
"Is that dinner, sweetie? Wonderful. I've been rehearsing all day and I'm positively famished." Castle considers his dinner plans rather plaintively and doesn't comment. His mother had said she wouldn't be home. "What is it?"
"Dad's making chicken Alfredo and I'm making the salad. Dessert's in the fridge."
Martha investigates the fridge, removing a pleasant bottle of white wine as she casts a beady eye over the dessert. She pours before she says anything. There is rather too much obvious effort for it to be dinner simply for the family.
"Is your nice Detective Beckett coming for dinner again, darling?"
"Yes, Mother." His tone is not conducive to further conversation. Unfortunately, his mother is not receptive to hints.
"You've invited her nearly every night since Thursday."
"She's been ill. She's got to be healthy, otherwise who'll protect me when I'm shadowing her? I wouldn't want to be shot because she's too ill to lift a gun."
His mother regards him extremely sceptically, but her next, undoubtedly discomposing, comment is stifled by a rap on the door. Castle's move in that direction is forestalled by Alexis's happy squeak and dash for the door. Really, Alexis is fifteen. A teenager. She should loathe all of his friends. Not that Beckett's exactly a friend… Why has he got such a civilised teen? Though he doesn't want Alexis to dislike Beckett, either. Maybe just be a little less enthusiastically supportive? He can manage his own love life, and he'd quite like to keep it that way.
"That must be Detective Beckett," his mother says. "It's so nice that Alexis likes her. Such an improvement on most of your female… friends." There is no possible response to that that will not get Castle into a seriously sticky situation, so he contents himself with a glare.
"Hey, Alexis," Beckett says as she steps inside and into view.
"Hi, Detective Beckett," Alexis bubbles happily. "You're going to love dinner. Come on in. Where did you get that necklace? It's really pretty. I'd love one like that."
Castle looks across the room just in time to clock the necklace and choke on his greetings at Alexis's words. Over his cold, dead body. That necklace is strictly for adults, and Alexis won't be sufficiently adult until she's sixty-five. And if that's hypocritical, he really does not give a damn.
"It was a present," Beckett says calmly. "I'm not sure it would suit you," – she's damn right it wouldn't suit Alexis, ever – "your skin's so white that you'd really look better with some coloured stones to set off your complexion properly. This would just disappear on you." She grins wickedly. "I'd go for emeralds, with your skin and hair. Tourmalines or peridots, if your Dad won't cough up for emeralds, or there's always jade."
Castle excuses himself before he explodes. She's wearing his collar, which is astounding – but he can't stand much more of a conversation teetering along the edge of a very dangerous precipice. One false step or misstated word and disaster will ensue. But she's wearing the collar. He takes refuge in his bedroom before he either betrays every single one of his feelings by kissing Beckett – Kitten – into blancmange and then leaving precipitately with her, or expires from strangulation of those same feelings. She's wearing his collar. Finally she's accepted who she can be with him.
He takes a moment or two, calms himself down, checks that his expression doesn't include anything that his mother might spot as being unusual, and wanders back out very casually to continue his culinary efforts. Along the way, he removes the white wine from in front of his mother and places it near the glasses he'd put out for Beckett and himself.
"Wine, Beckett? Help yourself. Mother already has, so if you don't you'll miss out." There's a harrumphing noise behind him.
Beckett doesn't pick the wine up and pour. In fact, she's placed her hands very firmly in her lap and knotted them together. Tightly. There's a well-hidden hint of uncertainty in her expression, though she's watching Alexis and his mother with a surface coating of her usual sardonic calm. She is not looking at him.
"Something else? Are you driving?"
"No, wine would be nice, thank you." She looks up, briefly, more uncertainty in her eyes, as if she thinks she's done something wrong. Ah. A little reassurance that actually she's done something that he very, very much appreciates is needed. Castle smiles in a vaguely encouraging fashion, suitable for public consumption – that is to say, his family.
"I like that necklace," he says. "It suits you. You should put it on more often." His words are very carefully chosen to sound entirely innocent to his family and simultaneously let Beckett know that he is very happy that she is wearing it of her own volition. Beckett's eyes flick up to meet his, and just for an instant he lets his own heat flow into his face.
She relaxes. She's got it right. She hasn't messed this up. Wine arrives in her glass and she picks it up.
"To getting back to work," she toasts.
"Murders and mysteries, real and fictional," Castle answers.
"Oh, darlings. How macabre. To good parts, good actors, and good friends," Martha counters. "Oh – and good reviews."
Alexis mutters something that sounds regrettably like "Good grades" and lifts her lemonade.
Dinner passes off with only a few edgy moments, though Castle becomes more tense by the moment, especially when Martha starts admiring Beckett's necklace over coffee afterwards. Beckett plays it all off with perfect aplomb and doesn't indicate by a single look, eye-blink or startle that it is anything other than a pretty piece of costume jewellery.
"Costume, Detective? A woman as beautiful as you should wear the real thing."
"Unfortunately the city doesn't pay me that much." Beckett makes very certain she isn't looking at Castle when she speaks.
"But it's lovely, anyway. Whoever gave you it must have had very strong feelings for you."
"I'm sure they did," Beckett manages, succeeding in preserving a poker face. The way she remembers it, there had been a lot of strength involved. Every single time. She'd certainly felt it, too. She absolutely does not look at Castle. If she does she'll collapse in laughter. Instead, she drains her cup.
"Thank you for dinner. I'd better get home. I'm on shift first thing."
"I'll see you home."
"You don't need to. I'll be fine." But the look in her eye says that she doesn't expect or want him to agree with her.
"You forgot your gun."
"I didn't forget it. I don't bring it to civilised dinners. Shooting over the dinner table went out with the Wild West."
Castle reaches the door. "Still seeing you home, Beckett."
"Glad to see some manners stuck," Martha mutters, as the door shuts behind them. "Now, what did Richard do with that wine? Perfect companion for a solo evening. Who does he think he's fooling? Seeing her home?"
Castle waits until he's safely in the cab before embarking on the discussion he's been planning since he looked up as Beckett entered his loft.
"I'm glad you put that necklace on," he purrs into her ear. It's almost the same as he'd said earlier, but now his tone is entirely different. His arm slides around her, and she readily curls close, still a little relieved that she hasn't mis-stepped, or over-stepped, still a little uncertain of the rules of this strange game. His fingers stroke over the edges of the collar. "But I have to wonder why." His other hand lies warm and strong on her knee, slowly tracing her clasped hands.
"Are you asking me for something, kitten?" The arm around her tightens, trapping her; the hand on her knee turns over and closes around her wrists. The something he's offering is clear. "I think you are. You're accepting that I own you. You're admitting that you want me to. You're completely mine." The purr has dropped down the octaves until it's a deep, velvety baritone; seeping into her nerves and slinking over her skin. She tries to squirm closer, and is held more firmly.
"Only what I allow you, pet. Stay still." She's sufficiently wrapped in that there isn't much choice. It's so easy, and so good, not to have a choice. There will be plenty of choices, and plenty of decisions, to be made when she's back at work tomorrow. Right now, there's still a little space of peace.
"Now, where was I? Oh, yes. You're showing me that you know I own you. You want me, but you know that you're only allowed to ask. It's all up to me. So you put on your collar to ask, without having to use your words." He smiles down, and tucks her in a little further. "I like that, but you can't do it every time. You'll need to use words sometime. Starting now. Why are you wearing that collar, kitten?"
Beckett suddenly smiles sexily and mischievously. "Miaow," she murmurs, and looks up, half-submissively, half-naughtily, through her eyelashes. Castle looks at her, open-mouthed, then gives up, collapses in laughter, and then can't resist kissing her. He intends to drop a you-win flavoured quick kiss on her, and then deal with her mischief-making appropriately, out of public view. The quick kiss does indeed occur. It just doesn't stop there.
He's still kissing her as the cab pulls up at her building, which really had not been the plan, and it's hardly been quick or gentle. If the cab hadn't arrived, it might not have been discreet for much longer, either.
He drops the right quantity of bills on the driver – tip included – and takes off after Kat, who is casting him come-hither glances over her shoulder and swaying her hips in an astonishingly sexy fashion. He crowds her once they're in the elevator, pressing her into the wall with his body and kissing that certain spot below her ear which will send her mewing for real. By the time the elevator decants them at her floor, she's lax and curved into him and not laughing at all any more.
"Miaow, kitten? That's your only word?"
"Mmmmm." She smiles, sensuously, with an attitude of why not?
Castle revises his plans and smiles back in the manner of a well-fed tiger. "Okay, kitten, miaow it is. That's all you're allowed to say. Just remember that this was your idea." He slides down the zip of her dress and lets it fall from her shoulders to the floor. Then he stops hard and looks closely at what little she's still wearing.
"I just bought you that!" falls out of his mouth. Though, as he's trying not to swallow his tongue or drip drool down his shirt, it does explain the lack of stock when he'd gone shopping. Beckett chokes. "I must have gone shopping shortly after you did. No wonder it was all gone." Beckett gives up, collapses in laughter against him, and squeaks gently for a while.
"Shall we compare notes, Castle?" she finally emits, when her gales of giggles have subsided. "Maybe next time you should – oh, I don't know – maybe tell me that you're planning to increase my wardrobe?"
Castle tries very hard to recover his game.
"You told me lies, Beckett. You said you were grocery shopping. That doesn't look like groceries to me. I approve of your taste, though. It exactly matches mine." She quirks an eyebrow. "If you insist on wearing underwear when we're out, then I'm going to choose it." There is a noise that might be a choked off snicker.
"Like you just didn't? When were you going to present me with it?"
"Soon. I was going to surprise you," Castle says, plaintively. "I was hardly going to bring it with me when my mother and daughter were watching, was I?"
"No," Beckett agrees, abruptly sobered. He runs a hand up and down her back, reassuringly.
"No." He tips her face up and drops a kiss lightly on her lips. It's followed rapidly by a much deeper, harder investigation of her mouth. "I was going to drop it off before I came to the Twelfth tomorrow. After my family had gone out. Or in my mother's case, before she woke up."
Beckett grins mischievously and very seductively. There's no kitten now, only a very adult feline.
"You could come and see what I bought. Make sure you haven't duplicated it all." Her hips sway enticingly as she sashays to the bedroom door.
"If I have I'll just take it back and change it," Castle shrugs, unbothered by the prospect.
"Take it back, sure. I've got plenty. I don't need more."
"Uh-uh. I'm going to choose your underwear, kitten." He catches up and catches her in. "But right now I'm going to choose to kiss you." He exerts a little force, turns her and kisses her a little roughly, knots his hand into her hair to open her for his mouth on her throat, around her jaw. She slithers bonelessly slightly downward and rolls against him. His other hand closes over her rear and presses her hard in. She fits perfectly right where she should, in her heels and ashes-of-roses silk underwear, and right now he doesn't want any games, no kitten, simply her and him and them.
Sometimes, he likes mostly-plain vanilla, and now has become one of those times, made so in surprise and humour and laughter and loving and love – Oh. He thought what now? This is not a good way to hit that thought. He's thought that immediately twice before, and it hasn't ended well. Both times he'd rushed straight into it and it had been a disaster. Not this time. He doesn't want this to be a disaster; he doesn't want to move too fast and find he's wrong. (He's not wrong. He's sure he's not wrong.) Take it easy, Rick. Don't push – Beckett, or yourself. Let it grow naturally. Maybe that's where the ridiculous urge to be wholly over-protective is coming from. Slow down.
He kisses her deep and slow and sure, bringing her hands up round his neck and loosening his grip to flick his own shirt buttons open, pulling her back in, skin to skin. She curves against him, opening for him to search her mouth, curling a long smooth leg around his waist. He doesn't stop kissing her for an instant as he lifts her and carries her, wrapped around him, to lay her out on her bed and simply look at her while he gets rid of all irrelevant extras, such as the majority of his clothing.
He'd been a little unsure of the dull, grey-pink colour when he'd bought it, but it's gorgeous: not itself demanding attention but drawing the eye to the excellence of shape and form it frames, thin silk and delicate lace almost-fragile over translucent skin and slim body, caressing the curves and swell of hips and breasts. It matches the almost-fragility of the off-duty Kat, such a contrast to the on-duty Beckett with shield, gun, and driving alpha personality: never fragile at all.
She's looking up at him looking down at her, peaceful, almost passive: a slight enigmatic smile on her lips that he simply has to kiss away, desperate for her to be his, and in his arms, and never, ever, to let her leave him. But he mustn't be that impulsive. She's so easily spooked, and so uncertain, and so very fragile outside the job. Wild, headstrong declarations, however truthful he believes or even knows them to be, will not impress a woman for whom the careful uncovering of motivations and actions is her life's blood, and who is pathologically disbelieving of pretty much everything she first hears or sees or encounters.
None of which stops him kissing her some more, rising over her to fall into the endless worlds of her mouth and the hills and valleys of her body, no bonds or restrictions or imprisonments; no toys or games.
No dreams.
Only the two of them, reality, and the simple act: although he's taking the lead there is no overt domination here. It's softer than he's ever been with her, but she seems equally as content, responsive, and receptive: as long as he leads then she can't fail. That suits him very well: he'll lead her to him. Always and only him, and by the time they've walked that road she'll see it too.
He kisses her much more assertively, touches her with forceful intent, and she arches into him for him to strip her of the delicate silk scraps, accepts his kisses and his touching and pulls him into her; smaller, elegant hands biting into his shoulders as he takes her first with fingers and then with body: still no games, and she moans and cries his name and comes only a short movement ahead of him.
"I ought to go home," he says, a while later, cuddled around her and playing idly with a wisp of her hair.
"Mmmm." She sounds most of the way to asleep. He carefully unlocks the necklace, and puts it out of the way.
"See you tomorrow?"
"Mmmm." An eye opens and gazes sleepily at him. "Paperwork. If you like." It closes again, and the rest of his Beckett snuggles back down against him.
"Not if it's paperwork."
" 'Kay then."
Some more time passes, quietly cuddled together.
"I need to go home." There's a mildly unhappy noise. It might translate to don't want you to. It might equally translate to if you must. Or okay then. But as long as it's unhappy at the prospect of his leaving, then everything's okay.
It's only when he gets home that he realises that he still hasn't seen what she bought. He grins widely. That'll be fun, another evening.
Thank you to all readers and reviewers. Much appreciated.
