Disclaimer: The only part of Castle that I own is the TV on which I watch the show.

A/N There's another little foray into M territory in this chapter. If you want to skip it, stop reading after the paragraph about her leaving him breathless, and pick up again at the paragraph that begins, "When they wake up, it's really too late for breakfast."

Even in the dim light he can see how pale she is, and that she's shaking. Her eyes, which are big under ordinary circumstances—and there's nothing ordinary about this—are enormous. She thrusts her right arm out to the side, as if she were trying to grab on to something to restore her balance, but there's only air.

"What?"

"Will you marry me, Kate?"

"Are you sure you're not mixed up?" She's flung her left arm over her chest. "I mean, that you haven't mixed me up with someone else?"

"No. I'm not mixed up. I want to marry you."

"Me? Beckett?"

"You, Beckett."

"Really?"

"How about if I say your whole name, which I now know, thanks to your passport?" She looks like some magnificent woodland creature who has just encountered a human for the first time and doesn't know quite what to do. So he smiles encouragingly, takes the ring from the box, holds it up to her, and quietly asks, "Katherine Houghton Beckett, will you marry me?"

She sits down hard on the grubby platform where 20,000 pairs of sneakers, sandals, boots, and shoes have whirled and scuffed and leapt and stopped today. And then she throws herself forward with such force that he's flat on his back with her on top of him, the ring safe in a death grip in his hand. "Yes," she says against his cheek, "yes, I will." And she kisses him. "Yes."

He's kissing her back, one hand caressing the soft skin between her shoulder blades that her dress has left bare, the other clutching the ring, when he hears a cough. Then another cough, a bit louder than the first.

"Monsieur?" The tentative voice is about fifteen feet away. "Monsieur? Madame?"

Castle breaks away from the kiss, turns his head and sees an obviously embarrassed young man. The recipient of his keep-the-place-open-for-a-few-minutes bribe is standing in the light that's coming through the open doors.

"Kate, Kate. Sorry, I'm sorry. We have to get up. The elevator guy is here."

"Oh, oh." They scramble up, a tangle of legs and arms, and she dusts off her skirt. "Bonsoir, monsieur," she says to the young man, as she she takes Castle's hand. She gives him a little tug, and they stroll together to the elevator as if this were any summer night anywhere on the planet. They ride down in silence, and when they get out Kate gives the man her very best smile. "Merci mille fois."

"De rien, madame."

Their car is waiting, and as soon as they're safely installed in the back seat she buries her face in his neck. "I didn't know what to think, Castle. No one ever proposed to me before."

"And I hope no one ever will again." He tilts her face up so he can kiss her thoroughly, or at least as thoroughly as he can given the seat belts and the bumpy streets and a driver who is sneaking as many looks as he can in the rear-view mirror. Castle finally breaks away. "Give me your hand, Kate, so I can put the ring on. Otherwise I'm not sure I'll believe that you said yes."

"I did. I did say yes." She nuzzles his neck again, and offers him her left hand, pulling the fingers just slightly apart, and watches as he slides the ring on. "It's gorgeous. But it's so huge."

"Wait, it doesn't fit? No problem, we'll get it sized as soon as we're back in New York."

"No, no, it's a perfect fit. I meant the diamond's huge."

He kisses her fingertips and says, "Looks just right to me."

She puts their hands on her lap. "When did you even have time to buy this?"

"Oh, I had plenty of time," he says, and laughs.

"You did? How? We've been together almost all the time since, you know."

"Since the doughnut?"

"Yeah." He can see her blush, even in the dark.

"Kate, I bought it on October twenty-fifth."

Her mouth opens, closes, and opens again. "But that—that was. You mean last fall? That's almost a year ago."

"I know. It was the day after we closed the case of the doctor who switched his sick baby for a healthy one. Seeing the way you were with the father when he was reunited with his little boy, and how you were with the doctor's wife—it made my heart stop. And then Paula called to tell me about the contract for more Nikki Heat books and you threatened to kill me, not for the first time. But your eyes weren't threatening at all."

"They were, too."

"That's what you think. By then I'd learned to read you pretty well. Thing is, my heart stopped when I looked at you then, too. And when I got home I made an appointment at Van Cleef and Arpels so I could be ready with a ring as soon as I had the nerve to propose."

She looks down at it again, her eyes almost as wide as they had been a few moments ago, on top of the Eiffel Tower. "This is from Van Cleef and Arpels? It was, um. That was."

Silence. In the long silence, he sees her swallow, sees her eyes fill, and so he cradles her hand in his palm. "It was the place that inspired your mother's favorite ballet, Jewels. You told me about that when we were on a stake out a few months before. It was so freaking hot and we couldn't turn on the A/C." A tear rolls into the curved space between his thumb and index finger, and another follows. "Hey, hey, don't cry. You're not supposed to be crying when we've been engaged for five minutes."

"You remembered that? About Jewels? I can't believe it."

"Oh, I remembered. At first I thought it was going to be boring, when you talked about the choreographer—"

"Balanchine."

"Right, Balanchine, thank you. How he was so blown away by visiting Van Cleef and Arpels that he did a ballet about diamonds, emeralds, and rubies. But that fascinated me, that kind of inspiration. And you were so animated about it. And then you talked about how your mother took you to see Jewels when you were a little girl. You should have seen your face. You got to go backstage and meet the ballerina who was in the 'Diamonds' part of the ballet."

She nods. "Merrill Ashley."

"Was that the ballerina? I confess that my memory didn't include her name."

"I got her autograph." Kate wipes her free hand across her eyes to push away the tears. "Still have it," she adds, and smiles. "It's in a box at my dad's cabin. After my apartment was bombed I realized that it was there and I was so relieved. That was a really, really important moment in my childhood, Castle."

"I could tell. That's why I got your diamond where I did."

She's still and quiet for a bit, and then she squeezes his hand. "You know what?"

"What?"

Her voice is sultry and very low as she slides her hand down the inside of his thigh. "I can't wait to get into bed with you." The car suddenly slows. Shit, did the driver hear her?

Castle has no time to respond, because the driver is announcing that they're at the hotel.

When they're back upstairs and unlock the door to their suite, Kate gasps. "There are lights on in the bedroom. Oh my God, the maid's been here."

"So?"

"So, the bed," she groans, covering her face. "The way we left it. Oh God oh God oh God oh God."

"Calm down," he says, walking through the sitting room. "This is France. I'm sure she's seen much worse." He peeks around the doorframe. "See? She left us chocolates on our pillows, so how bad could we have been?"

Kate's pressing herself against him now. "Oh, very bad, Castle. Do you not remember?"

"I do. I definitely do."

"But not as bad as we're about to be," she says, grabbing him by the belt.

"Really? And you call me a perv?"

The ring must transmit some kind of superpower, because she gets his clothes off him almost without his knowing it, and in what seems to be seconds. When he ties to unzip her dress she slaps his hand away. "I'm faster." Fast, huh? Oh, it's going to be one of those.

But it's not. It's slow. Excruciatingly, tantalizingly, magnificently slow. She works him up from head to toe—literally, toe—and back. Every time he thinks he can put a stop to it, she switches both tactics and directions. What she can do with breath alone leaves him—and he's so addled now that any but the most basic vocabulary has abandoned him—breathless.

She may be flexible and wily and inventive and surprising and strong, but he's stronger. "We're both wet all over, Kate," he says, flipping her onto her back and pinning her down, his knees astride her thighs. "I can't take it anymore. I'm about to explode."

"Thank God," she says, "because you can't imagine how ready I am to be the explodee."

"I don't think that's a word."

"Explode into me," she says digging a heel into his back, "and I'll show you exactly what kind of a word it is."

"You know," he says later. "I was going to request the Arc de Triomphe, but I think I'll have to wait a while for that."

"Well, Castle, speaking of that." She's still breathing hard. "You did remind me of the obelisk in the Place de la Concorde just now. The obelisk in the summer sun."

"I did, huh." He reaches over and begins to fondle her breast, which is still flushed.

"You did. Firm, hot, erect, towering, endlessly monumental." She's rolling towards him and suddenly stops. "Ouch!"

He pulls back his hand. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, did I hurt you?"

"No, I just rolled over onto something." She props herself up on one arm and runs her hand over the sheet. "Holy fuck," she says, holding the something up in her hand. "We melted the chocolate." She crawls on top of him like a jungle cat. "You know what I'm going to do with this?"

"What?" he asks weakly if expectantly, as he watches her remove the silvery paper and begin to slide down his stomach.

"I'm going to wrap it around you, and lick it off."

"Sweetest thing I've ever heard, Kate."

Some time later—her warm hand and even warmer mouth having left him incapable of calculating time—she pops her head up. "Sweetest thing I've ever eaten, Castle." At that they both explode, this time in laughter, and they fall asleep, probably still laughing.

When they wake up, it's really too late for breakfast, especially since Kate is taking them somewhere she loves for lunch, but while Castle's in the bathroom she calls room service for coffee. They drink it in bed, propped up against the head board, but falling against each other.

"How do you like being engaged so far?" he asks.

"So far? So far it's perfect. It's just—."

"Just what?" He sits up straight, worry transforming his face. "Don't tell me you're regretting this. I know it must have seemed sudden, but please, please don't say that."

"Of course not. No, no. It's just, are we crazy? We've barely dated, we kind of blew by dating."

"I think we blew a lot of things."

"Castle! I'm serious."

"I know. Listen, Kate, so we skipped dating. But we didn't really, except in the traditional sense. And why should we be traditional? There's nothing traditional about our relationship except that I love you and—"

"And I love you."

"So, don't you think, looking back, that we we've really kind of dating all along? Flirting, jealousy, everything?"

"You were so jealous of Will. And Demming, oh man."

"How about you and Kyra?"

"I was not."

"Oh, please. The surveillance camera photos of me kissing her on that roof? I thought you were going to kill me."

"Might have wanted to kill her, actually."

"See?"

"Okay."

He puts his cup on the nightstand and checks his watch. "What time is our reservation?"

"One."

"I hate to say it, but it's after eleven, so we should get up. And we should take our suitcases with us to the restaurant, and go to the airport from there."

All the air whooshes out of her lungs. "You're right. We should. Dammit."

"Kate," he leans over and kisses her shoulder. "This is just the beginning, you know. What do you say? Want to take a shower with me? And then we can dress and pack."

"Okay. But no monkey business in there, we don't have time."

"Monkey business? You're the monkey, the way you can climb—"

"Yeah, yeah, banana man. You know what, maybe if we're fast we can monkey around just a little."

While they're showering, she sings and hums. It's the same song, but sometimes she uses the words, and sometimes not. He loves listening to her, and when she comes to the end, he misses it. "What is that? It's so familiar."

"Another Edith Piaf song, one of her most famous. 'Je ne regrette rien'."

"Tell me the last part you did, I really loved that."

Non, je ne regrette rien
Car ma vie, car mes joies
Aujourd'hui, ça commence avec toi.

"It's exactly the way I feel right now, Castle."

"And how is that?"

No! I regret nothing
Because my life, my joys
Today, they begin with you.

He finds that he can't say anything, but he hopes that his eyes tell her. When they're drying off he picks up her ring, which she had put on a shelf for safekeeping. "Don't forget this."

"As if," she says, and puts it on her finger. "I wish I could wear nothing but this, for the rest of my life."

TBC

A/N This is not the end of their discussion about getting engaged, just the end of this chapter. Thank you all, very much!