Author's Note: This little side-shot snippet takes place immediately after Ellie's encounter with Casey in Castle where he whispered a secret in her ear.
She was still shaking when she got home, aftershocks rolling through her body after her very personal encounter with one Major John Casey.
Rather than being angry or embarrassed that he had nerve to whisper those things in her ear, with Sarah in the room no less, she hungered for more, starved to hear him tell her more of what he wanted to do to her.
The old Ellie, well, she would have slapped him across his arrogant, handsome face, outraged and offended by his brazen impudence. The new Ellie, "Ellie 2.0" as she had nicknamed herself shortly after becoming the human Intersect, was barely restraining herself from returning to Castle and calling the Major's bluff. The man made her whole damn body ache, and she was tired of playing games.
"He wants to play? We'll play," she huffed, nearly crushing her purse as she grabbed it off the table on her way to the front door. "To the victor go the spoils," she muttered.
She yanked the door open, liquid fire edged with sheer determination burning in her eyes, now the color of molten steel, and crashed into an unyielding wall of solid muscle. Déjà vu washed over her as, once again, large hands banded around her upper arms, arresting her velocity. She felt herself leaning in, or, was she being pulled in, toward his heat.
"John? What-?" she blinked, looking up, getting lost once again in a brilliant sea of blue.
He loosened his grip, slowly sliding his hands down the length of her arms before releasing her. Never breaking eye contact, he unbuttoned one of the front pockets of his cargos and fished out a small, white plastic square. Holding it by the metal clip at the top, he dangled it in front of her face.
Her likeness started back at her, "Westside Hospital" stamped at the bottom of the badge. "You dropped this in Castle in your haste," he said quietly, taking a step forward, causing her to step over the threshold and back into the condo.
"Thank you, John. That was very careless of me." Her lips parted, and she siphoned shallow breaths into her mouth, watching as he continued to advance on her as she backed further into her home.
She felt her back meet the edge of the breakfast bar. "You seemed in an awful hurry to get somewhere, Ellie." He leaned forward, his hands resting easily on the breakfast bar, closing her in, as he planted his feet on either side of hers, completing the cage.
The new Ellie wasn't feeling quite so gutsy now. "I was heading out to do my errands. I have a lot to get done before work tomorrow." Her cheeks flamed and she felt her lower lip tremble even as she was mentally rebuking herself for letting the steel sift right out of her spine.
John pressed closer, grazing her breasts with his chest. God, the man was killing her. He lifted a hand, grasping a strand of errant, silky sable hair between his thumb and forefinger, tucking it behind her ear.
She was drowning in a pool of heat, moisture slickening the inside of her thighs as his body came closer, and she felt the delicious rasp of his calloused fingers against the tender shell of her ear. An involuntary shudder wracked her body, and she clamped her mouth shut, stifling her gasp.
"Cold, Ellie?" he asked, learning further forward, pressing his bigger body against hers.
"Y-yes," she stammered. "I must have caught a chill. It's cold in here."
"Liar," he breathed in her ear.
~Fin