A/N: Thanks to Jessie for making me believe I could do this, helped me chip away at my wall of blockage. Thanks to everyone else who is sticking around.
P.S. The morgue is in the precinct. I don't care if it's not-in this story it is. Now you know.
Disclaimer: Not mine.
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"I'll see you tomorrow."
"I'll see you tomorrow."
"I'll see you tomorrow."
Castle's simple statement replays over and over in Kate's mind as she tries to decipher the implication behind his tone and inflection, the wry smile that the words sprung forth from. Though trying to figure out Castle's motivations is nearly always a losing battle, one she doesn't have the energy to partake in at the moment.
Elbows on the desktop, she drops her face into her hands, groans quietly in frustration. How could she be so imprudent? She had sex with him, asked for it, wanted it so badly, spurred him on…and right against her front door, hard and clothed and desperate.
And it was wonderful.
And it was stupid.
As she's often accustomed to when thoughts of him are involved, arousal coils in her gut, winds itself lower and lower, lands heavily in her belly. If she doesn't distract herself now, she'll get worked up until the vortex of want is so tight it can only be unwound by him. And he's spent weeks finding the best possible ways to unfurl the accumulation of tension and frustration he helped to originate years ago. Now she can't even go a full day without wanting his thick fingers, and tongue, and-
And, no no, they are not doing this anymore. It was a moment of weakness on her part, and it's over and done with, a mistake to be learned from. Moral of the story: Being in the same room as Castle will inevitably result in conflict, combat, or copulation.
It doesn't help that she wore his damn tee shirt to bed last night, woke in the middle of the night smelling of him, the soft cotton soaking into her skin, and still able to feel the heft of him between her thighs. As her own hand skittered down her chest and past her stomach, she felt empty, hollowed out; the coolness of the sheets beside her seemed magnified as she rolled over to burrow into an unoccupied pillow.
She crosses her legs to alleviate the ache, cracks her knee on the underside of her desk and curses under her breath.
A glance at her watches shows the time to be eleven-thirty a.m. 'Tomorrow' is too broad of a timeframe for her to be lazing hypnotized by the slow-spinning hands on her watch. If he were planning on coming to the precinct, he would have been here by now. Right?
Okay, so, maybe he's had time to rethink. Realize that it's best to do this as a clean break; no need to muddle it up further with emotions and urges. Oh, who is she kidding? His "this isn't over" didn't leave a lot of room for interpretation.
He's not letting go.
She shoves down the instinctual brightness that blooms at the thought, the knowing that if the circumstances were different, this would be it for him. He was already it for her.
She needs him to let go.
The elevator pings, announcing an arrival, and she instantly tenses, contemplates hiding under her desk. She watches as two uniforms step out, whooshes out a sigh of relief, and relaxes back into the chair.
"Who are you waiting on?"
She whirls around and faces her smug-looking friend. "Geez, Lanie, you nearly scared me to death," she admonishes.
Lanie shrugs, unapologetic. "Job security."
The M.E. spins a chair from behind her and drops into it, grabs the corner of the desk to roll a little closer. She folds her arms over her chest and eyes her. Kate shifts under the scrutiny.
Damn if her friend isn't smirking at her like she knows something. Or maybe it's some voodoo reverse-psychology where Lanie just thinks she can coax her into leaking something. "Beckett, you expecting someone?"
Well, she's not playing along. "No." How the hell can a one syllable word come out long, shaky, and in question form?
"The way you were fixating your attention on your watch and that elevator, it doesn't look like a no."
"Stop fishing. I'm not biting."
"Okay, so let's pretend that you're sitting here trying too damn hard to look like you're not waiting on your boy to waltz off of that elevator. Hypothetically, of course."
"Of course," Kate sighs, caught.
"So, how did you even know that he's here? Have you already talked to him this morning?" She leans in, chin-on-fist, completely invested on waiting for her answer.
"He's here?"
"Oh, come on, Kate—"
"No, I didn't know. Wait, are you sure he's here?"
"Uh huh. I passed him coming into the morgue." Kate startles. "Don't worry. I kept my mouth shut. Only waved."
"Thanks?"
"He, uh, didn't look so…desolate."
"Huh."
"So, you don't know anything about his change in demeanor?"
"I haven't seen Castle today, Lanie."
"That's not what I asked," she reminds. "You're not as slick as you think you are."
"Shut up." She's fighting a losing battle here.
"Spill."
She pauses, deliberates on concocting some lame, elaborate story. But, Lanie's not going to buy it; it'll just be a waste of breath—something she seems a little short of lately anyway. "I slept with him," she groans quietly. "Last night. Well, there wasn't any sleeping involved." The words dance off of her tongue in quick succession.
"Was it good?" Off of Kate's look. "Hey, you spared me every detail yesterday. I know nothing. Friends are supposed to know all the juicy tidbits. You're cramping my style."
"It's always good," Kate admits begrudgingly, looking anywhere but at Lanie.
"Ah, yes, see, doesn't spilling that make it a little better? Feel free to unburden yourself, baby," she hints with a sly chuckle. "Tell mamma the details. In my experience, make-up sex?" She pauses, either for dramatic effect or because she's flashing back on an example. "Always the bomb."
"We didn't make up."
"Oooh, angry sex, then?"
"I am not talking about this. Especially not here." Kate looks around, eyes the people milling about. There's no urgency; it's a surprisingly slow day, one in which ears and eyes are usually notably open. No one looks as if they're paying them any attention, but better safe than sorry.
"Lunch is on me, then."
"I'm not hungry." Though she is, really. She ate one bite of her pizza last night before her stomach said "oh no, you don't" and she shoved the box in her fridge. She hasn't even attempted food since.
"Too bad. Let's go." She tugs on her arm, and Kate willingly stands from the chair and follows.
They wait as the elevator creaks to a stop, announces its arrival. They separate as the panels open, allowing any passengers a clear path between them.
As luck would have it, the first time in hours that she's not expecting Castle, she gets Castle. He's not watching where he's going; he's mumbling something to himself as he nearly walks into her.
"Ah, sorry." He looks up then, startles when they're face-to-face, then steps back into the elevator.
She wants to reach in, push the button to close the doors and pray he's not quick enough to stop them. Before she can make her fantasy a reality, Lanie is shoving her into the box and stepping in behind her. Then she pushes the button before anyone else can swing in with them, and that totally wasn't how this was supposed to go.
"Hi," he breathes. He waves his fingers at Lanie, but doesn't leave Kate's eyes. His are dark and steady, unwavering, and he's too far into her personal space, his hand hovering near her hip, as if shielding her from the metal railing at her back.
She thinks Castle is inching even closer, can feel his heat seeping into her side. Or just wants to feel it, maybe, remembers what a furnace he is, how he brands his flesh into hers, naked and hot.
She's feeling claustrophobic, even as the floors tick down, lights indicating the proximity of their destination.
Lanie is eyeing the emergency stop button again.
"Don't even think about it."
"What?" Castle guiltily slides a foot away from her, drops his arm to his side. "I wouldn't do anything with company," he whispers, head tilted too close to her. If she twisted her neck just so, his lips would- No. No.
She nudges him away with her elbow. "Not you."
"Oh." He takes that as some kind of permission to press into her side again, and Jesus, that wasn't a good idea either. They're squeezed into the corner of the elevator, she and Castle, and Lanie is just watching them, with this investigative amusement coloring her features.
When the panels open, she rushes out into the precinct's lobby, is tempted to just keep going out the front doors, but she's waiting on Lanie. Lunch with Lanie. Yes. Far, far away from Castle.
"Are you leaving?" He's asking Lanie, and Kate doesn't like this. She doesn't want them conversing, in cahoots. That was a scary prospect before there was sex, and breaking up, and more sex, and Alexis for them to talk about.
"Yes, we're leaving," she responds, waving Lanie towards her.
"Lunch," the M.E. explains, shoots Castle an apologetic glance.
"Ah." He turns away from Lanie and cants towards her as if he is going to touch, but thinks better of it. "Can we…talk later?"
"No."
He sinks his teeth into his lip and nods, and oh no, not that face. His eyes are a bit shiny and he looks disappointed and pitiful, and she just wants to put her mouth on him everywhere everywhere until that look slithers away.
She needs separation and she needs it now.
"You wanna come to lunch with us?" What the hell, Lanie? No. Her best friend is a traitor and tyrant and is playing a dangerous game. Because if they think that she's going to agree to-
"I, uh, actually already have lunch plans," stumbles out of his mouth.
Oh.
That's what she wanted right? Him to move on?
She's not prepared. This is the type of thing she knew would be possible, but didn't want to think about. Notions that maybe one day, light-years away, she would see a picture of him arm-in-arm with someone, or an engagement announcement, or a new book dedicated to a set of unfamiliar initials; she could crumble then, in this undeterminable future—the one so far away in her head that she's chosen to shut those thoughts down as they approach. But now, now she's going to freaking cry, right here with detectives and officers and criminals brushing past her; and her best friend and her—whatever he is—witnessing the whole breakdown.
"Come on, Lanie." She spins and hunts down the quickest path to the exit, takes deep breaths through her nose, quick exhales out her clenched teeth, thinks about anything but the heaviness in her chest, tears stinging her eyes.
"I could cancel," he offers to their retreating backs.
"Don't bother," Lanie calls over her shoulder as she squeezes Kate's forearm in some gesture of sympathy that she doesn't want, regardless of whether she needs it or not. "Enjoy your date."
That makes Kate cringe. She has no right to be angry, no reason to ask him not to find someone else, court them, take them into his bed, love them. But, that doesn't make it hurt any less.
"Wait—you thought—you both thought…," he lags off in a puff of half-laughter, his face tinged with surprise. "I can invite her with us. It's-"
Lanie stalks back to him before Kate even has time to realize that she's not by her side any longer. Kate watches as she pokes a finger into his chest and Castle winces at the contact. "Richard Castle, you are an arrogant son of a—"
"Alexis," he divulges swiftly. "My lunch plans. With Alexis."
Kate's shoulders sag in relief as she gulps in air that's no longer stale, but her head throbs at the girl's name. The daughter who just wants to protect her father, but has, in turn, forced Kate to give up the happiness that she's been grasping at for so long and finally found. It's such a conundrum; one that Kate is still glad Castle isn't privy to.
He's smiling at her, a small tentative one, one with forgive me? attached because he knows exactly what she was thinking and how it affected her, damn it. She schools her expression, peeks at her watch, plucks invisible lint from her blouse-feigns nonchalance (pretty terribly, the way his features keep softening as he watches her), but can't break their gaze; it's magnetic.
"Of course. Alexis," Lanie says confidently, mercifully breaking the little spell she and Castle had found themselves under. Wait, Lanie looks devious, conniving, and a slice of panic cuts through Kate. "Yes. Invite Alexis to come along."
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