Lean Wide Out the Window
He texts her at noon but doesn't hear back, so he calls at one. She answers a little breathless and sounding like she's dived deep into something, her words distracted and choppy.
"Was wondering about lunch?" he asks, already knowing it's a bad idea. He shouldn't have called.
"Um. Yeah. Hold on." He gets the muffled noise of her hand over the mouthpiece as she speaks to someone else, the sharp edge of a command, and he realizes it was poor taste to call and ask.
Impolite, really, because he's putting her in a spot where she feels she has to entertain him, or make sure he's okay, and he's fine. He woke at nine and even did a little writing, talked to Alexis on video chat while she walked to her Pysch class, and then he even managed some practice with the new crutches.
He feels sweaty but accomplished and he wanted to share but he should have known better than to-
"Castle. Hey. Want me to pick us up some Remy's? I could use a burger."
"If you're swamped-"
"I just cleared my desk. Good timing."
He pauses, mind racing through all the possibilities, all nuances to her inflection of every word, and for the life of him, he can't sense a single iota of sarcasm or frustration or even just putting up with him. "Okay. Remy's is good."
"Milk shake?" she murmurs. It sounds like she's putting on her coat; he can hear the scrape of fabric across the mic in the phone, the noise she makes when she's got her arm tangled in the sleeve and pushes through.
Why does he know that? It feels odd to know that noise, feels intimate in a way that sharing a bed and touching her skin is not.
"Castle? You with me?"
"Yeah," he rasps, nods to himself as he blinks through a strange revelation. "Yeah, I'm with you, Kate."
"So. Strawberry, chocolate, banana-"
"Can you have them mix chocolate and banana?"
"Course. The usual?"
"Yeah. But pepperjack cheese."
"Oh? Hmm, don't know about that."
He laughs because it surprises him, the heat in her voice and the tease, and yeah, it's no different than the last few weeks - her willingness to be here with him - but he still expects her to be too busy to stop. Too busy to tease, in a hurry to get back.
"Be there in about twenty, Castle."
"Yeah," he says, snapping back to the present. "See you then."
Everything she does only affirms what he's known, what showing up on his doorstep soaking wet and jumping him means - because we love.
He's a man of words, but she tells him so much more without.
"You should go," he says, using his foot to nudge her away.
"Stop that," she grumbles, trying to angle around the straight poker of his leg. She laughs and sidesteps him again. "Castle."
"You need to go. Stop hanging around here," he grins back. She can tell he's delighted she's hanging around though.
"I really do need to go," she sighs.
"I told you. I can hear your phone even when you put it on vibrate, Beckett."
"Your spidey sense again?"
"Don't need it. I think it must be in your coat pocket with your keys?"
She flinches and pushes her hand into the pocket of her coat as it hangs over the couch, finds her phone right up against her keys, like he said. So he could hear the phone vibrate and jangle the keys and of course, she knows it's probably been going off since she got here.
"I think we have a break in the case," she apologizes. She glances through the loft windows at the darkness beyond, the city breaking up the night with its restless energy and neon lights. Well, no. No neon in Castle's neighborhood, of course. She brought him lunch yesterday but skipped it today in favor of getting home early, and now she's torn between finishing up the case and staying in with him.
"Go, Kate."
"I'm going," she mutters, shooting him a dirty look. But she stops trying to engage him in that chair, instead moves back for her coat hanging over the couch. He's watching her with his hands resting on the wheels of the chair.
"I'll just be here practicing on my crutches."
She pivots on her heel. "No. Castle. Come on."
"I'm getting good," he proclaims.
"Castle. Not while you're alone. Please. Because I don't want to have to worry about you doing some other stupid thing-"
"It wasn't stupid. I just lost my balance," he grumbles.
"At least Alexis was here," she sighs. "But I'm leaving you alone tonight and I don't want to come home after putting a case to bed only to find I have to put you to bed as well."
"Oh, but you do such a good job," he says, voice lowered into that sexy range that makes her shift on her feet. She glares at him for it, hands pushed into the pockets of her coat, but she can tell she's hit a brick wall with him. He won't make that promise to stop using the crutches when the crutches give him freedom.
He wants so badly to come with her, but he really can't. Not even on crutches.
"Okay, Castle," she gives in. "But if you end up in the emergency room, you better not be calling me."
He's beaming up at her now, like she gave him permission, but she doesn't try to argue with that. She just maneuvers around his wheelchair to brush her hand over his back and kiss his cheek. He turns his head and touches her lips, makes it a little more interesting though not impossible to resist.
"I'm fine. Go catch a killer."
"They said the warrant came through," she admits, lifting up again.
"Go, Beckett. Don't make me shove you out the door with my bad knee."
She laughs a little, feeling marginally better about leaving him, though no better at all about how alluring the case is, how it siren songs to her just outside the loft.
She itches to go.
"Go."
"I'm going."
He's asleep when the rowdy, noisy bunch of them come tumbling through his door, but he orients swiftly. He didn't mean to fall asleep; he was waiting on her.
She stumbles to a stop with her grin plastered wide on her face as she finds him on the couch, but instead of a sharp question, instead of the crumbling frown of concern, she grins wider and comes to him, Esposito and Ryan at her back.
Kate practically bounces on the couch beside him, hooks her arms around his neck and leans in to thoroughly, devastatingly, kiss his mouth. She tastes like the good whiskey and faintly of dark chocolate, which means celebrating, which means The Old Haunt. Without him.
She pulls back even as Ryan and Espo are finding awkward places to stand in the living room, and Kate sits back, arms still at his neck, her smile a little softer now but no less proud.
"We got him," she murmurs. "Processed and in holding and the DA loves me."
"The DA really does love her," Esposito grumbles.
Castle laughs because all three of them are a little buzzed, but Kate shifts on the couch and settles in close to him, their shoulders touching as she looks up at Kevin and Javier.
"Tell him," she demands. "Tell him how it went."
"She's making us tell you because she's so modest," Ryan snorts.
"She figured it out," Esposito sighs. "I hate her a little."
"You and me both," Castle says, because he knows what that means. Knows how watching her solve a case, that moment of breakthrough, gives Kate something breathlessly arousing - an aura.
Wait. Espo better be keeping his eyes to himself. "The DA loves you? Which DA?"
All three laugh at a shared joke, eyebrows and smirks and the camaraderie he's not a part of.
Castle shifts on the couch to adjust his leg, but Kate's fingers are running over his forearm and circling his wrist, incredibly distracting.
"So. How did it go?" he asks, nudging them out of their post-celebratory drink let-down.
Ryan is the first to talk, sitting down at the very edge of the chair as he starts. Espo crosses his arms and stands sentry just behind him, throwing in words every now and then, making little digs, and Kate just presses her side against his, stroking the top of his thigh and fiddling with the velcro on the brace, like she's excited and still humming with energy.
There's something about a foot chase and a bad-ass Beckett, and his mind is already overactively concocting details, scenarios, a vivid visual of her hair flying and her coat unbuttoned and her weapon in that two-handed grip that makes him think about dirty things.
They got the guy.
He gets Kate.
"No, I have all day with you," she promises, crossing her fingers behind her back. "Want a sponge bath?"
He laughs hard and slides an arm around her waist from his position in the wheelchair; she leans in and rests her ribs to the top of his head, a strange embrace.
"A sponge bath, huh?"
"Yeah," she grins. "Could be fun."
"Could be," he gives nothing away. "Or you could spot me on my crutches?"
She sighs and sinks down a little, kissing the soft skin at his temple. "You're killing me with those crutch runs."
"I've been racing with Alexis," he admits to her. He doesn't even look ashamed.
"I know," she mutters, choosing instead to drop into his lap without warning him. She sees that flicker travel across his eyes, a bracing for pain, but it must not come this time. "She told me. She tells me things."
"That's not fair," he mutters into her neck. His sharp inhale feels like relief, but it also sends scattered messages down her body, awareness flaring.
"We share," she needles him. "She totally tells on you. Every time."
"You've enticed my daughter into conspiracy against me and it's not sexy at all," he grumbles. But the way his lips brush hot fire at her throat and collarbone tell her he thinks it's so very sexy. Oh, wow. Yeah, that's nice.
"Conspiracy to what?" she chuckles, tries to keep the breathlessness out of her voice. "You think we're plotting to murder you in your sleep?"
"Could be. Who knows what nefarious plots you have in mind?"
"I had one nefarious plot that you seemed to skip right over there, Castle." Her fingers stroke at the back of his neck and down inside the collar of his robe. He's not wearing a t-shirt under it and it's all hot skin and the resistance of his shoulder muscles as he moves to hold her harder.
"Oh, yes. Sponge bath. I see what you're doing. Trying to divert me from my chosen path."
He must feel good, if he's foraying this far down her shirt with that mouth. Whew. Okay. "You better be diverted, because if you're getting me worked up for nothing, I really am going to murder you."
"You getting worked up, Beckett? I didn't notice."
She curses at him and grips the back of his neck, angles him to kiss her with a rough flash of irritation that has more to do with chair and less to do with how far his hands have gotten into her pants.
"Sponge bath," he gasps, face that alive and curious wonder. "Yes. Let's - you said all day?"
"Waiting on autopsy results. Won't be till morning," she promises.
But his face shifts into a pout. "I'm missing everything."
"You're... missing what?"
"The whole case."
"I've texted you," she defends.
"The last I knew you were doing paperwork on that other guy. Now there's an autopsy on a body and I don't even know what happened."
She closes her mouth and frowns. "Are you really... put off because you missed the body drop? Because Castle, your hands have stopped. And that's not smart if you still want a sponge bath."
He wriggles his fingers and she gasps, not expecting that or that close, and he grins.
"Whoa," she breathes. Been a while. She's been so careful, tried to be so patient, and now she's squirming on his lap and chewing hard on the inside of her cheek to keep from dragging him bodily to bed. "Okay. That's... good. Can't be that mad if you're..."
His mouth catches her jaw and skims to her ear. "I'm bummed I'm missing all the good cases. Last week it was the four guys from the shipping company and body parts winding up all over New York and I can't believe I missed you taking them down."
Why is it hot to hear the details of gruesome murder investigations in her ear like this? It's not. It's just been a while and he's been a little passive because his knee hurt him and now his voice is molten and his hands know exactly - oh, exactly - what to do.
"Castle, just..."
"Just what, Detective?"
"I promise more detail if you'll just..."
"Like this?" he murmurs and she closes her eyes, heart thumping. "Yeah, I know what you like. You know what I like?"
Everything goes still and it takes a second for the tunnel of her arousal to unnarrow, widen out again, and she stares at him dumbly, unable to process why he's stopped.
"I like murder investigations, Beckett. I like you and murder investigations and how we spin a theory - it's almost dirty."
She blinks and lifts off his lap, untangling from those promising, teasing hands, her fingers dragging down the lapel of his robe to tug unmercifully. He rolls a little towards her - he forgot to put the brake on again - and she presses a fierce kiss to his mouth.
"I know what you like," she murmurs, trying for a little payback. "I'll do my best to recount every single sordid detail. In your ear. With every gasp. Now - Castle - come with me."
And oh yes, she meant it like that too.