Murder He Rewrote
When Kate wakes up, it's to the brush of tender fingers at the mountain range of her spine like gathering snow and the cool touch of a mouth at her shoulder. She turns her face into the pillow and lifts a hand, still so satiated from last night that it feels entirely disconnected, her wrists thin and brittle as wire.
Oh, last night.
Attentive and passionate and thorough, Castle unravelled her from the core outwards until her skin hummed with static charge and her words scattered in the breeze of his touch, beyond coalescence. After the pool – she's hyperaware of the blossoming haematoma between her shoulder blades - and then again in the shower as they rinsed off the chlorine, Rick took her to bed.
And of course it's intense every time (their first night, the first time he sank into her, she cried into his shoulder) but it's never, ever been quite like that. The things he did to her.
The things she did to him.
Kate is startled to find her hand still floating in the middle of the sheets, manages to scrape together enough awareness to anchor it against Castle's chest. She cracks an eye open to see him propped up on one elbow as he watches her, his fingers still ghosting over the skin of her back.
It's been hours, and still the contact sends frissons of pleasure through her, just tiptoeing the line between ecstasy and agony. "Don't touch me."
He snatches his hand away as if she's burned him and Kate huffs a sigh, rolls onto her back and reaches up to rake her fingernails over the dark scatter of stubble at his jaw, his neck.
"I can't handle it. You've ruined me."
"Really, still?" He hums, lifting an eyebrow at her as he clasps his hands and settles them pointedly in his lap. And oh, thank God the sheets pool around his waist and cover all the necessary parts of him. She absolutely can't take any more, but the sight of him makes her mouth go dry and her whole body ache with need every time.
"Mm. What happened to the bathrobes?"
"I think they're still outside. You know, from when we skinny dipped?" He leers at her, curling his fingers around her hip so the whole of his forearm rests low at her abdomen, the pressure a thick and dragging weight that tugs her brain down and away until she can't do more than squirm underneath him.
He laughs at her, damn him, but he bends to press a chaste kiss to her forehead and then slips out from under the sheets. "I'll get them. Don't move. I'm really enjoying this whole 'there's no case so yes let's lounge in bed' thing."
"You still want to lounge even if we cover up?"
Castle falters in the doorway and makes his eyebrows dance at her, gloriously naked. A flush crawls up from the base of her throat and Kate rolls onto her stomach, propping her chin in the cup of her palm to watch him. And of course he sees, the delight leaching into his words. "Well, we can still snuggle, right?"
"I don't want to spend all day in bed." Kate says, pressing her mouth into a seam. She can't stop the fissures of laughter at the corners of her eyes though. Not that she'd ever really want to.
He nudges the door open with his hip, shooting her a long look rich with so much lust that Kate finds her hips shifting against the mattress entirely without her permission.
"I want to take you to brunch, Kate Beckett."
And then he's gone, leaving her to roll over and arch her back, settling down again and curling up in contentment. If this is what life is like with him-
Well. Needless to say, the rest of her body is entirely in agreement with her heart on this one.
When he comes back, he's already wearing his own robe and he passes hers over without complaint. Kate shrugs her way into it and mirrors him, laying on her back on top of the sheets with her hands clasped against her abdomen. Demure and separate.
"So I've been thinking about the next Nikki Heat." He starts, and Kate has to sink her teeth into her bottom lip to stifle the laughter. Really, Castle? Why don't they just discuss baseball stats?
"Mm?"
"I have the plot kind of half-formed. But there are some inconsistencies. Can we talk it out?"
A frisson of pleasure rolls through her at that. Sometimes she forgets, momentarily, that this is her favourite author. This is the man who's made her laugh and cry with his words, taught her how to hold together the jagged edges of herself. And now he's asking for her opinion.
Of course, of course, she loves when he discusses Nikki with her. But right now, the thought of puzzling out a homicide makes her want to groan and tug her pillow to cover her face. "Castle, I'm on vacation. If I wanted to think about a murder I would have stayed in the city."
"Right. Sorry." There's a pause where she can hear him thinking, his brain ticking over the facts. "I think I might have the guy die in Nikki's backyard. And then the cops find some meth head and attribute it to him just because it's convenient."
"This is not my case."
"Still, as cases go you have to admit it's pretty weak." He says, huffing a sigh that smacks of frustration. It's adorable, honestly, and all her annoyance melts away just like that.
Kate lifts her head from the pillow to look at him, her forehead entrenched with frown lines a moment until she lies back again. "If you keep obsessing over this it's going to ruin the weekend."
Castle holds his hands up in supplication and sighs out, the work of Kate's mouth as she contemplates exactly how long he's going to take to kiss her going right over his head.
"So what do we do?"
Mm, yes, here's her window of opportunity. A smile scrawls its way across her mouth and she rolls over, stretching the length of her body against his own. "Maybe you just try putting it out of your mind?"
Coming in to kiss him, Kate falters as he turns his head and gesticulates again, for once ignoring the siren call of her open mouth so close to his own.
"But what about the gun? They'd have found the gun on him."
"Castle," Kate sets her palm against his cheek and turns him to look at her. "That's not putting it out of your mind."
She leans in for a more successful kiss this time, presses her mouth to his like scattered punctuation to the words that still trip free from him. "You're right, I'm obsessing. I won't obsess."
"Okay." Kate grins, coming back for a longer kiss. He curls his fingers around her shoulder to keep her close, his tongue sweeping inside and sending a shower of lust cascading through her whole body until her toes curl.
When he pulls back, it's to rest his mouth against her cheek and haul her body closer, his hips shifting under her weight. "Can we do brunch now? I'm actually really pretty hungry."
Kate opens her mouth to protest, tell him this first, but her stomach growls its own contribution before she gets a chance. He grins but lets her have it, doesn't say anything. She rolls off of his body and climbs out of bed, kneels down next to the suitcase she never even bothered to open last night.
Yeah, actually, she could really use a shower. She grabs the bag with her toiletries and picks out clothes for today, disappears into the bathroom and shuts the door on his eager face.
"Not a chance in hell, Castle."
Okay, so he really, really adores vacation Kate. He might have said that already, but it's no less true.
She's wearing this halter shirt that's sort of tie-dyed in white and blue and purple with these white capris that smooth over every delicious curve and plane of her and really, how is he supposed to focus on anything when shadow pools at her clavicles and calls out for the touch of his mouth?
Across the table from him at the little breakfast café he and Alexis have been coming to religiously since his daughter was no more than a tiny slip of a girl who curled on his lap and called him Daddy, Kate Beckett is laughing at his jokes.
All of them, even the terrible ones that make his cheeks flame because he can't actually believe he's even allowing himself to say that. She still laughs, full and bright and rich. And every time, all of the other customers turn to gaze at her, this gorgeous divination of God that has somehow stumbled into their local café.
"So, I got in trouble with Mother and Alexis for not having a plan. There was some mention of things to do under the stars, but I think we checked that one off the list pretty thoroughly last night, right?"
The waitress appears at his shoulder right as he finishes talking and Kate's cheeks flame. She carefully avoids his gaze as she orders and waits for him to do the same, watching the poor girl walk away for a long moment before she pins him in place with her gaze.
"Not that I didn't enjoy it. . .thoroughly, but can we not discuss it in public?" She huffs, sipping at her ice water and leaning back in the seat. Her spine arches and her breasts strain a little against the material of her shirt and it's just completely unfair that she's still so capable of taking him apart like this.
He takes a long swallow of his own water, eyes closed so he doesn't have to see her watching him, and the slide of cool relief down his throat startles him into clarity. Right. What was he saying?
"Anyway, so I was thinking after we eat we could just wander around the town for a little while? I don't get a chance to often; Alexis always wants to go back to the pool or the beach."
Kate's whole face floods with light as she grins at him, settling her hand over top of his where he rests it on the table. Her thumb circles and she nods, starlings careening across the soft mist of sky behind her. "Sure. Yeah, show me all your favourite places."
Their server returns with the food and Kate turns her smile up to the girl, drawing out a startled echo onto the teenager's freckled face. "Thank you so much."
"Um, enjoy your food." The girl stutters, hurrying back to the kitchen, and Castle can't help but laugh.
"It's really not fair when you do that, you know."
Kate lifts an eyebrow at him and spears a grape with her fork, sliding it past her lips with so much deliberation he just knows she's doing it on purpose. Mm, okay Kate. Keep this up, that's fine. He'll just continue working on his many, many ideas for payback.
"Making us mere mortals feel so inferior."
He gets an eye roll for that and she busies herself with her fruit salad, doesn't deign to comment. She's got waffles too but she doesn't touch them yet, apparently finding the multitude of torturously sensual ways she can pick at the fruit much more entertaining.
Castle shovels pancake into his mouth with abandon, his stomach a hollowed-out, angry thing. Hmm, yeah, she thoroughly exhausted him. His phone rings and he has to swallow hard, struggling not to choke as he swipes across the screen to accept the call.
"Castle."
"Hey Castle." Ryan's voice greets him, and Kate must hear because she lifts startled eyes to his and sets her fork carefully down against the table top. "Yeah, I'm gonna put you on speakerphone so you can weigh in on this."
"Weigh in on what?" Rick muses, his free hand sliding across the table so he can tangle his fingers with Kate's and grin stupidly at her. He flicks his own phone to speaker and prays that Kate will have the good sense not to say anything.
Ryan sounds almost gleeful and it draws Castle's attention away from his partner, curiosity spiking in his stomach. "Well we're in the morgue with Lanie trying to figure out who Beckett's boyfriend is."
Kate sits up a little, sends a startled glance from his phone to his face and back. He lifts a hand, a subtle reminder that she absolutely has to be quiet.
"I have nothing to do with this nonsense." Lanie's voice cuts out, impatient as ever with the boys' antics.
"Yeah, until you're bagging their mangled bodies when Beckett finds out." Castle says, inordinately pleased with the grin he earns himself for that. She looks almost proud of him and it sends a hot wash of need through his gut.
"Like we're afraid of Beckett." Esposito says over the line and Rick winces, glances at Kate to gauge her reaction to that.
"Besides, how's she gonna find out?" Ryan adds and Kate scowls, reaches out to snatch his phone from him. He yanks it away from her just in time, gives her a long look.
"I don't know who Beckett's dating, guys. I just know that-" Castle glances at his girlfriend's face, gives her a tender smile that she returns even with the thrum of irritation at her jaw. "That he makes her really happy. So maybe we should just let her be? I'm sure she'll tell us when she's ready."
There's a moment of silence on the line and then Esposito speaks up, voice heavy with suspicion. "Dude, why are you so calm about this? You're seriously okay with Beckett dating another guy?"
"I'm okay with anything that makes Beckett happy." Castle says slowly, picking his words carefully from the bunch that crowd his tongue. "And if that's someone other than me, then that's okay. She deserves to be happy."
"And you're just going to watch?" Ryan surmises, a lift of disbelief to his words.
Kate clutches at his hand, her eyes so dark with sorrow it's like a storm rolling in to greet him. "Beckett is my best friend. I love what we do at the precinct, I love being there and I don't want to give that up. So yes, I'm going to watch. I'd rather have her in my life as a friend than not at all."
Both of the boys go quiet at that, Lanie silenced too in the background, and Castle grits his teeth against the knot of pain in his chest. It's all just too familiar, their pity, having to watch as someone else got to be the one to make Kate smile. It's too sharp a reminder.
"Now if you'll excuse me guys, I really have to get back to work."
He hangs up and drops his phone back to the tabletop, his eyes darting to Kate's face at the quiet keening she lets out. "Castle."
"Sorry about that."
Close to tears, Kate half-falls out of her chair and rounds the table, snagging his hand to pull him up. She drops a fistful of bills to the table and doesn't look back, tugging him along after her. And then she's shoving him up against the side of a building and kissing him like she's trying to prove a point.
Her tongue is this scalding, slick thing he can't even keep track off; every time he tries to give it back he finds she's already moved on. She kisses him until her chest heaves against his and she has to stop to suck in air.
"I'm so sorry that I did that to you, Castle. I'm so sorry I made you watch."
He manages to get his hands up to cup her cheeks, his forehead falling into hers. "It's okay. Honestly, Kate, I wouldn't have even minded if I'd thought that Josh actually made you happy."
"No one-" Kate cuts herself off, shaking her head as if she can't believe he could be so stupid. "No one has ever made me as happy as you do."
"I know. You make me happy too." He beams at her. She must read the truth all over his face because she steps back, slides her hand into his but doesn't clutch at him. A loose hold to fluctuate with the movement of their bodies. "Can we go explore?"
"Okay."
Oh no. No, Kate. "Stop frowning. Hey, come here." Castle curls an arm around her waist to draw her in close, brushing his mouth to her temple, her cheekbone. "All of that stuff with Josh doesn't matter now. Look, we're finally in the Hamptons together. We made it."