A/N: Overwhelmed by the response is somewhat of an understatement. Thank you for taking the time to read, alert or review, it makes these dark December days a whole heap brighter.

Her chest is heaving. Actually heaving with rage as the breath explodes out of her in violent bursts.

Her eyes are narrowed and every person she meets on her rapid journey away from him flinches when she catches their eye.

Good!

Anger bubbles under the surface of everything. Claims like fire, hot flames licking at her insides and singeing everything in their path. Her reason burns to a cinder, her focus and control ash in seconds.

She wants to smash something.

She wants her gun.

Dammit, she wants him.

Fuck.

They were so close she could practically taste him and for a split second she thought he was going to ask -

He's a fucking idiot. But she wants him.

He didn't shave, playing up his devil may care playboy image no doubt, and she shouldn't be thinking about kissing him and feeling the rasp of his stubble over her skin. She shouldn't be thinking about kissing him at all.

But she is.

Kissing him.

Or killing him.

She's torn between them as if they are her only options when the idea to fuck him senseless springs to life again and god, she wants that. But it won't work because he just doesn't see her as that person.

Doesn't really see her at all. He can't.

Not enough to the character?

She growls under her breath, storms forwards looking for the nearest exit, her mind whirling. He has no fucking clue what he's talking about.

Don't think you know me. That's what she threw at him that first day but by now he should know something.

That's the problem right there, she thinks as she stops dead, he has no idea who he's dealing with. She's not some fictional two dimensional cop. She's not bound by the ink and paper confines of his plot line.

She thought - well it doesn't fucking matter what she thought because clearly he's an idiot and so is she.

She has fucking layers. He has no idea. None.

Of who she is. Or what she's capable of.

Never been scorned?

She turns on her heels and eyes the crowd, suddenly searching for him.

Is he blind? Never been scorned and yet he stands there oblivious?

He calls her muse and sees her as what exactly?

Mythical?

Untouchable?

She's a flesh and blood woman for crying out loud and he's an arrogant ass. But she wants him. The writer. Her writer. The man she thought she saw a glimpse of.

He calls her extraordinary, like it's nothing. Like it wouldn't knock her for six that he could see her that way.

He has no idea.

She wants to show him. Let him peel her apart and see exactly how extraordinary she can be.

She thought he was going to ask. Heat like fire pools low in her stomach, ripples out like lava as the realization rolls over her. Now she wants to hear him beg.

A vivid flash of him working her with his mouth as she stares down from above ricochets through her mind and Beckett stumbles to a stop in the middle of the room.

He names her muse and she wants to inspire him to his knees.

He wants extraordinary and he has no idea what she's capable of.

Maybe she should show him.

Fire surges through her blood, the heat of confrontation hot on its heels lifting her to the balls of her feet and twisting her police tactical training into something darker, dirtier.

She navigates the crowd and spies him slinking into the Men's Room.

Perfect.

When she throws open the door he's already lost the jacket.

Elbows deep in the basin, the sound of the door flying open and slamming shut again makes his head snap up. With the flat of her palm holding the door shut she stares him down in the mirror.

His eyes burn into hers yet he doesn't retreat or look contrite. He looks pissed, grouchy, roughed up and a little dangerous. He looks hot and vulnerable at the same time and damn if that doesn't make her want him more.

"Beckett?"

Her breath is coming fast, actions happening before her brain has time to assess them, contradict them. She's operating on pure instinct and she likes it.

When she flips the lock he spins and a shower of water cascades from his arms, ice cold pinpricks landing on her bare legs. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

You.

The word stays there, hungry, at the tip of her tongue and she can't find the voice to set it free. Her eyes fall on his open shirt, his rolled up sleeves, to the graze of stubble at his jawline. To his eyes and the soft swell of his lips.

And - oh, fuck it - screw words.

She launches herself at him, pushes him back until he stops moving, until he can go no further and she slides in close.

He's warm under her hands, smells familiar and unknown and the rasp of his pants against the soft skin of her inner thighs makes her insides quiver.

She doesn't think, doesn't speak.

Her breath comes fast and loud and she needs to be closer, running her foot up the back of his calf until her heel catches at his knee.

She hooks her leg around him, shifts her weight and - fuck - she might as well be naked, she can feel every inch of him through the suddenly too tight cling of her dress.

Beckett wraps an arm around his neck, tugs his shirt collar to bring his face closer, fingertips just shy of grazing over his jawline and burning to do it.

"Castle!" She breathes, and it comes out husky, needy. Not what he expected. It stuns him. Oh, she likes that. She smiles.

Beckett gets one last good, clear look in his eyes and registers his shock - ha, good, smug bastard - then her hands are in his hair and her mouth is opening against his.

He wants extraordinary?

He'll get it!