AN: Did Castle just turn totally X-Files on us (episode 4x12, Dial M for Murder)? Cigarette-smoking mystery man meeting up with Mulder in dark creepy parking garages and such, anyone? (This has nothing to do with this story; I'm just sayin'.)
Anyway,Happy Castle Monday!
#3 One Thousand Seventeen Miles
It's been three weeks and she feels strangely off-kilter. Her coffee tastes blander when she has to buy it herself. She sips and paces in front of the murder board, trying to make sense of the convoluted connections between her four suspects. Castle would like this one, she thinks, smiling to herself; a case involving competitive Scrabble players. Oh all the word jokes she's missing out on!
She sighs, sits back against the table. Missing the way he'd get a theory started; crazy though it might be, it always got her brain going.
Sometimes they text. Not every day or on any kind of regular schedule, but he'll check in with her, send her funny comments or observations from his trip that he thinks she might appreciate. She catches herself with a silly smile on her face more times than not when she receives one of his messages.
She knows where he is on his book tour; he handed her his travel schedule before he left and she doesn't like to acknowledge how often she checks it. Minneapolis today.
She may as well admit that she misses him. The innuendoes and suggestions that make her days more fun; the way he can get a smile out of her when she's about to lose faith in the world. His smile and the tender feelings he holds for her, unacknowledged but so clearly visible in his eyes.
Sometimes she forgets what she's still waiting for.
It's been three weeks already, and there's another three to go.
She's in bed when her phone signals a text. Who'd be texting her at eleven thirty at night?
'Still awake, Beckett?'
She smiles. Castle. 'Yes, though in my pajamas already,' she texts back. She can't resist teasing him because he's far away and it's safe this way and she knows he really likes it when she teases him. She can almost see the appreciative gleam in his eyes.
It takes a few minutes longer than she expected for him to answer. And then there's a knock at her door. His text arrives simultaneously.
'Care to let me in?'
Her mind screeches to a halt, and she scrambles out of bed and through her apartment. She feels giddy, her tummy in delicious little flutters, because he shouldn't even be here but he is and she missed him. But she schools her features, happy grin transformed into slightly exasperated smile, and opens the door to him.
His eyes light up when he sees her, smiling warmly at her for a moment. Then he lets his gaze wander, exaggeratedly runs his gaze down her body, then back up.
"Cotton, Beckett?" He takes in her leggings and the oversized sleep shirt. "A bit of a letdown, I must say."
"You flew a thousand miles to scrutinize my pajamas?"
"1,017 miles, actually," he clarifies, stepping into her apartment.
"I was cold." He turns to face her. "You know how cold it is up there?"
She laughs, a happy delighted sound that she cannot hold back. He came because he missed her, and they both know it.
"You want some coffee?"
"Sure." He follows her into the kitchen.
She starts preparing coffee, because coffee keeps them balanced, coffee is safe. And she owes him at least another 95 cups. He sidles up next to her, leans against the kitchen counter, watching her move about.
She reaches up to a cabinet to get a coffee filter. Feels his eyes on her as her body stretches, and her neck tingles in awareness.
"So how's your tour going," she interrupts the silence, trying to get her footing. She pours water into the coffee maker.
"Oh you know, hordes of women, thousands of chests to sign…" She glances at him from the corner of her eye, and he winks at her. "…the usual."
She rolls her eyes, scoots past him to grab the coffee grounds from the refrigerator.
He reaches for her, fingers circling her wrist, and pulls her to face him. "Everybody loves Nikki…" he whispers darkly.
Her body flares with heat. "That's… great." She loathes how inarticulate she sounds, swallows heavily. He has her. Does he know that he has her?
He tugs at her wrist, lightly, and she comes another step closer. Their knees almost bump.
She looks up at him. "When are you going back?"
He reaches out, slides a few tendrils of her hair behind her ears, then follows along the rim of her ear with his fingertips, grazing the soft skin of her neck. Her eyes flutter.
"Tomorrow morning," he says softly, slips his other hand around her waist, tugs her closer, fingers against the ridges of her spine. Her leg slides between his. "First flight out."
Her eyes widen. "You…"
He swallows the rest of her words with his mouth. His lips are warm against her, tender touches, tasting her, and her limbs weaken.
"Kate," he murmurs against her mouth, throaty and desperate, and the can of coffee grounds clanks to the floor when she drops it to grip his shoulders, her fingertips digging into his muscles. She sinks her lips to his again, slides her tongue against the length of his, hungry for him. He pulls her tightly against his body, chests and hips and legs one long line, and they kiss, dive together deeply; passionate, ravenous.
When the first desperate thirst is quenched they slow down to gentle, loving touches, lips against lips. She slides her hands down to lay them against his chest; feels the heat of his skin through his shirt, and the thunder of his heartbeat against her pulse point. She looks up at him when they pull apart.
"1,017 miles… That's a long way to come for a kiss."
He smiles at her, and his eyes are sparkling with ecstatic joy, brimming with love, and she is flooded with a warm, giddy happiness she can barely contain.
He slides his fingertips along her cheek, drops another kiss to her lips. Whispers against her mouth.
"Totally worth it!"
End of Scene