Author's Note: A sort of interlude of a chapter, in which we see what Castle is thinking.
The Best-Laid Plans
Chapter 7
Castle stirred, reaching out with one arm and encountering only his sheets and blinked bleary eyes open to see empty space in the other half of his bed. Beckett was gone. He wasn't exactly surprised but he couldn't deny the pinch of disappointment and, yes, hurt.
She was gone and he could almost think he'd dreamed the whole thing–certainly it wouldn't be the first time he'd dreamed about her–except that he was naked and there was the faintest lingering scent of cherries on his pillow.
He pushed himself upright. Just the faint scent of her was making him hard which was not helpful, at all. And then he froze. His eyes had fallen onto the nightstand by his bed. Her dad's watch. She must have forgotten it. In her rush to leave, no doubt.
He winced a little. Message received, Beckett. As if she hadn't made it clear that first night in the hotel that this new whatever-this-was would not be a relationship. A one-night stand, she'd called it that night. Now a two-night stand? Partners with benefits?
Even a year ago, he thought, the prospect would have delighted him. Just sex, nothing more–and it certainly didn't hurt that sex with Beckett was the hottest of his life, surpassing even his imaginings. Now, when he was half in love with her–oh, who was he kidding, he was completely in love with her. Head over heels, irrevocably in love with her. He lifted an absent hand to rub his chest, absurdly, as if that could make the ache in it dissipate.
He'd told himself he was fine with just the one night, told himself it was more than he had ever honestly expected to have with Beckett since she had spent the last year making it clear she wasn't interested in anything more than a platonic, professional relationship. Told himself one amazing round of sex with Beckett was better than nothing and he could be satisfied with that.
Nice comforting lies that would have helped more if he'd really been able to believe them for longer than a couple minutes at a time. He hadn't been but the sting of hurt had, thankfully, been softened by some understanding and more than that, a flicker of hope because if their one time had shown him anything, it was that the physical attraction between them was even stronger, more intense, than even he'd realized it would be and he'd hoped it might lead to more–more sex, yes, but also more of a relationship because from what he knew of Beckett, she didn't really do casual sex.
And now, they'd had sex again.
But she had still left him almost immediately afterwards. At least, this time she hadn't been in quite such a hurry to leave. He had fallen asleep pretty quickly afterwards but he did remember that she'd stayed until then, allowed a short time of post-coital closeness.
It had to mean something, didn't it? She had come to him, even though she had been so certain, made it clear that she planned for their first time to also be the last. He could read between the lines and the mere fact that she had gone so far as to reserve a hotel room for the night had made that clear, even if her words hadn't confirmed it. A hotel, a neutral, anonymous place, as if they were just two strangers who had hit it off rather than friends and colleagues who had each slept over at the other's respective homes before, albeit entirely platonically. But then last night, she'd come to him, to his home.
Oh, a part of him, the immature part of him, was crowing that she really liked having sex with him, given in to uncontrollable physical attraction. Which was good, great. God knows the sex was incredible.
But now what? Sex with Beckett, as amazing as it was, wasn't enough for him. Not now, maybe not ever. At this point, he couldn't imagine not falling in love with her. Maybe he really had been doomed from the very moment he met her.
But Beckett had clearly already made up her mind that she wasn't interested in a relationship, at least not with him. So now he needed to… make her change her mind.
Make Kate Beckett change her mind. Put like that, it sounded rather like it could qualify as one of the labors of Hercules because Beckett was probably the most strong-willed, stubborn, frustrating person he'd ever met in his life.
For what had to be about the thousandth time, he wished he hadn't been so stupid as to fall into bed with Ellie Monroe. And not flirting with Madison would have helped too but mostly, he was sure, it was the Ellie Monroe thing. How was he supposed to convince Beckett that he was serious, that he was more than just the celebrity playboy, that he wanted a real relationship with her?
If this had been happening to anyone else–if his heart, his happiness, weren't on the line, he might find the whole thing hilarious. How he, who had a well-earned reputation for being good with women, could find himself at such a loss.
But that was the problem. He knew how to flirt with and charm most women but Kate Beckett was not most women. It was one of the things he loved about her. Outside of his own family, she was the one woman he'd met in years who wasn't impressed by his looks, fame, money, connections, or even his charm. And he realized that without any of that, he wasn't sure what to do, how he could win her over. What was that line by Austen, she had showed him how insufficient were all his pretensions to please a woman worthy of being pleased?
A woman worthy of being pleased–well, Kate Beckett was certainly that. And yes, he wanted to please her, thought he would willingly spend the rest of his life trying to make her smile, make her happy. After all she had already been through, she of all people deserved to be happy.
The physical attraction between them–the sex, no matter how amazing it was–wouldn't be enough to convince her to start a real relationship with him, he knew. She wasn't shallow.
His first instinct was to go for some grand gesture but that wouldn't work. This was Beckett who valued her privacy–and had made it very clear she wanted to keep their sex life–if he could refer to something that had happened twice and may very well never happen again as their sex life–between just the two of them. She would probably kill him if he made some grand gesture that outed them and he would prefer staying alive, thank you.
The only other thing that came to mind was her mom's case but there, he stopped himself. No, absolutely not. He had tried that last year, to disastrous effect, and he wouldn't do it again. And he had already done what he could, giving the money to catch the supposed Rathborne, only for it to blow up in his face when he'd gotten himself taken hostage by Dick Coonan–no, that way was done. For anything to do with her mom's case, he would follow her lead. He had learned that lesson at least and he would not, could not, risk making that mistake again.
She had let him stay, told him she even liked having him around in the precinct, and he wasn't about to risk doing anything that might make her kick him out, again, and this time almost certainly permanently.
She'd said he made her work more fun. It was something, wasn't it, his natural optimism tried to assert itself. Okay, so saying he made her work more fun was a long way away from, oh, falling in love with him–oh god–but this was also Beckett, reserved, cautious Beckett, and just a word from her was like a speech from anyone else.
Another thought occurred to him, his burgeoning optimism abruptly withering. What if she regretted last night? Now that he had thought it, it seemed all too likely. Knowing Beckett and her apparent decision that the night at the hotel would be a one-time thing, she would probably view last night as a loss of control and the Beckett he knew would not feel good about that.
He sighed and stood up. He could use a shower, a cold shower, and maybe that, plus coffee, would help because so far, his cogitations were getting him nowhere. But then again, it wasn't that surprising because Beckett had always had the ability to discombobulate him, hadn't she?
A little while later, Castle sipped his coffee, reflecting that coffee would probably remind him of Beckett for the rest of his life. It was not a very comforting thought because it occurred to him that if–oh god, if–he lost Beckett, if she rejected him, he might not even be able to drink coffee anymore. (No pressure.)
He gritted his teeth a little. No, he couldn't lose her, had to do something to tell her, show her, that he really cared about her, that she wasn't just any woman to him. He needed to give her evidence of how he felt. He knew Beckett, skeptical Beckett, too well not to realize that she was hardly likely to believe words, not least because his own stupid actions in sleeping with Ellie Monroe a few weeks ago would bely anything he said in her eyes and anyway, she spent her entire life dealing with people's lies, too much to believe any facile declarations.
She would need actions–but there again, as he'd already realized, a grand gesture along his usual style was out. Anyway, his grand gestures tended to involve spending money and pretty much the only thing Beckett ever let him buy her without protest was coffee and the occasional bear claw. Even on their one outing to Remy's, she had argued with him about splitting the check and he'd only won by using his greater reach to hand his card to their server before Beckett could and she hadn't exactly been thrilled. So yeah, while he would be quite willing to run out and buy her a puppy or a pony or a ring–wait, what?! Whoa, there, Rick. Oh god, when had he even started to think in terms of possibly getting married again when he'd sworn after his failed marriage to Gina that he was done, no more public failures for him. Oh damn, clearly hope sprang eternal as far as his optimistic heart was concerned. His optimistic and insanely premature heart because he had no doubt that if he so much as mentioned the m-word to Beckett in relation to the two of them, Beckett would run so fast and so far she'd be a speck of dust on the horizon before he could even ask the fateful question.
He hauled in his thoughts from where they'd run and returned to his immediate problem. How to show Beckett that he really wanted a relationship with her.
Not even coffee was giving him any inspiration. All he could really think–and it wasn't exactly a plan–was to keep showing up, keep working with Beckett every day, keep being there for her, which had the benefit of being what he wanted to do anyway. And obviously no other women, which would be easy because having experienced what it was like to have sex with Beckett, he was already 100% certain that he never wanted to have sex with anyone else ever again.
It wasn't much but maybe in the course of spending time with her, some other bright idea would strike.
It was a sign of how distracted he was that Alexis's "Morning, Dad," made him start a little. He hadn't even heard her footsteps coming down the stairs, let alone registered her presence, which was unlike him since he still tended to be attuned to her after years of having trained himself to be alert to every small sound from her since her babyhood.
"Good morning, Alexis."
He studied Alexis a little more closely than he normally did, as he had been the last few days since Meredith had announced her change of plans, alert to any indication that Alexis had been hurt more than she'd admitted by Meredith's flakiness. She had seemed fine, of course, but his concern wasn't entirely assuaged, at least not yet.
Alexis got some yogurt and poured herself orange juice for her breakfast before joining him at the island and he eyed her. She was eating her yogurt in silence, which wasn't typical of his daughter, who was more of a morning person than he had ever been, and the corners of her lips were a little downturned.
He felt a spike of worry, not unmixed with anger. He'd been afraid that Alexis's apparent calm in the face of Meredith's cancellation had seemed a little too good to be true and now it seemed he'd been right. He could really learn to hate Meredith, he sometimes thought.
"Is something bothering you?"
His daughter blinked but then made a small face. "I see your Dad ESP is still functioning."
"Why, yes, yes, it is," he agreed with mock smugness, even as his chest seemed to tighten a little. It was an evasion which wasn't a good sign, although at least, he also knew that this was his daughter's way of gathering her thoughts.
"It's that summer program at Princeton that I applied for, remember? I just got an email from them this morning and I got wait-listed."
Oh, so it wasn't about Meredith after all, but still, another disappointment. He inwardly winced, sliding an arm around her shoulders and tugging her in to press a kiss to her hair. "I'm sorry, sweetie, but you know, being waitlisted isn't an outright rejection," he tried. "It means you still have a chance."
Alexis grimaced. "Not much of one. No, Dad, I should just accept it. I'm not going to get to go."
"Oh, Alexis," he sighed. He was swamped with a sudden rush of irrational guilt because he couldn't entirely deny that when he'd heard about the program, he'd been torn between pride in his daughter and feeling as if his heart might sink into the pit of his stomach at the idea of spending a full six weeks without her. He hadn't, exactly, gone so far as to wish that Alexis wouldn't get in because he could never, would never, wish for Alexis not to get something she wanted, no matter what he felt about it, but even now, he had to admit that he wasn't exactly disappointed for his own sake that Alexis would still be around this summer. (God, what kind of father was he?)
Alexis sighed and for a moment, turned her face into his shoulder, rather as she'd used to when she'd been little. Some warmth sparked in his chest. No matter how scarily grown-up his daughter might be, at least she still turned to him for comfort.
"If it helps, I think they have to be out of their minds not to accept you."
She gave him a rather wan attempt at a smile. "Thanks, but you know you're biased."
"I do know that," he agreed readily, "but that doesn't mean it's not true. With your grades and activities, you should be a shoo-in and if those admissions people at Princeton can't see that, then they don't deserve you."
Alexis managed a faint smile. "Thanks, Dad."
"Anytime. It's what I'm here for, you know, to keep reminding you that you're amazing. And you know, Alexis, this is just one summer program. It doesn't mean you won't get into a good college or anything. This doesn't dictate your future."
"Yeah, I know. I'm just disappointed."
He inwardly flinched. He hated seeing his daughter down like this, hated more that he was never sure what to do or say, for that matter didn't know if there was anything at all he could do or say. "Is there anything I can do?"
She nestled her head against his shoulder more snugly. "Just this."
He didn't know how his daughter could do that, make his heart feel as if it might melt and burst with emotion all at the same time. He turned his head to press a kiss to her hair. "This, I can do."
"And talk to me some more?"
For just a moment, she sounded very young, almost like the little girl she'd been just yesterday, as far as he was concerned. "You know me, I can always talk," he managed with an attempt at lightness. "It's a talent. Just like you are also talented and brilliant and those idiots at Princeton don't know what they're missing."
"Da-ad," she sighed.
His modest daughter. Okay, no more flattery–that is, no more truth. Distraction it was. "Okay, well, I've been thinking, how about we go out to the Hamptons next weekend the way we usually do? We could keep up with the tradition, our kick-off-the-summer weekend. I think we're overdue for some pool time and I can get some illegal fireworks, those silver starbursts you like?"
She managed a smile. "Yeah, sure, Dad."
He had the nagging sense that his daughter was indulging him but at least she was sort of smiling again. "Just think about it and if there's anything else you want to do, tell me."
"Yeah, I will. I'd better leave for school now." She gave him a fleeting buss on the cheek. "Love you, Dad."
He felt the usual flare of warmth in his chest. "Love you too. Have a good day." He watched as she flitted out the door, stopping only to scoop up her backpack along the way. At least, she seemed more cheerful, which was the important thing.
He grimaced and thought, for about the millionth time, that things had been easier when Alexis was little, back when an extra scoop of ice cream could basically cure all ills. These days, her disappointments and worries could not be helped nearly that easily. But at least, when it came to Alexis, she still turned to him for comfort and he could still (mostly) find a way to help her, could still cheer her up.
Which was more than he could say for Beckett, the other most important woman in his life. But well, he was getting to know Beckett better too–and she had, after all, come to him in his home. And that reminded him that he should probably get going because he wanted to get to the precinct earlier than he normally did because he didn't want Beckett to fret over not having her dad's watch for any longer than she needed to.
Almost in spite of himself, Castle felt a little flicker of nerves as he entered the precinct that morning. He really did not know how Beckett would react to seeing him, if she regretted last night and if she did, what would happen to them? He didn't think–he hoped–that she would try to kick him out of the precinct out of regret. It would be unlike Beckett to punish him for what she would view as her own mistake (he inwardly winced) but if it made things awkward between them, worse, if it made his presence in the precinct unwelcome to her, then he couldn't insist on staying. Forcing his presence on her like that wasn't in him.
He let out a breath, trying not to feel as if his entire future happiness rested on what might happen in the next few minutes, and exchanged greetings with the desk sergeant on duty in the lobby with as close an approximation of his usual manner as possible.
For basically the first time, he did not immediately look for Beckett when he stepped out of the elevator into the homicide division, was too nervous to do so and deliberately avoided looking in her direction. Instead, he pasted on an easy smile as he passed LT and Karpowski and lifted a hand to wave at Ryan. Esposito was away from his desk and only after he noted that did Castle finally allow his gaze to find Beckett.
Their eyes met for just a moment before she looked back down at her desk. He tried but couldn't quite read her expression and tried to tamp down on the budding apprehension as he neared her desk.
He normally just carried their coffees in his hands but today, he had opted to get a cardboard cup-holder for their two coffees and placed it on her desk. He glanced quickly around before slipping his hand into his jacket pocket and quickly deposited her dad's watch into one of the empty spaces in the cup-holder before he grasped his own coffee. Even he had to admit he wasn't a master of ninja stealth (unfortunately) so he had decided using the cup-holder offered the best chance for subtlety in giving her dad's watch back to her without anyone else noticing.
Seeing her dad's watch at least had her react, her eyes flicking up to his, and–his silly, susceptible heart leaped–the faintest hint of a smile just touched the corners of her lips. "Oh, thanks," was all she said.
"Anytime," he responded and then found himself blurting out, gracelessly, "And how are you?" He could have kicked himself. Laughable to think that in some circles he was actually known for being suave. Smooth, it was not, entirely clumsy and both too direct and yet indirect at the same time because he couldn't simply ask her in the middle of the bullpen if she regretted having sex with him again.
He saw her blink and then some color crept into her cheeks. She understood what he was really asking.
"Well, it's a paperwork day but better now that I have coffee," she answered with manufactured ease.
It was a characteristic response that kept carefully to the surface and evaded anything more real but for all that, he felt oddly encouraged. It wasn't as if he'd expected her to tell him outright if she regretted what had happened. Her words rarely revealed much but at least for now, her expression had said more because it hadn't stiffened nor had she otherwise tensed or given any indication of upset. And she'd blushed a little, which she didn't often do, which indicated some awareness, even self-consciousness, but nothing negative, at least not that he could tell.
And then inwardly grimaced and sighed as it occurred to him it was probably a little pitiful to be reduced to this, grasping at such straws, trying to interpret every tiny flicker of an eyelash and imbue it with significance.
"Back again, huh, Castle?" Esposito greeted him and Castle turned to see the other man. Espo pasted on a look of mock offense. "You didn't bring me coffee."
Castle fell in with the banter, widening his eyes in a pretense of innocent surprise. "I didn't, did I? Must have slipped my mind. You're just not that memorable."
"Or maybe you're just going senile. You are getting on in years," Espo needled.
Castle bridled in exaggerated offense. "I am not. I'll have you know I'm in my prime."
Beside him, he heard a soft sound from Beckett and snapped his head to look at her, forgetting all about Esposito, as she coughed.
"Beckett, what's up?" Espo interjected, all raillery falling from his tone.
Beckett coughed again and waved a hand in both their directions. "Nothing. Never mind. Just swallowed some coffee the wrong way."
"Maybe you need to be drinking out of a sippy cup instead," Espo quipped.
Beckett shot him a look that had even Espo retreating, turning his attention back to Castle.
"Say, Castle, don't you have anything better to do than bothering us on a paperwork day?"
"Nope, I really don't," he responded automatically as his heart seemed to jump around in his chest. Beckett was a little flushed and carefully turned away from him, focusing on her computer, but it hardly mattered because he had heard her quick indrawn breath that had turned into coughing and he knew that it was because she'd reacted to his saying he was in his prime. She wanted him. It shouldn't have felt like a revelation, certainly not after the two nights they'd had, but oddly it did because this was different. This was in the precinct and for Beckett's mind to be running along those lines to react so strongly to what hadn't even been meant to be an innuendo–well, it had to mean something. Especially because they were already friends but they were clearly not in the friend zone anymore. Friendship and lust–it wasn't enough but it was something to start with, especially because nothing he knew about Beckett indicated that she was someone who had casual sex. No, there had to be something more there on her side. He just needed to build on it, assure her that she could, should, trust him with more than just her body.
Beckett was still keeping her eyes fixed on her computer and then she was called into a meeting with Captain Montgomery and one of the ADAs to talk about one of her old cases that was nearing trial so Castle was left to his own devices. Which wasn't unusual for a paperwork day and he often sloped out of the precinct fairly early on rather than sticking around all day but today, he stayed. Wanted to show Beckett that it wasn't just about the fun part of playing at being a cop that he liked, or something like that. He made some notes for the last chapters of Naked Heat and then passed some time talking about sports with LT and a few of the uniforms.
Her meeting over, Beckett was back at her desk and occupied with paperwork and although he made her another coffee and supplied her with some gummy bears from the vending machine downstairs, he didn't linger for long at her desk. He didn't want to annoy her, certainly not today, and he would be the first to admit that sitting still was not his strong suit and he knew she disliked his fidgeting when she was doing paperwork, so wandering was the better option.
He retreated into the break room, finding Morales, one of the other detectives there, and fell into talking with him about his kids, the eldest of whom was a year younger than Alexis.
When he emerged from the break room, his eyes as usual immediately found Beckett and the thought darted into his mind that she was bored. And then wondered how he knew that before his brain belatedly registered the somewhat abstracted look on her face, the slow speed of her typing, her posture. Very subtle signs but by now, he was very familiar with her usual focused look, knew how quickly she could type.
But then she blinked and glanced over, seeing him, and in a moment, her expression had subtly shifted, become close to her usual cool competence. He felt a pinch of hurt in his chest as it occurred to him that even for something as impersonal as boredom, she hid. Would she ever let him in, trust him enough not to keep her shields in place? He didn't know. But he could at least help, dispel the boredom.
He thought quickly of what he could do to amuse her–he would juggle except he'd never mastered that and anyway, they were in the middle of the bullpen so it would need to be something more subtle than that. A card game, she enjoyed the occasional game of poker, but he didn't carry a pack of cards with him on a daily basis. Wait, he had an idea.
He moved to sit in his seat. "Beckett, can I ask a favor?"
She glanced at him. "You can ask but I don't promise I'll do it," she returned, a faint smirk tugging on her lips.
He pasted on an expression of exaggerated solemnity. "Will you do me the honor of playing a game of Hangman with me?"
She blinked and then laughed, his silly heart leaping in his chest at his success. "Wow, Castle, you really are bored today, aren't you?"
He lifted one shoulder into a half-shrug. "It's a paperwork day," he responded obliquely.
"Fine, I'll play Hangman," she pretended resignation but he caught the hint of a smile flirting with her lips, the brightness of her eyes.
He schooled his lips into straightness. Mission accomplished.
"Come on, wordsmith, let's see what you've got." Beckett flipped to a new page of a notepad, quickly drawing the basic structure of the gallows and then, after a moment's thought, drew a series of dashes to form four words.
"Challenge accepted, Detective." He was almost tempted to deliberately throw the game just to see her smirk but his own competitive spirit revolted and anyway, he knew from their poker games that she would want to win fairly. "R."
She filled in three R's.
"I."
"Nope, no I." She smirked as she drew the "head" of a person on the gallows.
"C."
"Nope again. Tell me you're not just spelling your own name as guesses."
He faked shock. "Can I help it if my name happens to contain some of the more commonly used letters?"
She gave him a look. "Uh huh."
"E," he guessed next. He was not spelling his own name.
She wrote in five E's. He studied the remaining spaces. The second word was 'the,' he was almost sure.
"S."
"No S, try again." She drew in a second short line to make an "arm." for the person.
"A."
She wrote one A in the third word.
"T."
There were two T's, one in the first word and yes, the second word had to be 'the.'
"L."
"No L's." Now the person had both arms. "Two more wrong guesses and then you're dead," she teasingly warned, smirking at him.
"H."
She wrote two H's and yes, the second word was 'the.' Four words. Something niggled at his mind.
"N."
She wrote in two N's–and he had it.
"Quoth the raven, 'nevermore,'" he intoned.
She made a face of mock disappointment. "You got it. I made it too easy, didn't I?"
"I think you're underestimating my brilliance. Although I do appreciate the Poe reference."
"I thought you would," she returned rather dryly but her lips curved. "One more round and then I should get back to work."
He feigned resignation. "I suppose I can't expect you to entertain me all day."
"How mature of you to acknowledge that," she drawled.
"I know, it was, wasn't it?" he affected smugness. "See, I'm learning."
"Learning at the speed of a snail with ADD so you can stop smirking.
He only grinned and she gave in and laughed and he couldn't help but think that at that moment, playing a silly game with her, exchanging their usual banter, there really was nowhere else he would rather be. And seeing her smile, the brightness of her eyes, he could only hope, desperately, that maybe she might be almost as happy to be there, spending time with him, as he was with her.
~To be continued…~
A/N 2: Thank you, as always, to all readers and reviewers.
