Small reminder: this chapter is M-rated.

Chapter 10

Castle swallowed, without benefit of honey shine to ease his arid throat. "Yes." He paused. "I mean, yes, it doesn't matter."

"Hmm. It doesn't bother you that you've been alive for hundreds of years and I haven't?"

"No. Does it bother you?"

"Yes…I think. Maybe. I don't know. You're older than my dad – well, possibly." Her face set. "That's a conversation I'll have with him."

"That makes me feel like I'm cradle-snatching!" Castle complained.

"Aren't you?"

"No – that was mean!"

"For someone who's over four hundred – and you can tell me exactly how old you are in a moment – you do a really fine imitation of a four year-old."

"Also mean."

"So how old are you?" Interrogation Beckett arrived.

"It's rude to ask a gentleman his age."

"No, it's rude to ask a lady hers. And anyway, you're a puca."

"That doesn't mean I'm not a gentleman."

"I didn't say you weren't." She smirked. "I also didn't say you were."

"Even meaner." He grinned. "That's my Beckett."

"Your Beckett? I think I'm my Beckett." Castle merely smiled at her. "And stop evading the issue. How old are you?"

Castle humphed. "This persistence is very unkind."

"How. Old."

He squirmed, and wriggled, and his ears turned gently pink. "I don't know."

"Say what?"

"I don't know."

"How can you not know?"

"We didn't exactly keep records, okay? Dating – that's years, not social occasions – conventions kept changing and anyway it never seemed to matter. Who was counting?"

"I am."

"Stop detecting at me. After five or six hundred years you stop counting, and anyway I can't fit that many candles on my birthday cake." He pouted. "It's not fair."

"That old." Beckett had a sip of honey shine.

"It doesn't matter," Castle insisted. "Anyway. You aren't answering my questions."

"What questions? You haven't asked any questions."

"Okay." Castle took a breath. "Will you come on a date with me?" His blue, blue eyes transfixed her. "Tomorrow? Here?"

"Tomorrow? But I have to be back in the city tomorrow night early. Shift starts at eight on Monday."

Castle grinned in the manner of a magician about to pull a rabbit from his hat. "That doesn't matter."

"Yes, it does."

"The inn is, um, a little detached from reality. We could stay here as long as you like and it'll still be the day and time we left."

"And if I want to go to the hostel that I originally booked?"

"We'll go there, come here next day you're off-shift the following day, and we'll go home tomorrow on the trail just like you planned."

Don't be dumb, the worm yelled. Another superb dinner, and who knows what might come up? If worms had eyebrows, it would have waggled them salaciously.

"Okay."

"You will? Great! Cedar!"

"Yes, puca?"

"Vila Beckett has agreed to have dinner tomorrow night with me, here."

"You won't regret it," Cedar directed at Beckett. "It will be a different menu, of course."

"Of course."

"For now, enjoy your drinks."

"Thank you," they said together.

Across the room, sighs of romantic relief were swiftly muffled, and a buzz of conversation arose; fortunately not intelligible at Beckett's table, since it involved a division of wedding-planning duties that would have re-stoked her fury until the supernatural population of the USA was reduced to three – Beckett, her father, and (probably) Castle.

"Why are you staring at me?" Beckett queried.

"You're always telling me off for creepy staring – which I don't do. I admire. Totally different. Anyway, what's different now?"

"You're staring more. Why?"

"I've never seen you with long hair, that's all. It's gorgeous."

"It took ages to wash, condition, and comb. I don't think it would be practical."

Castle drooped. "No, but it's still lovely. I like those two little braids at each side that tie back." He half-reached out, then brought his hand back. "But if you need any recommendations for products" – Beckett raised the deadly left eyebrow – "Rowan – that's the dryad over there who came in with the Wendigo – I think they might be dating – she runs a hair and beauty salon."

Beckett boggled.

"They – we – all have occupations, professions. We have to live."

"Some more expensively than others," Beckett snarked.

"Nobody's poor. The miracle of compound interest," he added pompously.

"I can balance my own check book too," Beckett snipped. "I'm perfectly well aware of what compound interest achieves."

"Compound interest over several hundred years adds up to a lot. So we're all comfortable."

"Who writes your books?"

"Beckett! I do! My books are all mine – meanie. That wasn't nice." He smiled slowly. "We could do nice things." His hand crept across the table towards hers. She flicked a glance down, and up again – but didn't shift her fingers from where they lay on the wood.

"Are you suggesting that our date isn't nice enough for you?"

"No. Our date will be wonderful. After all, it's with me."

Beckett blew a raspberry, but Castle's fingers crept a little closer. "You are so full of it," she said, but a smile sneaked on to her mouth. "Were you going to take my hand, or are you just imitating Thing from the Addams Family?"

Castle's hand stopped creeping closer and landed on Beckett's, which turned up to intertwine their fingers.

"Awwww," murmured the clientele; visions of the biggest supernatural wedding ever dancing in their eyes.

Some time later, the honey shine had been drunk, nobody had approached Castle and Beckett, and indeed the bar was emptying; not without a certain number of hopeful glances at the table where they sat.

"It's late," Castle murmured. "I think we should call it quits for tonight."

"Yeah," Beckett agreed, reluctantly. "Um, maybe we could go riding tomorrow? Before dinner?"

"Sure." He rose, and tugged Beckett to her feet too. "I'll be in the stables" – he grinned – "whenever you like." They meandered out of the bar, and towards Beckett's room.

"Does that mean you're going to your own room now? Because you seem to be walking towards mine." Beckett couldn't prevent a tiny hint of hope tinging her brisk tones.

"A gentleman always escorts a lady home after dinner." Castle's arm arrived around her. "Especially on Hallowe'en. You never know what might be lurking in the shadows, waiting to pounce."

"Anything pouncing on me without my agreement is going to get a very nasty shock."

"So no pouncing, then."

"Depends."

"Oh?"

"I said without my agreement. So if I agreed, then there wouldn't be nasty shocks." She pulled out her room key.

"What about other things? I don't like pouncing. I prefer kissing." He turned her gently towards him. "Do you have views on kissing?"

"Kisses? Depends who's doing the kissing." She smiled in a feline fashion. "I seem to remember that there were some kisses yesterday that I didn't object to." She turned back to unlock her door.

Castle waited until the door had opened, and then turned her once more. "I remember those kisses," he husked. "I didn't object to them either." He grinned wolfishly. "We could check in case they're objectionable now."

"Could we?" Beckett quirked an eyebrow, and stepped into her room.

"Yep," Castle agreed. Since he still had his arm around her, he entered her room too. "Wow." He looked around. "I asked Cedar to give you the best room, but this is awesome."

"You've never been in it?"

"Nope. I've never brought anyone else here." He shut the door.

"No-one?"

"No-one. I never wanted to, and they weren't…suitable."

"They were human, you mean."

"That too."

"Meaning?"

"Cedar's is special. It's not for just anyone, and I never met anyone that I thought would feel right here. You do."

Beckett frankly gaped. Castle brought her into him, and looked down at her through warm blue eyes. "You fit here. Here at Cedar's and" – his wolfish grin returned – "here in my arms." He lowered his mouth to hers while she was still trying to process his previous words, and then her brain failed to be able to process anything at all except the searing desire flaring from his kiss.

His arms tightened a little, his tongue tickled along the seam of her lips, and she opened to him like a waterlily in the morning. She tasted of heaven, and heat, and then of sheer, raging, desire. Her hands gripped his neck, his ran into her hair; she pressed into him and he held her there, as close as they could be: kissing frantically; still standing by the door.

Castle opened one eye, noted the armchair, and, without missing a beat, sat in it with Beckett on his knee, still in his arms, still kissing her. She angled her head, and took control; diving into Castle's mouth and raiding until he surrendered to her and let her have her way for a time.

Not a long time. Castle liked to raid too, and slowly, seductively, he coaxed back control of the kiss. He turned their kiss deeper, harder; his hand slipped to her spine, pressing her in; soft curves against firm pecs. She made a sexy little noise, and suddenly Castle found that his dress shirt was half open, and the sharp red nails of the vila were tracing oh-so-lightly over his chest. If that was how she wanted to play it… He tugged her soft, silky, strokable top free of her pants, and slipped searching fingers beneath to meet satin skin.

The contact burned. Fire exploded where his fingers touched her; heat blossomed where her nails scratched lightly. Their whole world contracted to their bodies; their touch; the power and passion in their kiss; so much more even than the previous night. Tongues tangled and thrust, hands roamed, desire pounded through their veins, sizzled down synapses to pool hotly at their cores.

Castle's shirt slipped from his shoulders. Beckett made a small pleased noise at the muscles revealed, and followed up by a lazy stroke of her hand from his neck, over flat brown nipples with a tiny scratch that made him groan, downward to the belt of his dark pants. He caught her wicked hand before it could maraud further south.

"My turn," he grated, trapping her hand between them, sweeping her shirt up and over her head before she could wreak havoc. He'd do some havoc-wreaking of his own.

Havoc-wreaking was abruptly paused by the sight of Beckett's bra. It was crimson, lacy, and barely covered though surely enhanced the unexpectedly voluptuous mounds beneath the delicate fabric. He'd never imagined that she dressed like that, under her prim button-downs and pants. "Gorgeous," he murmured, and stroked a thick finger along the lace edge, down into her cleavage, and up the other side. She wriggled, and then retaliated with another slow trail of her hand down the centre of his chest to his belt buckle. She paused, a wicked glint sparkling in her eyes, then seized a hard kiss from his lips and simultaneously whipped his belt open.

He grabbed for her fingers before she could undo him further, and held both hands in one of his, then smiled lazily. "Caught you. Now, where was I? Oh, yes. I was here." His free hand returned to the edge of her bra, and sneaked under it. She drew in breath. Castle's fingers sneaked a little further, then retreated to pull her close so that he could kiss her as hard as she'd kissed him. She snapped her hands free, and before he could think to recapture them, she'd gone straight for the prize.

If he hadn't been at attention before, he surely was now. Even through his pants, her touch was scorchingly erotic: seeking and finding his iron hard mass. Quick, evil fingers opened the button, whisked down the zipper, and slipped inside, taking him firmly in hand. All the (extremely limited) thought departed his head in one blazing instant. Instinct took his own strong fingers to Beckett's pants, instinct (and experience) had them undone in a flash, instinct lifted her the fraction above his lap to whisk her pants off and away, instinct toed his shoes off, for surely he wouldn't need them now.

Her underwear matched. Oh, fuck, her underwear matched and how would he ever be able to sit by her desk again and pretend to be calm knowing that she wore tiny silk-and-lace scraps that had burnt out his brain? She did something completely wicked with her long, elegant and totally evil fingers, and even the astonishment of barely-clad Beckett in his arms disappeared as all the blood in his body concentrated itself in one place. He'd never been so aroused in all his long life. All his vaunted control over himself incinerated in a microsecond. He dived into her mouth, ravaging; using all his strength to hold her tighter, closer; to press her breasts to his chest and then to rise from the chair and carry her to the bed, shaking off his pants as soon as he'd lowered her to it.

For a moment, he simply stared; burning the image of Beckett spread over the beautiful bed in two scraps of silk and lace which revealed not enough and yet too much; an indelible picture of sheer sexuality. The mass of her vila-form hair spread around her; the blood red of her nails flared brightly against the cream and gold of the linens. He ran his hot gaze from crown to toes, absorbing every detail, dropping his shirt while he looked, and looked. Finally, he sat on the bed, stripped his socks, and turned to her.

She smiled like a lazy cat, and curved sinuously, as boneless as that same cat but far more dangerous. "Like what you see?" she husked, and drew a finger down his chest to his boxers. "I like to touch." The finger dropped further.

"I like to touch too," Castle growled, leant up on one arm, and glided the other hand over one pert breast, just enough to slide the bra a little. When she drew in breath, he copied the movement on the other side, and again, alternating, never pressing enough for her. She gasped out an uncomplimentary comment on his actions, and took drastic action of her own. A slim hand wrapped around him and slid, up and down, firm enough around his rock-hard body to have him groaning.

"How about taste?" she teased, and he could barely restrain himself.

"I'll get there. Patience."

"Vice can be so much nicer than virtue."

"Sloth is a vice. So taking it slow is an added vice." Castle smiled as lazily as Beckett had. "Nice vices are better taken slow."

"What about nasty vices?" she jabbed.

"Those are better not taken at all."

"I entirely agree," she purred, and flexed from head to foot, creating an interesting diffraction effect under her bra. "So how about those nice vices, then?"

"I think we'll start here." He slowly approached her mouth, already parting for him; the wicked hand coming up to clasp his shoulder as their lips met. This time, it was slow and sensual; seduction, not conquest. Desire rose; until he lifted from her mouth and dropped tiny kisses along her jaw to end under her ear, where attention to a sensitive spot left her gasping and wriggling; her nails biting into the muscle of his back. He played for a little time, then left to kiss down her neck and on to the swell of her breast. She wriggled more, so he lipped and sucked until her breathing turned to soft noises. Then, with a predatory smile, he moved further south. He paused at her sternum, and stopped kissing. "Your bra is beautiful," he murmured in a velvety bedroom baritone, "but I don't think you need to keep it on." He slipped a hand beneath her back, found the catch, and skilfully undid it one-handed.

"You still have boxers on," she pouted; a sultry, sulky tone in her voice that went straight to his groin.

"And you still have panties on – very pretty panties, though there's barely enough material in them for them to be called panties – but I'm sure," he drawled, "that we'll both lose them in time." He prevented further conversation by applying an experienced, erotic mouth to her breasts. She retaliated by sneaking her hand between them and insinuating it into his boxers, which he instantly regretted having retained. Instead of enjoying her beautiful breasts some more, he shifted downward, forcing her to remove her hand. Mischievously, he kissed her navel with a swift tickle of his tongue. She squeaked, and wiggled, and as he did it again – the results were so amusingly arousing he couldn't resist: giggling, ticklish Beckett was wonderful – cursed him.

He caught her hands as she aimed for his ears, rested his chin on her stomach, and smiled sweetly. "You're ticklish." She humphed. "But exploring that can wait."

"It better," she sulked.

"I have a much better idea for exploring." He sat back on his heels, smirked dangerously, then oh-so-slowly began to peel her pretty panties downward, leaning forward to drop tiny kisses down each leg. She twisted, and he pushed her legs slowly wider, letting her anticipate – letting himself anticipate. He settled into position, shoulders spreading her, and grinned wolfishly. "Time to explore," he purred, and fell to. He tasted, delicately lapping over the sensitive knot of nerves, teasing and tantalising; winding her higher and higher until she moaned and whimpered and then commanded and cursed and finally came hard.

Beckett, floating in a sea of orgasmic endorphins, felt Castle's broad body snuggle up beside her. She curled into his warmth, and enjoyed it.

You love it. Beckett ignored the worm. She was perfectly content where she lay, cosy, cuddled and cossetted in Castle's arms. Worms had no business spoiling that. Castle petted softly at her hip and waist, apparently also perfectly content, though Beckett could feel a sizeable reason to start another round pressing against her.

Told you.. Hung like – Shut up. You should – I said shut up. I know what I should do. I guess there's a first time for everything, the worm snarked.

Beckett turned around without detaching herself from the circle of Castle's arms, and took assured possession of his mouth while her hands took assured possession somewhat lower. He tensed, and then his embrace tightened. "Your turn to play?" he asked, and loosened his clasp. "Happy to be your toy." Beckett watched as he lay on his back, arms open and relaxed. When she slid his boxers down, as slowly as he had done for her, she sat at the end of the bed for a moment and simply admired his, well, build.

I suppose that's a synonym for what you're actually looking at, the worm commented sardonically.

Beckett carried on scrutinising Castle, who essayed some small, flirtatious flexes of biceps and pecs, smiling lazily as he did. "Nice view," she said, ensuring her gaze was fixed at the centre of his body. The view in question stood straight up in appreciation. How best to appreciate it right back, she wondered, and then, as swiftly, decided.

Castle volubly and loudly appreciated her chosen method of appreciating him, though his choice of language left a lot to be desired, and shortly couldn't be described as language at all. Well, Beckett thought, sauce for the goose was also sauce for the gander. She wriggled up his body, pillowed her head on his chest, and tugged his arms around her until he should recover his brain.

Thank you to all readers and reviewers.