Chapter 16

Beckett prepares carefully for their dinner. A hot shower and several hours sleep has improved matters enormously, but now she needs to ensure that she can make her own feelings clear. The first thought she'd had when she woke had been of Rick's words: I was falling in love with you right then. They'd clasped themselves around her heart, warming her soul. She can't, now, doubt that Rick Rodgers, the man she'd – oh, admit it already – fallen in love with, is the real man. No PR construct, arrogant and cocky, could have written the depth of emotion that he had written; no shallow celebrity could hear another's pain and loss and understand it

Her thinking continues until it's time to leave. She wants to be there first: stupidly, nervously, she wants to have her back to the wall of their booth. Their booth? She guesses so: it had been hers, first: that half-hidden place, but then…they'd shared it and it had been theirs. She hasn't been to Remy's since… the truth had been revealed.

She does indeed arrive first: tucks herself into the booth with her back to the wall and waits, trying not to fidget. The server takes her order for milkshake, and she waits. A little pile of shredded serviette becomes a larger pile. Rick hasn't arrived.

She checks her phone. No messages. Her face falls – and then she remembers that she'd blocked his number and she'd forgotten to unblock it. Frantically, she taps at it.

Not ten seconds after she's unblocked his number, a text from Rick pops up. Are you getting these? Kate, why aren't you answering?

She taps back immediately. Forgot to unblock. Here. K.

There asap. R.

She relaxes, and sips her milkshake.

A few moments later Rick rushes in.

"I'm so sorry," he blurts. "There was an accident and all the roads are jammed and I couldn't get through and I thought you'd changed your mind and" –

"No," Beckett says, blushing uncomfortably. "I forgot that I hadn't unblocked your number and I thought you had changed your mind because you weren't here and hadn't called."

Rick picks up her restless, fretful hand, enclosing her fingers and stilling them. "I'm here now," he says reassuringly. The tips of her fingers curl around to settle on the back of his hand. His thumb strokes the back of hers. "Are you okay?"

"Are you?"

He smiles, beautifully. "Yeah. You're here." He curls his free arm round her shoulders and settles himself about her. "There. Right where I like you."

"I like being here," she murmurs, a little bashful.

"Good."

A server peers round.

"Food?" Beckett ventures.

"Yep."

Orders are given. The server disappears, and Rick takes instant advantage to ensure that Beckett is enveloped. She wriggles slightly, mostly to ensure she can breathe.

"Er…" she starts uncertainly, when more drinks have arrived.

"Mm?"

"Are we" – she cringes – "okay?"

"Uh?"

"I mean…" she stops.

"Mm?"

She shrugs, rather hopelessly. Actually saying something is much harder in person than it had been in her head.

"I mean I ditched you but here you are and I… and you… and I think I'm in love with you too," she rushes out on one babbled breath and then tries to hide in the corner.

Castle stares at Kate, who is doing an excellent impression of a pangolin: curled tightly with armoured defences on full display. He tries to unfurl her: however, he might be bigger but she is definitely more skilled in furling. Eventually, after a rather unedifying effort, he simply resettles his arm round her, and tuts annoyingly.

"Out you come," he flirts. "You can't say something like that and then hide. Especially when we haven't had dinner yet, and I'm hungry."

Kate peeps up from under those astonishingly long, seductive lashes. She looks entirely terrified. There's only one thing to be done.

"What – mmmmfffff."

Well, that worked. Of course, there is no possible universe in which kissing Kate wouldn't be great, but working – a little more chancy. Here and now, though, it's working. More importantly, she's kissing him back, so it's – they're – definitely okay.

"What was that?"

"A kiss," he points out happily. "Want another? Kisses are good for you."

"I was rapidly acquiring the impression that you thought kisses were good for you," Kate snarks, very dryly indeed.

Rick smirks. "You're definitely okay. You're snarking." She adds a glare, and the smirk widens. "And a glare. All we need is – and there's the eyeroll. Trifecta! I win."

"You win?" she squawks.

"Yep. I win."

Before that can develop into the argument which is quite clearly approaching, their burgers arrive and Kate, as ever, digs straight in. Food trumps arguing, and it also seems to have caused her to forget her admission. Or maybe that was the kiss.

"When did you last eat?" Castle asks.

"Yesterday," she says, swallowing a mouthful of burger, and smiles mischievously at him. "You didn't offer me any dinner and I didn't get time to try the canapes."

"They were good. Especially the little fishy ones. You should have tried them."

Kate's eyebrow rises in a familiarly boggled fashion. "When?"

Castle smiles back equally mischievously. "If you hadn't been ripping Roy a new one…" he entices.

"Montgomery had no right to drag me to that function" –

"But if he hadn't, we wouldn't be here," he says, unanswerably. Kate glares at him. "Do you want dessert?" he adds.

She rolls her eyes again. "Yeah. Please."

Dessert appears, and is eaten. Coffee appears, and is drunk. In that time, Castle doesn't let go of Kate for a moment. In all that time, he wants to yell She loves me too! to the whole of Remy's and indeed the whole of Manhattan.

However, finally it's time to go. Kate, nestled into the crook of his arm, her usual quiet self: the serenity he'd become used to over the preceding weeks. Mostly. There's still a tightness across her shoulders, rigidity in her spine. Belatedly, it occurs to him that she's still scared; still afraid that they're broken; still unsure.

"We're okay," he says. "I should've told you, you should've listened."

"But I didn't. I didn't want to talk to you, or listen to you."

"You did, though. You read it. Same thing." It doesn't seem to be helping. In fact, it's actively not helping. He pulls her back closer. "Look, just 'cause they're both me doesn't make a difference." She startles. Aha. He's hit it. "When I was with you it was just me. There's only one me, and all of him wants you. Detective Kate Beckett, Twelfth Precinct." He gulps. "I just want you."

"I…" It's her turn to stop, and swallow. "I didn't like Richard Castle." She stops again, and doesn't restart for a long, tense moment. "I liked" – another swallow, and then a cannon-fire of words – "I fell in love with Rick Rodgers. I hated Richard Castle. How's this ever going to work if I can't like both of you?"

Castle abruptly decides that this is a conversation best not held walking down the street, whistles down a taxi, puts them both into it and gives Kate's address.

"Uh?"

"Let's talk at yours, not in the street – and before you ask, my mother and daughter are home and I really, really don't need them interfering so we can't go back to mine."

"Uh?"

"Kate, we have to talk about this. I just don't want to do it on the sidewalk – do you?"

"No…"

"Right. So let's go somewhere to fix it in private."

Fortunately the taxi is brisk, since Kate is staring into space with the mien of a stunned sow and no intelligible words at all. Castle pays, tows her out, nudges her until she opens the door of her building, nudges some more until she opens the door of her apartment, and finally shuts the door behind them.

"Coffee," he says firmly.

The magic word kick-starts her intelligence.

"Yes." She goes to her kitchen and switches on the kettle. Castle follows, and when she's finished finding cups, coffee and creamer, wraps his arms around her waist to turn her around and into him.

"There. That's better." He strokes up and down her back: large warm hands soothing away the knots and tension, petting until the coffee can be made and taken to her couch.

"I know you didn't like Richard Castle. You told me. Several dozen times over. What I never got the chance to tell you was that I invented him to deal with all the PR and parties. I just wanted to write. But there's all the publicity and the pressure and everyone wanting a piece of you so I invented this guy who loved all of that and" –

"And he took over," she says.

He gapes at her. "How did you know?"

"I – I don't know how you saw it but you did because it's in there – I did the same. To cope with my mother dying."

"You did?"

"Yeah. Till I didn't need it any more. Mostly."

"Okay. So anyway, I invented Richard Castle, celebrity playboy. And gradually he took over, like you said. And… well… I liked it. Lots. Everyone loved him. He – I – was popular, and he was easy to be." He sips his coffee. "And then I lost my book and I couldn't write and… I went out and there you were in that bar and suddenly I didn't want the expectation any more. I just wanted to be able to be me and not have to play up to the personality or pretend. And you let me." He drinks some more coffee, which doesn't help the next bit. "And then I kissed you, or you kissed me, and you'd just told me you hated him – me – whoever – and I couldn't lose you." His head hangs. "I knew I should tell you, but I couldn't. And you didn't want to talk to him. Me. No matter how I tried."

"He was an arrogant idiot who hit on me. And then hit on the waitress."

"I didn't!"

"It looked like it."

"Sure it did. But I didn't. I tipped her and chatted. Then I flirted with the women who hit on me, because otherwise they get pushy and they start trouble rather than leaving me alone, and then I went home all on my own. But I didn't think you'd be as upset as you were because I didn't know why it all mattered. Now I do."

Kate wriggles uncomfortably. "He was pushy. I liked you because you didn't hit on me. You backed off. Didn't expect anything." Suddenly she grins up at him. "Except all those answers."

Castle grins back. "Research. I always do my research, really thoroughly."

"I noticed," comes back, desert-dry.

"You weren't research, though," he adds much more seriously. "I never asked you about your mom."

"No." It's thoughtful. "No, you never did." She snuggles right up into him, coffee cup safely on the table, drained. "If you'd only been Richard Castle, you would have. You absolutely would have."

"Probably," he admits.

"So… you're more than that. Rick." She reaches for him, pulls his head firmly down, and kisses him hard. "You're still Rick Rodgers." Another firm kiss. "But Richard Castle is still a pain, so don't bring him here."

"Never." He plants a hard kiss of his own on her smiling lips. "Never, ever."

"Never," she affirms. "Because" – her head ducks away so he can't see her face, hidden against his chest – "he took my mother away. You brought her back."

"In the book?"

"Not just there. You – she could always find joy in the little victories, or in the small things. Like you."

Castle tips her chin so he can see her glistening eyes. "Even in the little things, there's always a reason to be joyful. Always something to make you happy." He embraces her, pulling her into his lap, and then turning her so that he can kiss her softly, and then harder, response building in the clutch of her hands and press of her tongue against his. "You make me happy."

"You too," she murmurs into his cheek.

He slides his hand into the soft hair at the back of her head, kissing her again: hard, possessive hands holding her to him; hers gripping him. He explores, relearning her taste, her touch against him, the scent of her hair and the soft, smooth skin beneath his fingers. Shortly, shirts fall away, and skin meets skin – and it ignites once more.

Castle surges off the couch, taking Kate with him and carrying her to her bedroom because he can't bear to let her lose contact with him for an instant. He lays her out on her bed as if she were made of the finest porcelain: simply appreciating her. Her eyes wander over him, the gold flecks sparking hotly, a sensuous smile spreading across her mouth, as she nibbles provocatively on her lower lip.

She really shouldn't do that, because she knows exactly what it does to Rick, but… she nibbles again. Rick falls on to the bed, frantically toeing off his shoes (hers fell off on the way) and kissing her like there's no tomorrow, big body covering her and pressing down, bare chest hot against her skin, hasty hands undoing her pants, pushing them down; pushing his down.

She moves slightly to accommodate the width of his thighs, to feel the hot pressure just where she wants it, to arch up slightly and rub against him and set spark to fuse. He gasps, and takes her mouth again, and swells and fills against the welcoming warmth. Her hands slide over his back, lightly scraping, reach the edge of his boxers and peel them downwards from him as far as she can reach, releasing him to her avid, elegantly wicked fingers. Gasp becomes groan, and then he plunders her mouth and starts to use his own diabolical hands to unclip her bra and discard it, then palm the soft curves of her breasts and tease the erect nipples till she whimpers his name and her nails bite into his back and he moves lower.

She squirms and giggles – giggles – and squeaks. "That tickles, you rat. Stoppit."

"Can't." He smirks up her torso. "It's the stubble." He rubs it over her stomach, gently, and she wriggles again. He moves a little further south, and she wriggles more.

"Stubble?" she pants.

"Yep."

"That – oh – part of the persona?"

"Only if it has to be," he grimaces, "but actually it happens by now unless I shave again," and he slides a little so the stubble reaches some very sensitive areas indeed.

"You can – ohhhhh – keep that bit for here ohhhhh."

He's rolling off her panties now, and oh God yes there stubble certainly has its good points.

"Okay," he agrees amiably, and then stops talking altogether because his mouth and oh God do that again tongue are otherwise engaged in a very different conversation in which she is providing no coherent answers whatsoever while making an awful lot of noise.

"Rick!" She spasms helplessly and falls back, limp. He slithers up the bed and smiles very smugly.

"You liked that." She can't answer. Her head may have fallen off. She manages a faint noise of vague agreement. "You should let me do that more."

"Uh," she emits.

"Good. You agree."

Did she? Oh. Yes. More. Yes. But right now, just cuddle her. She'll worry about more when she can feel her fingers. She makes an enormous effort and moves a whole inch towards his wide, warm chest. "Mine," she breathes, and relaxes against him.

Castle cuddles his thoroughly sated Kate, delighted to have her back exactly where she should be, in bed with him. He nuzzles affectionate kisses into her hair, and lets her know just how pleased he is to be there with her. After a moment or two, she wiggles seductively. How nice. She's ready to play some more.

He glides a hand over her stomach and upward, cupping a soft curve and slipping his thumb over her nipple. She sighs, and curves into his touch as his other hand starts at the same point but moves downward, sliding between her legs and cupping there, not – yet – moving. Another sigh, and she moves to try to bring his lower hand more firmly against her. Not yet. He shifts one broad finger, ghosting it against the wet heat. Sigh becomes a shiver, and she opens a little to allow him wider access: slips up his body to bring hard weight into the soft damp cleft, slides against him so that he catches breath in turn.

"You like that," she murmurs, and brings fingers to him to find out if he likes that too, guiding him over her. He does like it. So much. But he also likes turning her to a hot mess of lust and – she said it – love, and so he wickedly flexes his fingertips and paints her nerves with her own desire and oh, worked up, blissed out, desperately writhing Kate is just so utterly perfect and all his and then he pushes into her and claims her as she surrounds him and moves with him and then there's only the explosion and hot, sweet release and Kate.

"Mine," he rasps, and pulls her in to cage her against him. "My Kate."

She turns over within his arms and drapes herself across him, head over his heart. "Mine," she says decisively, nestling in comfortably.

"That too." He smooths down her back, petting without intent. "Just us. Rick and Kate."

"Mm."

Nothing happens for a little while. Castle pets affectionately, Kate stays curled up into him, stroking his flank occasionally. An air of pleased contentment suffuses the room.

"Why did you buy my book?" Castle asks suddenly.

"Huh?"

"Why did you buy my book? I mean, you never did tell me why, or why you were at that fundraiser at all. You told me about your mother" – his tones are soft, sympathetic – "but why there? Why not just go to a signing?"

"Dad."

"Uh?"

"AA. We both try to support it. And it was your books that Mom loved so that was double reasons." Her head is buried in his chest. "Dad" – she swallows painfully – "He's been dry five years now."

"I get it."

"That's why I told you to make a donation when I gave you the book back. I didn't want paid for it."

"Never thought you did." She relapses on to his chest and snuggles back in. "So you wanted a signed set of books so you could feel closer to your mom?"

"Yes," she mutters. "Silly."

"Not silly. But" – he hesitates, and Kate hums questioningly against his ribs – "um… if you still wanted them you could have them." She squeaks. "I could…um… just give you them. Signed. If you wanted, that is. You might not want them because you don't like him…um…me him…but if you did I could and it wouldn't take long but if you don't just say and I'll never mention it again and" –

"Yes."

"It's really up to you so – what?"

"Yes."

"Promise?" he says, like a small child. "Promise you'll let me?"

"I said so already." But her eyes are soft and a little liquid and she's totally lax and unguarded.

Suddenly she grins evilly. "After all, you need to make it up to me. I bought a book of yours that was not for sale."

Fin.

And so we are done. Thank you to all readers and reviewers, named, guest, old and new.

Guest: this isn't exactly canon Heat Wave: it's a different type of story still called Heat Wave.

I have two in progress stories: one short and one which I think will be a bit longer, but I can't predict when they will be ready. When they are, they will appear. Hope to see you then.

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