Chapter 148: 148. Game (of love)
Castle takes his jacket off and tidily hangs it up, divests Beckett of hers and does the same, and then waits a beat. He knows she’s expecting him to pounce, but she’s been teasing him for a while and he’s going to prove that sauce for the Castle gander is sauce for the Beckett goose. (He congratulates himself on the correct gendering of that phrase.)
As he had expected (and hoped) Beckett hesitates slightly, and then steps out of her shoes and wanders toward the kitchen and the coffee. Castle pads after her. There is a certain aura of confuddlement about her, which is just what he wants. There is, of course, also a certain aura of irritation that she hasn’t got her own way, but he’s pretty sure that will dissipate in due course. More accurately, he’ll dissipate it.
He leans on the counter and watches the production of coffee without comment, though he appreciates the effect on her profile of the slight stretch to reach everything. It shows up very nicely the curves of her cleavage and indeed some slight excitement as her button-down pulls a little. He forces himself not to reach out and touch. Yet. Instead he just admires, running a heated gaze over her, which even though she isn’t turned to him he knows that she feels.
Coffee, Beckett and Castle all arrive at the couch simultaneously. Correctly concocted caffeine achieved, Castle allows himself to sling an arm around Beckett, whose aura of irritated confuddlement has not changed, and nestles her in to his side.
“Are you going to tell me what you want for a prize?”
“How’d you know if I’ve decided yet?”
“You’ve got that I-know-something-you-don’t-know look. You’ve had it all day. And you said you had, earlier. So you’re just being mean not telling me.” Beckett makes a happy noise and snuggles in. “That’s not an answer.” More snuggle. “Snuggling up to me will not stop me wanting an answer.” Snuggle stops. It’s replaced by a nuzzle into his neck. “I said before, you can’t suborn me with seduction.” Nuzzle stops. It’s replaced by a dirtily wet kiss and lick all the way up the vein in his neck to the nerve at his ear.
“Really?” she purrs wickedly into said ear. “You seem pretty suborned and seduced to me.” Her hand is proving her point. It’s found hard evidence of how seduced he is. “Besides, it’s you who’s complaining.” Her hand goes for a little more seduction. Her mouth nips his ear, and circles the shell. Castle’s arm tightens around her. His brain had very little to do with that. He’d had a plan. He still has a plan. It’s just very, very difficult to remember his plan when Beckett is quite definitely seducing him with a completely different plan. The key points float back into his fuzzy brain. Seduce Beckett. Seduce Beckett till she’ll tell him everything just so he doesn’t stop any more. Yes. That was the plan. Definitely.
It’s just very, very difficult when Beckett’s being flirtatious and mischievous and downright naughtily feline. It takes all his brain cells and turns them to kitty-kibble. Which thought finally recalls him to his plan for dealing with this very definite Kat. All he has to do now is stop her stealing his mind for long enough for him to steal hers.
Since Kat is all snuggled up to him, she clearly won’t mind if he simply lifts her into his lap – so he does – and snuggles her back in – so he does that – and embarks on the exceedingly pleasurable pastime of kissing her for a while – so he does that too, and sure enough objections do not happen. They don’t happen when he delicately and surreptitiously embarks on the buttons of her shirt, either, mainly because his Kat is none too delicately and certainly not surreptitiously halfway down opening not just the buttons of his shirt but also the buckle of his belt. She was almost as relaxed as in the Hamptons, which is seriously hopeful.
His plan is racing out of his head almost as fast as her fingers are racing down his shirt. In absolute desperation (and lust) he flicks open the buttons rat-a-tat-tat and shoves her shirt down her arms, which traps them and removes her hands approximately a tenth of a second before doing so would have left him gravely injured if not mutilated.
“There,” he says smoothly. “Now, where was I? Oh, yes. Prizes.” He smiles lazily. “If you won’t say what you want, I’ll just do what I want. I’m sure you’ll like it.” The smile turns dangerous. “You always do. I know what you like.” He smirks. “Me.” He kisses her hard before the infuriated riposte can exit her throat. “So I’m going to do things I know you like.” He takes her mouth again, pulling her round so that she’s straddling him and then taking off the tangled shirt and replacing it with one hand around her slim wrists, behind her and pressing her close, and one cradling her skull, supporting her into his searching mouth. “That’s better.” He nibbles round her jawline. “Perfectly positioned.”
“I’m not a doll,” Beckett snarks, slightly spoilt by a gasp and wriggle.
Castle teases the nerve at her ear. “Nope,” he murmurs, and presses her further in. “Definitely not. I’d say you’re all woman.” He drops into the sex-soaked semi-growl that seduces her ears as surely as it does her body. “All woman and all mine.” He lets go of her wrists, and keeps that arm around her as he stands up, pulls her back against him so he can roll hips into her and enjoy the answering movement. Beckett has fallen neatly into feline and feminine Kat-ness: responsive and happy and very clearly enjoying herself. She’s melted into his grasp in a thoroughly provocative fashion, and anyone who ever thought that feminine might equal weak was totally, utterly wrong. There’s nothing weak about his Kat, or his Beckett, but that doesn’t stop her sometimes being softly feminine behind her own door.
In which case, it’s time for him to be pleasantly assertively masculine. Well. To continue being pleasantly assertively masculine. Starting with the removal of the entirely unnecessary pants that Beckett is still wearing. Those fall to her feet with an enticing swish. He lifts her slightly, and hey presto, they’re gone. Since his shirt is mysteriously fully open, it seems entirely unfair and unreasonable not to tuck Beckett against his chest, and then it seems entirely unfair and unreasonable not to tip her face up and possess himself of her mouth: to explore and search out and conquer, and once he’s begun that there’s only one way to continue.
He hoists her up and carries her the short distance to her bedroom, where he can simply lay her out and have his wicked way with her. At least, he’ll have his wicked way when she stops using her wicked wiles on him. If she wiggles against him like that again, the wicked ways and wiles will be against the wall. He applies a little strength so she can’t wiggle any more, being too tightly against him, and carries on with the plan.
By the bed, he doesn’t yet spread her out over it. Instead, he keeps her pressed tightly against him with a firm hand planted across her neat ass, so that she knows exactly how aroused he is, how much he wants her: the force of his need grinding into the open soft heat where she equally wants and needs him. He takes hard possession of her mouth once more: insisting on surrender, invading and then owning; till the soft noises begin and the tips of her breasts are hard where they’re rubbing against his chest. Her hands are plucking at his pants, trying to slide between their bodies and undo them.
“In a minute,” he murmurs into her avid lips. “Wait a minute.” He moves across her jaw to flirt with the nerves at her ear and then slants her head to open the curve of her neck to him and carries on down.
Beckett has slipped into the tide of arousal that she’s been watching rise since before dinner without so much as a whisper of protest. She wants her forceful, possessive, assertive Castle and here he is, currently teasing the cut of her collarbones and holding her so that her head has dropped back and her heated centre is pressed right against his hard length. There’s a looseness around her ribs where he must have unfastened her bra: he draws it off her and perforce that takes her hands away from his broad body and leaves her depending on his grip to keep her balanced.
And then he lowers her to her bed and leaves her legs dangling over the side and stands between them, simply looking: hot, midnight dark blue eyes raking her form and scorching her skin; firing her blood and flicking all her synaptic switches to full on. She reaches for him, but he’s not where he should be: somehow just a fraction too far, still gazing.
“You’re beautiful,” he says reverently, and the heat in his eyes isn’t only searing lust, but far more, far deeper. He drops to his knees, and his hands curve around her waist; hers meet his shoulders. “You’re just so beautiful.” His voice is falling down the register all the time, deeper and deeper, tugging her down with it. His mouth is planted against the base of her sternum and it’s vibrating through her, dark and dangerous: reverence has moved over to make way for sheer sexuality.
A kiss follows the vibrations, then a swift, unsatisfying flick to each side, tantalising and teasing by turn. She tries to curve towards his delicate touch, to bring him where she wants, but large hands hold her in place, weight prevents her turning or arching, and she’s left with no option but to wait for him to show her what he plans.
“Let’s do some things you like,” he rumbles. It’s not a suggestion. It’s not asking for her input, either. She emits a querying little sound. It’s not quite a whimper, or a whine. He shouldn’t be talking when he should be using his mouth entirely differently. “You’ll need to wait and see what they all are.” Ah. Castle wasn’t entirely joking about that. Oh well. It’s hardly a problem if he wants to play. She stretches bonelessly and rubs across him, delighted to be stroked and perfectly ready to be played with.
He smiles against her skin, and then lifts his head to move his hands upward from her waist. His thumbs flirt wickedly with the curves of her breasts as his fingers slither higher until each breast is cupped in one hand and his naughty thumbs are sliding to and fro over ever-tauter nipples. She mews, a little pleading, pushing up into his touch. “You like this,” he murmurs, doing it again, massaging sex into her skin with every stroke. “But you’ll like this more,” and he palms her, rolling, tiny little pinches which tease without stinging. She does like it more, and sighs out pleasure. She loves it when he does this. She squirms against him, moving to the rhythm of his ministrations but unable to press any other areas into him. The sigh shifts to whimper. She wants more, but Castle isn’t giving her anything more: simply the seducing, drugging pattern of his hands that doesn’t slow or speed, doesn’t change, doesn’t alter at all but is bringing her up and up. He’s pillowed his chin on her stomach so he can watch her reactions, smiling lazily. Her hands clutch in his hair.
“You really like that. But you’ll like the next bit even more,” he eventually says. By that time she’s stopped saying anything, in favour of noises. “On the other hand, you were mean to me. Want to tell me what your prize is?”
So that’s his game. She knew that. She did. She’d just lost sight of it through the fog of arousal. She gathers her voice and some game. “Don’t you want to have some fun too?” One of her hands wanders down his chest and finds taut pectorals and hard nipples for it to play with. The other tightens on his shoulder to pull him closer. He allows himself to be pulled, shuffling inward, and she rises slightly to kiss him. He takes full advantage, hands coming around her face and lifting her to sitting: wrapping her in for a change of pace signalled by the slow, deep kisses. It doesn’t last.
“I am having fun,” he husks into her ear. “I love it when you’re totally responsive to everything I do. Let’s do some more. We could do lots more, but you won’t tell me what you want for a prize, so I’ll just decide what I want to do and do it, till you do tell me.”
“Is that a threat?” Beckett breathes, twisting the words around her mouth till they escape on a hot slither. “’Cause I don’t think it’s going to work.”
“Why, I might think that was a challenge.”
“Really?”
“Mmm. Yes. Are you challenging me?”
“Would I do that?” She nips his ear.
“You might. Just like I might take you up on it. If you were challenging me.”
She nibbles at his earlobe again, and slides a hand down between them to find him. Castle lets her, for a moment – it feels so good, oh god do that some more – and then gently removes her, trickling his hand between her legs just for an instant to find damp fabric and heat: she lifts to his touch and mews again when he withdraws it.
“Something you like?” Mew turns to growl. “You could have it. You know, if you weren’t keeping secrets.”
Beckett considers just telling him. Then she considers how good she feels right now. Then she considers how much better she might feel if she lets this play out and Castle just keeps on trying to – er – persuade words out of her. She’s sure words will happen. They just might not be the ones he wants. She makes her decision.
“Make me,” she dares him.
“Make you stop keeping secrets?” He suddenly looks very big, very male and very dangerous. His voice trickles into her ears. “So it is a challenge. I like challenges. Game on.”
He drops her down on to her back and then pins her hands by her ears as he plunders her mouth once more. This time, when he’s finished taking her mouth, he moves straight down to take one proud nipple into his mouth and start on persuasion. It doesn’t take long for gasps to become whimpers to become soft moaning; it takes less time for the same to happen when he gives due attention to the other side.
“What’s your secret, Kat?”
“Not telling,” she breathes.
Castle likes this game – and Kat has clearly signalled that this is the way she’d like to play today. He trails a hot, wet line down her cleavage, and then wanders his fingers over her stomach, stopping to investigate her navel. She squeaks, and wriggles.
“What’s your secret?” He tickles her navel again, pins her legs to the bed to stop her escaping and dances fingers over some extremely sensitive nerves round her middle. She wriggles a lot more.
“Stop it!”
“Tell me your secret.” He tickles again.
This was emphatically not the plan. He was supposed to extract it from her with sex, not tickling. This isn’t fair.
“Won’t,” she says crossly, and even folds her arms, which land on Castle’s head.
“Won’t? You mean I can’t tickle it out of you?”
“No. Stop it!” she squeaks on a high-pitched note.
Castle smiles evilly.
“Not what you wanted?”
There is a growl that promises death.
“Were you expecting something different?”
“I’m not telling you anything if you keep tickling me,” Beckett says, sounding like a sulky child. “I hate being tickled.” She tries to turn over. Castle doesn’t think that was the plan at all, and stops her.
“No escaping. If you won’t succumb to tickling, then I guess I’ll just have to try something else.”
That’s more like it, thinks Beckett. She stops her futile efforts to turn away from him. Futile, because there is a very firm grip around her hips and a solid weight still leaning over her.
“But I enjoyed tickling you. You wriggle so delightfully. Almost as good as when I do this…” and he rises up away from her and draws one hard finger through her centre. “See? I think I’ll do it again,” and he does, and she writhes. He manoeuvres his other hand to remove his shirt, which is easy, and his pants, which are not so easy. “Now,” he rasps, “let’s both get comfy.”
Castle slides her fully on to the bed, arranges himself beside her, slips a hand under her neck and consciously adopts a wholly predatory demeanour. “Tell me your secret,” he commands.
“No.”
He catches both hands and imprisons them in the hand by her shoulder. “No?”
“No.”
The other hand wanders over her chest and plays once more, while he bends and kisses her until she softens again, stops playing at resistance, stops her play-sulks and arches and curves to him, opening to his avidity and giving back plenitude. His fingers draw little patterns, and his mouth follows, and she begins to breathe harder, move more demandingly. A swift stroke dances downward, traces the edge of her panties, slips beneath, teases the sensitive flesh and makes her whimper and buck against him, his thigh pushing her legs apart for access.
“Tell me your secret,” he purrs.
“No…” she whispers, but it’s sounding less convincing by the instant. He smiles ferally and strokes more firmly, circling the knot of nerves, coaxing sexy noises from her and then stealing them with more hard kisses, working her up and still holding her wrists so she can’t retaliate, everything in his gift. She moans and tries to turn into him, to rub over the coarse hair of his leg and take what she wants.
“Something you want? Tell me your secret.”
“Castle…”
He slips fingers into her: in, out till her muscles are fluttering and she’s close, and “Tell me your secret.”
“If – ohhhh – I don’t?”
“I can keep this up all night. I can keep you like this all night, just petting my Kat. Or you could tell me your secret.”
Kat smiles naughtily up at him. “Could I? What’ll you do if I tell?”
Castle peels her panties off one-handed, wrestles himself out of his boxers and moves over her, settling between her legs. “What would you like me to do?”
He’s let go of her hands, and she digs nails into his flanks. “Inside me. Now.”
“Tell me your secret.” He slides against her, hinting at what she could have. “You’ve had your fun.”
“Mmm,” she hums. “Stop teasing me.”
“Stop teasing me, then.” He slides again, and she sighs at the sensation.
“Ohhh-kay. After – ohhhhh now please.”
“Promise?”
“Promise. Now.”
Castle releases his own control and lets desire take over and take his Beckett-Kat in one surging, fluid motion: she arches hips to him and brings him impossibly deep and then there’s only her heat and her movement and her and tempestuous release for both.
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