"Be With Kate?!"

Disclaimer: I still don't own it, and I am back to being a poor student with bills, so I'm even less worth suing.

AN: Co-written with the wonderful Stacy Rogers, who did all hard parts. Set following Boom! In season 2.

She was surprised at how easily Castle had agreed to make himself scarce for the evening so Lanie could drop by. It felt as if he knew they were going to talk about -

Well, to talk about him.

But if he was going to call her on it then, he is pulling back now. "Hey, I told you, you have a home here, as long as you need it. So, that means you need to feel free to make yourself at home."

He smiles, so genuine it almost undoes her right then and there.

If she weren't scared to death of the thing she found in his drawer, under the bubble pink Spongebob T-shirt, if she were just brave enough, she would probably -

The doorbell ringing startles her out of her daydream, inches away from his perfectly shaved chin. "Oh." She draws back, both embarrassed and pissed at her own pathetic self.

He sighs, gives her a somewhat sheepish smile.

"Right. I'll be in my office if you need me."

"So, now I can't unsee it, and I'm living in his house, and it's in my head, obviously. Only he doesn't know that I know and it's going to make living with him completely awkward."

She sighs as she sits back on the sofa, running her fingers through her hair in frustration. At least now she's not the only one who knows.

"Duh. Girl, you need to do something about it," Lanie finally says as she curls her legs under herself, finishing her fourth glass of surprisingly good red.

"But what should I do, Lanie?!" Kate whines, gulping her drink down in one go. " I can't just walk up to him and say, 'Sorry, but I've been snooping in your T-shirt drawer and found this?'"

"Or, you could kiss him," her friend suggests knowingly, raising an eyebrow.

"That might be not a very good i-...Oh, shit!"

"...Kate? What's wrong?" Lanie stares at her in confusion, as she hurriedly extracts her phone from between the sofa cushions, feeling even more mortified when she sees Castle's number on the screen.

She groans, realizing she must have butt-dialed him, somewhere after she broke off her hysterical rant and plopped down on the sofa.

"Shit, shit, shit." Her hands are shaking as she is trying desperately to disconnect the call.

She knows it's only a temporary fix. He...shit. He lives here. She's in Castle's loft. So, she has less than 30 seconds before he finds her here, in his living room.

"Lanie, I need to hide!"

(When she thinks about this much later, the only excuse she has for herself is too much wine in her system.)

But Lanie only rolls her eyes, looking at her friend's futile attempts to fit behind an armchair and then scramble over back to the sofa.

"Girl, you need to stop hiding is what you need. And I need to go catch a cab because you're about to have much better company."

"Kate? Are you all right?"

Her mortification grows at the sound of a familiar voice.

"M-Martha?" What are you doing here?"

Lanie stands up at this. "I should go -" she says, rising, just as Martha approaches Kate, half hidden behind the sofa.

"Lost an earring, darling?" she asks in a sarcastic tone, accidentally talking over Lanie.

This is exactly how Castle finds them all when he finally walks out of his office.

"Ladies," he says wryly. "I'm sorry to break up this little party, but Beckett and I have something to talk about."

"Yes, of course, I was leaving anyway." Lanie hurriedly grabs her purse, while Martha takes advantage of the situation and helps herself to some wine.

"Lanie?" Kate's voice is pathetically weak and pleading. "Don't leave me alone."

But she hears the door click shut behind her friend, already gone.

"I'll just take this upstairs," Martha offers, leaving too.

Kate freezes.

"Kate." It's Castle's voice, too close, but somehow both concerned and amused. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I am." She is trying hard to sound casual. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"Well, as I, absolutely accidentally, mind you, heard just 5 minutes ago, you found something in my drawer. That seems to have been quite a shock. And why were you snooping in the first place?

She takes a deep breath. He doesn't seem to know what she found. She isn't sure if that's good or bad.

"I wasn't snooping. I was borrowing a T-shirt to...I was borrowing a shirt. My stuff blew up."

"I see." He says nothing else for a long few seconds and she is internally begging him to just drop it.

"So. From the sound of it, you found something besides a T-shirt. And, by the way, you're always welcome to sleep in my clothes-uh-I mean...whatever you need, Kate, of course."

She blushes and - what the hell - he'll find out sooner or later anyway. She silently puts her hand into the pocket of her jeans and out comes the crumpled sheet of paper.

His bucket list.

She slowly rises, bringing herself out from where she has been crouched with no small amount of embarrassment. Looking him in the eye, she extends the paper out to him. "What is this, Castle?"

"What is th-o-oh. That's what you've found." And then it's his face going red, right down to his neck and up to the tips of his ears. "I - I can explain. Kate, it's -"

She sways. His hand comes out fast to catch her. "Whoa. Easy. You sure you're okay?" he asks as he leads her back to sit on the sofa. "I'm fine," she says again, a bit sharply, annoyed at having to repeat herself. "I had some wine with Lanie. Don't think that means you get to change the subject."

"I'm not changing the subject. I'm just concerned about you!"

She gives him the look she usually aims at her worst suspects and Castle winces.

"Okay, but can you blame me? You're the one who has been hiding behind the sofa."

Her mouth opens, closes. She has no answer. But she's not the one with the secret either. At least, not on paper.

"Castle," she says, soft but insistent. "What does it mean?"

"What do you think it means, Kate? Or rather - what do you want it to mean?"

"I - It can't mean anything, Castle. At least, not right now."

When she looks at him, his eyes are so full of questions and - oh, shit. Hurt. He's hurt.

"Castle," she tries, her voice scraping.

"I was running, you know, the cab wasn't fast enough. So I ran. And then the bomb went off. And - it felt like my whole world just…evaporated."

"It just didn't make sense. And all I could think about until I heard your voice, until I knew for sure that you weren't...that you were alive - all I could think about was you. And that I screwed up again and we would never get to be more."

Kate is silent, completely lost for words, her heart ready to jump out of her throat.

"Rick - I," she finally utters. She takes another deep breath, and then she goes for it. Puts it right out there before she can stop herself.

"I can't ruin us. I can't start something with you and then see you go when you wake up to reality. Because this image of me you have in your head is even less real than Nikki Heat."

He laughs. Actually laughs. "What image is that, Kate? The one who avoids everything she feels except anger? The one who fills her life with work instead of happiness because she thinks that's all she deserves? I'm not blind, Kate. You drive me crazy." She's staring at him, dark, silent, indignant. "But you're also the most compassionate, warm, fiercely loyal person I've ever met. And you drive me crazy. But, I think, you could be happy if you let yourself. If-if you let me help." He blinks, swallows then meets her eyes directly. "I think you should."

It feels surreal and overwhelming, but maybe it's time for her to stop punishing herself for her mother's death.

"There is one thing uh...Lanie advised me to do," she whispers, her voice hoarse with emotion.

"Yeah? What is that?" he raises his eyebrow suggestively and she can't help rolling her eyes - he definitely heard her friend's drunken remark.

"It was good advice," she continues, her fingers sneaking around his neck of their own accord. "And I'm going to follow it."

She's kissing him before she has time to think about it any further, before she has a chance to talk herself out of it.

But oh, it's so worth it. She has never felt anything like it before. It's better than any wine, better than her favorite chocolate and almost as good as coffee. "Wow," he croaks, when they finally let each other go, looking rumpled and slightly cross-eyed. "I must be dreaming."

Kate laughs softly. "Are all your dreams rated PG, Rick?" She feels different suddenly, can't quite understand how that's possible. She's had maybe two minutes with him, and yet she already feels lighter. Nervous, but lighter.

She leans in closer, about to kiss him again, when her phone chirps cheerfully from the sofa. She sighs, bumping his shoulder with her forehead and smiles when she feels his gentle kiss in her hair. "Bet it's Lanie," he rumbles.

"For someone so pushy, she has terrible timing," Kate says, reaching for her phone.

The text from her best friend consists of only one word "So?"

Kate types out the words the best she can from her memory of the auto feature on her dad's old phone she now wishes had come on hers. Sorry, the person you are trying to reach is busy and may take a while to respond.

She switches the phone off, drops it back on the sofa and turns to Castle. He smirks.

"So, where were we?"

-FIN-