"Welcome back, Beckett," called Captain Roy Montgomery as he saw his best detective exit the elevator and walk toward her desk. Her arm was still in a cast but the look on her face showed she was more than ready to be back at work.

"It's good to be back," she smiled, accepting the numerous 'good to see you' comments from her colleagues as she passed. Dropping her bag on her desk, she turned to see where Esposito and Ryan were, but both appeared to be absent.

"Beckett, when you have a moment," Montgomery said from his office doorway. She nodded and walked to join him, closing the door at his request.

It was nearly twenty minutes later when she emerged, having worked out the finer details of what her desk duty would entail. They had agreed that she could still run interrogations, though only with another detective present while she was still injured and she could, of course, work the murder board and chase down leads via the phone. She knew she would find it difficult to be restricted, but it was certainly better than being cooped up at home.

She sat down at her desk heavily and started flipping through the report the captain had given her. Ryan and Esposito were out tracking down a suspect and she wanted to get caught up on the case before they returned.

"Breakfast?" said a voice quietly in her ear. She stilled and watched as an arm clad in an expensive jacket reached over her shoulder to place a cup of coffee on her desk, quickly followed by a bear claw. As the arm retreated, the attached hand hovered for a moment, before briefly clasping her shoulder in a show of support.

"Castle, what are you doing here?" she asked, not turning to look at him. "I thought we agreed that I was going to return to work on my own."

"Oh, you meant you wanted the whole day on your own?" He feigned ignorance and she finally looked at him to give him a mock-glare as he dropped into his usual seat. "I thought you just wanted to make your grand entrance alone." She rolled her eyes and his smirk grew bigger.

"What are you doing here?" she repeated. "I'm just going to be doing paperwork."

"Someone has to feed you," he replied, taking a bite of his own pastry.

"Will you ever change?" she sighed.

"No... and you wouldn't want me to either. We're good as we are."

After a long pause, she admitted, "Yes, we are."

Neither heard the other quietly whisper, "For now."

The End

So, there we have it. As much as I want to see Castle and Beckett together, I couldn't bring myself to write it, as neither are ready for that relationship yet, in my opinion.

A huge thank you once again to Tanya Reed for the fantastic beta.

Thank you for sticking with this story and for the reviews, plus those who added it to their alerts and favorites. It's been so long since I've written anything, I wasn't sure how it would go. I've been re-inspired though and am partway through writing another Castle fic.