XIII : A New Year's Eve Castle story

Last time:
"You happy to see me or something?"
Incapable of tamping down on her joy, she lets him see it all. It belongs to him, after all.
"Maybe just a little."
Her heart swells, takes a slow turn, and then settles in her chest, because he's here. And at this moment, there's nothing more she could wish for in the whole, wide world.

"Feeling's mutual."

Putting her back on her feet, he leans in for another tiny kiss, snags the handle behind him, and swings open the door to usher her inside, words glancing off her jawline.

"Let's get warm. We've got a few more minutes to go. Nice timing, by the way. Did the Duck finally quack?"

Stepping out of his arms, trading that heat for the welcome warmth of the massive stretch, she presses her lips tight to keep the grin from blooming.

"You've been waiting all day to use that one, haven't you?"

He flicks her lightly on the behind as she climbs in, and she swats at his hand in protest.

"Admit it, you thought it was a little bit funny."

Not admitting. Poking him in the shoulder playfully, but definitely not admitting.

Despite the ample room, he settles in beside her on the bench seat and takes her coat, sheds his own, hangs them to dry.

The car's windows have rolled up, and they are moving slowly through the streets, headed south, unperturbed by traffic and the press of revelers.

"Funny is too strong a word, Castle. Juvenile? Inane? Oh, I've got it: puerile."

Uncorking a bottle with a famous enough name that she recognizes it, he pours them each a glass of bubbles, passes one frosty flute to her.

"I am so very turned on right now."

"Save it until after I've had my champagne."

"Far be it from me to get between the lady and her liquor."

Tapping his glass with her own, she takes a long sip, feels the adrenaline start to leech out of her veins.

"And yes, Chuck confessed, thanks to some detective work by none other than your daughter."

Not certain she should even bring it up at this point, she is encouraged by the lack of shock on his face.

"Alexis texted me a little while ago. Sounded pretty proud of herself, actually."

"I'm proud of her. You saw me interview the victim's wife. She was the perfect grieving widow. I couldn't get anything out of her. From what Lanie said, Alexis had her eating out of her hand."

"Maybe she should be aiming for law school instead of pre-med."

Something loosens up in her chest when he gets that proud daddy expression on his face. It had been the very first clue all those years ago to the kind of person he was deep down. She finds herself smiling unconsciously back at him.

"What happened to the party at her dorm?"

"She said she found out a bunch of kids were going to be drinking. Guess she learned her lesson last summer."

"You raised a good kid, Castle."

His hand closes over her knee, squeezes gently.

"I take credit for half the genes and for not getting in her way."

Thinking better of boosting his ego any more than she already has tonight, what with the running through the street into his waiting arms, she shifts the subject.

"So where are we going?"

Straightening her slacks and smoothing her collar, her fingers fidget with a button on her blouse. She's not dressed for whatever black tie event he must have planned. Maybe they can stop by her place. Mentally flipping through her formal wardrobe leaves her staring past him out the window for just a moment, but he laces his fingers into hers, draws her attention back to his face, eyes crinkled at the corners, lips bowing up just enough to call it a smile.

"Nowhere. Anywhere. Don't really care, now that you're here."

She could kiss him. He's been mind-reading again.

"I thought we could just drive around for a while."

Letting loose his grip, he reaches behind him and a widescreen flickers to life.

"And we can watch the ball drop from right here."

Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve is already working up to the countdown, sadly without its namesake for the first time in decades, though they still have few minutes before the incandescent crystal sphere begins its journey down toward the giant "2013."

Another button push and the moonroof opens, carving out a slice of dark sky peeking between buildings. The snow seems to have stopped for the moment.

"It's a nice night."

"It is."

Closing in on her slowly with those broad shoulders, so neatly outlined in the crisp cut of his... Mohan's, maybe... he sips his drink, and she reflexively does the same, tastes the prickle of effervescence as it chills her mouth, slides effortlessly down her tongue.

Her palm traces the lapel of his tux jacket up to where it meets his collar and tie.

God he looks good in a tux.

"Thank you."

Damn. Must have said that out loud.

Leaning in to brush his lips at her ear, his voice is a smooth baritone wave of electricity.

"But then you look good in just about anything. Or nothing at all."

After all these months, that voice shouldn't still have such power over her, but she shivers, tilts her head to let his lips continue to skim along the curve of her neck, his nose buried in her hair. His fingers have found their way under the hem of her blouse, trailing flames of awareness in their wake as they explore the swath of skin wrapping from just over the jut of her hip bone around to the small of her back. When one finger dips under the waist of her pants to trace a tingling thrill along the entire length of the lacy edge of her underwear, she can't help the arch of her back or little moan that vibrates against the soft, warm flesh just above the crease of his collar.

Ryan Seacrest pipes up with the announcement of "two minutes" until 2013, but she isn't quite convinced she wants to mark them any way other than with kisses, wherever Castle wants to put them.

But then their driver taps on the privacy glass, and Castle lets out a warm wash of air across her collarbone and reaches behind him to lower the barrier.

"Mr. Castle, would you still like for me to-"

He has to clear his throat before he can get his answer out, and that makes her grin a little more than it ought to. Good to know she's not the only one who still gets carried away.

"Yes. Perfect timing. Please do."

As the divider closes once again, the long car takes a turn to the right, and then in another few seconds, they pull to a stop.

Castle has topped off their glasses as she has been trying to figure out where they are. Lower Manhattan, right on the tip of the island.

His arm comes around her as she hears the TV personalities call attention to the dropping ball. A quick glance at the widescreen confirms it; less than a minute left in 2012.

Too much darkness, too much evil touched their lives in 2012. But every minute spent in fear, in longing, in pain has been worth this miraculous ending. Never would she have thought as she sat alone at midnight, ringing in 2012 with red-rimmed eyes, a thick leather photo album on her lap, that she would close the year any other way. And now, her happy ending is right beside her, almost insistently tugging her closer, until she figures out what he's getting at and finally complies on a smile and a chuckle.

All in all, not bad, Kate Beckett. Finishing the year with a close, putting a notorious lowlife behind bars, and then spending midnight curled up in Rick Castle's tuxedo-clad lap in the back of a limo, sipping vintage Veuve.

Not bad at all.

The broadcasters have just started the final countdown, but her attention is only for the man whose lips are murmuring "ten" against the shell of her ear.

The sibilant "Seven" tickles just enough to make her grin and pull away, find his eyes, so dark and deep and consuming. His hand has returned to its favorite spot warming the small of her back, and when he gets to "five," he curls his fingers so that each one presses a point of contact firmly into her flushing skin. At "four," his thumb pulls away, and so on, until he's down to one digit, pushing into the knot of muscle bordering one side of her spine.

Foreheads already nudged together behind the curtain of her dark curls, they meet the new year in each other's eyes.

"One."

They've said it together, lips brushing, breath mingling, so quietly that neither is certain they said it at all.

Cheers erupt from the speakers with strains of "Auld Lang Syne," but all are faint echoes in her ears as their lips merge in earnest, a pliant, fluid caress that deepens in an instant to all-consuming. His tongue asserts itself, parting her all-too-willing lips, and seeking hers, meeting, tangling, pulling needy sounds from her throat and setting off rockets of consummation, curling her toes until she's almost lost herself in it, almost given completely over to the press and pull of his mouth and his arms and his body, everything swirling up into a spiral of want and a realization that this is the only man she will ever kiss at midnight on New Year's Eve until the day she dies. And through the haze, she's astounded to realize this concrete certainty doesn't inspire panic-in fact, an eerie calm has descended on her heart, her mind, as her body is whipped up higher with every passing second.

Out of nowhere, his hand catches her forgotten champagne glass just as she's let it slip from her fingers, and they part, panting and pink-cheeked, half-dazed, joy and lust and everything else she can't quite name spilling over. Setting their glasses to rights on the console, he takes a breath, wraps his hands snugly at her waist, and lifts her up gently, follows immediately after and presses her in the direction of the moonroof.

The night air meets her her flushed face in a breath-stealing cloud as she peeks out, straightens to stand, taking in the skyline of the financial district abutting the water.

Popping up in front of her, the breadth of his chest and shoulders just fit through the rectangle as he peers out, gets his bearings. Pointing suddenly over her shoulder, face alight, he curls one wide palm around her waist and spins her so that her back is pressed against him, solid and sure.

"This way. Turn around."

Oh.

Oh, that's just perfect.

His voice heats the air around her ear as she leans back, uses his body to support her weight.

"It's not perfect, but not bad for short notice."

They are double parked along with a few other cars, which she knows won't last long with the police presence on all the roads tonight, but they have an unobstructed view of Liberty Island. The statue floats in the abyss of shining black water, surrounded by fireworks, softly popping on a time delay across the open stretch where the rivers meet.

It's a ways off shore, so it's not the giant spectacle it would be if it were right overhead. But with Castle's arms snaking around her, his bulk blocking the wind as it whips across from the water, his chin tucked snugly over her shoulder, the scent of his cologne in her nose and the sound of his breath in her ear, it's as intimate and peaceful as their own private light show.

"Got a resolution in mind?"

Tell him.

It fills her mind, the only thing she has promised herself she must do this year. At this point, she sees her avoidance of the words as almost cowardly when the feeling is pouring out in every other way possible.

"I do. You?"

"You kidding? I have a whole list. Numbered and prioritized. Revised annually to include the ones I didn't get to the year before."

Her eyes roll, knowing he can't see them but almost sure he can feel the bounding condescension of the reaction.

A volley of silver bursts over Lady Liberty, and she turns to him, wanting to share that suspended moment of wonder, finds his eyes dark, reflecting all that sparkle straight back into hers.

"Number one: hug you more."

Adjusting his hold on her, he folds her tighter into his embrace, turns his head to face her more fully.

"Number two: kiss you more."

His lips have chilled, but they match hers evenly in spite of the sideways angle and open to heat and comfort and longing. Slow, persistent, unerringly patient, he numbs her mind to anything but him, sets her body off like the fireworks still exploding in the distance. When they part, it's on a sigh, an unhurried promise for more, and soon.

"If all your resolutions are like these, I might actually approve of this list of yours."

Slithering around in his arms, she finally gets hers around his neck, laces her fingers into the silky hair at his nape.

But rather than diving back into resolution number two, his eyes shut tight, a muscle twitches at the clench of his jaw, and he carefully enunciates the next number with eyes still closed.

"Number three."

A pause, silence as he opens himself back up again, finds her in the darkness.

"Tell you I love you more. Or, well, ever."

Her heart kicks up at the words, at the mirror image of her own vow. Regardless of the fact she can't yet say it, hearing it is a rush of heat, and light, licked at her subconscious with flames of forever and always. Their always.

A flash of something like panic shows through his carefully schooled expression, and his next words hurry out as if chasing it away.

"I know you aren't ready, don't want to hear it, feel like its putting pressure on you. But this is my resolution, and I need it-need to tell you when it's just bursting out of me, and it has to be good for you somewhere deep down inside to hear it, let it sink in, even if you don't feel the same way yet."

Her heart lurches to a stop, lungs scream for air. How could he think-

"Why would you say that?"

His brow smooths, the little wrinkle of determination melting into shock.

"Say what?"

"That I don't want to hear it? That I don't feel the same way?"

The fierce streak of blue has come back into his eyes, wide as they are staring down at her.

"I just assumed that with your reactions the first couple of times I said it, well, you pretended for a year that you hadn't heard me, and then you sort of glossed over it that second time..."

"Both those times times you only said it because you thought I was going to die."

His face falls further, eyes losing all of their spark, lips slack.

"You have a point."

"And just because I wasn't ready to hear the words that way at those times, doesn't mean that I don't want them now. You've said them since."

"Oh yeah, like an idiot in bed on Christmas Eve. I still can't believe I fell into that cliché."

"It's only a cliché if it isn't true."

His eyes are searching hers now, seeking she knows not what. So she'll give him everything she can.

"It lights me up inside."

"It does?"

Nodding, she lets the smile come. And he answers with sunshine.

"In that case," his broad palms cup her numbing cheeks, thumbs stroke just below her lashes, and finally, finally she gets to hear him say it with a smile, "I love you, Kate. Happy New Year."

#*#*#*#

Love and luck and champagne kisses at midnight to all my readers! I hope you are ringing in the new year with hope and joy. What are your resolutions for 2013?

And to Joy, thank you for sharing your birthday with me, and as always, thank you for the beta!

Twitter: Kate_Christie_
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