In the end, we lie awake

xxx

"I like it with the lights on," he laughs.

She flops her hand out to smack him in the chest, and he laughs again and captures her by the wrist, holds her there. He finds himself drawing letters on her palm, aimless at first, and then spelling love into her skin, the two of them side by side on their backs in her bed. If she reads him, she doesn't let him know.

"This is one instance in which I really would love a clapper," she murmurs.

"Clap on, clap off?"

"Exactly." She gives a little sigh and he studies the ceiling, the warm golden glow in the room as her lamps infuse the space with light. "I'm not moving," she mutters.

"Give me a second; I'll get them when I can move."

She hums now in pleasure and curls on her side towards him, still sweaty and trying to cool off, but looking at him. He releases her hand so she can have it back, and she switches instead.

Her other palm flattens out at his chest, fingers flex and lay down, and surely she can feel the ragged bump and thunder of his heart.

He closes his eyes, memory still fresh with the feel of her above him, her hair in the light and her skin, the rise of her body, the way it meets his, the unbearable force of his love.

He still has promises to keep.

Castle rolls over now too, blinks past the rustle of the sheet beneath him, the slope of the pillow in his view. She opens her eyes and he sees the naked edge of sleep and how it makes her regard him like a lost treasure.

"Come here," she murmurs, drawing him in.

Castle meets her offering with his mouth, a slowed down kiss, warm and mumbling as she says something he misses. He presses into her, arms enfolding the slim angle of her waist and her shoulders, a leg slipping between hers.

He keeps his promises to her.

"Kate," he sighs, lowers his mouth to taste the skin at the hollow of her neck, the scar. "Kate, I love you."

Her leg wraps around his waist and her fingers skim in his hair and she's pulling his head up to kiss him, she's kissing him, she's close and rich and vibrant, and she's permeable enough to give it right back to him, everything he needs, all the help in the world.

"I know," she breathes into him. "I know."