She's still a bit quiet, a bit hesitant, when the last of her boxes arrive. He can tell that something's wrong, that there's still something bubbling away under the smooth exterior of his wife's features. Of course, he's only had seven years of learning her tells in minute detail, of coming to know her more closely than sometimes she even knows herself. And of course, he knows that it wasn't easy in some ways to let go of her place, that the symbolism of the change was hard even though in practice she'd either lived in the loft or in DC for the past couple of years.

He waited till after dinner, till after she'd had some time to work through everything, till after Alexis had distracted them with complaints about finals and Martha had gone over her second audition in exhaustive detail, till both of them had retired to their respective bedrooms, and he'd cleaned up after dinner while she took a shower.

They were curled up on the couch together with her back snuggled into his chest, on their second glass of wine, watching some old re-run of Picard pontificating on The Next Generation after they'd watched Hard Kill, one box half-unpacked when he broached the subject again. He knew he'd been caught up in the excitement of the case, in the reality of meeting his boyhood heroes, but what he lacked in tact sometimes, he tried to make up for in honesty.

"So, what happened?"

One hand slid her fast-growing locks out of the way as she craned her neck around to look at him, eyes green and brown and mesmerising as ever. Her brow was still a little furrowed though, that little hint that all was not right in her world.

"What do you mean?"

"C'mon Beckett, I know you. Something's definitely bothering you. Out with it, lay it on me."

She pursed her lips, glancing away and then back at him as if weighing up her options. He didn't push further, just rubbed her back through her thin t-shirt with a broad palm, reassuring her that she didn't have to keep this bottled in. This was his wife, intensely private, prone to clam up, and couldn't be made to drink if she was dragged to water.

She needed to come to this decision on her own.

He waited.

She did.

"Did you mean what you said before?"

"About?"

"About not liking my apartment? That the floorboards creaked and how we could hear the neighbours?"

Her voice crackled a little, strange intensity inherent in it. This was not what he had expected- he'd thought she was upset about his behaviour during the case, the way he'd gone running off with Brock Harmon or something.

"Well, I mean…yeah? Come on, Beckett. I love you, always have and always will. But not liking your apartment doesn't really mean anything. It's not a judgment about you at all."

He shrugged, willing her to understand.

"I just never realised…"

"I might be an ass sometimes, but I'm not that bad…am I? We were packing up, for at least the second time. I thought it was finally safe to mention it."

He remembered the first, hurried time they'd packed up her apartment, working around the clock to get it done time before she moved to DC. The way they'd collapsed in almost semi-delirium at 5 am, when they'd tried to take a sexy shower together and basically fallen asleep on each other in the middle of foreplay, the way they'd laughed about it over breakfast the next day.

"I didn't realise it still meant so much to you, given you've not lived there in a couple of years, basically."

His eyes flicked to her curios on the shelf, to the bedroom where her clothes and heels resided along his.

"That's true. And I've always thought of home as people, not a place."

She was pensive, mood quiet. He let it play out, not pushing her, not arguing, just letting the comfortable silence drape around them like a familiar blanket.

"But come on Castle, what's the real reason you didn't like the place. The floorboards…that's a sitcom reason, not a real one."

He breathed out, her own gentle probing in turn no less than what he deserved, the truth no less than what she deserved.

"We fought there. I almost lost you there."

He couldn't bring himself to do more than whisper the words into her ear, and she twisted in his arms till she was looking him in the face as he spoke, her eyes brilliant green pools of understanding and sympathy and anguish in themselves, mirroring him.

"All our big fights. The one before Montgomery's funeral, when you got shot. The one…where I told you I loved you. The one where I found your boarding pass stub. All of them were there at that apartment."

The memories and images flickered through his brain, too fast to follow almost. How he'd been struggling with his feelings, struggling with the lies, struggling with his jealousy. How they'd lashed out at each other, how he'd licked his wounds after every match, sure this time that it was for the last time, that they were over, that he'd lost any chance at happiness. The way the world had weighed down on his shoulders, the fury that had coursed through him each time he'd stepped out that door and walked down that hallway. His universe collapsing, imploding in on itself, everything torn and asunder.

"Oh Castle, babe…"

She trailed her fingertips over his cheek and jaw as he fought against the unbidden tears, blinking then back, trying to reign his emotions in. The cool metal of her ring against his face was another layer of reassurance in itself, helping him, anchoring him.

"I mean, I know it's stupid. We've had fights here, we've had fights at the precinct. It's…"

"No, no, it's not stupid. You're allowed to not like my old apartment. Good reasons and bad ones, both count."

She pushed off her elbows, leaning up to press a kiss against his lips. He closed his eyes and relaxed into it, the feel of her, the feel of his wife in his arms, her hands on his face as ever all the tonic and all the relief and all the love he needed. She tasted like fine wine and summer rain and the cosy embrace of home itself, and he lost himself in the moment, her tongue moving against his, her hair brushing against his face as she leaned over him.

When they broke apart, needing air, he didn't let her get very far, leaning his forehead against hers as they entwined their fingers together, newfound equilibrium and understanding steadying them both, reinforcing them both. He felt her warmth, both actual and metaphorical, and basked in it as he always did, ever so glad that he'd found this extraordinary woman, that she loved him as truly and deeply as he loved her.

"To be fair, it wasn't all bad you know. I was half-tempted to steal my drawer and bring it back with me the other day, cousin Sophia be damned."

She giggled at that, actually giggled, the inner teenager of Kate Beckett coming to surface once again, and the smile that spread over her features as she did lightened his heart further. He could live off that smile alone, should it come to it.

"She'd have been pretty confused about the chest of drawers in my room didn't have that particular drawer."

"I was planning to keep it under the bed, next to my secret stash of blankets, The ones I need because you hog all the covers."

That earned him a well-worn roll of the eyes, and he skated his hand over her hip in response, sliding underneath her shirt to touch bare, silken skin. The way her breath hitched at that made him feel warm on the inside for a whole different reason, and when she looked at him again, her eyes had changed. Now they were dark and feral-green, pupils dilated as she rocked her hips against him in response.

That was all it took between them sometimes, an errant touch, a slight change in breathing, and suddenly the whole atmosphere was charge, ready, the foreplay already begun. Her hand skimmed down over his chest, onto the broad planes of his shoulders, and then to his upper arms, sensual and soft and trailing little blazes of fire across his skin.

"Shall we take this to our bedroom, Mrs. Castle?"

"Let's, Mr. Beckett."

The storyline regarding Beckett's apartment felt a bit strange to me, for various reasons. Half-finished, even, and certainly not quite in-character for either Castle or Beckett. This post-ep is my effort at getting it to make some kind of sense from both perspectives, but especially Castle's. Thank you for reading, and please let me know what you thought.