fanofthegenre | [ a missing scene ]

Entry tags:

oom,
rick castle

[ a missing scene ]

Coonan dies on the floor of the precinct, his blood pooling out around him.

Beckett doesn't stay long after the body's taken away - just long enough to answer the necessary questions, fill in the details for the official report herself, give the information that proves a discharging of her weapon was necessary. She doesn't look at Castle for the rest of the night, and somewhere in the cluster of policemen and EMTs, he disappears, leaving the chaos behind him.

She heads back to her apartment - late, much later than she'd even anticipated, but she's far from tired and her hands are still stinging from the amount of time she'd spent rinsing them in the women's restroom hours before. She pours herself a drink and starts running the water in the bathtub, ready to soak and hopefully drink enough to pass out eventually.

Because otherwise, she's going to have an impossible time sleeping tonight.

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Castle follows, scanning the floor for his scarf. Ice cream and whiskey don't exactly go great together, but it gave Beckett a reason to go into the kitchen -- and gave him a chance to collect his thoughts. This isn't like Beckett at all. Not that he's complaining -- not that he ever would complain if she decided to hang off his neck in a happy, smiling loop -- but slipping too comfortably into her invitation to stay isn't sitting right in his gut.

He trails her to the kitchen and stops at the butcher's block, resting his palms on the smooth wooden surface. He raises his eyebrows in approval at her choice of late night snack. "Dulce de leche," he says, turning one of the frosty containers around to see the label, "I kinda' figured you for a Rocky Road girl, actually."

"I had Rocky Road," Beckett admits around a spoonful of mint chocolate chip, "but that one's always the first to go."

She doesn't indulge every night, but every once in a while she likes to stock up on an extra pint or two for those cases that leave her head hurting. Like this one. She plucks the other pint out of Castle's fingers and opens the lid, dipping the same spoon into that one.

There are a couple of good-sized divots in the ice cream, but nothing to suggest that Beckett's been having a hard time lately. He suspects that ice cream, like his novels, are indulgences that Beckett allows herself privately. 'Restraint' is a word that doesn't pop up in Castle's vocabulary very often.

He takes a spoonful of ice cream. "I was doing a junket for the pre-release of Storm Fall and they sent me to Italy. Don't know why -- 'guess I sell there -- anyway, there was this little cafe on a corner that we went to in the middle of the afternoon. They actually served gelato in a half a conch shell." He fishes out another dip. Grins. "Just when I think I'm getting too provincial."

She dips her spoon into the dulce de leche again, partaking in one of those bites she's forced to swipe her mouth multiple times over the shallow bowl in order to scoop the ice cream out with her lips. Clearly, she's not concerned about the visual she's presenting.

"Think you'll sell any Nikki Heat in Italy, too?"

The thought occurs to her that maybe he'd have to leave for that.

"Maybe," he says. "There's always a junket or a signing or a glad-handing to do." He scoops a bulb of vanilla over his tongue, favouring it as if it's hot, not cold. "You should come. Milan's nice this time of year."

"Me? I couldn't. I have my job, my responsibilities. I'm not one for all that press and paparazzi."

She absently brandishes her spoon in thought.

"Besides, you're the one they'd all come to see anyway."

"You're Nikki Heat," he points out. "I'm just the voicebox."

"You're more than that," Beckett starts, and then shovels another spoonful of ice cream into her mouth before she can say anything else.

Castle leans his elbows on the butcher's block, grin wide and in full effect. "Right," he says, "I'm also the literary flatfoot who follows you around because I have a bi-monthly poker game with the mayor." His spoon whips out like a striking cobra and scoops a bit of mint chocolate chip from her bowl. "The thorn in your side, the pebble in your shoe, the alarmingly handsome lichen clinging to your tree."

"Let's not get that literary. My brain can't handle all the metaphor."

There's the obvious brain freeze, of course, as well as the dulling effects of the whiskey. Beckett experiences a brief moment of clarity and reaches out to dab a small drop of ice cream on the end of Castle's nose.

He blinks, trying to pull his focus when her finger reaches out to stab the tip of his nose. 'Gets a feeling of cold and realizes what's happened. He doesn't swipe the sweet cream away; 'takes his finger and scoops a glob of ice cream, depositing it on the back of her wrist.

She should've expected retaliation, but gasps just the same, turning her wrist to lick off the small glob from her hand.

"You've got a little something there," she teases, indicating the spot on her own face.

"What, here?" He spreads a dollop of ice cream on the opposite cheek.

"Oh, you are so dead - "

Beckett readies a spoonful of ice cream and forms a makeshift trebuchet with her fingertips to fire it at him.

Castle braces on his hindquarters and holds up his hands in self-defense. "What, you can dish it out but you can't take it?" He feints toward her other cheek with a fresh glob of ice cream.

Beckett stifles a chuckle with one hand, ducking her head to dodge any and all possible launchings of ice cream - faked or otherwise.

"You can't handle what I'm prepared to dish out, Castle," she boasts.

"C'mere," he challenges, jutting up his chin and wagging the ice-cream-loaded finger, "bring. it. on."

Movements made sloppy by the buzz she's still got going, Beckett tries to shove a fingerful of ice cream in his face but slips, putting him in more of a giant bear hug - hardly threatening.

She starts laughing so hard her shoulders shake, harder than she has in a long, long time, and there may even be a tear that slips out with it.

The ice cream zigzags across his neck and disappears into the collar of his coat: along with Beckett who, of course, maintains her record of constantly surprising the hell out of him, even when he should be expecting it. "Whoa --" he catches her with an arm around her waist, pushing a laugh beneath the warm curtain of her hair "-- is this a surrender or a defection?"

"Surrender? Hardly," Beckett declares with a firm shake of her head. She fully intends to stop using Castle as a human brace. Any minute now.

Just as soon as the floor feels like it's going to stop swaying.

"It's a, um - hey, I'm not the writer here. Don't ask me to come up with a good word for what this is."

Close, would be one word that Castle might use. Dangerous would be another, and if he were a smart man, Castle would have left when he'd said he would. Sure, being a lean-to for his partner has its advantages (two of which are pressed against his left shoulder) but she's drunk and he's halfway there and there's a couple of good-sized elephants in the room with them after today's events.

He slides his elbow beneath her armpit and gives her a boost, jostling her up his chest so they're practically nose-to-nose. "Run up the white flag already, detective. Just admit that I out-soft-serve you."

Beckett chooses to go through the motions of pretending she's actually considering her concession. She bites her lower lip, glances upward to the ceiling, feigns deep thought, even hums softly under her breath. It's an obvious act, made even more obvious by the fact that said breath hitches briefly when he hoists her up against him.

"Uh, no," she murmurs, her eyes descending to his face, covered in sticky ice-cream remnants, and she's pretty sure she looks equally ridiculous with the stuff dripping down her cheek.

"Nice effort though, Castle. For a minute, I almost let you get the drop on me."

"Dear Diary, today I got the drop on Detective Beckett. It was truly, truly awesome." His arm slides 'round to the small of her back, support under her arms, so he can tilt her back and see if she's got her feet beneath her. Barely. He swabs one of her high cheekbones with his thumb. "You've got a little something --" a frown "-- well, now I'm just smearing it. Maybe I can corner the market on a brand of Ben & Jerry's that doubles as a nightcream."

She's almost on tiptoe, her center of gravity more than halfway tilted, and she scrunches up her face when the pad of his thumb slides over her cheek, chuckling quietly.

"Now look what you did."

One of her hands mimicks the movement on his cheek, whisking it away with a few swipes of her index finger, proceeding to stick it in between her lips without a thought.

"Mmm, caramelly."

How does she manage to do that?

'Take a simple motor function and turn it into some wild, wanton (perfectly innocent) sex kitten gesture that gets his lower stomach twisting in on itself like a yo-yo that's gone rogue? Christ, he really should have left fifteen minutes ago.

"Maybe I should make us some coffee," he ventures, tiptoeing around propriety -- but in a pair of heavy workboots.

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