Like so many other things about Castle, this finish is also unpredictable but no less overwhelming when it happens. There's the catch - in her breath, in her chest, a moment where she's suspended in the in-between, in some kind of ecstatic limbo - and her body tenses, her back bowed, dark hair spilling over her shoulderblades when she arches toward him for one last surge.

The catch, but also the inevitable release and the feeling akin to an explosion as she cries out, just once, biting down hard on her own lower lip to stifle the sound halfway through. A rush of warmth, and Beckett slowly begins to find her center of gravity again, laying back into the surprising safety of Castle's arms.