James, long used to their squabbling, simply blocked it out.  In two decades he had not heard a new argument from either party and, after unsuccessfully attempting to join in the first time he caught them bickering, he just sighed and carried on.  Clearly it was just one of their things and the detective was not one to begrudge Barney for staking that claim on Helen; he and her had an intimidating amount of shared history and quirks as it was.  From day one, it had been difficult, if not impossible, for outsiders to squirm their way into The Five’s circle and James was impressed at how deeply Barney had integrated himself into their lives.  Especially since it started with something as mundane, and loathed, as coffee.

So the time James and Barney caught Helen in the kitchen with a coffee mug at her lips came as a great surprise to all parties.

“This isn’t what it looks like!” Helen exclaimed, heavily shadowed blue eyes wide over the steaming mug of coffee.  James just tiredly leaned back against the doorframe with an amused smile stretching his face as Barney stepped into Helen’s personal space.  This, James mused, was going to make for a great show.

“Really?” Barney said gleefully as he nudged his boss with his shoulder.  “To me, it looks like you’re drinking coffee.”

“I’ve had one sip!  One!” Helen could feel a blush forming and ruthlessly tamped down on her embarrassment.

“And how many cups?” Barney crowed.  “Are you the reason why my pot is depleting faster than usual?”

“Hardly!” Helen scoffed.  “This is my first cup of coffee.  Ever.  Which I only poured because I’ve completely ran out of tea and I am in desperate need of caffeine.”

Barney looked at her suspiciously and then nodded in acceptance of Helen’s claim.  “So, what do you think?”  His shit-eating grin got wider.  Helen just looked at him flatly.

“It tastes like swill,” she said succinctly.  “Burnt swill, in fact.”  Barney looked horrified until he turned to the twin coffee makers and his expression relaxed as he took in two pots, one full and one empty.

“Of course it tastes burnt,” Barney said. “You took last cup of coffee out of an hours old pot.  Here, let me fix you a new cup – it’ll be marvellous and you will love it!”

James winced as Helen’s jaw clenched and her eyes hardened minutely.  Never a good sign.  He was amused to notice that Barney hadn’t picked up on that particular tell.  Either that or was blissfully unaware of Helen’s state of mind in his over-caffeinated exhaustion.

Barney chatted enthusiastically as he poured a new cup of coffee from his second coffee machine, oblivious to Helen deliberately pouring the burned coffee down the sink with narrowed eyes.  He didn’t look up until Helen slapped the ceramic mug down in front of him.

“That,” she said, “will not be necessary.  I am going back to work.”  She swept an imperious gaze over the two men.  “And we shall never speak of this again.”

With that, Helen stalked out of the room, her back ramrod straight and her head high.  Barney looked at James and slumped sheepishly with his eyes pleading mercy.  James laughed.

“I see some things never change,” James said between chuckles.  “Helen would always get a bit moody in Oxford when things didn’t go quite her way, especially when she began forsaking sleep for science.”

Barney laughed.  “I bet she never went as far as to drink coffee back then.”

“Well, no.” James admitted as he swung an arm around Barney’s neck and led him out of the kitchen.  “But there was that time where I convinced her to try cocaine.  Now that, my friend, is quite the tale.  I’ll tell it to you sometime, perhaps after we catch Helen’s latest prize.  For now, we’ve got work to do.”

“Hmm?” Rachel replied.  The blonde was focused on the car in front of her going fifty-five on the bloody highway and really wasn’t paying too much attention to man her passenger’s seat.  She pressed down on the accelerator, inching closer to the old Cavalier and silently cursed the car alongside her blocking the passing lane.  While Rachel by no means had a lead foot, she preferred to be going a few miles over the limit, not a couple under.

“Could you take the next right?”

“What?  Hood, why?” Rachel groaned, “If you need another pit stop, you can hold it.  We’re half an hour from D.C. and I told you not to buy an extra large coffee.”

“It’s that turn right there,” Hood ignored Rachel to point out a dirt road that didn’t even warrant a deceleration lane.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Rachel sighed, but, nevertheless, she flicked up her turn signal and took her foot off the gas pedal, “Where are we going, Hood?”

“I saw a sign for a diner a little ways back,” Hood explained.

“A diner.  Hood, I told you to grab some breakfast from the hotel,” Rachel rolled her eyes.  Men.  They never listen to good advice.

“None of it was particularly appetizing.  The muffins were clearly stale,” Hood pointed out.  Rachel couldn’t argue with that – her own breakfast was abandoned halfway through.  “Besides, I wanted pancakes.”

“Oh c’mon Hood.  We’re almost home; couldn’t you have just made your own?”  Rachel turned onto the grid road, wincing as the SUV bounced as it left the smooth highway.  She eyed the suspiciously level surface with trepidation – no heavy tire tracks.

“Not exactly.  All my groceries expired last week and I haven’t had the time to go shopping,” Hood admitted with a small grin.

“Living off of takeout?” Rachel looked over at Hood and smiled back.

“Don’t tell me that you’re not!”  Hood shot back.  Rachel shrugged and smiled.  She turned back to navigating the twisting road and Hood unashamedly turned his gaze towards Rachel.  The late morning sun lit her hair in a blaze of platinum blonde glory and Hood was briefly captivated by the play of light.  As the SUV slowed to a stop, Hood redirected his gaze out the window and his eyes widened in surprise.

“Oh,” Hood said.

“Wow,” Rachel agreed.

Scottie’s Diner was a complete and utter dive.  The paint was both fading and peeling, the windows were smeared with dirt and there was only one car in the patchy grass that apparently served as a parking lot.  An equally dilapidated building was partially blocked from view by a handful of overgrown bushes and a beat up old pickup was parked beside it, its bed filled with an assortment of junk and, Hood squinted, was that a broken chair?

“Um… isn’t there an IHOP on the way to the Hoover Building?” Hood asked.

“Yes, yes there is,” Rachel lied and shifted the SUV into reverse just as the front door of the diner banged open and a large woman with flaming red hair tumbled out.

“Customers, Scottie!  Customers!”  The woman, with a speed unexpected from her size, rushed over to the Tahoe and tapped on Hood’s window.

“So what’ll you two be havin’?” The woman had pressed her face way too close to the window and Hood and Rachel took in the makeup caked face, the hair so red that it was a faded crimson and the wide, nicotine-stained smile in mute disbelief.  Rachel reached over to the window commands and the glass slowly slid down.  The older woman casually rested her arms along the now open window.

“My, you are a cute one,” the bottle redhead eyed Hood.  Hood’s eyes were very wide and very green as he subtly shifted towards Rachel, still mute but now with shock.  “M’name’s Lizzie.  Y’folks from ‘round here?”

Rachel had to resist rolling her eyes as Hood stared dumbly at Lizzie.  For a genius, the man sure wasn’t good at thinking on his feet.  Rachel leaned forward and cleared her throat, “No, we’re just passing through.  Actually, we need directions.  Could you tell us how to get to Piscatawny Creek?” Rachel was sure she had passed a sign for the place recently.

Lizzie’s watery blue eyes narrowed craftily as she replied, “Well, I’m not entirely sure of the route, but I know Scottie can tell you.  Come in, come in!  I’ll get you some coffee!”

Rachel eyed Lizzie’s death grip on the Tahoe and realised that there was no escape.  She sighed, shoved the car into park and turned off the engine.  “I suppose we could stop for coffee.”  Lizzie smiled gleefully, eyed Hood again and let go of the window.  Hood quickly hit the command to roll up the glass and the two got out of the car, Rachel locking it as they walked towards the diner.  Hood and Rachel purposefully slowed their steps and let Lizzie get ahead of them.

“I don’t think they get very many customers, Rachel,” Hood leaned down to speak quietly in Rachel’s ear.

“I don’t think so either – the road didn’t have deep enough tire tracks,” Rachel murmured back, “I figured that that wasn’t a good sign.”

Lizzie looked back and eyed her two unwitting customers slow pace, close stance and quiet conversation critically, “You two been involved long?”

“What?  No, we–” Hood cut himself off as Rachel’s hand slid into his.  Automatically, Hood shifted his hand and laced their fingers together.  Rachel suppressed a territorial smirk and tightened her grip on Hood.

“We’re just married,” Rachel said then squeezed her eyes shut.  That was so not what she meant to say.  Married?  Really?  What was she thinking saying that they were married?  Rachel flushed slightly, resolutely avoiding Hood’s gaze.  She didn’t particularly want to know what Hood was thinking, especially since she was encouraging him to move things forward with his dog sitter a month or so ago.

Lizzie’s eyes focused on their clasped hands and made an interesting discovery – “No rings?” Rachel’s blush deepened, her embarrassment countering her usual quick wits.  Surprisingly, Hood rescued them.

“We wanted to get married as soon as possible,” Hood smiled down at Rachel, who finally met his gaze.  She was surprised to see a smile on his face and a warm look in his eyes.  Rachel’s blush showed no signs of abating as she broke eye contact with Hood.

Lizzie stared at them for a few moments more before clapping her hands together and exclaiming, “So, whatcha waitin’ for?  C’mon in!”

Hood and Rachel stepped into the diner and shared a quick look.  The inside was just as bad as the outside – a light layer of dust covered most of the surfaces and the floor was grey with grime and sticky in places from long-ago spilled pop.

Rachel stretched up to whisper in Hood’s ear.  “It’s no wonder that they don’t have many customers.”  Hood grinned and huffed out a small laugh.

“Just take a seat there, I’ll bring you your coffee in just a sec,” Lizzie gestured to a booth by the windows.  Hood and Rachel approached cautiously and quickly noticed that one of the benches had a long rip in the vinyl.  By silent mutual agreement, they both slid into the side without the rip.  After settling in, Rachel discretely ran a finger over the tabletop, grimacing when her finger came off with a bit of a grey coating.  Hood leaned over, curious, and she showed him her finger.

“With so few customers, how is this place so dirty?  What else could you do all day but clean?” Hood asked quietly.

“Sudoku,” Rachel nodded at the open book near the old-fashioned cash register, “And probably soaps.”  Hood eyed the small tv placed at a perfect viewing angle from the till.

“Have a favourite soap, Rachel?”

“Are you kidding me?  I don’t even have enough time to regularly watch primetime shows!” Rachel rolled her eyes.

“I dunno, Rachel, you do tend to disappear for an hour in the afternoon every now and then,” Hood teased.

“Ah, yes, you’ve caught me – I need my weekly Days fix,” Rachel grinned at Hood.

”You watch Days too?  It’s pretty good, but General Hospital is better, if you ask me,” Lizzie plopped down two small cups of coffee in front of Hood and Rachel, then sat across from them, “Cream or sugar?”

“No thanks,” Hood said, pulling the small cup towards him.

“Both please,” Rachel waited until she got her sugar fix before taking a sip… and then promptly tried to hide a gag. “Maybe a bit more sugar.”

Curious, Hood took an experiment sip from his cup and nearly choked.  The brew was quite potent and far more bitter than even Hood preferred.  To add insult to injury, it also tasted faintly burnt.  “On second thought, could I perhaps have some sugar as well?”

“Of course,” Lizzie said, laying a hand overtop of Hood’s.  Rachel narrowed her eyes at that display and scooted closer to Hood, who, had also shifted closer to Rachel while carefully removing his hand from under Lizzie’s.  The two were pressed together close enough to be uncomfortable so Hood slung his arm over the back of the bench.

After a few moments of uncomfortable silence in which Lizzie continued to eye Hood, Rachel, impatient to leave, spoke.  “So… about those directions?”

“Ah, I had Scottie whip you two up a late breakfast.  You’re both so skinny – you need meat on your bones,” Lizzie grinned, “It’s difficult to cook and write at the same time, y’see?”  Hood and Rachel exchanged horrified looks.  If the coffee was that bad, how terrifying would breakfast be?

“I hope you’re hungry for pancakes!” Lizzie slapped her hands on the table and then slowly pushed herself up, “how about I bring you folks a fruit platter?”

“Well,” said Hood after Lizzie left, “at least she got the order right.”

“I just hope the contents of their kitchen are at least fresher than either of ours,” Rachel sighed.

Hood grinned and nudged Rachel gently, “So you have been living off of takeout!”

Rachel grinned back, “Well, if your exploits didn’t generate so much paperwork….”

“My exploits!” Hood exclaimed, “Who was the one to shoot at another car yesterday?”

“Riiiight.  And your little demonstration in that borrowed lab was nothing,” Rachel laughed.

“It was only a little explosion!” Hood protested.

“An explosion?” Lizzie asked, clomping towards Hood and Rachel.

“He’s a scientist,” Rachel said as if that explained everything.

“Who explodes stuff,” Lizzie said flatly.

“It wasn’t me, it was the undergrad!” Hood declared.

“We were the only ones in the lab, Hood,” Rachel pointed out.

“Rachel, Rachel, Rachel… Undergrads exist to blame things on.  I didn’t get a PhD just to be blamed for a minor lab accident,” Hood explained.

“Caused a few ‘accidents’ back in your wild and crazy college days, Hood?” Rachel grinned.

“Of course not!  I just didn’t prevent a few of them,” Hood grinned back, unrepentant.  “I think your college days were far more interesting than mine, Rachel.  I tended to spend my spring breaks in either in the library or the lab.”

“What?  No trips to Tijuana?  Just a trip to the stacks?” Rachel teased.

“Hmm, it’s not like a trip to the stacks was… boring,” Hood smirked.

“You didn’t!” Rachel exclaimed.  Hood just kept his smirk and Rachel leaned forward, “You did!  Did you ever get caught?”

“There were a few close calls, but, no, I was never caught in flagrante delicto,” Hood turned to face Rachel fully, his smirk turning into a full toothed grin.  Lizzie cleaned in closer, her eyes wide in fascination.  Unfortunately, her perusal of the agent and the scientist was cut short by frantic motions from the kitchen – Scottie was demanding her attention.  With a heaving, melodramatic sigh, she pushed herself up from the booth and slowly made her way over to her business partner.

“What?” She hissed at Scottie.  “Can’t you not see that ah’m busy?”

“Lizzie, please.  Stop crowdin’ the customers or they’ll ne’er come back.”  Scottie rolled his eyes.  “Here, take this here fruit and come straight back to the kitchen, y’hear me?”

Lizzie rolled her eyes right back and snatched the fruit platter from Scottie’s unresisting hands.  She floofed off back to her precious customers.

For their part, Hood and Rachel hadn’t even noticed Lizzie’s departure.

“Ha!” Rachel had exclaimed.  “What would they have done if they caught you in the act?”

“Honestly?  I have no idea,” Hood shrugged.  “Probably banned me from the library.”

“And then what would have you done?  Failed all of your classes?” Rachel teased, eyes bright with amusement.

Hood let out a small huff of laughter.  “Unlikely.  If necessary, I would have bribed my friends to get me the materials that I needed.”

“Friends that require bribery?” Rachel arched an eyebrow.

“I had the best fake ID on campus – everything was a reason for bribery back then.”  Hood said gravely.

The tray clattered against the table as Lizzie set down the fruit.  “Here you are, loves.”  She moved to sit down across from them but froze when a throat was cleared quite loudly from the kitchen.  “Ah’ll be back in a few with yer pancakes.  Eat up!”

Hood and Rachel eyed the fruit dubiously.  All of the, thankfully meagre, pieces seemed strangely off colour.  Hood reached out a tentative finger and pushed the fruit around in a haphazard inspection.  “Doesn’t seem to have any mould,” he murmured to Rachel.

“Well,” she said in reply as she picked up a piece of watermelon.  “Bottom’s up, I guess.”  She chewed briefly and hastily swallowed.

“How was it?” Hood asked.

“Overripe,” Rachel replied.  “You try the next one.”

Hood carefully selected a strawberry and hesitantly popped it into his mouth.  Frowning, he chewed and swallowed thoughtfully.  Rachel eyed him impatiently.

“Well?” Rachel asked.

“Underripe.”  Hood stated solemnly.  Rachel groaned.  “You next.”

Rachel didn’t bother to carefully inspect the next piece of fruit – ignorance was bliss, she figured.  As it turned out, that particular adage didn’t hold true.  “Bruised.”

The two managed to clear the entire platter in that manner – one would eat a piece of fruit and comment on it and the other would follow suit.  Whilst Rachel’s complaints stayed well within a normal range, Hood’s had grown more and more esoteric with each bite.  He had finished the platter with a hastily cut off “prunus necrotic ringspot virus” when Lizzie stepped forward with two heaping plates of pancakes.  She plunked them down in front of the two investigators and grinned.

“Eat up, dearies!  And ah better not be seeing no leftovers!” Lizzie’s inane grin grew wider as Scottie placed syrup and butter onto the table before dragging the redhead off again.

“Oh god.” Rachel said, eyeing the six inch stack in front of her with trepidation.  “How many miles do you think I’ll have to run to wear off these calories?”

“I can’t eat all of this,” Hood said.  “You have less than me – take some of my pancakes.”

Rachel glared at him and her voice came out in a low, dangerous growl.  “You’re the one who got us into this mess – eat your damned pancakes.”

On the counter by the till, Lizzie leaned over, resting her chin on her fists.  “Aren’t they not an adorable couple, Scottie?  A bit odd, to be sure, but cute.”

Scottie just nodded the nod of a browbeaten man.

“Yes Rachel?”

“I won’t be coming in to work today.”

“Me neither – there must have been something in those pancakes we ate yesterday.”

“I hate you, you know that?”

“On the bright side, if your symptoms are the same as mine, you won’t need to run those extra miles.”

“I really hate you, you know that?”

“…I’ll call Frank.”

In fact, Kate had nearly nodded off entirely when she heard Alexis’ voice.  It sounded suspiciously like a cheerful ‘Hi Kate!’ but that couldn’t be right – it was two in the afternoon.  Alexis still had class and, barring a family emergency, Alexis would never skip class.

Kate’s eyes snapped open in realisation and her body tensed, ready to act, and she pinned Alexis with a serious stare.  “What’s wrong, Alexis?”

Alexis flinched back and adjusted the strap on her book bag.  “No-nothing?”

“Why aren’t you in class?” Kate asked, her stare softening a fraction.

“Because class is finished for the day?” Alexis said as if she were talking to her dad on one of his more thick-headed days.  Kate frowned – she didn’t like being on the receiving end of Alexis’ ‘are you dense?’ tone and she would be embarrassed to admit how many times she had had it levelled at her.

“It is?  But it’s,” Kate flicked her gaze, and her mouse, to the monitor, “…oh.  Four o’clock.  Apparently.  Sorry Alexis, I thought it was a lot earlier.”

Alexis grinned.  “Dad does the same thing, except I usually catch him writing at six in the morning under the impression that it was just past midnight.”

Kate laughed.  “I guess there’s one thing cops and writers have in common – strange hours.  So what brings you here?  If you were looking for your dad, he’s off on a coffee run.”

“In this heat?  I’m impressed – how did you convince him to leave the Precinct?”

“We drew straws.  Castle picked the short one.”  Kate’s smirk was devious and wiggled a little in her seat.  Alexis raised her eyebrows.

“Let me guess, Dad went first and all the straws just happened to be short.”

Kate’s grin widened.  “Perhaps.  Pull up a seat – Castle shouldn’t be too much longer.”

Alexis dropped down into Castle’s usual chair and pulled her bag onto her lap.  “Actually, I’m not here to talk to Dad; I was wondering if I could talk to you sometime?”

“Of course.  Wanna go grab some coffee now?” Kate asked.  “Clearly I need some.   And, either way, I also clearly need a break.”

“No, that’s alright.  I’d rather not risk running into my dad,” Alexis shrugged.  “I’m just wondering about a summer job, that’s all.”

“Got any ideas on what you want to do?” Kate asked, and then laughed.  “Then again, you probably have prospective employers lined up or you wouldn’t be talking to me, would you?”

Alexis blushed and looked away.  “Yeah….”

Kate leaned forward and looked up at Alexis.  “Hey, hey!  That’s perfectly alright, Alexis.  I’m the same way – there’s no point talking about something—”

“—Unless you’re reasonably certain it won’t fall through,” Alexis finished and Kate grinned.

“Exactly.  So what’s the plan?”

“Well, I was out shopping with Rina on Wednesday and we ran into her boss.  He took one look at me and started gushing about how I was the perfect model for one of his dresses and he offered me a job.  Rina thinks I should take it, Gram says that models have no talent, but if I want to, I should do it and Paige thinks that models are brainless morons and that I don’t need a job anyway because my dad’s rich.” Alexis said in a rush.

Ryan and Esposito, already casually eavesdropping on the conversation, glanced at each other and synchronously rolled towards Beckett’s desk.

“So now I don’t know what to do and I was hoping that you could help.”

“Modelling, huh?”  Ryan said, smirking at Beckett.  Kate glared at the duo warningly.  Predictably, they ignored her.

“Well, you certainly came to the right person for advice, isn’t that right Beckett?”  Esposito had an identical shit eating grin on his face.  Alexis raised an eyebrow and silently prompted Esposito to continue.

“Freaky how she does that,” Ryan muttered as an aside.

“You see, Little Castle, Detective Beckett here was a model once,” Esposito’s grin widened as he ducked to avoid the pen his boss threw at his head.

“When I was seventeen! And what part of ‘don’t tell Castle’ didn’t you understand?”  Beckett hissed.

“Ohhhh!  You meant all of the Castles?” Ryan said.

“Could we tell Mrs R. then?” Esposito grinned and failed to duck this time and Kate’s pen hit in square in the forehead.  “Ow!”

“Scat, you two!  Don’t you have paperwork to file?”  Beckett made shooing motions with her hands and the boys rolled off, bickering.

“Hey bro, is there pen on my head?”

“I dunno man, hold still and I’ll see!”

“Well?”

“I think so—”

There was a smack and a slight yelp of pain.

“Get your hand out of my face, Honeymilk!”

“Are you ever going to stop calling me that?  It’s been years, man!”

Kate rested her cheek on one hand and smirked sideways at Alexis.  “One thing about this job is that it’s never boring.  As for the modelling… if you want to do it, go for it.  Despite it all, I’d really regret not having modelled; it’s a bit embarrassing in hindsight, yes, but better that than spent the rest of my life wondering what I missed.  At the very least, knowledge is knowledge, wherever it came from.”

Alexis smiled and her blue eyes sparkled decisively.  “And it would only be for the summer – it’s not like I want to make a career out of modelling like Rina.  Not that I could; Dad is getting pretty weird about possible careers lately.  He doesn’t want me in a field where someone got killed on one of your cases.”

Kate rolled her eyes.  “How did I miss those conversations?  How many jobs are you down to?”

Alexis rolled her eyes back.  “One – veterinarian.”

Kate winced.  “Sorry, that one’s a no go – the guy we just caught worked at a vet clinic as a vet tech or something.”

Alexis rolled her eyes again.  “Well, I suppose now that everything has been eliminated I can threaten to bum off of him forever like Grams.”

“What’s this?” Castle said, carefully depositing his full load of coffee and assorted pastries onto Kate’s desk.  “My two favourite ladies are waiting for me?”

Kate smiled up at him fondly.  “No, I’m waiting for grande skim latte with two pumps sugar free vanilla.”

“Alas, they were out of bear claws, so I brought you a donut instead.  I hope this is acceptable?”  Castle presented the chocolate raspberry jelly donut with a flourish as Kate dug out her coffee from the tray.

Kate made a show of inspecting the donut and daintily plucked it from Castle’s hand.  She took a bite and winced as the raspberry jelly squirted out onto her hand.  Castle, laughing, swiped a bit of the jelly before it could slide off Kate’s hand and onto her paperwork, and suggestively licked it off his finger.  Kate rolled her eyes.  “Yes, Castle, the donut is indeed acceptable.”

Castle dimpled at her before turning to his daughter.  “So Alexis, what brings you to this fine establishment?”

“Just wanted to ask Kate for some advice,” Alexis said with a shrug and a smile.

“So, did the detective give good advice?”  Castle asked.

Alexis smiled.  “Yes, in fact she did, Father.”

“Of course.  When has Kate steered either of us wrong?”  Castle said with a dopey smile.  “Well, I guess there was that time with the – oh no, that’s wildly inappropriate.  Or the–”

“Castle,” Kate interrupted, “You’ve already used this joke.  Twice.  In the past week.”

“Fine,” Castle sighed melodramatically, “So what were you asking Kate about?”

“Oh, just about a summer job,” Alexis said.

“At the Precinct?  We could carpool!  Or, well, share a cab.”  Castle grinned.

“Sorry Dad, I was thinking about modelling.”  Alexis grinned at her father’s flabbergasted look.

“Modelling?”

“Yes Dad, modelling.  Rina’s boss wants me to work for him this summer.”

“But…!”

“Rick,” Kate interrupted gently, “It would just be for the summer.”

“Yeah, I guess…” Castle said, distracted by Ryan’s furtive ‘get over here’ motions.  “One sec; it looks like Ryan needs me for a minute.”  He ambled off towards the other two detectives and the three began speaking in hushed tones.  Esposito pointed something on his monitor and Castle’s eyes widened as he leaned in closer to the screen.

“Alexis,” Kate said, drawing Alexis’ attention away from her father.  “About what Paige said about you not having to work because your dad is rich?  Work anyway.  My parents had money too and I never had to worry about college funds or anything, but I found that I just felt better if I was providing for myself.”

Alexis just looked at Kate for several beats before smiling slightly.  “Yeah.”  She said.  “I think I’m the same way.”

Castle’s low whistle echoed throughout the still bullpen and Kate and Alexis returned their attention to the men.  “That had got to be one uncomfortable position to stand in – and who holds a tennis racket like that?”

Kate’s eyes widened.  “You didn’t!”  Her green eyes narrowed as she pushed herself up from behind the desk.

“Uh oh,” Ryan said.

“Scatter!”  Esposito commanded and the three men shot off in different directions.  But Kate was only interested in hunting down one man.  The man holding the flash drive.  The man who was going to be sleeping on the couch for the next few days.

“Richard Nathaniel Castle GIVE ME THAT FLASH DRIVE!” Kate yelled as Castle jumped between the closing doors of the elevator.  Karpowski just looked at Castle.  He smiled back widely.

Kate, seeing that the elevator had already left, skidded around the corner and wrenched open the door to the stairs and barrelled down them.

After a few moments of stillness, Montgomery stepped out of his office as Ryan and Esposito slunk out of the men’s washroom.  The three men gathered around the youngest Castle and stared at the elevator in amusement.

“We’re not going to see them for another hour, are we?”  Alexis asked after a long moment.  A chorus of nopes, uh uhs and yeah rights echoed from the bullpen.  “Thought so.  I think I’ll just take the subway home.”

Written mostly because I have a huge soft spot for mom!Beckett fics and because I’m currently on a quest to see how many Castle/Beckett fics I can write without them ever actually kissing.  I’m up to three (by a technicality).  And a half, if you count the half-finished fic languishing on my hard drive.

As ever, thanks is owed, and given, to the lovely Sarah/ObsidianJade for telling me that I forgot important words like ‘not’ and one of Alexis’ lines.  Without her, my stories would be even more nonsensical.

—

It was two am and Katherine Beckett could not sleep.  Not an uncommon occurrence – her all nighters spent staring at the murder board, followed by power naps in the break room, (and that time she broke into the Captain’s office and passed out on his much more comfortable couch) were a bit of a legend in the Twelfth Precinct.  But it wasn’t murder keeping Beckett awake that night.

No.

It was far more frustrating problem.  And it was all Castle’s fault.

The relaxing bubble bath with wine, scented candles and soft, ambient music, while perhaps a good idea for unwinding after a long day of paperwork with none of Castle’s antics, turned out to be not-so-relaxing when she hauled in her collection Richard Castle’s novels.  Even that, though, would not have been a problem if it wasn’t for the fact that the wine went straight to her head (or maybe a little farther south) and she started her own Castle smutathon.

And so, by the time the water cooled, Kate Beckett had spent over an hour in the bath reading in chronological order, of course, Castle’s twenty-six (seven, including Heat Wave) bestsellers (plus the ones that didn’t sell quite so well) purely for the sex scenes.

Yeah.

Bad idea.

Especially, Kate rolled over and groaned into her pillow, since I used to wear off this Castlelust by writing smutty Derrick Storm fic.

But, no, Kate Beckett was not going to lower herself to writing fanfiction for books written by a man she saw damn near every day.  It was bad enough knowing that she had written them in the past, and even posted them to the internet (on multiple sites, even!), but she was certainly not going to lower herself to writing them again.

Especially since, as soon as Castle started following her around, she had mass deleted all of the fanfiction she had ever written about his characters.  Sadly, her resolve had only lasted a week – she had caved to the online peer pressure and reposted all of the fics, mostly to prove that she wasn’t one of the fans who vowed to Never Read Richard Castle Again Since He Killed Off Derrick Storm.

End result?  She was still active in the Castle communities and had watched the explosion of fic that had followed the release of Heat Wave.  It was alarming.  People really liked the Nikki Heat character – there were, of course, the obligatory Nikki Heat bashfics (briiiiing Derrick Storm baaaack!), but overall, the authors seemed to revel in her literary alter ego.

Kate sighed and beat her fist into her pillow.  Clearly she wasn’t going to get any sleep tonight, and her friends had been clamouring for some Heat/Rook smut from her…  How hard could it be to write about Nikki Heat?  She knew as much, more even, about the character as Castle did.  And it wasn’t as if she couldn’t figure out Rook.

Oh, God.

She was not seriously considering writing for a ship that was, for all intents and purposes, her and Castle.

But Castle did, her traitorous mind pointed out.  He clearly has no problems with our alter egos getting it on.

Ultimately, that was what convinced Kate to boot up her laptop, pour herself another glass of wine and open Word.  She stared at the blank document, feeling more embarrassed than the first time she wrote a Castle smut fic – and that had been years upon years ago before there was even a hint of Derrick Storm on the horizon.  She took a large swallow of wine for fortification and, shuddering, she began to write.

Nikki Heat smirked inwardly as she swept, fashionably late, into Rook’s magazine’s cocktail party.  The formfitting wine red dress, accented in gold, drew looks and the lithe, athletic form it cased kept the gazes on Nikki.  Despite all of the admiring stares, Nikki felt Rook’s eyes on her and she turned to face him with a saucy smile.  Rook’s Adam’s apple bobbed and he absently set his champagne glass on a nearby table.  The air between the two smouldered and the other partygoers unconsciously cleared a direct route to Nikki for Rook….

–

“Good morning, Beckett!” Castle swivelled around in a chair – her chair – with a beatific grin on his face.  “Coffee?”

Kate growled faintly, accepted the coffee and glared, annoyed by Castle’s perpetual chair stealing.  Castle looked blankly up at her for a moment before the flash of understanding went across his face.  The man either never bothered to hide his emotions or had inherited more than his charm and flair from the dramatic from his mother.

Seemingly in response to her thoughts (perhaps he inherited the psychic powers as well?), Castle had leapt up and held out her chair in a gentlemanly manner.  With a small smile and a mostly feigned suspicious look, Beckett sank gracefully into her seat and Castle gallantly rolled her forward.  She raised an eyebrow at his antics and he just smiled and gave an extravagant bow.

“My, my Beckett, are those bags under your lovely eyes?  Were you up all night?  Was it murder?  I’m hurt – why didn’t you call me?” Castle’s shocked air turned lascivious and he leaned in, “Or was it a man?”

Beckett rolled her eyes.  “Hardly.”

Castle gasped, one hand flying to his heart.  “It was a woman!  Why didn’t you call me, Beckett?”

Beckett huffed, “Don’t flatter yourself, Castle.  What’s got you in such a good mood?”

“I woke up early this morning – really early – five am early – and I have finally managed to bypass Alexis’ parental controls on my–” Castle started.

“Ah!” Beckett held up a hand.  “I do not need to hear any more!”

“No, no,” Castle said, “You’ve got it all wrong – the parental controls weren’t for, uh, adult sites (why would I need those anyway?), they were for the Castle fansites.”

“The Castle fansites?” Beckett said blankly.

“Yes!  And in the year I’ve been away, there has been a veritable explosion of activity!  My favourite author–”

“Favourite author?”

“Of fanfiction.  It turns out that she had deleted all of her stories, but not because of the killing off Derrick Storm thing, and reposted it in the time I’ve been away.  She hadn’t written anything new, though, until just this morning (it was fate, I swear!) and, whew, let me tell you, that was one hot scene between Heat and Rook.”  Castle sighed happily.  “I really wish I could meet this woman.”

Kate Beckett just stared at him in horror.

—

A/N: My attempts at swearing off writing fanfiction never seem to succeed… which is insanely meta considering the subject matter of this fic.  So, yes, maybe Kate is a little too much like me but, hey, it’s crack!fic.

Unrelated, but awesome(ish) – this fic was the first fanfic posted publicly to Google Wave.  Go Castle fandom!

I blame my beta, Sarah (ObsidianJade), for this fic (even if it was an accidental self-prompt).  Somehow both of the fics I wrote in the past year are all her fault.

PS:  I now know how weird it is for people to write fic about characters who share their name.  I’m still not sure if I should be offended by Nikki Heat or not…

ObsidianJade adds:  I’ll happily take blame for this one, it’s hilarious.  I’d happily take blame for a multitude more of stories from Nikki, but she doesn’t co-operate!