(FIC) The Call
Title: “The Call”
Fandom: Castle
Characters/Pairings: Ryan/Esposito, Beckett
Word count: 710 words
Rating: PG-13
Occasion: Prompt (and beta) by the adorably lovely theaquamarine =] Uploaded for starscythe’s birthday.
Spoiler alert: None
Disclaimer: The boys aren’t mine. Sigh. If only, if only…
It could have been worse, she decided as she hastily pulled on a red blouse and slipped into her black pumps. All things considered, getting a call from the station at five-thirty in the morning wasn’t too bad. She counted her blessings that it wasn’t another midnight case.
She fastened the chain holding her mother’s wedding ring around her neck and tucked it into her shirt, fastened her father’s watch around her wrist, shoved her gun into its holster, and examined herself briefly in the mirror before darting out the door.
As she buckled her seatbelt across her chest, she pulled out her cell phone and pressed speed dial 4 - Ryan’s cell phone. Between Ryan and Esposito, the former was definitely faster at answering his phone; sometimes it would hardly ring once before she would receive a chipper “Ryan here”.
But this morning, the phone rang four times before a crackling in her ear told her that someone had picked up.
“Hello?” came a gravelly voice from the other end of the line that caught her off-guard.
“R-ryan?” she stuttered, wondering how she could possibly have gotten the wrong number. “It’s Beckett.”
“Oh, hey Beckett,” the man replied. She paused for a moment, then-
“Esposito?”
“Yeah?”
“Why are you answering Ryan’s phone? Is Ryan okay?”
“Ah…” Esposito paused, the crackle in the phone indicating that he was moving it to a shoulder to free his hands. “Yeah, Ryan’s…Ryan’s fine. Just a little preoccupied. In fact, we both are - so what’s up?”
“I got a call from the station,” she began, somewhat concerned. “They found a bod-“
The rest of her sentence was drowned out by a moan.
“Shit, Espo,” she heard Ryan groan from the other end of the line. “Be gentle!”
“Sorry,” Esposito replied. “It’s just…ah…this is… wow…”
“God, that really hurt...”
“Can’t help it, bro. It’s really, really tight… I can’t even get my fingers in-“
“Ouch!”
“Sorry! …I’ve never done this before.”
“Take it easy, alright?”
“I’m just gonna hold still for a minute. Lemme know when it stops hurting.”
“No!” Ryan shot back quickly. “Don’t stop, just…just keep going…the slower you go, the more it hurts…just move, damnit…”
Heavy breathing. Scuffling. Ryan moaned.
“God…so tight... Almost there, bro. Just hang on…”
“Ahh …Javi, please…I need you to-…”
“Oh, wow, Kevin... gah, I can’t-“
“Harder!”
“Shit, if I go any harder, I’m gonna tear something.”
“So close - one more tug - OH GOD, YES! JAVI!”
“You know what,” Beckett squeaked, her eyes wide and her cheeks burning, voice an octave higher than usual. “I’ll just text you the address. Just come when you’re ready.” At the recognition of her own accidental innuendo, she hung up before the jokes could start. Feeling the heat of the blush on her cheeks, she took a long drink from the bottle of water in her car, trying to halt the images of the scene she had just heard that were flowing through her mind.
Esposito flopped backward onto Ryan’s bed, breathing hard. It was only then that he remembered that he had been on the phone. “Beckett?” he said into it, watching Ryan’s bare chest rise and fall on the bed beside him. “Beckett, are you-I don’t believe it. She hung up on me.”
“That’s okay,” Ryan panted, stretching out and yawning. “Shit, I’m tired now.”
“You’re tired?” Esposito said incredulously, moving closer to him. “I’m the one who did all the work!”
“And you did a wonderful job,” Ryan said consolingly, flashing him a grateful smile that morphed into a frown. “It hurt a lot more than I thought it would, though,” he admitted.
In Esposito’s hand, Ryan’s phone vibrated and Esposito flipped it open to read the text message from Beckett: an address in Soho.
“Let’s go,” Esposito muttered. “We’ve got a killer to catch.”
“I’m hungry,” Ryan complained. “It’s early, and I haven’t had breakfast.”
“No problem,” Esposito replied. “We’ll grab some crêpes on the way. They’re about the closest thing to pancakes that we can get on the fly.”
Ryan flashed him a warm smile. “Thanks,” he murmured.
“No problem,” Esposito responded. “But the next time you get your head caught in a shirt, I’m just gonna grab the scissors and cut it off.”