A/N: SPOILER ALERT: This is a fun little one-shot based on a few spoilers that have been floating around for ep. 6x08 'A Murder Is Forever' as well as Sneak Peek #1 released by ABC yesterday.

Happy Birthday, Beline! This is for you, my friend. Hope you have a wonderful weekend. xoxo

Designs On You

The first time he vaguely noticed was when he was woken early one morning to find her sitting up in bed have a staring contest with Linus – the large black and white photograph of a lion that had hung on his wall since Alexis was wearing lace-trimmed, frilly ankle socks and red patent Mary Janes.

She had gently suggested that he move the picture to his office because she said she thought the lion was glaring at her. Glaring at her! The cop who could stare down dirty bombs and serial killers, Big Foot and murderous Senators, even take on the FBI without blinking was being freaked out by a picture of a lion? And it would have been cute, adorable even, had it not been for the fact that she actually meant it…that he should take the picture down off his bedroom wall.

Now, he didn't want to be…animalist, or was it species-ist, specious…or whatever, but she said nothing about the bull elephant adorning the other wall. Oh, no. Elephants were somehow allowed, since she had a whole perky little parade of them marching across her desk at work.

However, due to some as yet unexplained prejudice or other, poor Linus was on his way out. And that's how it started.

The second time he noticed was late one night, mid-yawn, as he reached his hand out blindly, patting the drinks cart for the bottle of 21 Year Old Balvenie Scotch he'd been saving for an especially long and difficult day exactly like the one he'd just battled his way through.

He felt around for the familiar column of the cardboard presentation tube, his mouth already watering in anticipation of the sweet honey jam flavor coating his tongue and then rolling all the way to the back of his throat to burn with a warm, fiery spice as it went down so easily he could smell the peat smoke from here.

Nothing. Nada. Nichts. ничего. Nic. Niente. Nul. Nix.

He opened his watery, tired eyes, peered down, searched the cart. Gone!

In its place he found a bottle of Patron Silver Tequila and a fancy, Polish Vodka that looked more like a perfume bottle. He vaguely remembered Kate telling him that the name of the vodka – U'Luvka - translated as 'legless' in English. Well, he doesn't know about legless, but he was getting a headache just looking at it, that's for sure.

His loft, his man cave, his haven, is being feminized, nay Beckettized…no, Kateified, bit by stealthy little bit.

The third time he noticed was during a quick shower and shave before they ran out the door to a crime scene the following morning. He decided to save time, shave in the shower since Kate had jumped in ahead of him, steamed up the mirrors, taken the only warm towel and used the last of his expensive, imported shaving gel on her legs.

He soaped up his face, reached out instinctively for the imitation ebony, silver-tipped, titanium bladed, cutthroat razor he had specifically left sitting on the tile shelf of the shower enclosure, only to find something plastic, lightweight and pink sitting in its place.

What the…?

The day rushed by in a flurry of canvassing, warrant drafting, interviews, and endless cups of coffee, and so it slipped his mind to challenge her…yet again!

But by the time they reached the weekend and he couldn't find his games console, discovering a Union Jack throw pillow and a guitar - a guitar! - sitting on his favorite leather recliner in its place, he decided now was the time to go and talk to her.

Man up, Rick, he tells himself, as he takes a deep breath, cracks his knuckles and goes in search of his sexy, formidable fiancé.

"Kate, have you seen my—? Hey, watcha doing?" asks Castle, wandering into the bedroom in nothing but his robe and boxers to find Kate kneeling on the floor of his closet.

The sight of her, near naked on the floor, pulls him up short. His mouth starts to water, his palms begin to sweat, and his brain starts to fog.

"Tidying," comes her muffled reply, her back turned to him as she crouches knee-deep in thick, cream carpeting.

He leans on the doorframe, lounges really, trying to look casual, the two edges of his navy robe parting company to reveal his bare chest and legs, the tie trailing the floor behind him like a long plush tail.

The smooth, sensual line of her back, the soft flare of her hips, the silky tan of her bare skin, the lace of her...

Damn! He's getting distracted already.

"Come here," he cajoles, his husky voice dripping bourbon and smoke from their night out at his bar; the night out that lasted until two in the morning when Kate pushed the last paying customers out of the door and locked up behind them so they could have a little private party of their own."

The party carried on in the cab all the way back to the loft, and then things got really noisy and really dirty really fast, and so now she's on the floor of his closet, lining up her shoes with the best part of four Advil in her stomach and a bottle of water by her side. (So she threw up, her hangover would be all the worse if she hadn't.)

"Kate, it's Saturday morning?" he grouses, sticking out one bare foot and probing her shapely, toned rear with his toes until she falls forward onto her hands and knees.

"Hey! Are you still drunk?" she asks, sitting back on her haunches to faux-glare at him, her glittering eyes giving her away.

"If I say yes will that mean I'm off the hook?"

"Can you hand me that pile of sweaters?" she asks, moving on from his state of drunkenness and the physical assault on her tush remarkably quickly.

When Castle does as she asks, passing her a neatly folded bundle of dark colored cashmere and lambs wool, it's only once the sweaters are in his hands that he realizes that they are in fact his – they are his sweaters!

"What—? Eh, Beckett, these are mine," he says, hesitantly pointing out the obvious, because he is pretty sure that if he isn't still drunk, then Kate most definitely must be.

"Yeah. I'm moving them over here. They take up far too much space on that shelf," she says, as if this should make perfect sense and just…end of discussion.

Castle sighs. Hangovers make him feel horny and the things she was doing to him last night…

"Hey, babe. Come back to bed," he whispers, stealing a candy stripe hatbox out of her hands and dumping it on the floor beneath his winter coats.

Wait, does he even own a hatbox?

"We just got out of bed," she points out, running a hand up and down the front of her own body to indicate the slinky black slip she has on. Barely has on.

And that is so not helping, Kate!

"Is there some state or city statute I'm unaware of that precludes us from getting right back in?" he argues, smoothing his hands up and down her bare arms with unconcealed longing, quirking a sexy smirk and batting his eyelashes, before tugging her towards him with a predatory smile.

"I was right. Still drunk," she says, clipped consonants clicking on her tongue as she pushes past him and heads for the bathroom.

She manages to slip inside before he can follow her and she locks the door! She never locks the door.

"Beckett?" he hisses, through the tiny gap in the woodwork. "Beckett?" he whines, the sound pathetic with need.

"Castle!" yells Kate, her frustration clearly evident in her voice. "I'll be out in a minute. Give me some peace. Go amuse yourself," she scolds, and then he hears her laughing in response to his sulky, heavy, dramatic man-sigh.

He wanders back over to their bed. It's a wreck - a scene of complete and utter sexual devastation. He stands and stares at it for a whole minute, a stupid, lovesick grin on his face. There's a red silk scarf still draped over the headboard (Kate left her cuffs at work), and a couple of long black feathers lying on her nightstand, along with a few other surprises she magically produced from her bedside drawer.

He flushes, grins even wider, shivers and his nipples tighten – a muscle memory – their tiny flesh-colored peaks brushing erotically against the velour plush of his robe. God he's getting turned on already and she's not even here.

Busy! He had better get busy. If Kate comes out of the bathroom and finds him mooning around with a hard-on…well, let's just say the last time he did that she told him where to go…and it wasn't 'lie down on the bed, darling'. More along the lines of 'deal with that yourself, Rick'. Because as with everything, Kate likes to be in charge…or she likes to think she is, he tells himself cunningly.

He sets about picking clothes up off the floor – his and hers – and he re-hangs what's salvageable, folds the rest for dry cleaning or throws it in the laundry hamper.

His silver bullet cufflinks are still dangling from the cuffs of his shirt, and so he extracts them, dumps the shirt for washing, and then sashays over to his dresser, whistling, to put them in the little cedar wood box he had specially made to house his collection of cufflinks.

But it's...it's no longer there... M.I.A.

In its place sits a cream leather jewelry box, a tiny crystal bowl with several pairs of earrings inside, two ornate bottles of perfume, a tube of hand lotion and a brightly patterned, oval-shaped box of Kleenex tissues he's never seen before.

He's being edged out, he suddenly realizes. She's done it again! Stealthy Detective Beckett is using her feminine wiles as a distraction technique to make over his home so he wouldn't even notice!

He panics. He spins. His blood runs cold.

She's probably in the bathroom right now with a circular saw dismantling Boba Fett limb-by-limb…

"KATE!"

Thoughts? Thank you CB for your wise counsel and for reminding me that Castle's headboard is solid! ;) Have a great weekend everyone. Liv x