A/N- I do not own Castle or any of it's characters. Wish I did, I'd have a better wardrobe :)

This is my first fanfic so please be kind. Any advice to make my future stories better will be highly appreciated. Thanks to Joanna- if she didn't tell me I should post it...I probably never would have!

You Can't Give Up

Chapter 1

Time was standing still. Her breathing had slowed. She kept trying to calm down her racing heart. What was she going to do? She didn't have time for this, not now. This wasn't part of the plan. Hell none of this was part of their plan. But this? Sure, in the future…but not now. Not with all the uncertainty in her life.

Her focus had to be him. She had to find him. She didn't know where to look, not without clues. The boys had no clues and she had basically been worthless. "You can't give up". His words broke through her internal rambling, but it didn't stop it.

Time was standing still, but moving too fast at the same time. He'd been gone for one week. One week without seeing him. Without touching him. Without him…

She didn't have time for this. Not now, maybe not ever. Not without him. This was their future. Someone sabotaged their happy ending. They earned their happy ending, dammit. They'd been through hell and back together. Why more? How much could two people expect to take? Expected to handle without shattering into a million pieces. "You can't give up. That's the deal." His words tried to remind her. Reminded her to be strong for him, for them.

She took one more deep breath, trying to push confidence back into her system. She could do this; she had to. She would find him and until that point, no one else could know. She threw the plastic test, with the 2 pink lines, away into the trash bin, washed her hands and splashed cold water on her face. She could do this. She had to; there was more than just them to consider now.

Kate walked into their bedroom and grabbed her phone off of the nightstand. She saw on the caller ID that it was the precinct. Hoping this was the call she was waiting for, "Beckett."

"Hey. You should probably get down here. We may have something." She released the breath she didn't know she was holding. There was hope. Sure Esposito didn't have all the answers nor did he give her many details over the phone, but he had given her hope. She needed that.

"I'm on my way." She carefully placed her chain with her engagement ring around her neck and quickly put on her father's watch before she ran out the door.

The drive to the precinct was longer than usual. She wasn't sure if it was her desire to get there as soon as possible or if there was an unusual amount of traffic. By the time she made it into the parking garage, her frustration was on high. Castle was out there and she knew it. He was out there and he needed her. She was letting him down so far and she needed to fix this. She needed to find him.

"So what do you have?" Beckett said walking up to the boys, who were huddled around Espo's computer. Her voice appeared to startle Ryan who was concentrating on some footage on the screen.

"Well, you know how we received word of the black SUV driving on the same highway where Castle's car was found? Black SUV's are just as popular as you would think, so it was pretty much a needle in a haystack. However, Tori was able to correlate traffic cam footage of vehicles meeting that description, with the time they would be heading out of town."

"Ryan, get to the point. Did you find the car that was involved with Castle's accident?" He looked at her sympathetically, she didn't want his pity, but she felt bad for snapping. This wasn't his fault and he was just trying to help.

"Sorry Beckett. Yes, we found the SUV. It was completely wiped of all prints and most DNA"

"Most DNA? What do you mean most…"

"CSU recovered a piece of hair in the cargo area. Nothing anywhere else…Beckett, it was Castle's hair," Espo said with an exhale after finishing his partner's story. Castle was back in the city. Alive? Why would someone abduct him and drive him back into her jurisdiction? And why would they be so careful with most of the trace evidence, but be so careless with something that would link Castle to that car.

"They wanted us to know he was there. It's almost like they're leaving us breadcrumbs. Who the hell are these people?"

Esposito turned back to the screen which was still blocked from Kate's view.

"This is what we were looking at when we called you. After we got confirmation that it was Castle's hair in the car, we had uni's canvas the area trying to find out if anyone saw someone matching his description. A homeless guy mentioned that he may have seen 3 people moving back toward the building where they ditched the car. He said that the man matching Castle's description didn't seem to be walking on his own. That he almost seemed drugged."

"Oh my god." He was in the city and he was alive. Why were they still sitting here? She was getting a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach. Not sure if her gut was trying to tell her something or if her body was trying to re-confirm the test results from this morning. She swallowed down the bile that was rising in her throat and refocused on the issue. They needed to get down there and they needed to go now.

Ryan interrupted her thoughts before she could move, "Beckett, Tori was able to find security camera footage that covered that building."

"What…okay that's a good thing, right?" The boys moved so Ryan was standing on her right and Espo was standing on her left. Why were they being so cautious with her?

"Kate, the camera confirmed that one of the kidnappers was Tyson" Her hand flew to her mouth; she really was going to be sick.

TBC