Prompt: 47 secs: instead, she says ''oh, you you don't remember cuz you were in shock of strangers exploding? THE MAN THAT I LOVE SAW ME GET SHOT AND HE REMEMBERS EVERYTHING JUST FINE!''

He watches as she paces around the box, Bobby her prey, the whole situation not unlike how he and Beckett were just months prior, when a hungry tigress circled them from below, plotting out her next move to strike. To devour them.

Beckett was growing impatient with Robert Lopez. She was ravenous for answers.

"'You don't remember,'" she scoffs at the kid. "How do you not remember?"

"I was in shock," Bobby claims. "The bomb went off. Everyone was running and screaming."

"Okay, okay. So, you remember what happened after the bomb went off, but not before?"

Castle can tell by her posture sitting on the table in front of him that she doesn't buy Bobby's story. By the tone of her voice, she doesn't buy it one bit and, furthermore, his flimsy excuse is pissing her off.

The tigress that is his partner looms closer to her prey. Angry. She's ready to pounce.

"It must've been one of those traumatic amnesia things - "

"Bobby!" Beckett snaps, right in the boy's face. "Don't lie to me," she growls.

"I'm telling you it was all a big blank. It was the trauma."

"It was not the trauma," she bites back, lifting an accusatory finger at the young man seated before her. "You don't get to use that excuse."

"I swear, I don't remember!" Bobby tries again, but it's too late for him now. His predator strikes.

"The hell you don't remember!" Beckett roars, and Castle feels a sense of pride swelling in his chest as his tigress makes her kill.

"Do you want to know trauma?" Beckett asks, fury in her voice. "I was shot in the chest," she says, and Castle nods along with her words. If anyone would know traumatic amnesia, it'd be her. She's lived it. They both have.

" - and the man I love had to sit there and watch as the lights went out on my life. I bled out, my heart stopped, and I died right in front of him in that ambulance. He remembers every second of it. I remember every second of it."

Castle's blood runs cold, his eyes drifting back up to the scene unfolding before him.

"And so do you."

Beckett stalks away from Bobby, scowling, arms crossed over her chest in her frustration. The room goes silent.

"All this time..." he murmurs.

Castle sits frozen to the spot, and though she continues her line of questioning with Bobby Lopez, the rest of his partner's interrogation becomes a blur.

The man I love.

I remember every second of it.

Beckett exits Interrogation One after what feels like an eternity inside of it. Bobby wasn't breaking, but he would eventually. She'd figure out what his role was in the bombing soon enough, and find the key to unlocking all the answers to this tragedy.

Closing the door behind herself with a heavy sigh, she startles when a figure appears in the doorway to observation, a familiar travel cup held loosely in the hand at their side, the unmistakable scent of coffee wafting from within.

"Hey," she greets him, the smile already forming on her lips, only to find a grim expression staring back at her once she meets his gaze. It was as if all the light was gone from Castle's beautiful blue eyes.

Wait. He was watching?

...the man I love had to sit there and watch as the lights went out on my life...

Oh, god. Castle.

"Kate," he calls out to her. Weakly. Soberly.

Esposito comes walking through the bullpen then, heading in their direction. "Guy's still not talking?"

Beckett looks to Esposito, then back to her partner. Her mouth opens and closes, then does it again. Castle's eyes don't move off of her.

"N-not yet," she stammers finally. "I'm gonna let him sweat for a bit."

"What's our next move?" the other detective asks.

She eyes Castle carefully as she replies, "That's up to him." Then, finding her stronger voice from within, "Have unis go over his apartment. Maybe we'll get lucky and come up with something to break him."

Esposito nods, satisfied with the answer, before he continues on through the bullpen, headed for his desk.

"Castle," she starts, turning back to him, but he's shaking his head, his eyes doing a quick perusal of the bustling homicide floor.

"Not here," he says. "Not now."

Suddenly, Kate Beckett gets the overwhelming sense that, if they put this talk off any longer, it's going to destroy them. Their chances together.

"No. Right now," she says urgently, and she doesn't even think about it before reaching out to grab his hand in hers. "No more waiting, Castle. Tell me where."

He nods, and she could swear she sees a spark reignite in his eyes at the physical contact. Castle pulls her in the direction of her desk then, confusing her momentarily because didn't he just say not here?

But then he lifts her coat from her chair and sets his coffee down next to the one he'd left for her on the desk just a short time before.

A promise to return together.

"Okay. Let's go," he says, leading her to the elevator.

He helps her into her coat as the doors close on them. As they descend, she finds his fingers with her own again.

She won't let him go.

They find themselves at the Boylan Plaza memorial after walking hand-in-hand for a time, paying their respects to the dead, and making their silent promises to get the bombing victims the justice they deserve.

Unsure of how to approach him yet, but feeling a desperate need to hold on to him, to them, Beckett waits him out quietly. A solid presence at his side. A firm reminder that she's here, she's with him. And she's not going anywhere, not unless he wants her to.

Castle squeezes her hand as they stop at the bottom of the steps, coming to the metal gates that separate the memorial from the active crime scene.

"I really thought…" he begins softly, and she tilts her head to his voice, moves closer to catch every word, her fingers gripping his in encouragement. Whatever he has to say, she doesn't want him to be afraid to voice it. Not now.

She lied to him. For months. And he found out in one of the worst possible ways.

He deserves this opportunity to get it all out. Whatever it is he's feeling.

She owes him that.

But then Castle shakes his head, fighting with his words. Probably trying to find the right ones to say. He starts again.

"I really believe we have a future, Kate. That we could be happy together. I was willing to wait. I am waiting. I will. If that's what you want. If you feel the same way. But if you don't - "

"It is," she tells him urgently, pressing firmly into his side. "I do, Castle. I want this. Us."

"Then why did you lie?" he asks then, and he sounds like a little boy. So hurt. Betrayed. She's wounded him deeply.

"I was - "

She wants to immediately defend herself. Say I was scared. She starts to, because she was. She still is. But it's not time for excuses here. Excuses won't fix the pain she's caused with her lies. Excuses won't fix the bond that's been broken between them because she wasn't ready, and she needed time to heal before she could even entertain the idea of being more.

He's watching her attentively, his eyes guarded, as if prepared for another blow, and she makes sure to maintain eye contact when finally she speaks.

"When I first met you, Rick, I was just going through the motions of every day. I was all about the work, the job." She glances briefly over at the flowers around them. The candles burning in broad daylight. The pictures of lives lost. Futures gone in a flash.

"My dreams had become nothing more than speaking for the dead. Bringing their killers to justice, and giving families closure. Something I never had. But you," she pulls his hand up to her chest, opening his palm above her heart. "You helped me learn how to live my life again. To dream for myself. For a future. You gave me a reason to smile every day. To laugh. Even on the days in my darkest of moments, you're right here. My strength. Like a shining beacon of what could be. What I can still have."

She feels his fingers tremble beneath her palm as she holds it to her chest, and she tangles her digits together with his. "What I do have."

His eyes are glistening when she meets them with her own again.

"I ran from you, Rick. I ran because I've never had this with anyone before, and I needed to heal those old wounds, and the grieve the new ones, before I could become me again. It wasn't fair of me, and I know I hurt you deeply, but I just...I needed to become more than my mother's murder, more than the scared nineteen year old girl who hides behind it whenever she comes up against something that feels too big to handle."

This time, she places her hand above his heart, feeling the pounding of it beneath her fingertips.

"I needed to be the woman who could cherish your love, be worthy of it, and who could love you openly in return with all her heart. My heart. And I'm almost there, Castle. I am."

She feels the tear that has slipped down her cheek only after Castle has brushed it away with a deft finger.

"You'll always be that woman, Kate. I love all of you; your faults and your imperfections. I always have. I always will."

She lunges forward then, wrapping her arms around his neck.

"I'm so sorry, Castle," she murmurs into his skin, tucking in closely beneath his chin. Castle envelopes her in a tight embrace, rocking them back and forth gently in the mid-morning sunlight. The small crowd around them pays no mind, probably assuming they're here to share in their grief like many of the other visitors.

It's a long moment before either of them speaks again, Castle being the one to finally break the silence.

"I mean it, Kate. However long you need, I can wait for you to be ready. I'll be right here when you are."

When she lifts her head from his chest, it's with a smile. She bumps her nose to his, forehead coming to rest against his.

"It won't be long. I promise."

Castle returns her smile, then reaches for her hand.

"Come on," he says, trying to tug her along. "Let's get back to the precinct. We've got a suspect to go break."

"Wait," she replies, then pops up on her tip toes, covering his mouth with her own. Her kiss is brief and chaste, respectful to their surroundings, but when she drops back down to her heels, she's smiling again, tucking herself back into his side. "Okay, let's go," she says.

They'll have all the time in the world now after the case is over.