He awoke to the sound of Kate choking for air beside him, limbs flailing out in desperation and swiping at him as her fingers flew for her throat, clawing at her own skin.

Castle quickly lifted up on his arm, hovered over her with caution as he tried to catch one of her hands and pin it to her side.

"Kate," he called softly, not wanting to startle her, but needing her to come out of the nightmare, needing her to breathe. "Beckett - honey, please," he tried again, delicately brushing the hair back from her bruised forehead, hoping to soothe her and stop the tormented noises pushing past her lips.

He couldn't bear to hear the growing sounds of agony ripping from her mouth, her hoarse cries for breath viciously tearing their way up her throat, scraping the already sore tissue raw. It only aided his imagination in conjuring up images of what she must have gone through, how they must have tortured her.

Rick slid an arm around her back, supported her head with a hand at the base of her skull, kept the other over her chest to keep her hands down, and carefully hauled her upwards.

He should have been there, should have protected her like the partner he was supposed to be. She wouldn't be in the throes of what was obviously a horrific night terror if he had been able to find her sooner.

Kate still writhed against him, weakly trying to get away, but he held on, cradled her body closer and continued to call her name until finally, he felt her jolt awake.

She jerked into consciousness, greedily sucked the air into her lungs and latched her fingernails into the band around her chest. She had to get out, had to escape, but there was a hand brushing softly at her cheeks, wiping the trickles of freezing water-

"Kate."

She blinked at the sound of Castle's voice beside her, the relief replacing the phantom feeling of ice filling her lungs, and she quickly drew her hand away from his forearm, retracted her nails from his skin and apologetically smoothed her fingertips over the impressions they had left.

"Castle," she sighed, curling her knees to her chest and turning her face into the crook of his neck, inhaling his scent and savoring the way it warmed her.

"Are you - Do you want me to make you some tea?" he asked hesitantly, rubbing a hand up and down her arm. "I could put some honey in it to help your throat. Or some soup, I could make you some-"

"Castle."

He sighed, raised the hand at her arm to dust his fingers along the slash of her still aching cheekbone.

"Is there anything I can do?"

She shook her head, wished the hopeless look in his eyes would diminish.

"No. Just-"

Kate squeezed her eyes shut, swallowed roughly, and lifted her head, sought his lips.

When he had arrived in the woods with Ryan and Esposito, Castle had sprinted to her, scooped her into his arms the second he reached her and held her against his chest despite the paramedics reminding him she needed to be looked over in the ambulance. But she had ignored them too, relishing in the encompassing warmth of his body against hers and letting his whispered chants of love into the icy tresses of her hair wash away the memories of how she had ended up there.

He had taken her home after remaining at her side for over two hours in the ambulance as the paramedics had examined her lungs and throat, questioned her endlessly about her breathing pattern and whether or not she believed she had any potentially broken bones. He had helped her clean up in the shower, diligently keeping her face from going under the spray as he rinsed the grime from her hair and gingerly scrubbed a washcloth over the fresh bruises scattered across her skin. She had carefully kept from going into much detail when he quietly asked her about each mark. If she would have gone back there, to the origin of every bruise, scrape, and abrasion, she wouldn't have been able to head back to the precinct hours later to give her statement.

Castle had spent the entire day watching over her, caring for her in every way he knew how, but she needed the constant shiver in her body to be eradicated, needed to replace it with heat.

Rick gently tugged her into his lap, kept his arms secure around her as his tongue slipped past her lips and wiped her mind clean.

She didn't want to think about how the man who killed her mother was running for president, or the appointment scheduled with Doctor Burke for the next morning, how she already knew it would take her weeks to be comfortable anywhere near a tub of water again. She just wanted him.

Castle eased her down with him, keeping her close even as he rolled her onto her back and helped her lift her sleep shirt over her head.

"I read your letter," he mumbled into the underside her jaw and she stiffened beneath him. "CSU found it, managed to get it to me before we left earlier."

She nodded her acknowledgement while she tugged his pajama pants down and skimmed her nails lightly up his back.

"I just wanted you to have… I didn't want to leave you without making sure you knew how much you mean to me."

His head tipped down, forehead falling to rest against her clavicle, but she had still caught the darkness in his eyes.

"I hate even imagining-"

"Then don't," she whispered, tilting his face upwards to see his glimmering blue eyes wrecked with the pain of possibilities. "I'm here, Castle. I made it, and I'm not going anywhere," she promised, raking her fingers through his hair, letting them travel down to curl around his nape.

Castle followed the gentle tug from her fingers and lowered his mouth back to hers, kissed her slowly and removed the rest of their clothes.

He slid into her effortlessly moments later, a long smooth stroke that made her release a soft sigh against his lips, and she nudged them onto their sides, adjusted her leg high at his hip and started a leisurely, unhurried rhythm with her hips circling just barely against his. He rasped her name at her ear and she curled her arms around his back, traced her fingers over his scorching skin and trailed open-mouthed kisses over the line of his throat.

"I love you," he breathed, pressing his fingers into the skin at her thigh, hauling her leg just slightly higher and deepening the angle of his thrusts. She gasped, but clutched him tighter, grinded her hips a little harder. "With all of my heart," he added, reciting her own words back to her and making her vision blur with tears.

She whimpered into his neck and tilted her chin upwards to find his mouth, cry out quietly against his lips as her orgasm rippled through her slowly, spread like fire, burning away the ice that had taken residence in her bones. He followed within seconds, trembling and breathless, but didn't let her go, even as the sweat began to accumulate between them and the heat of him started to smother her. But she welcomed it, buried herself deeper in his embrace so that the entirety of him engulfed her completely.

"And you're the greatest thing that has ever happened to me, too," he whispered into the top of her head, his voice unsteady and shaking, but his hands firm and assuring as they splayed at her back. "I can't wait to marry you."

Kate smiled, the first real smile she had felt grace her lips in nearly two days, and nuzzled her face into his chest, her body loose and liquid draped over his. Castle yawned, drew the sheet over them, and she pressed a kiss to his skin, finally believing she could sleep a few hours in peace.

A/N: This was one of those 'if I don't post it now, it's never seeing the light of day stories' so I understand if it's not very good and/or littered with mistakes.. but I hope those who took the time to read enjoyed my mediocre contribution to the bundle of post eps fics for 6x17 nonetheless.

tumblr: bravevulnerability

twitter: onlythebattles