Based on a prompt over at castlefanficprompts from rtds9fan. See my tumblr (takeiteasykate) for the full prompt. Big thank you to the Triple Threat of Jo, Lou, and Joan for beta'ing this one: your edits made the world of difference.
"I'm telling you, bro, as soon as Lanie handed the new partner the invite, she blew up!"
Rick rolled his eyes at Javier, disinclined to believe his colleague. It was probably all a big mistake. After all, who would ban Christmas decorations?
"He's right, Rick, it happened! Lanie, back me up on this." Kevin called out to their co-worker as she arrived at the booth in their favourite Friday evening spot, The Old Haunt, the week after Thanksgiving.
"Here's how it went," Lanie began, sliding in next to Rick. "Javi, can you get me a glass of red wine, please? The merlot cab', if they have it." He agreed, making a hand signal to the guys and receiving affirmative responses for more beer.
"Okay, I gave her the invite card, and said…
"So, will you come to the party, Kate?"
Kate read the card she'd been given. "This party is during working hours?" She glanced up. "In the office?"
Lanie shrugged, "Sure, we always have it during the day so our colleagues with children can get home as usual. Roy said the partners preferred it like that."
With a slight nod, Kate looked back at the card and tapped it against one hand. "I'd prefer you didn't waste work time with this. It needs to be rescheduled, immediately. I'll be speaking to the other partners about this today." She passed the card back to Lanie, a deep frown on her face. "Also, no decorations anywhere in this office. I see so much as a bauble and the person responsible is gone."
"...then she stomped her skinny ass out of the break room and next thing we hear is her office door slamming shut."
"See?" Kevin waved his free hand in Lanie's direction, his worried face directed at Rick. "You're The Christmas Guy, you have to fix this or I won't get to see Sarah Grace be a sunflower!"
"She sounds like a complete Grinch to me, guys," Rick frowned. "I don't know if I-..."
Javier handed Rick his beer but didn't let go as he spoke, snagging Rick's attention. "Bro, do this for the good of the team. We're counting on you."
"So it's you who's been leaving me a coffee all week."
Kate stood in the door of her office, watching one of her team as he placed a to-go cup of coffee on her desk. She was pleased to have finally gotten to see who it was who'd been responsible for keeping her caffeine levels up; it had been a sweet gesture during her second week at the firm when she was sure the entire paralegal staff was about to threaten mutiny just because she couldn't get a hold on her Christmas crankiness.
"Ah, you caught me…" She tried not to return Rick's cheeky grin, biting her lip to keep the smile from spreading. "Just bringing you a cup of good cheer to set your Friday morning off in the right way."
Kate arched an eyebrow in his direction as he moved away from her desk and sauntered towards her, the full effect of his hideous 'bad' Christmas sweater hitting her with full force. "Is it a bribe so I turn a blind eye to the fact your sweater is inappropriate for the workplace?"
"What, this?" Rick pointed at his chest, where a running pattern of fornicating reindeer was emblazoned in red, green, and white. "This is nature!"
"It's unnatural…" Kate moved past him and placed her briefcase on the desk, picking up the coffee Rick had left. "But thanks for the drink."
Rick lifted his own cup in salute and with another disarming grin thrown in Kate's direction he left her office.
Kevin's head popped out of the cubicle opening as he walked past. "So? Do you think you'll be able to bring her around?"
Rick kept walking until he arrived in his cubicle, next door to Kevin's, with Javier already leaning over the opposite side of the four-person square they shared with Lanie. "She seems a nice person, bro, and a good boss, but this whole anti-Christmas crusade is nuts." Javier shook his head, "Totally crazy."
Rick leaned up against the cubicle divide nearest Kevin to peer at his co-workers. Kevin was such a worrier, wanting everything to be just so and nothing to change. With a wife and kid at home it was little wonder he was desperate for the Christmas party to go ahead as normal, he was so convinced he'd end up missing Sarah Grace's pre-school play as well as the pot luck if anything changed. Javier just wanted an easy ride with as little hassle as humanly possible.
"No sweat, man. This was just the beginning." Rick pursed his lips. "But, you guys, quit making it sound like we made a bet on it or something. I don't think it's a crusade, I think there's something really bothering her."
A few days later, Rick found himself sitting in his boss' office, halfway through his second coffee of the morning, and in the midst of a lively debate.
"No, there's no way King is better than Connelly!"
"How can you say that, Rick?! The guy's written hundreds of mystery novels!"
Rick shook his head, levelling a disdainful look at Kate. "Quantity over quality, seriously? It's like I don't even know you."
They smirked at each other, dissolving into giggles until a knock on the door jamb cut them short with bright eyes.
"Kate, your first client has called to say she's running late. Be here in about twenty minutes."
Kate nodded, standing up from the visitor's bucket chair to return to her desk chair. "Thank you, Lanie."
"You're welcome," Lanie replied, throwing a saucy look in Rick's direction. He glared at her, but with a glance at his watch he realised he and Kate had been chatting about absolutely nothing work-related for almost an hour and a half. He made his excuses and left, though the subtle glance over his shoulder at Kate allowed him to notice the droop in her shoulders as he disappeared.
Lanie cornered Rick in the break room the following week, determination written across her features.
"Rick Castle, what's your game?"
He paused in front of the fancy espresso machine and waved his cup at the interrogator. "I have no idea what you're talking about."
"You hang out in her office every morning, make her a coffee or two, and then grace us with your presence an hour after we all get here."
Rick held a hand up to stop her. "It is so not every morning."
"Uh, yeah it is, Rick."
His hand slowly drooped back to his side as he realised that she was right.
"Are you seriously trying to charm our boss into letting you put your decorations up and have the pot luck during work hours?" Lanie crossed her arms, propping her hip against the fridge.
"What?! No." He stopped gesturing with his empty mug and put it down on the counter. "No!" He picked the mug up again and looked at Lanie. "Do you think that would work?"
"Rick!"
"I know, okay? I know. That is kind of how it started, sure. But now… now I just… I really like her, Lanie. Like, like like her."
Lanie rolled her eyes at him. "Uh huh…"
"Not because she's hot! I mean, she totally is, but not just because of that. Under that lawyer armor she's got a sharp mind and she's generous and sweet, and kind too. And I…" He put the mug down once more and flopped into a nearby chair, doleful eyes turned to his friend. "I'm helpless."
Lanie collected Rick's mug with an indulgent smile and started making his coffee. "Ho boy, you got it bad."
By the time she walked into her office on December 21, after roughly three weeks of not having to make herself a drink on her arrival at work, Kate realised that her employee wasn't just leaving a coffee for her, he was taking the opportunity to talk to her every morning. She wasn't sure she minded, either, since they seemed to be able to discuss just about anything from movies and books to politics and silly stories from college, but that didn't mean she didn't want to have a bit of fun with it. She narrowed her eyes at him as he looked up from his phone.
"Alright, so you want to get in my good books, is that it?" She put her briefcase on the desk and sat beside Rick in the spare visitor chair she kept on the opposite side of the desk from her own swivel chair, reaching for the coffee he held out to her. But when she glanced at him, expecting to share a chuckle at the joke, she took in the confusion on his face. "Rick? You okay?"
"What? Oh, yeah, I'm fine. What do you mean? About your good books."
"The daily coffee and a chat? I was joking that maybe you're going for employee of the month. I guess it wasn't a good one." She scratched at the armrest of the chair as an awkward silence stretched between them.
"Oh. Oh! I get it, right!" The hollow laugh she heard didn't sound particularly convincing.
She shifted her gaze from the thread she was unpicking to Rick's frown. "What's up?"
Rick leaned his elbows on his knees, cradling his coffee in his outstretched hands. "Did you know that the rest of the team call me 'The Christmas Guy'?" Kate shook her head, listening intently. "Well, they do. But this year is so different than usual. I…"
He glanced up at Kate, the bashful look he gave her making him seem much younger all of a sudden. "I just don't understand how you can hate Christmas so much that you won't even let us put up a few decorations, I mean how-…" He suddenly stopped, looking guilty. "Crap, Kate, I'm sorry, it's none of my business. I'm sorry. I'll just go."
Kate's hand rested on Rick's arm before he could rise from the chair. "No, wait. I… I do owe you an explanation." She stood, moving to close the door before she returned to her previous spot.
"I was barely out of law school, living with friends in San Francisco after graduation while I worked at a firm there because I couldn't imagine coming back home to New York." She leaned over and put her cup down on the desk, returning her hands to fiddle in her lap. "The evening before Christmas Eve I was due to fly back for the holidays, and in the morning I got a call from the police. My parents had been in a car crash, some drunk truck driver hit their car at an intersection and they died."
Tears brimmed in Kate's eyes, threatening to fall, but she willed them back. She didn't want to cry in front of a colleague, even one who'd become such a close friend already. After all, her parents had passed away so long ago, she thought she would have run out of tears by now.
"It's okay to cry, Kate." She gasped as Rick's hand covered hers, warm and steady over her clammy, fidgeting fingers, and the surprise of his touch opened the dam as she let her tears trickle down her nose and onto the back of his hand. After a few moments of quiet sniffles, she took a deep breath and looked up at Rick.
"They died, and that's why I don't celebrate Christmas anymore."
He was at a complete loss as to what the hell could he even say in response to that. The worst possible thing to happen to someone at Christmas - death of close family members, her parents both gone at once - and it had happened to Kate.
Kate, who he made coffee for, and sat with every morning in the last few weeks, and could talk with about anything they could think of, and was falling seriously fast in love with. He couldn't just say nothing.
"I-…"
The phone on his boss' desk rang, cutting him off as she removed her hand from his grasp and jumped up to grab it and a handful of tissues.
"Hello? Yes. Okay, thanks Javier. Could you get them some drinks, please? I'll be right there. Okay, bye."
Rick stood up and started to leave, but he was stopped by a quiet voice behind him. "Rick? Thank you, for listening." He turned and a sad smile passed over his face as he looked at Kate, puffy eyes, patchy foundation, raw emotion and all.
"Always."
He turned away, and he had his fingers on the door handle when she spoke up again.
"Rick?"
Face the music, Rick, he thought to himself, turning to Kate once more, like Sarah Grace the sunflower turning to the sun. He tried to keep the feeling of being resigned to his fate of unrequited love for his boss off his face as he quirked his eyebrows in reply.
"Put up your decorations," she whispered.
"What?" He blinked, stunned by what he thought she'd just said.
Kate cleared her throat. "I said, put up your decorations. The Christmas decorations. I should never have let my past get in the way of your traditions. I'm sorry for that."
Rick nodded in response and had begun to walk through the door when he paused and knocked his knuckles lightly against the door jamb, his mouth quirking into a smile. "Thank you, Kate."
When Kate finished up her meeting a couple of hours later, she walked her guests back to the elevator past some of the most elaborate Christmas decorations she'd seen outside of Fifth Avenue. It took all the concentration she could muster to not be distracted as she said her goodbyes, especially when her eyes caught on the sight of Kevin on Rick's shoulders and Lanie on Javier's shoulders, her four paralegals busy affixing twinkly lights to the edge of the windows.
She couldn't help herself as she sauntered up behind them and folded her arms. "Just what do you think you're doing?"
Rick turned around so fast, Kevin almost fell off his shoulders but they righted themselves just in time for Rick to get a face full of LED bulbs and wires as he spluttered. "You said… you… you're joking. You're joking!" Kate snorted as she started to laugh, and soon the rest of them were joining in.
"This is going to look great for tomorrow's lunch, guys. Well done," Kate praised them all, smiling warmly.
"Tomorrow's lunch?" Lanie gasped, ten feet in the air on Javier's shoulders still.
Kate nodded, "I'll make cookies tonight to bring along, sound good?" Two of the guys nodded dumbly, looking pleased at the prospect of sugary treats, Lanie gave a thumbs up, and Kate savoured the twinkle in Rick's eye as he smiled widely at her.
The next morning, armed with a large box of cookies made to one of her mother's recipes and a two-cup tray of coffee, Kate arrived at work feeling more positive and festive than she had in over a decade. She greeted everyone she passed with a smile and a quick 'hello' as she headed to her office, eager to start the day. At her door she paused, a post-it note affixed to it.
Please knock before opening the door!
Kate found it odd to knock at her own office door, but the scrabbling and muffled, "Hang on a second!" meant she was strangely glad she had done so. The door opened a tiny fraction and Kevin nipped through the gap, grinning at Kate as he scuttled past. As she went to step forward, Lanie exited, swiftly followed by Javier, who shut the door behind him, and Kate couldn't stop the confused frown from settling on her brow.
"Rick?"
The door opened again, enough for Kate to see a sliver of Rick's body and an eye peering at her. "Not quite ready, you're earlier than usual! Just a second!"
"I-…" The door shut in her face so she knocked again, louder this time. "Let me in, this is my office! Rick!"
Finally the door was thrown open, and Kate was so busy gearing up to reprimand Rick that at first she didn't notice the changes that had taken place. A twinkling light caught her eye and she made a slow turn as she entered the room, taking everything in. A small potted fir tree, tastefully decorated in gold and white, sat in one corner of the office, while the colour scheme was copied by a long paper chain draped around the windows and bookshelves, and golden white lights lined almost every straight surface.
She let Rick take the cups and cookie box from her, and watched in a daze as he set them down on her desk. Kate realised her vision had blurred as she looked at the lights, and she reached up to stop the tears from falling yet again. This office had seen too many tears already.
"So? What do you think, Kate?"
She took one final turn around the office to collect herself, walking over to the tree and touching one of the branches with a gentle brush of her fingers before she returned to where Rick stood leaning against the door frame.
"It's beautiful, Rick." She looked up at him and rested her hand on his arm. "Thank you." In her peripheral vision she noticed something green above his head and looked up a little more. "Is that…" She frowned and looked at Rick again. "Did you put mistletoe up in here?"
"No, that was Lanie." Rick flashed a mischievous smile at her.
Kate narrowed her eyes at him. "Semantics." She flexed the hand still on his bicep and leaned towards him. With a playful flick of his eyebrow, she felt Rick place his fingertips on her waist as he presented his cheek for her, but as soon as he closed his eyes she diverted course and pressed her lips to his.
Her other hand rose to cup his cheek as his arms wove around her waist, drawing their bodies closer together, losing themselves in each other. The sound of applause and wolf whistles broke them apart moments later, both flushed and staring at each other in shock for a moment before they smiled and started to laugh and wave at their co-workers.
"I guess Santa decided I've been a good boy this year," Rick whispered when the staff had got back to work and left them alone. "He brought me you."
Kate grinned, "Who needs Santa when I have The Christmas Guy?"
Well, I didn't manage my fanfic goal for the year (write more!) but at least I managed to pull the Christmas fic out of the bag at the eleventh hour. Five years running was too good a streak to miss.
Merry Christmas, everyone.