A/N: This is unbetaed goodness. All mistakes are mine.
Disclaimer- Pretty sure it's not mine…
Enjoy.
Shake Hands with the Devil
Being a cop Beckett had always figured she'd take a bullet and that her plucky sidekick would follow suit. They were a magnet for danger, yet they always managed to survive. It was dangerous enough for cops, trained professionals. So for Castle, a novelist in the line of duty, danger was an understatement. They'd been shaking hands with the devil for over thirty years and she is grateful, so grateful that it hasn't come to more than that.
They've survived shootings, stabbings, beatings, torture, hypothermia, radiation and everything in between. They always protected each other's backs and made it through.
But nowadays, instead of trying to keep him in the car, she's finding his wallet in the washing machine, and his keys in the freezer. She's turning off the stove and ensuring that the car engine isn't left running in the garage.
It broke her to see him brilliant mind like this. The brilliant mind that had saved her life in more ways than one. The brilliant mind that had created stories that he could no longer remember off the top of his head. It wasn't just his stories that were hazy; his silver linings were going too. His impulsiveness that had yanked those wires all those years ago was leaving him too.
His mind was going, and so were her joints. All her old injuries had finally started catching up with her. The added bonus of arthritis didn't help. She was getting too old for this.
Whenever she holds the brochures in her hands, she can never bring herself to open them. She can't help but feel like she's betraying him. He had always been there for her, and here she was, ready to send him away.
"You can't keep doing this forever," Alexis kept telling her. "Especially not on your own."
Alexis always offered to have them move in to her place, but Kate's never ready to give him up.
One day, she calls Alexis completely in tears.
"He doesn't remember Nikki Heat."
Later that day, they sit at the kitchen table surrounded by pamphlets and brochures.
She always figured she'd take a bullet and her plucky sidekick would follow suit.
She never thought it would be like this.