Like I said in the summary, this is set between Montgomery's shooting and Kate's shooting in the season 3 finale. Hence the title!

In the Crossfire

It had been four hours since he had watched her bent over the body of Montgomery. Four hours since her world had imploded. And although he was trying his hardest, he knew there was very little he could say or do that would make any of what had happened okay except be with her. Not that that seemed to be helping much either; she had a million questions and he had no answers, not a single one. He was beginning to think he was out of his depth, had been for a long time now when it came to Kate Beckett.

He thought of her in his arms, kicking and struggling, begging him to let her go and let her run right back to the firing squad, the pack of wolves out for her blood and how her words and struggles had only made him hold onto her tighter, determined not to let that happen. Her voice when she had screamed for him to let her go was like nothing he had heard before. The desperation, the way it had sounded as if her heart were breaking right there, in his arms… he would do anything for her, anything to make her feel better, give her anything she asked for, but not that. He wouldn't let her go, not for anything, and he knew she had known all along, even as she had pleaded for him to do it.

He had to had to physically hold her up afterwards, after she saw Montgomery lying there. She had sobbed and it had been far worse that her tears now. He hadn't thought her capable of such awful emotions, or rather he hadn't ever seen her lose control before. He had said her name over and over, desperate to get through to her but she had only kept shaking her head. He had thought she was never going to stop, but when Ryan and Esposito had arrived it was as if a switch had been flicked in her head. Suddenly she was standing without him supporting her, her cheeks were dry and her voice was relatively steady; he was the only one who could hear the tremble in her voice. She would no longer meet his eyes and he knew she was ashamed of her grief. He had felt her beginning to shut him out, close up and lock whatever it was she was feeling away somewhere deep inside of her and he was desperate not to let that happen.

Which was why there was nowhere else he would rather be right at that moment that sitting on her sofa, while she sat next to him looking broken. He knew she didn't want him there (or wouldn't admit that she did). That she was fighting him, silently.

"Leave me alone," she whispered. "I want to be alone."

"I can't do that, Kate," he said, almost regretfully.

"Won't," she corrected.

"Perhaps," he agreed almost conversationally. "But either way, I'm staying."

She looked at him and rather than the fury he was expecting, there was something akin to a smile on her face.

"Alright," she agreed.

Taking this as an invitation, he sat next to her, close enough that he could reach out and touch her hand if he needed to, but far enough away to give her the space that he knew she wanted and needed.

"Why? Why did he do it, Castle?"

Whether she was talking about the series of events that had led to her mother's death, or simply what had happened four hours earlier in the hangar, he didn't know. It didn't matter.

"Kate, don't do this to yourself," he told her softly.

"Do what, Castle?" She asked, looking up. "Blame myself?" She gave a short, derisive laugh, her lips twisting into something that was a bad parody of a smile.

"It was not your fault. Kate, he did what he had to. He knew what he was doing."

"No," she said, shaking her head. "No. I should have done something."

She was silent for a moment, then her head snapped up and her gaze was focused firmly on him. She suddenly no longer looked as if she were crying, her expression hard and unforgiving.

"You shouldn't have been there, Castle," she accused. "You shouldn't have taken me out."

"What was I supposed to do, Kate?" He demanded, his anger rising despite knowing that she didn't mean what she said. "Let them shoot you too?"

"This is your fault!" Kate cried, her voice rising. "You shouldn't have been there! I told you, I told you we were done, and you still came back. You never listen! If you hadn't come back, then Montgomery might still be alive."

"No, Kate, if I hadn't gotten you out of there, you might be lying on the slab next to Montgomery's in the morgue."

He hadn't meant to be so blunt but it had come out that way anyway. Kate was staring at him, her mouth slightly parted, a shell-shocked look on her face. For a moment she sat frozen like that, silent and unmoving, as if she were watching a particularly gripping part in a movie and was no longer aware of her surroundings.

Then, like floodwater bursting a dam, her tears were back, two times worse than before. She bent her head forward, allowing her hair to fall around her face like a curtain, shutting her off from him.

"Kate," he said in a gentler voice.

She didn't respond, but her sobs now were loud and wracking. He apprehensively reached out a hand and rested it on her shoulder, waiting for her to physically push him away, to tell him to get out and never come back.

Instead she mumbled, "Castle. I should have saved him. He died because of me."

"Oh Kate," he murmured. "You being there wouldn't have saved him. They'd have shot you and then killed him."

Her sobs were awful now; the noise was beginning to physical hurt him, somewhere in his stomach, or perhaps his heart. He wanted to make her stop, for himself as much as for her.

"Kate, come on," he tried. "You'll make yourself sick."

"Make myself sick?" She echoed contemptuously, and she looked sideways at him through her hair. "I don't care. I don't care anymore."

"Don't say that," he said automatically. "Don't you say that. You owe it to Montgomery to carry on."

She was shaking her head again, back to despair.

"I can't, Castle, I can't."

His hand was still on her shoulder and he let his hand fall slowly to rest on the small of her back, holding his other arm out. Accepting his offer of comfort, Kate half climbed, half crawled into his arms and he enclosed her tightly in his hold.

"God, it hurts, Castle," she said, her face pressed against his shoulder.

"I know it does," he said, a hand playing with the ends of her hair. "I know."

He listened to her crying for a few minutes, the sound no more bearable than it had been earlier. Her grief might as well have been his grief, he felt it just as sharply on her behalf.

"I'm so sorry, Kate," he murmured against her hair, and he was, sorry for everything bad that had ever happened to her and which he couldn't do a thing about. He trailed his fingers up and down her spine slowly, waiting patiently for her to cease crying. He wanted to say something comforting, but there was nothing. He was just as shocked as she was by how fast things had changed over the past 24 hours. Montgomery…well, he'd had no idea, had never suspected that Montgomery had been a part of her mother's murder. And now he was dead, unable to give Kate any answers, or even an explanation. Castle could only imagine what she was feeling. Kate was not one to trust easily, but he knew that she had trusted Montgomery with her life. To think that all this time…

"Castle?" Her voice broke his reverie and he looked down at the top of her head, his hand stilling and coming to a rest on the small of her back.

"Yes?"

"Thank you for being there. Earlier. For…for stopping me, I mean. When Montgomery…"

She stopped, unable to continue, and he understood.

"Of course, Kate. You know I've always got your back."

He could feel her nodding briefly before she sat up, wiping her cheeks with the heels of her hands. She stood up and he watched as she made her way to the kitchen, opening a cupboard and pulling something out. A bottle. He recognized the honey colored liquid at once, as she silently poured two tumblers without asking him whether he actually wanted a drink.

She brought the glasses back to him, handing him one and taking a long sip of her own. He swallowed some of the whiskey, letting it warm his throat.

Kate took a deep breath.

"I don't know how I feel, Castle. How am I supposed to feel?"

"However you feel is fine," he replied.

"I feel…I feel betrayed. He knew, Castle, he knew all along and he never said anything, never tried to tell me…and I don't know how I'm supposed to forgive him for that. But that doesn't stop me from…from missing him. It's my fault he's dead. He did that for me. How can I be angry at somebody and miss them at the same time?"

A frown creased her forehead and she took another long sip from her drink, almost draining the glass.

"There's no textbook way to feel, Kate," he told her softly. "People feel the craziest things, you know. You can hate somebody and love somebody at the same time. Just like you're allowed to be angry with him. But that doesn't mean you can't miss him too."

She sighed and finished her glass, resting it on the coffee table. He couldn't imagine it had really helped her all that much; she certainly didn't look as if she felt any better but he supposed it would be a very long time before she felt that.

Kate ran a shaky hand through her hair and turned to face him fully. Even in the half-light of her apartment he could easily see the brightness of her eyes which he was willing to bet wasn't caused by the whiskey alone.

"How am I still here?" She asked him, her voice betraying her. "I should have died. I should be dead."

He had an overwhelming urge to stop her from talking, from saying these god-awful things.

"Kate-"

"You know it's true," she interrupted before he could say anything. "I'm always dodging bullets. Usually metaphorical ones rather than literal ones, but still. When's my luck going to run out?"

"Stop it," he told her firmly. "Stop thinking like that."

"Everything's such a mess, Castle. I don't know what I'm supposed to do anymore. Who I'm supposed to trust."

He stood up, placing his half-drunk glass of whiskey next to hers and straightening up in front of her. His hands came to rest on her forearms, his thumbs softly rubbing gentle circles.

"You can trust me," he told her. "Always."

She nodded, letting out a shaky breath.

"I know. But…"

But it wasn't enough. He knew that. One person is never enough. You need people around you, so that if one person ends up letting you down you still have others to turn to.

She closed her eyes tightly, swaying slightly on the spot. He slid his hands slowly up her arms to rest at her shoulders but still she kept her eyes shut and he suspected that she was fighting the urge to cry again.

"I can't do this anymore," she whispered finally. "I can't carry on fighting this battle."

She started to cry again, closing her eyes even more tightly to fight off the tears that were falling regardless of her efforts, cutting a line straight down her cheeks. Automatically his own arms closed around her and his right hand began rubbing her back slowly while the other hand was pushed into her hair, tangling his fingers with her curls. It was reassuring to feel her, warm, soft, real. Alive.

"Kate," he murmured, and all the sympathy, the pain he felt on her behalf was betrayed in that one syllable, simply by the way in which he said her name.

He could feel her half shaking her head, her face firmly buried out of sight beneath her hair and against his chest.

"I'm sorry," she blurted out.

Her voice was muffled, but still he understood every word she said. Her voice was reverberating around his chest, against his heart, and even if it hadn't have been he'd have known what she was saying. He didn't really feel he needed her words anymore, to know what she was feeling or thinking. Perhaps he hadn't for a long time, but was only just realizing it now, tonight. He just knew that she loved him and that she knew that he loved her. It wasn't a sudden, bolt out of the blue type thing, but it hadn't been a slow dawning recognition either. It was just as if he had, somewhere deep within himself, always known, from the very first second he had seen her. How could he not love her? He had always loved her, even before he had known her somehow.

"You don't have to be sorry," he told her.

"Montgomery-" She began but her words were cut off by a sob.

"He made the decision himself, Kate. He did it because he felt he had to."

Her next words were not as easy to distinguish, and yet he still knew. He understood.

"My mother-"

"You haven't let her down," he said, even though she hadn't said those exact words out loud.

"You," she said finally, and at this she pulled herself free of his hold. "You didn't have to be a part of this and I've dragged you into it anyway."

"No, I wanted to be a part of it. I chose to."

She stared at him and he gazed steadily back. She knows, he thought. She knows I'm in love with her. Just like me, she's always known it.

"I can't keep you safe," she whispered.

"I'm not asking you to."

She shook her head and looked away from him. Guilty. He knew she still felt guilty, but there was little left for him to say or do that he hadn't already tried. She was tired and too upset to think straight, let alone listen to reason from him.

(Or was it empty reassurances he was offering her?)

"Kate, it's been a really long day-" He began.

"Oh, you can go home, Castle, I'll be fine," she said, and if it weren't for the fact that five minutes earlier he had been supporting her entire weight while she sobbed then he might actually have believed her; she could be a very convincing liar when it came to needing to push people away. However, as long as the day had seemed, he knew how much longer the night was going to be for her. And perhaps for him, he wasn't acting entirely selflessly.

"That's not what I meant at all," he told her. "I already told you. I'm staying. You're stuck with me. Bad luck."

She almost managed a smile at this and he found himself reaching out almost involuntarily to tuck some of her hair behind her ear.

"I was going to suggest you try to sleep," he told her, letting his hand drop quickly before she had a chance to protest.

"I can't sleep."

"Try," he said again.

She shook her head, but he put a hand on her back and turned her in the direction of her bedroom.

"At least change into pajamas and pretend to try?"

"Fine," she conceded, apparently not feeling up to an argument with the one person she had left.

"Call me when you're done," he added, as she opened her bedroom door.

"Okay," she agreed.

While she changed he drained the rest of his whiskey and then rinsed both glasses. He placed the bottle that she'd left on the counter back in the cupboard, not wanting her to have any more. Drinking might bring a temporary relief, a comforting oblivion for a few hours, but reality always came back ten times worse the next morning. Better to start facing things right now. She knew this herself, after her Dad, but he wanted to make sure.

"Castle?"

He turned around to find her standing in the doorway of her bedroom, dressed in an oversized plum colored t-shirt and black leggings, her hair caught up in a messy bun. She looked exhausted, even if she had told him that she couldn't sleep.

"You're tired, Kate."

She shrugged.

"I still won't be able to sleep. Too much is going on in my head. I can't stop thinking about it all."

She briefly closed her eyes as if trying to block out all the thoughts and he walked over to her.

"Do you want to talk about any of it?"

"No," she said, opening her eyes again. "Not right now. Maybe later. Another day."

"Alright," he agreed. "Another day." He hesitated. "Do you want me to stay with you?"

It was a risky question and he knew it, but his tone was sincere and he didn't think she would misinterpret his meaning.

"Yes."

If she thought it was weird or uncomfortable then she wasn't letting on (although he remembered her excellent poker face), and he cautiously followed her into her bedroom, watching her stop by the side of her bed and turn to look at him.

"I'll bet you're loving this," she said as she pulled back the blankets on her bed.

"What?" He asked, confused.

"Oh come on, Castle, you've been dying to get me into bed for years," she murmured, even conjuring up a half-hearted smile.

"Perseverance really does pay off," he replied, returning her smile in an attempt to make the situation seem less awkward, although as it was he thought they were both doing pretty well.

She sat down on the edge of the bed and he was sure she was rethinking her agreement to this, but then she looked up at him and he could see so clearly on her face that she needed him there. Needed somebody to stop her from losing it altogether. She just didn't like to admit these things. She looked helpless and vulnerable, all of a sudden, two things he thought Kate Beckett could never be, her eyes heavy with grief and tiredness and her hands wringing together apprehensively in her lap.

"It's going to be alright, Kate," he told her softly. "I know it doesn't seem like it now, but one day it will be. It won't be as hard anymore. You'll feel like yourself again. You'll feel okay."

Nodding slowly, she climbed into bed and pulled the sheets up to her neck. He made his way over to the other side of the bed, flicked off the light. He lay down on top of the blankets on his own side, not wanting to cross anymore lines tonight, when he knew how much she valued her space and privacy. Still, she was the one to roll over closer to him, her face just distinguishable in the darkness.

"Rick?" Her voice was soft and low, but he could sense everything she was holding back on.

"Yeah?"

"Did you mean what you said earlier?"

"What did I say?" He asked, frowning and trying to remember anything he had said that might have been out of the ordinary.

"That I could always trust you."

"Of course I meant it, Kate."

"And you'll be here?" she asked tentatively. "If…if things get bad."

He knew what she meant. If the grief took over, as it had done before. If she needed an anchor, somebody to hold her securely while the wave of grief came crashing over her unexpectedly, threatening to cut her adrift and send her spiraling out of control.

"I'm always just a phone call away," he said. "I promise."

He could feel her relax then, turning around and leaning back against him. He wrapped an arm automatically around her waist, resting his hand lightly against her stomach and holding her as tightly as he dared. Her hand came up to rest on the arm he had around her waist, her fingers brushed back and forth over his wrist and forearm slowly. After a few minutes her breathing had become even and steady, her fingers still against his hand, the welcome nothingness of sleep taking over, if only for a few hours and he sighed.

The sight of her asleep, finally, exhausted by everything that had happened, brought little comfort. He was glad that she was no longer awake to dwell on her thoughts and replay images from the day vividly in her mind, but this was only the beginning. Or rather it was the middle, the middle of everything, too far in to stop and go back to the way things used to be, but with no end in sight either. She was caught in the tornado now and while she slept she was merely resting in the eye of the storm, waiting to wake and be hurled back into it. He wasn't going to let it consume her. Nobody was going to take her from him. He might not have a gun or a badge or anything of any worth to do this, but he was going to do it all the same. He was going to save her somehow, if it meant he had to drag her kicking and screaming through the worst parts of her grief and anger, just as had pulled her out of the hanger hours earlier. He was going to fight off her enemies, both real and invisible, the men out there wanting her dead and the phantoms in her head, the ghosts of all kinds of people. They would solve her mother's case, together. He would be there the day she finally did it, holding her hand and telling her that he had always believed she would do it.

And in the end he would have her. Not Detective Beckett, the homicide detective he wrote about, nor Beckett, the woman he flirted with and joked with while he kept her at a safe distance, for her sake rather than his own, but Kate Beckett. Her. Simply the woman he loved.

He didn't know when and he certainly didn't know how, but he just knew. He knew all the same.

Thoughts would be very much appreciated!