Title: Too Meta
Author: Cschick
Summary: Just a quick little missing scene from the episode Nikki Heat. How did Castle say no to Natalie?
When Natalie stalked into the room with her hair dyed brunette, her clothing an almost-exact match to Beckett's, Rick Castle's ability to distinguish between reality and fiction momentarily collapsed.
It was Beckett standing in front of him . . . and it was Nikki Heat. It was the manifestation of every quality that he admired in Beckett, with every desire he'd incorporated into Nikki. It was, for the moment, a figure of his imagination appearing in the world of his reality. "Just like I dreamed it . . ."
With that look of sarcasm that was all her own, Beckett made him aware he'd made that statement aloud. He tried to stay behind, to listen to her comments on the situation, but his feet followed that figment made real into the hallway, down to the elevator, as Beckett faded away from his side.
The warm reality of her lips encountering his suddenly brought his brain out of its daze, returned him to the here and now. He smelled the acid scent of the hair dye, saw the thick layer of makeup that created her perfect face, once again saw Natalie hidden beneath the character she'd tried to so perfectly create.
"Hey, hey . . ." he stammered, pushing her away just after the elevator door shut behind them.
She skillfully pouted at him, a frown that carefully did not wrinkle her face, a look that was perhaps Natalie, maybe Nikki, but definitely not Kate Beckett.
"Aren't I exactly what you imagined?" she asked, stretching before him, thrusting her breasts too far into his personal space, artfully tossing her hair back.
He swallowed hastily and took a deep breath, trying desperately to process the situation. This he recognized, this he knew.
The self-centered desire to pull every eye to herself, to be exactly who she wanted to be in each moment. The ability to convince everyone that she was someone other than herself, to play a part to the hilt. The talent to hide her inability to figure who out she was under the characters she created. He had seen it in his mother, he had seen it in his ex-wives.
He had fallen for it too many times.
"You are Nikki Heat," he responded, smiling at her while he carefully slid himself along the wall and out of her embrace.
"And you are Rook. Come be Rook with me."
That demand cleared the final hazes of the fiction from his mind. He was not Rook, she was not Nikki. This was not Kate Beckett standing in front of him, her clothing professional and her face open and honest. This was Natalie Rhodes, her clothing provocative, her face a mask.
"No." He did not even allow himself to consider the proposal.
The confusion and shock twisted her face, making her not Nikki, not Kate, but only Natalie. "No?"
"Rook is fiction, Nikki is fiction. You may live fiction, but I only write fiction."
A wave of anger swept across her face, and she stepped away from him, crossing her arms across her chest. Now, despite the hair, despite the clothing, he only saw Natalie.
"I don't get it."
The elevator doors opened onto the ground floor and he stepped out, leaving Natalie glaring after him. "Good night, Natalie."