A/N: I love the whole family dynamic Beckett and Ryan have, how they sort of seem like siblings sometimes, so this is just a little one-shot about that. Enjoy! Disclaimer: I don't own Castle.
First time they'd ever met he'd saved her life.
She'd been on the job a few years, but he was a rookie. Captain Montgomery had only brought him into the Twelfth a few days before when he'd gotten a request for backup over his radio. He'd been driving him, he replied. He was off duty. He was a rookie, he'd wanted to add. Rookies don't get called for urgent jobs at night.
The woman on the other end snapped, "I don't care, you're the closest. You want a killer to go free?"
He took a deep breath, steeling his nerves, quickly responded, "On my way," and let go of his radio. With no one listening, the windows sealed against the cold air, he shouted every expletive he knew.
And then he drove faster.
When he arrived at the old shutdown restaurant a minute later, the street was dark, and there was one car parked outside (he assumed it belonged to the cop who'd radio'ed.
He left his hat in the car and checked his holster to make sure his gun was there and ready. Even working in the prisons he'd never had to shoot anybody with it. He slipped inside the already open door, hand on his firearm, ready.
The inside was dark as well and he resisted the urge to call out. He swore again, inwardly; he'd left his flashlight on his dashboard. He pulled out his gun and held it up, his elbow not quite locked. It was shaking too much.
This was bad, really bad. He didn't have a clue what these circumstances were: how many cops, how many killers, and which was which when he found them. That was the problem, if a plainclothes cop had called; he'd heard of situations where cops had gotten shot because the killer convinced them they were the police. Though his training officer had told him that, who knew how true it was?
Still, he really wished the woman on the radio had told him what kind of help she needed.
He tiptoed to a door, slightly open, light shining dimly around it. He didn't hear anything on the other side. With one quick movement he pushed his way inside.
The two people—one female, one male—instantly turned and leveled their hands at him. On instinct he put his hands up.
"Rookie," the woman snapped. "You're a rookie?"
So she was the cop. No guessing games here.
"Sorry, you said-"
"Would you put your gun up?"
"Sorry, yeah." He swung his gun arm at the man. She'd aimed again at the criminal the moment she'd deduced who her back-up was.
The man watched this exchange with an air of uncaring, and it unnerved him. He seemed to have walked into a stalemate, effectively tipping the odds, but the man just smirked. "Well, Detective, you have a decision to make."
He turned, bringing his weapon to point at what his rookie eyes hadn't noticed; a small unconscious child lay against some fleabitten blankets. At least, he hoped she was only unconscious. Her wrists were thin, tied to a hook nailed into the wall. The light blond hair was grey with dust, and her face looked grey-tinged and grimy, her cheeks and eyesockets hollowed and sunken. He wanted to puke. She was so tiny, she couldn't be older than four.
"She alive?" he muttered.
"I don't know," the detective replied. She glanced at the girl and the killer seized the moment.
He saw the hand move, though it was quick as lightning; he was quicker, however, and dove at the woman. They both crashed to the ground and the bullet hit the brick walls. The woman shot, managed to get his knee, and he fell, howling in pain. Several cops burst through the door and fell on him, securing his weapon and cuffing him. The detective and the rookie scrambled to their feet and dropped beside the girl.
"She's alive," he announced.
She picked the girl up, gently untying the knots securing her to the wall. She cradled her in her lap, and the rookie finally had the chance to take in the detective's appearance. She was younger than him by several years, in her mid-twenties, really young for a detective flying solo. He had been about her age when he'd been in the Academy. Her hair was dark and about shoulder length and her eyes looked haunted as she watched the little girl sleep, waiting for an ambulance.
"Here," he said, pulling off his jacket and wrapping it around the girl. The detective looked up to give him a small smile; she didn't have a jacket.
"I left mine at the precinct," she explained. "I'm Detective Kate Beckett."
"Officer Kevin Ryan. You're at the Twelfth?"
"Yeah. You too?" He nodded, and she mimicked the action. She watched the girl, holding her comfortingly. After a minute she glanced up again. "Thanks for saving me. It was good, for a rookie."
He grinned. "No problem."
Two years later she'd ended up as his boss when he'd been promoted to detective. He had a feeling she'd requested him for her task force, though he'd never asked. He knew that would be awkward for her, since she never really let on that she actually like people.
One day in January they had just finished up a tough case, the single mom of a couple teenagers, the oldest of whom had just started college. It had turned out to be a colleague of the victim who wanted a promotion. After cases Ryan could usually find his boss at her desk, filling out paperwork, but this time she'd passed it off to him and then disappeared. He didn't really take note of it until he needed her to sign the forms. He stood up, ready to call out, and realized she wasn't there. Her computer was still on and her stuff was still at her desk, but she was nowhere in sight.
Although to be honest Ryan wasn't sure why he was there either. It was well past one in the morning. But she'd given him the paperwork, so he was doing it. And after the day they'd just had, he didn't dare argue.
He sat there for a moment, unsure of what to do. It was unlike his boss to not be at her desk, and he'd never had to deal with the situation. Finally he stood and went to find her.
"Hey, boss?" he called lightly. Literally no one else was in the precinct, which freaked him out a little. Everyone was always a little jumpy after a case like that. "Beckett?" he called again.
No answer.
The light in the break room was on, so he went in. She was curled up on the couch, staring at nothing. Her thoughts were evidently elsewhere. Her eyes were red-rimmed and she clutched a pillow to her stomach. Haunted, Ryan thought. She looked haunted. He realized that he didn't know much about his superior's past. Looking so vulnerable, he couldn't help but use her first name. "Kate?" he asked.
Her eyes shifted to him. She pushed herself up and reached for the papers. "Here, I'll take them." He waited as she signed them messily on her knee. "Here you go," she said quietly, wiping her eyes indiscreetly.
"Are you, uh, okay?"
She shook her head, and he made to see what was wrong, but she sniffled, "I'm fine."
He sat down quickly beside her, putting an arm around her shoulder comfortingly. "No, you're not, what's wrong?" He thought of everything that was going on right now. "Is it Sorenson?"
"No, no, Will's fine."
"What then? What's wrong?" He made her look into his eyes. "You know you can trust me, right? I've always got your back."
She coughed and nodded. Ryan had never in the past few years seen her like this. "It's January 9th," she said quietly.
He didn't know what that meant to her. It was true, it was after midnight, but he didn't know why it was important. He looked at her questioningly.
She took a deep breath and said, "Today is the day that my mother died."
He didn't answer, but pulled her closer to him so she could cry on his shoulder. He knew that her mother had died, but he hadn't known when. He was also curious as to how she had died, but he wasn't sure if he was that brave.
Maybe at any other time, when it wasn't two in the morning and they weren't sitting on the couch in the break room in the empty precinct, when she wasn't crying and it wasn't the anniversary of her mother's death, maybe then he'd chicken out. But he only had one shot to ask. "How…" he almost backed out when she glanced at him with watery green eyes, "how'd your mom die? She was…she was pretty young, right?"
She nodded. "Yeah, she was young. She…she was murdered."
Ryan felt something drop in his stomach. "Wh-why?"
She shrugged. "We don't know. No one knows. They said it was random gang fighting and they never found the killer."
"Oh, Kate, I'm so sorry," he said, hugging her. She didn't respond, just wiped her eyes again. He couldn't remember ever calling her by her first name, but he thought what with the personal subject just calling her Beckett wouldn't work.
She leaned on him for a bit, letting him hold onto her, breathing shallowly and trying to compose herself. Finally she sat up straight, and he let go. "Sorry, I-"
"It's fine," he insisted with a shake of his head.
She smiled gratefully at him and stood up. "Now that you're done we should head home," she said. At the door she looked back. "Hey, Ryan?"
"Hmm?"
"Thanks. Not just for tonight, for coming to help that night we met, even though you were off duty and you were a rookie and you sucked." They both grinned, and she continued. "Thanks for being part of my team."
He shrugged. "No problem, it's nothing."
She gave him one last smile before disappearing.
So that was why she'd taken this case so personally. Similar, and so close—it was like the world was coming back to throw its own sick irony in her face. Ryan didn't like that one bit.
He might've been less experienced, and under her command, and he knew she could handle herself in a firefight, but Ryan always felt like he needed to protect her, like he was responsible for her. Ryan had younger sisters, and he felt the same way about them. He would protect her and help her and be on her side no matter what.
A/N: Hope you liked it! Don't forget to let me know what you thought. (: -Indy