Castle closes the lid of the laptop with his heart in his stomach, the taste of bile in his throat and guilt weighing heavy in his chest. It's his fault – the massacre of Kate's former AG team, their unnecessary separation, all of it. At least, that's what it looks like after watching the video made by his past self.
And now his mind is rioting because of it, confusion and conflict taking over, having the truth feel so close, so tangible, but-
I am erasing our mind for a reason, to protect Kate. Because if she found out then she will die.
His stomach twists, churns with nausea, and he buries his face in his hands, cuts the short half moons of his fingernails into his scalp. Will Kate ever be safe? Could she ever be safe with him?
"Rick?" Hayley's voice is a muffled call from beside him. He's barely able to wrap his head around it all, doesn't know if he wants to.
But the click of a gun sparks clarity through his system with ease, puts any and all decisions on hold.
"Back away from him."
Castle jerks his attention towards the front entrance of the hotel room, his eyebrows sky rocketing at the sight of his wife approaching, her gun raised and trained on Hayley. And he has absolutely no idea what is going on, but it definitely isn't good.
"Kate?" He rises with confusion, an instinctual spark of eagerness at her presence, and Beckett signals for him to stand beside her with the tilt of her head. "Beckett, I thought you had that conference in Boston, what's-"
"I got a call from Alexis, made it here as fast as I could," she explains, earning a groan of exasperation from Hayley across the room, but Beckett ignores the sound of agitation, focuses solely on him. "Rick, on my side."
Castle approaches her with caution, but each flicker of her eyes towards him is protective, insistent, divided with the fury that flares to life in her gaze each time it returns to Hayley.
"Captain, you don't understand," Hayley sighs, but Kate doesn't waver, her shoulders rigid with tension, loosening by only a fraction once he's standing next to her.
"Kate, I think there really has been a misunderstanding-"
"No, Alexis called me this morning, told me Hayley was acting suspicious and it set off a red flag for her. I promised her I'd be on the first flight out so I-"
"Kate?" Alexis calls out from her room, her heels clicking on the hardwood floor as she rushes in with her blue eyes wide, realization rippling through her gaze and spreading pink to her cheeks. "You – you didn't get my message?"
Beckett's brow creases. "What message? I just landed and caught a cab here, but I had my phone off-"
"Oh no," Alexis groans, covering her face with her hands and scraping them through the flames of her hair.
"You called Kate?" Castle asks, watching his daughter squirm a little before she swallows down her nerves, lifts her chin with that hint of defiance he knows all too well.
"Yeah, I just thought – I was going to investigate and I didn't know if it was safe to leave you alone with Hayley while I thought she was potentially dangerous-"
"So you called Kate and asked her to fly across the country to look out for me?" he demands, narrowing his gaze in disapproval.
"No, I asked for her advice," Alexis defends, crossing her arms over her chest. "She offered to fly out and nothing I said was going to change that."
"She's right," Kate murmurs, but her gun is descending to her side and Castle breathes a sigh of relief. The last thing they need is a shootout in his hotel room. "And you weren't answering your phone either, so you can't blame her."
"But Kate, I made a mistake," Alexis sighs, shifting from foot to foot. " Hayley lied, but she isn't a threat."
"Lied?" Beckett picks up on, holstering her weapon. "About?"
"It's quite the long story," Hayley offers, still sitting on the couch with her hands half raised. "Perhaps your husband can tell it while he packs his things? If you don't mind, I'm rather tuckered out."
"Yeah, yeah we should do that," he nods, placing his palm to the small of his wife's back, more of that adrenaline induced tension draining beneath his touch. "Everything's fine, Kate, I promise. Hayley's still one of the good guys."
Kate's eyes drift back towards the other woman while she stands from the couch with her attention on Beckett, one hand still up in supplication.
"For the most part, yes," Hayley mumbles, earning an apologetic quirk of Beckett's lips, one he's seen before, forced and so very strained.
"Sorry about that."
"No worries, your loyalty to your love is admirable," Hayley smiles back, inducing a tentative albeit genuine grin from his wife this time. "I'll see the three of you bright and early tomorrow morning, assuming we're still taking the same flight home?"
"I'll let you know," Castle answers with a nod before Hayley disappears into her room, but Alexis still eyes him with skepticism simmering in her gaze.
"Why would our flight plans change?" his daughter questions, but Castle merely shrugs.
"I was just talking to Hayley about maybe sticking around the city another day, taking you up on your idea of enjoying the beach," he muses, sliding his hand to curl at the bone of Kate's hip, remembering too late that his daughter is watching like a hawk. "But it was just an idea, nothing set in stone, Pumpkin."
"That'd be nice," Alexis agrees with reluctance, drifting in a few steps closer. "Are you going to come with us, Kate?"
Beckett's spine begins to stiffen, each knob of her vertebrae tightening, and Castle squeezes her hip. It's her call, whether or not she wants to clue Alexis in on the true status of their relationship. He's too worn down to put in the work required to hide it anymore, not when it was useless this entire time.
"Unless you were hoping for some one on one time with your dad, I'd like to," Kate murmurs, leaning into his side, one of her arms sneaking up to hook her thumb in the back belt loop of his jeans. "I took a couple of days off and bought a one way ticket at the airport, so my schedule is pretty much free."
"Yeah, and I can book you a ticket on our flight home if we extended our stay," Castle adds, this idea he made up on the spot shaping up to be a nice one, almost nice enough to make him forget all of the ugly truths he's learned tonight, how he'll eventually have to share them with Kate.
He can't handle any more secrets.
"Were you two ever even separated?" Alexis inquires, her brow curving, but her eyes glinting with mischief rather than the betrayal he had feared. His daughter is brilliant, perceptive, and he's certain she's aware that more is going on than she realizes, but she's leaving it alone for now, exuding acceptance instead, and he couldn't be more grateful.
"For maybe a couple of weeks," Kate hedges, sagging with some relief against him. Her relationship with Alexis has always been tentative, but over the last couple of years, he had seen it flourish into something stronger, mutual trust and respect built between the two, and he knew his wife had worried that their separation would dash all of her progress made with Alexis.
Luckily, that doesn't seem to be the case.
"Longest weeks of my life," Castle mutters, turning his head to smear his lips to Kate's temple.
"I'm honestly too tired to ask why we're keeping it a secret tonight, but I expect an explanation tomorrow," Alexis states, flicking her eyes between the two of them before releasing a deep breath and stepping forward, towards Kate with her arms raised to band around Beckett's shoulders.
His wife slips from his grasp to accept the unexpected hug from his daughter, patting between her shoulder blades when Alexis releases a sigh that trembles through her frame.
"Even though it turned out to be a false alarm," Alexis murmurs, lifting her apologetic gaze to him from over Kate's shoulder. "Thanks for coming."
"I'd do it again in a heartbeat," he listens to Kate assure her and Alexis pulls back, straightening with a soft smile.
"I know you would." Alexis reaches over to hook her arm around his neck, pressing a kiss to his cheek. "I'll see you both in the morning."
"Sweet dreams, honey," Castle calls to her as she disappears into the other room, some of the anxiety he had watched her carry all day dissipating with each step until she closes the door.
Kate turns to face him once they're alone in the living room area, waiting a single beat before she lurches forward to twine her arms around his neck, bury her face in the warm skin of his throat where she often seeks refuge, and Castle cradles her back, seals her body in tight against his.
"It's okay," he reassures her, practically able to feel all of the horrible possibilities that had likely swarmed her brain the second Alexis had called, stayed with her throughout her journey across the country, still running rampant through her mind and leaking through her veins. "Bad flight?"
"The worst," she breathes, fisting her fingers in his hair. "I thought you would be injured or held hostage or - or dead," she croaks, and Castle nudges his nose to the bone of her cheek, coaxes her from the hideout of his neck to cover her mouth with a kiss.
He whispers an apology into her lips, and then another, but Kate shakes her head, cups his cheek in her palm.
"I'm just glad you're okay," she mumbles into the corner of his mouth, her lashes fluttering closed against his cheek in a moment of respite.
"Me too, and honestly, glad you're here," he admits, gliding his hands down her sides to settle over her hips. "I missed you and you made the most badass entrance ever."
"Nearly shooting Hayley?"
"Well, if you disregard that part…"
"Castle."
She's chuckling, soft sounds of amusement slipping past her teeth as she rocks forward to touch her smile to his, stain his lips with her laughter. He has so much to tell her, so many things that will likely rob her of laughter for a while, and he intends to reveal everything tonight, everything he knows, that is, but first, he yearns for just a moment of time with his wife that isn't shrouded with the darkness of unbidden secrets and conspiracies.
"Want to come see my room this time?"
Kate pierces her bottom lip with her teeth, pins the seductive smile, and arches her brow.
"This time?"
"Yeah, Beckett. Last time you and I were in a fancy hotel room in Los Angeles, bad timing caused us to miss out on an amazing opportunity," he quips, already guiding her backwards with his hands on her waist. They've talked about that trip to LA nearly five years ago, about all of the lines they had nearly crossed, and even he could acknowledge it had been all wrong back then. Her former training officer dead, her relationship with Josh still in tact, and both of their hearts in a mess.
But tonight, with her wedding ring on her finger, a glimmering smile on her lips and her eyes alight with arousal and adoration, he wants to make a new memory far better than the old.
"Mm, yeah," she murmurs, teasing the buttons of his shirt free from their holes as he kicks the bedroom door shut behind him. "Still amazed, Castle?"
His heart skips a little at that, the fact that she remembers his words, and Castle grins, lifts his hands to cradle her face in his hands, dust his lips over hers how he had wanted to all those years ago on that couch.
"Yes," he whispers, tracing his thumb along the delicate shell of her ear as her arms lace around his neck to draw him closer, her body rising into him. And yeah, even now, she still leaves him in awe of every part of her. "Even more so now."