Author's Note: Here I go finally diving in! My first ever FanFiction is my take on what might happen when Beckett's secret comes out. A great big Hug and Thank YOU to McFluffy and Tux. You girls got me writing for real and then checked me twice! Thank you so very much.
Disclaimer: We all know who these characters belong to. No copyright infringement intended.
The door to the group study room was wide open, so he hasn't yet realized she's found him. He's slumped forward in a chair over by the window. A little conversation spot in a room dominated by large wood tables lined with chairs.
Her breath comes a little easier now. She's done with the running. At least she knew to come straight here, so there was less of it than there could have been. But still, way more than he ever deserved.
She continues to stand in the doorway, studying him as she catches her breath. His hands run roughly through his hair. She sees his fingertips dig into his scalp. Does he think she wouldn't think to look for him here? Does he think she wouldn't come after him at all?
She wonders if she'd bothered to call his mother, if Martha would know again that this was where he was. Somehow she doesn't think he's called his mother. Doesn't think he's talked to anyone. Like her, he just escaped the precinct and came straight here.
The first smile since early that morning quirks her lips. Well, it's a start. And it might give him and her, too, just enough to hold onto to get them through these next moments. She quietly unhooks her cuffs from her belt, then walks softly over to him, pausing just out of his line of sight.
He hasn't stirred, too lost in his own head to hear her approach. She thrusts her cuffs at him.
"You're going to need these for your first Citizen's arrest."
He startles, looking up. She falters in her plan when her eyes meet his. His unguarded eyes. She staggers, her breath a sharp knife in her chest.
She's always felt a million tiny threads, like spider's silk, binding her to him in the moment their eyes lock together. A ragged moan slips unheard from her lips, as she drops her head, severing those searing silk threads of connection between them.
Her eyes focus on her cuffs, still held out to him. She sticks with the plan, trying to find steady ground for them. She shakes the cuffs at him. "I did it first. Here, in fact. Now it's your turn. Citizens arrest, Castle."
He moves suddenly, his hands knocking the cuffs from her grasp. Then he's got a tight hold on her arms, fingertips that were just moments ago digging into his scalp are now making tiny little full moons of pain along the inside of her biceps.
He shakes her slightly. His fingers flex on her arms, reasserting his hold on her. His thumbs restlessly, almost brutally, caress her shoulders. His words assault her. Cut into her in ways nothing ever has.
"I trusted you. I gave you the space you wanted. Like I always have." A sound too much like a laugh tumbles out of him, but it's the words he's choking on. "Kate, did you think I would walk way? Please. I lost that power years ago. You should know this already."
He takes a moment to just breathe. Inhaling through his nose deep, cleansing breaths he holds for a moment in his lungs then lets whoosh out his mouth. He desperately wants to pull her back to him, but fights the impulse. Refuses to let her hide any longer. They must finish this. Move past it. He grabs hold of the line she threw out. Something to carry them through, he knows. He knows her.
"Citizen's arrest, huh? What's the crime, exactly, Detective?" He can't quite pull off the playful tone in his voice, but he's managed to get the words out and that's enough. He maintains his hold on her, but gentles his grip. She won't be running or hiding. Not a chance.
"I murdered a perfectly good partnership. In fact, the only true partnership I've ever had."
His hands fall from her shoulders and she takes the opportunity to step in closer to him, burying her face in the crook of his neck, taking her own stab at just breathing. Every inhale envelops her in the calming balm of his unique scent, the words to describe it just out of her reach.
His arms have encircled her now, pulling her tight against his chest. She snakes her arms around his middle and clings tight as he finds his voice again. "Just...Just tell me why, Kate."
He's grabbed her arms again, like before. As if he could keep her from spinning out of control. Bring her back to center so they can finally finish this. This wound has festered too long now. He'd allowed it. He had. He knew she was hiding something from him. Knew it and choose the path of least resistance with her again. Let the knowledge slide away. Hoping like a fool that it would somehow work itself right without them having to make sense of it.
He pushes her back. Relentless in his need to separate them. If he can just manage to keep her at arms length, maybe he can hold together long enough to get through it. Get to stable ground before they both fall together. If he can just manage to steady his breath. Her words had torn holes in his chest. Their partnership is not dead. Not by a long shot.
She hears him breaking apart in those stuttered breaths. She dares a glance at his eyes. No tears falling, but they're shimmering dangerously in his eyes. His eyes. Hell, she already is crying. She sees the evidence of it on his shoulder. Damp patches darkening the deep purple impossibly deeper. She holds her silence like a talisman against him. If she can just manage to find the right words to explain. If he'll give her more time though she long ago used up all her extra minutes.
"This is us, Kate. Us. I can't...I don't..." He takes another deep, ragged breath. "I cannot NOT be with you, so you'd better start helping me make sense of this. Of us. Kate, please. Please, Kate."
He breaks, like she knew he would. And she burrows once more into him, whispering into his soaked neck, "I'm sorry. I am so sorry. I am a fool. A stupid, foolish fool."
His fierce hold of her loosens and he begins stroking his hands down her hair to rub soothingly against her back. He feathers kisses along the crown of her hair, and allows one hand to wander into her hair, his fingertips ghosting over her scalp, coaxing her words out.
"I thought I was keeping you safe. Keeping me safe. My ravaged heart that could never survive your loss."
She's tired of always having to have a plan where he is concerned. Never just letting go with him. Just let them be. Be whatever. And suddenly all the tension and fight is gone from her body. She's nearly boneless in his arms.
She realizes the battle was lost before it ever begun. She is a fool. A stupid, foolish fool. How could she ever have believed his loss would somehow hurt less, be somehow manageable if she withheld her most intimate self from him?
"I love you, Rick." She finally lifts her head, so she can bring her lips to his cheek, pressing light kisses along his jaw and up to his ear, where she whispers again, "Rick, I love you."
He holds her tightly again for a moment more, his voice a soft whisper into her neck. "Thank you." Then he's pushing her away from him for the last time. A smile now gracing his ravaged features, pulling her out of the hole they'd fallen in. "Hey, I got an idea."
"Yeah?" She meets his smile with her own. Could it be that easy? Was it ever that easy?
"Forget about the damn citizen's arrest. I never wanted your cuffs." His eyes meet hers again, spinning delicate webs of knowledge and faith and love between them. The pain is still there, but it's been overwhelmed again, as it always has been by how she makes him happy.
"Coffee?" They say together. And then the laughing starts and he pulls her back into his embrace, holds her tight for a moment longer, presses a kiss near her ear, then tucks her into his side and begins walking with her. Time to go look for that coffee.
She stops them as they are making their way down the steps of the New York City Public Library. She's not sure how they managed to get outside without one word. Just being beside each. Yeah, that was enough. For now. And if he got a bit frisky with his hands here and there, well, she's definitely not complaining.
He tugs on her, trying to get her moving again, but she's turned away to look back at the library.
"What, Beckett?"
"How many times, Castle?" She whispers to him.
"How many times?" He's not following her for once. She's a bit surprised.
"How many times have we been in this library at the same time over the years and never once bumped into each other?"
"Ahh. That's easy."
"Really?" Her tone is one of complete disbelief. He can't possible know the number.
"Never, Beckett. Not once." He sounds sure of himself, but sees disbelief in her questioning eyes. "You and I? In the same place? At the same time? We would ALWAYS come together. Always, my dear detective."