A/N: It's been a while, folks. Between some super fun writer's block and grad school, I haven't been writing as much as I'd like. This is a little different from other stuff I've written, but it was inspired by a quote I really love (posted at the end) and I hope you enjoy it.
He asks her to join him in the Hamptons in the middle of a long-winded speech, the suggestion coming out as naturally as the sun rises in the sky each day, and for that reason alone she ignores the flipping of her stomach and assumes it's a joke. He's saying it to say it; a hypothetical, not a legitimate invitation, and so she doesn't give it a response.
So color her surprised when he goes on for a few more minutes and bookends the statement with, "Speaking of off the grid, I was serious about this weekend."
Serious. He was serious.
This is Castle; he's never serious. But about this, she realizes as soon as she looks at him, the clearness of his eyes and nervous energy radiating from his body, he is serious. She starts with a polite decline, a yeah, no on the tip of her tongue, a statement about how some people have to work for a living all but ready to go.
Except that's not what she says. No, what falls from her lips instead is an agreement.
"Sure."
It's simple; one word, four letters, one lousy syllable, but it has him beaming back at her so brightly she doesn't have time to dwell on the creep of panic flooding her system. Sure. It's not at all what she meant to say, her heart speaking before her brain and her mouth siding with the former, but all she can do is offer a smile in return.
The smallest curl of her lips that widens as she takes in the crinkles around his eyes, the pure joy he shows at the acceptance of his offer.
He's practically bouncing in front of her not three seconds later, gently grabbing her arm and guiding her toward her desk, words falling from his mouth a mile a minute. Essentials she needs to remember to pack, things she should bring but aren't absolutely necessary, a list of foods he has available in the house but we can pick up some other things if you're interested and she can barely keep up.
When he's finished relaying his almost-excruciatingly long list of Memorial Day Weekend festivities, despite apparently leaving some out because we need some surprises, Beckett, he makes his departure with mention of picking up supplies and promises to text her more details later.
She remains rooted in place for a few minutes after he's gone, blinking, her bottom lip pinned between her teeth. A small smile pulls at her lips and doesn't fade even as she finishes up the last of her paperwork.
Her relationship with Tom ends later that night and she knows she should feel some sort of sadness over the loss, but she doesn't. He's perfectly sweet and nothing short of a gentleman but she thinks, somewhere deep down, she knew from the beginning it wasn't meant to be.
Pointedly ignoring what might be meant to be, she curls into bed and goes to sleep.
The Hamptons is beautiful and his vacation home is everything she expects and so much more. More space than she knows what to do with, high ceilings that make her feel impossibly small in comparison, and a deck that leads right out onto the beach.
She spends time with his mother and daughter, weight by weight slowly lifting from her shoulders as she laughs with his family and allows herself to relax.
They spend the first two days bantering back and forth with barely-hidden innuendo, dealing with fleeting gazes and barely-there touches that leave her skin burning from where his left a trail.
It's not intentional, until it is.
On the third day he sneaks up on her from behind while they're on the beach, picks her up and—ignoring both the startled squeak that escapes her throat and the demands that he put me down right now, Castle!—runs into the ocean with her flailing her limbs. Halfway through she accepts it and merely grips onto his body as he brings them deeper into the water, grumbling promises to murder him later.
He tosses her a few feet away from him and she uses his to her advantage, remains underwater long enough to swim around him. She hears him calling her from above.
"Beckett!"
A few more seconds.
"Beckett," he repeats, and there's no mistaking the slight hitch of panic in his voice. He wades through the water, swishing it with his arms in an attempt to find her while he paddles to stay afloat. "Kate!"
She pops up then, facing his back, and it takes mere seconds for him to whip back around. There's a smug smirk on her face that falters only barely at the look on his face; the fear gives way as soon as he lays eyes on her, though, and he's the one who got himself into this situation so she doesn't feel bad in the slightest.
"That's not funny."
"It's kind of funny."
What's not funny is the way their eyes lock and the kiss he gives her seconds later, his lips slanting over hers so smoothly it's as if they've done it a million times.
When Royce is murdered and she feels like she's lost yet another vital part of her past, no one can stop her from leaving. Montgomery's not naive enough to believe she's truly taking some much-needed vacation time. He doesn't know for certain she plans to jump across the country, but he can't tell her to stay when he's the one who suggested she's too close to this one.
She tries to be upset when she's escorted to First Class and finds Castle lounging in a seat, champagne glass in hand.
He's not letting her dive head first into this one alone, he tells her. They're partners in more ways than one and they'll do this, like they've been doing everything else, together. She's stuck thousands of miles in the air and unless she wants to stomp back into coach and squeeze between those two men again, she's got nowhere to go. So she sits down, takes the champagne he offers, and levels him with a glare.
"You listen to everything I say."
She has zero jurisdiction in Los Angeles and if things go south, he's not to be in the line of fire.
Even as the words escape her mouth and he's nodding along, promising he'll do nothing stupid, she knows he won't listen. He won't step out of the way and let her take the fall, literally or figuratively, without throwing himself in front of her.
It's what scares her the most, she thinks.
They catch Royce's killer together, a team, and she's overwhelmed with it.
Back at the hotel she allows him to spring for the couples massages and she fights between crying and falling asleep on the small table. In the end she takes slow, deep breaths, and forces herself to relax for at least the duration of the massage, which helps. It's not the fault of the masseuse that she's still rigid where she should feel limber.
"Kate," he says later, after they're alone, and the soft timbre of his voice around her name is all it takes for her to lose it. She finally lets herself breakdown after days of keeping it all in and compartmentalizing, keeping her latent emotions about Royce at bay to get him justice. A heavy arm loops around her shoulder and pulls her into his chest. "Shh, come here."
With his hands rubbing lazy circles on her back, she sinks deeper into his embrace.
"He was my mentor, Castle," she says, her voice small and raspy.
"I know. And you loved him."
Her head lifts, eyes flying to his, but she finds no anger or jealousy. Only compassion and understanding.
So she doesn't deny it.
"Yeah," she admits, nodding against his chest. "Didn't love me, though, which made for a really embarrassing admission."
Castle chuckles. "He did," he assures her. "As a daughter, maybe. As a mentee. Not as a lover, but he did love you, Kate. And he knows that, regardless of how you two left things, you loved him too. That's what matters."
She doesn't trust her voice to scrape out over the lump in her throat, and so she gives another small nod instead, blinks away a fresh wave of tears. Castle holds her like that until she's cried herself out, until the adrenaline's all gone and she's left with nothing but exhaustion.
He plucks her from the couch and in a rare moment, she allows him to carry her into bed. He tucks her in and slides behind her, drapes his arm across her waist and lets her curl into him.
She falls asleep to the sound of his breathing and the rhythm of his heart beneath her cheek.
She falls deeper into her mother's murder and Montgomery dies and everything begins to fall apart.
When he has to carry her out of that airplane hangar he feels his heart crack into a million little pieces. She's kicking and crying and begging for him to put her down, to just put her down and let her run right back into the line of fire and stand her ground. She wants to fight but this is a battle she won't win, not here, not tonight, and so he cradles her face in his hands and kisses the tear-stains on her cheeks.
"Shh," he murmurs, a hand brushing the hair from her sweaty forehead. "Shh, Kate, please. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."
He presses a kiss to her temple, her cheeks, her nose, before finally landing on her lips.
"I'm sorry."
They stand in her apartment like a face-off, each on opposite sides of the room, neither willing to surrender. She's angry and upset and more determined than ever to get this right and find justice and he just won't listen.
"This is my life, Castle. Mine," she growls, taking a step forward. She's standing her ground and he is too and she thinks the way they both know each other makes it worse.
It's not intimidating; it's steel against steel.
But he can see the way her jaw sets, the way the veins in her neck pop as she tries to keep her emotions in check. In control, always. And she can see the way his fists clench, the way his chin moves as he grinds his teeth.
"If you want to throw your life away, fine," he says, and he doesn't mean it, of course he doesn't mean it, but he's so tired. "But I won't sit here and be witness to it. I can't do this anymore, Kate."
Her nose scrunches. "This is my mother's murder, Rick. Don't you have any idea what that means to me?"
The laugh that falls from his mouth is hysterical. "Of course I do!" He takes a step forward. "I know exactly how important this case is to you, and I get it. It's why you became a cop and why you fight like hell for every victim you're met with but Kate, don't you understand? If you die, who's going to fight for them? If you get yourself killed, who the hell is going to care about the victim like you do, huh?"
She doesn't say anything, doesn't trust her voice; she simply glares, shakes her head.
"Do you think your mom would want you to give your life for this case just like she has?"
"No," she says immediately, because she knows. "But I won't, Castle, I can win this, I just..."
"Maybe." His shoulders slump on a sad shrug. "Maybe you will win, and I'd love nothing more than for you to take these bastards down once and for all and to get justice for your mother. But the very real alternative is that you don't. That you lose. That you die with your mother and nothing's ever okay again."
Beckett's fists ball at her sides before un-clenching and she's so mad, so angry at everything and anything. She hates that she understands where he's coming from, because she does. She can't even be mad at him for being concerned because she knows there's a very real possibility that doing this will result in her death, but she doesn't know anything else.
This is what she's been working her entire career for. Justice for her mother has been priority number one since the day she was murdered. This is what she's spent her life doing.
If she doesn't see this through, who will she be then? What will she become?
"Alive."
Her eyes fly to his and oh, she didn't mean to ask that out loud.
"If you don't do this, you'll be alive." He closes the gap between them, hands on her cheeks as he looks into her glassy, hardened eyes. "You'll be alive and that's all I need. You won't be disgracing your mother by staying alive long enough to honor her life, Kate."
Fight draining from her body, she leans her forehead against his chest, wraps her arms around his middle.
"I don't know if I can stop."
"I can't lose you," he murmurs into her hair. His grip is tight around her. "Can't live without you, Kate. Don't make me bury you."
She says nothing for a few minutes, too many thoughts whirling through her mind, too many emotions pulsing through her system. Eventually, her fists grip at the fabric of his shirt and she exhales, eyes fluttering closed.
"Okay."
She promises to let it go, because as much as it may hurt her to put the lid on her mother's murder, it'll probably kill her not to.
(For the time being, she tells him, because as soon as the heat has died down she will catch the son of a bitch.
"We will," he amends.)
She may be willing to die for her cause, for her mother, but standing here with Castle pleading with her to stop, his breath hot on her skin, she's realizing she has a lot more to live for, too.
When a suspect has a partner no one knows about, a man who gets the jump on her and fires two shots before she realizes what's happening, all she can hear is Castle's yelling in the distance. Suddenly she's on the ground and he's hovering above her in mere moments.
Her chest burns, blinding white pain searing along her collarbone.
His hands are everywhere. In her hair, caressing her face, clambering around her body searching for somewhere to grab hold. There's a commotion happening around them; pedestrians scattering, her team calling for an ambulance and demanding that someone follow that bastard, but all she can hear are his pleas in her ear.
To stay with him, to hang on, to keep breathing.
I love you, I love you, I love you.
He breathes it into her hair as he leans down, smears it to her forehead with his lips.
Her mouth opens but she blacks out before she can say it back.
When she wakes in the hospital bed, somewhat surprised she's even alive, he's curled in a chair at her side. She blinks a few times, the dull lighting in the room still too much for her eyes, and tries to get her bearings.
The stinging in her chest is new but to be expected and she winces when she tries to wriggle, to get comfortable. The movement stirs the man beside her and he jerks awake, bleary eyes searching in the dark until they meet hers.
"Kate," he breathes, relief palpable in the single syllable. "You're awake."
One hand grips hers, twines their fingers together, while the other leaves the ghost of a touch at her cheek.
"You're staring," she rasps, voice gravely. "Must look really bad."
"You're beautiful," he tells her, doesn't miss a beat. There's still a sadness lingering in his eyes and she wishes so badly that'd disappear. "You were lucky, Kate. I didn't know how bad it was and I—I wasn't sure I'd see you again."
Humming, she lets her eyes fall closed. She's so tired.
"Won't... get rid of me that easily," she manages, a small smile tugging at the corners of her lips.
His fingers squeeze hers and she doesn't need to look at him to know one of those smiles she loves so much is back onto his face.
"Good. I have no intentions of letting you go."
She coughs and the movement jostles her chest, stitches pulling and scars stretching and it hurts. But she's lucky, she's told. By Castle and by the doctor who comes in at one point to tell her the damage. Two shots, one caught by the Kevlar and the other just above it, lodged behind her collarbone. It shattered a bit of the bone, which is, along with the whole removing-a-bullet-from-her-skin thing, what's causing the pain.
There's some nerve damage, too, which will require physical therapy to help her get the full range of motion in her right arm back.
She sighs and purses her lips as the man speaks but, overall, she supposes she is lucky. Without the vest, the first bullet would have missed her heart by a few lousy centimeters.
Her face contorts in discomfort when she rolls her neck to relieve some pressure, forehead wrinkled and nose scrunched. Her breathing is labored and comes out in rough puffs until the pain subsides.
"Hey," he soothes, a hand on her thigh now. It warms her skin through the thin hospital sheet. "Breathe, just breathe, okay? Try not to move."
A sarcastic quip is on the tip of her tongue, a gee I had no idea, I did that on purpose response, but she just bites her tongue and gives a small nod. Once it's over, the stinging now a dull throbbing that's just as unpleasant but much more manageable, she takes a deep breath.
"Stop looking at me like that," she says, leaning back carefully.
"Like what?"
"Like that," she repeats, gesturing vaguely. "Like I'm dying. I'm in pain but I'm fine, and with some time and physical therapy I'll be good as new."
"Those two things contradict each other." Eyes soft, he gazes at her like she'll evaporate if he so much as blinks. "That bullet could've—"
Cutting him off, Beckett holds his stare. "But it didn't."
Neither of them speak for a few moments, and the fatigue gets the best of her once more. Her lids are heavy and she keeps blinking, tries to stay awake.
"Get some sleep," Castle murmurs, brushing rogue pieces of hair from her face.
Opening her eyes, she trails her gaze over him for a few seconds. And then it hits her all at once.
"Castle—"
"Rest, Kate."
"Castle," she repeats, more insistent this time. He looks at her, waiting. "I love you, too."
She gets to slap the handcuffs on the man responsible for her mother's murder on live television. Heart in her throat, she gets to arrest him for the murder of Johanna Beckett and walk him outside, down the steps and through a barrage of news outlets.
After handing him off to another officer to shove him into the back of a police cruiser she pauses, takes a deep breath, and when her eyes slide open again they find him immediately. Her lips curl into a smile, matches the one plastered on his face, and she can feel the adrenaline coursing through her veins.
He's standing a few feet away, a decent distance from all the action but close enough that it only takes her a couple long strides to reach him.
Her arms wrap around his middle without preamble, the heavy weight of his arms curling comfortingly around her back. She sinks into him, breathes in the scent of his cologne and listens to the steady beat of his heart.
"You did it," he says, dipping low to speak into her ear.
She lifts her head. "We did it, Castle. Couldn't have done it without you."
He takes the compliment with a nod and bright eyes. "She's proud of you, you know. For this. For finding balance in keeping yourself alive and getting her justice."
"Yeah," Beckett agrees on an exhale. "She'd have loved you. For kicking my ass when I needed it, and for sticking around to solve her case."
Chuckling, he tugs her closer into his chest. "Wouldn't be anywhere else."
Her mother's at her wedding in more ways than one.
In the wedding dress that adorns her body, aged and loved to perfection. In the empty seat at the table beside her father, decorative doilies and plates and silverware in place for her even if she's not physically here. In the bright burst of sun before the ceremony and the gust of wind that comes just as she says I do.
She feels her here and it brings tears to her eyes; as much as she'd love for her to be at the ceremony and give her advice and hug her newly married little girl, she takes what she can get and what she can get is pretty damn beautiful.
Castle's smile threatens to blind her as she stares back at him at the alter, his eyes wide and glassy but happy.
She marries her best friend outdoors, surrounded by her friends and family, and there's nothing else she could've asked for. When he takes her hand and leads her back down the aisle, this time as husband and wife, she squeezes his fingers and can't wipe the grin from her face.
She catches her father's eye as she leaves and they don't have to speak for her to know how thrilled he is.
Their wedding night turns into a wedding early morning, and the two of them finally drift off to sleep as the sun rounds the horizon.
Their daughter arrives pink and screaming and with the most gorgeous little baby hairs on her head. She's placed in Beckett's arms and she's certain she's never felt love like this before, can't even begin to explain the feeling stirring deep in her chest.
Castle hovers, one hand on her shoulder and the other dusting along the soft skin of their daughter's cheek.
"You did it, babe," he whispers, his expression one of complete awe. "You were extraordinary."
She grins up at him before trailing her gaze back down to the little bundle in pink. The baby wriggles a little and lets out small whimpers that sound like music to her ears.
"You're beautiful," Castle murmurs. He can't take his off of her and she can't take her eyes off of their daughter.
Huffing, she lifts her head. "Look like a mess, Castle."
"A beautiful mess."
They name her Lily after her mother's favorite flowers.
Two years after Beckett does a brief stint on the Attorney General's team in Washington, DC—a change of pace that was refreshing for a while but ultimately not where she belonged—she gets a cryptic phone call with an AG team code. It translates to there being a life-or-death situation.
She meets with a man named Vikram. He tells her there's a connection between a declassified memo and a search she did during her time on the team. It was sent on to her former team, and suddenly they're all dead.
He wants to go on the run, to get out of the line of fire while there are people trying to kill him and warns her that she's in danger too.
"I can't just leave," she says, shaking her head. "If these people want a war, then let them bring it to my doorstep. I'm not running."
Vikram stares at her. "That's honorable and everything, but they just killed an entire team of skilled agents. If they come after you, you're dead."
But she stands her ground. "I have a team, a team that's damn good at what they do. If I run I'm on my own and I'm... tired of doing things on my own."
And so Vikram runs and Beckett goes back to the loft.
For a fleeting moment while she watches Castle, sitting in the living room and unaware of her arrival, she wonders if she's doing the right thing. If staying would put him and Lily in even more unnecessary danger. The thought alone sends chills down her spine as she glances up the stairs to where she knows their daughter is sound asleep. She wonders if she should tell him that she has to go away for a while, just for a little bit to keep their family safe, because her presence alone could be their downfall.
But then he turns around, notices her standing in the entryway, and a wide smile blooms across his beautiful face.
"Hey, Captain Beckett," he says, gesturing with his arms. "Come here, tell me about it. And don't skimp on any of the details, I want to hear all about how wonderful you were."
Her heart swells as she settles next to him on the couch and wiggles closer, his arm draped comfortably across her shoulders.
No, she decides in that moment. She can't disappear on him, and absolutely cannot abandon Lily. Can't tell some half-baked lie about needing some time apart so she can maybe keep them both safe from a threat she doesn't even know anything about.
Later that night she tells him about the phone call and the meeting with Vikram. She tells him about her former team's deaths and their supposed connection to a search she ran two years ago, and he listens. The stiffness in his form tells her he already thinks he knows where this is going; she's going to run, to do something stupid like barreling head first into the crossfire.
It's in her nature, so the assumption doesn't sting like it maybe should.
"If something comes of it, I want to figure it out," she starts, leaning against he headboard. "Together."
The responding smile and kiss he places on her lips is all the reassurance she needs to know she made the right decision.
Their son comes a few years later. He's not as loud as his sister was upon arrival, but he has the same wispy brown hairs on his head and a sweet disposition. Where Lily's outgoing and rambunctious, a true replica of Beckett in her younger years, they think this little one will be a bit calmer.
With parents like them it's a long shot, the mix of Beckett and Castle genes practically screaming for a wild, spunky child, but she feels it in her gut. Mother's intuition, if you will.
Castle doesn't leave her side and he doesn't let go of his boy, cradling the baby in his arms instead of placing him in the tiny bassinet beside the hospital bed. She's exhausted and every part of her body aches, but she can't wipe the soft smile from her face as she watches her husband murmur sweet words to their son.
"Looks like you," she whispers, earning a grin from the man in question. "He'll be a little heart-breaker."
He laughs. "As long as he has your wits, that's fine by me."
They name him Ethan for no other reason than they both love the name. And that's enough.
The days belong to her job but she's home before dinner each night and is greeted with the pitter-patter of tiny feet on the hardwood. Lily slams into her legs, wraps her tiny arms around her thighs and stares up at her mother until she reaches down to pick her up.
It's a routine now.
Beckett lets out an exaggerated groan, jokes about how big she's getting, and listens to Lily's small gasp of indignation.
Ethan toddles over from where he's seated in Castle's lap and lets out some excited babbling that has her grinning from ear to ear. Exhaustion forgotten, she places Lily back onto the floor with a pat on the back and a go help daddy with dinner, Peanut, and picks up her boy.
With him on her hip, she meets Castle halfway as he heads into the kitchen to keep their daughter from making a mess.
"Well hello there," he smiles into her kiss. "How was work?"
"Long," she breathes. Ethan tugs on her hair and she smiles as she grips his tiny baby hand and uncurls his fingers. "Tell you about it later."
She leaves Ethan in the living room while she goes to get changed, which means he immediately follows her into the bedroom and sits on the floor until she's done, and then she guides him back out.
"What's on the menu, Lil?" she asks, sliding on her socked feet towards the island.
Her daughter beams, bounces in place. "Spaghetti!"
Beckett nods her approval and rolls her eyes at Castle's exaggerated antics as he helps Lily stir the sauce. There's laughter and baby gibberish filling the kitchen and she doesn't even care that she's spent all day dealing with insufferable politics.
This is her happy place.
In the movies, people wake with fluttering eyelids and soft movements. She wakes violently, a burning sensation in her abdomen that sends shock-waves throughout her system.
The feeling is far too familiar.
Her eyes fly open as she gasps, acutely aware of there being other bodies in the room but too centered on figuring out what the hell is going on to care.
"Beckett, hey," a voice says, and her eyes are having trouble focusing. "Hey, look at me. It's okay. Relax."
Esposito. What is Esposito doing here?
"Javi?" she rasps, squinting in the bright light of the room. He turns the overhead bulb off and she gives him a grateful nod. "What's going on?"
"Do you remember what happened?"
"No, I..."
Esposito's lips pull into a thin line. "Caleb Brown, he opened fire in the loft," he starts, trying to jog her memory.
Brows furrowed, she begins to shake her head because no, no that doesn't make sense. But then, first slowly and then all at once, it starts to flood back.
Being at the loft with Castle, shots being fired, the noise ringing in her ears. Collapsing onto the hardwood.
Oh.
She was shot. They were both shot.
"Castle," she says, eyes wide as she stares at Esposito. "He was... where is he?"
Espo puts a hand on her blanket-covered knee. "Castle's okay. He's recovering in the next room over. Ryan's with him." He rubs at his face, lets out a sigh. "You two were lucky as hell, Beckett."
The sentence gives her the worst sense of deja vu. You were lucky, Kate.
Lucky.
Were they though? They don't—was it all a dream?
"I'm—what the hell happened, Javi?"
She doesn't know if she's talking about the shooting or the past ten or so years she's apparently just lived through in her head, but she asks anyway. As expected, he doesn't have an answer.
Nodding along, Beckett does her best to right herself. Everything feels... a little more disjointed. A little wrong.
"You scared us for a minute," he continues, shifting his weight from one foot to the next. "Castle too, but you... you coded, Beckett. We weren't sure if we were going to get you back."
She blinks.
Coded. She died. On her kitchen floor or in the ambulance or in the hospital, she doesn't know. She doesn't ask.
But she died, and maybe it wasn't a weird dream at all. Maybe it was a glimpse into something that could've been; a life she could've had if she'd made a few different choices.
Simple things.
Screwing her eyes shut, she forces herself to take a deep breath.
Lucky, Esposito called them.
Lucky to be alive, maybe. But getting shot is far from lucky, and being shown an alternate reality that felt so vivid, so tangible that it aches to realize it wasn't real isn't luck, either. That feels more like punishment. From whom or for what, maybe she'll never know.
What she does know is that she has to live with the knowledge of something else out there, a parallel life where she and Castle get together years earlier. A life where they don't go through some of the fiery, earth-shattering downs they've been saddled with here in this life. A life with two beautiful children.
A boy and a girl, one the spitting image of herself and the other a perfect replica of his father with shaggy brown hair and bright blue eyes.
The tightness in her chest as she takes a deep breath isn't just from the bullet.
I'll never know, and neither will you, of the life you don't choose. We'll only know that whatever that sister life was, it was important and beautiful and not ours. It was the ghost ship that didn't carry us. There's nothing to do but salute it from the shore.
- Cheryl Strayed, Tiny Beautiful Things
A/N #2: I toyed with the idea of going a bit further but I think it's better fitted to end here, before Beckett realizes just how breathtaking their reality is, too. Different from that sister life, certainly with some more challenging roads taken to get there, but equally as beautiful.