The Most Powerful Two-Letter Word in the World
The first time Rick Castle hears Kate Beckett say the word 'no', they're mid-introduction. She doesn't bother shaking his hand, never mind ask for an autograph. "Sir,"she implores the captain in an exaggerated hiss, "please!" and it's easy to tell it's the kind of 'please' that's asking for mercy, not requesting a gift of his presence.
He doesn't understand; he usually makes a splendid first impression.
As for himself, Rick thinks she's the most commanding detective in heels he's ever seen. Well, first he just thinks, guh,but he doesn't count that. (He's accustomed to being much more articulate.) So instead, he likens her to any number of fiery heroines before settling on one of his own creation.
It doesn't take him long to realize she'll never settle for one-dimensional. (And this suits him just fine.) And when he starts digging into her mother's case, it's the first time he's felt truly useful in a professional capacity in he doesn't know how long, so naturally, she throws it back in his face.
The summer Castle spends in the Hamptons is the longest of Kate's life. It's also the hottest on record for New York City, which just figures; she's sitting in a sweltering hell while he gallivants around the coast with that tramp of an agent. (Kate knows 'gallivanting' is just the right word, too.)
She spends the first month of it feeling nauseous every time she thinks of him (which is about once every 15.2 seconds, if she's being honest with herself, which obviously, she tries not to be). She lies awake at night, her bedroom window open to traffic noise and the rare breeze, and her mind wanders despite her best efforts: she constructs what a Castlesque Hampton retreat might look like, imagines a lot of mahogany and brass and glass windows open to the ocean air. She pictures tasteful decor, sand on the floor, sunrises viewed from bedrooms-and then, like the betrayer it is, her imagination turns to what might be going on inside those rooms, and the nausea is back, rolling through her like a wave.
By the second month, she's nursing her wounded pride (he hadn't told her 'no', exactly, but the sight of Gina sauntering up to him in the precinct had been a slammed door if she ever saw one), and by the third, she's build up enough resentment to be downright pissed off while mopping the sweat from her brow every other minute on the job.
By the time she surprises him mid-case in September, it feels damn good to be holding him at gunpoint.
Kate Beckett, the LA version, is all kinds of sexy. Not that Castle's surprised. Of course, there's more to it than that: it's the pleasure of seeing her with her hair down (figuratively and metaphorically), her feet bare, her badge off-if only for a few days. And then there's the very delicious proposition of sharing a hotel suite with her.
Not that thatturns out quite as well as he'd expected. Maybe he'd been kidding himself, but for a minute or two there, he'd really thought-but no. She shuts him down just about as fast as she can, the door to any possible advancement of their relationship physically closing in his face.
On the plane ride home, he closes his eyes and drifts off with the assurance of her beside him, the faint scent of her shampoo in his nostrils, her body heat warm against his side. It's the best night's sleep he's ever had.
The minute Kate sees Castle step into the airplane hangar, she knows she's officially outnumbered. She also knows she can outrun him, outmaneuver him, and overpower him, but this, apparently, is where she is wrong.
She's not going down (or out) without a fight, and to her surprise, he gives her one. He wants her out of that hangar just as badly as she wants to be there, his will an unyielding force of vice-like grip and bracing strength. His hands encircling her biceps are every bit as inflexible, even while his words are near-soothing in her ear. "No!" she cries. "No, no, no, no, no," each syllable a muffled sob against the palm that presses tight to her mouth. She's never in her life had her will so utterly denied by a man, and the fact that it's at Rick's hand causes tears to fill her eyes and fall as she yells.
After the danger is gone and the hangar falls silent, she shoves him away from her, hard, only to meet with no resistance. He stumbles back under the power of her blow while she bends double at the waist, drawing huge gulps of air to curtail her sobs.
In the months following the shooting and her recovery, she jumps into her work with more zeal than ever. Maybe she makes arrests with more brutality than is strictly necessary, perhaps she yells more and listens less, maybe she bites off the heads of her detectives when they're not quick enough or smart enough for her, but she tells herself all this is temporary: for now, she needs to regain the upper hand any way she can.
She doesn't know whether Castle still feels the way he'd said he did that day of the shooting, and she doesn't ask. She can't afford to feel that vulnerable again, nor that victimized, should the answer be no. She remains stubbornly with Josh, if only to maintain the status quo, and when Castle hooks up with an art insurer following one of their toughest cases, she convinces herself this tells her all she needs to know.
She'd have believed herself, too, except that he doesn't leave. Through it all, he's obstinately by her side daily, in the precinct , on the streets. He rides shotgun and asks questions and puzzles out mysteries in his uniquely genius slash infuriating matter, same as ever.
He puts himself in danger's way same as ever, too. On a routine interview turned chase on Canal Street, he flattens a guy who'd been running toward her down a blind alley, and in SoHo, he pulls her own service piece from her holster while she's wrestling with a perp on the floor of a warehouse, shooting the guy clean through the shoulder just as he reaches for a knife hidden in his pant leg. (The paperwork on that one had brought new meaning to the phrase, 'late night at the office'.)
And every time, during every goddamn stunt he pulls, her heart feels as though it resides on the outside of her chest, for anybody to come by and stab. Her pulse races, her eyes follow him instead of the action around her, and she diverts her attention from wherever it's needed most...the victim, the danger to her team, in some cases, the barrel of the gun pointed in the direction of her own damned self...until one day she finds herself scrambling for a set of cuffs she should have easily secured all because she'd been trying to locate Castle in the midst of a firefight, and once she's reasonably sure they're not all going to die because of her, she finally thinks enough. She kicks him off the case effective immediately ("What'd Ido?") and spends the rest of the afternoon wondering when she'd gone so soft.
The answer comes to her while she's turning the key in her lock late that night, and it's so reminiscent of a light bulb going off in her brain, she's almost blinded by the brilliance of it.
Since she'd fallen in love with Castle, of course.
She's turned down his invitation to the Hamptons so many times, he hardly listens to the answer anymore. When this time, she says, "You know, Castle, maybe I will," he actually replies, "Maybe next time, then," prompting such an odd look on her face that he mentally rewinds their last few lines of conversation.
"Wait...maybe?"
"Maybe." She's still looking a little odd to him. In fact, she's been actingodd, too. Hesitant and ill-at-ease. Almost...polite. She's tossed him the car keys on occasion, and on cases, she's stopped discounting his theories; he'd even thrown in a werewolf-as-suspect as a test.
"Could be," she'd said.
Could be?
Maybe she knows something he doesn't: maybe he's dying and no one wants to tell him. What other explanation can there be? He decides that if she offers to take him to Disneyland, he'll schedule a full physical first.
He leaves for the Hamptons around noon on a Friday; Beckett is between cases, catching up on paperwork, Alexis is on an overnight school trip, his mother is in final rehearsals for a play, so nothing is holding him to the city. He's expecting to inot/i expect Beckett, but if she shows, it won't be until tomorrow, maybe Sunday (likely so she can avoid staying longer than a matter of hours).
He takes a long walk down the beach, not turning around until the sun has all but disappeared behind the roofline of the house. He gets a glass of water in the kitchen, during which he notices the slider door to the back deck is ajar. Details come easier to him these days; he knows immediately that it wasn't forced. He steps through it cautiously and out onto the deck, where he freezes. Beckett is standing at the rail, her back to him. He debates how to announce his presence without startling her until he sees her shoulder twitch under his scrutiny, and knows he hasn't surprised her at all.
"You came." He crosses to her, but something in her posture makes him stop a few feet down the rail, where he leans against the wood, watching her. He feels wary again, like a cat trying not to startle its prey. Or maybe it's the other way around. "To what do I owe this honor?"
He'd meant it in jest, of course, but she doesn't smile. In fact, she looks almost panicked.
She continues to stare ahead, her eyes on the black void that is the ocean at this hour. He can hear the waves rhythmically hitting the sand.
He immediately sobers. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing, I..." She swallows. "I've been called before a review board for the Shavez case misfire."
He answers slowly. "The one where I fired the shot?"
She nods, and he curses under his breath. "I'm sorry. Can I come with you, maybe explain-"
"No."
He bites his lip on a quick reply. Did she really come all the way out here to reprimand him? "Well, they're wasting their time and yours. You did everything by the book."
She shakes her head, exhales sharply. "Including letting him get the jump on me in the first place?"
"Listen, that happens..."
"When I'm distracted looking around for you, yes." She's speaking strangely calmly, considering that he's pretty sure (but not quite certain) they're in an argument. He wishes he could say the same for himself.
"Well I'm sorry I was in the way! Maybe you were outplayed because-"
"Rick..." Her voice has suddenly softened; she sounds almost saddened, and he finds himself falling silent. "I was outplayed because I love you." She's still staring ahead as her hands curl tightly on the rail.
Because...?
"And I need to know if you still love me." She's more rigidly focused on the ocean than ever, her shoulders square and unyielding. "Or if it's too late, and I've screwed it all up too badly."
He finds himself thinking for what must be the hundredth time that she's the bravest person he knows. He says, "No."
As straight and tense as she's standing, she still visibly flinches. "You haven't screwed it up," he continues. He's telling it to her profile; she still won't turn to look at him. "Of course I love you. More every damned day."
She breathes. He watches her chest rise and fall, and one corner of her mouth turn upward, then, as if still not willing to take the risk, back down into a frown as she closes her eyes tightly for a moment. Then she nods, eyes still on the black horizon.
He steps toward her, reaches out to her. "Kate." He cups her chin in one hand and tips her face toward him. In her eyes, he sees the pain caused by countless murders, misunderstandings, and bullets to the heart. (The line is corny even in his mind, but is too true to pass up.) He brings his face closer, then waits for her to be the one to close the distance.