A/N: Haha. I love you guys. Thanks for listening to the song. Here you have it. Hopefully it'll make sense, cause really, there's hardly any plot.
The Twist
Chapter 2
Kate ran to Castle who was standing, smiling at her with his arms open, one reaching for hers. She brushed it aside, and started ripping his jacket open frantically.
"Kate, calm down."
"We have to put pressure on it, Castle. Just don't move. Maybe you should sit down."
Her words came fast and out of breath and he knew that she had to be moving, doing something, to keep herself from breaking apart. She'd just finished taking his jacket off, and started on the buttons of his white dress shirt, which had a small, bullet sized hole over his chest off to the left.
He grabbed both her wrists that were now shaking just the slightest bit, and she looked up to him, brows furrowed, eyes wet with unshed tears. "I'm okay. I promise. Look –" he said in a soft voice and bent his head down. She didn't move away from him, and damn if he had the heart to push her away. His fringe tickled her forehead as he bent to see his fingers undoing his shirt as quickly as he could to reassure her.
"I don't –" she said when she realized what she was looking at. She looked up at him then, her hands at his neck, subconsciously seeking out his pulse. Her doe eyed look almost brought him to tears. "You were wearing a vest the whole time, Castle?" she said in a weak voice.
"Yeah," he said, sounding watery even to his own ears. "Yeah, you know me. Always prepared."
She choked out a sob at that and finally closed her eyes, let her forehead hit his shoulder, and let him pull her closer to him for a proper hug. Her arm held on strong across his back, while her other hand carded through his hair, like she couldn't stop herself from touching him and keeping him as close as she possibly could.
After having her fill, she finally turned her head into his neck, took a deep breath and then drew back, out of his arms, with him still smiling at her – again that smile that silently spoke of his love. And she whacked him across the chest.
"Ow!" he said, indignant. "That's where he hit me! It stung."
"You'll get over it," she said with narrowed eyes. "Now spill."
He drew his brows closer, looking oh so innocent, and nuh-uh, she wasn't buying it. "What do you mean?"
She folded her arms and raised her brow, and God help him, even in that dress and those heels, looking all sweaty, and flushed from the dance and the adrenaline rush; he was intimidated. And turned on. "That –" she pointed to the vest, "is not a standard issue vest."
She glared at Ryan who was on the phone, calling for the paramedics.
His other hand held his gun, and she figured that the second shot had probably been him hitting Scott Sanders. Esposito was still on Sanders, holding him down, while someone else helped apply pressure to his wound. Ryan had the good sense of looking sheepish. He shrugged, and turned to yell into his phone.
Kate turned back to Castle, and poked him right in the center of his chest for good measure, receiving a yelp from him. "And you were not supposed to be here."
"It was my late book success celebration party!" he whined.
She rolled her eyes. "Castle, it was a fake party to draw Sanders out. It was risky for you to be here, and you know it."
"It was risky for you to be here, too!" he replied, being oddly calm about it. It made her madder still.
"He was threatening you in the letters, Castle, not me. He wanted to get rid of you!"
"Because he wanted to have you for himself," he said, still calm, but obviously radiating hatred towards the injured man. "And yes, that is a threat to me."
She huffed, and put her palms to her eyes, agitated and exhausted and just – she didn't even know.
"Kate," he said, gently pulling her hands down from her face so she would look at him. A tear escaped her eye, and she looked at him. "Oh, Kate." He brought her close and kissed her forehead. "I'm sorry. We should have told you."
"We?"
"Umm.."
Of course she picked up on it. "Yeah, uh, about that. Don't be too mad at them. We thought this would be a good idea, and we had it all planned out, and we knew you wouldn't go along with it though we were taking precautions and being careful and you just, you.. you're mad. I love you?" he grinned hopefully.
"You tell me next time!" she gritted out.
"Okay!"
"Even if you're scared of my reaction," she said strongly, poking him in the chest again.
"Alright!"
"And I will decide whether it's safe enough. Final call is mine," she said fiercely, grabbing a fistful of his shirt.
He looked down at it and up to her face again, eyes wide and gulped. "Yes, dear."
"And you two have explaining to do," she said still glaring steadily at Castle, as the boys walked up to them.
He vaguely heard them mumbling something and then mumbling out an excuse before running away. He found it hard to focus now that her thumb was gently rubbing his chest, right over his collar bone; in stark contrast to the glare and fist still holding on strong to his shirt, and he realized it was a façade.
"I'm okay," he repeated.
"I thought I lost you, Castle. I thought you were going to die because I couldn't do my job and protect you."
"I'm sorry I let you think that. I'm safest when I'm with you, Kate. If I really thought that this would go downhill, or that it would somehow hurt any of us, I wouldn't have done it."
"I know. I trust your judgment."
"I know you do. I mean, come on. I'm an awesome partner," he gloated, finally, finally earning a chuckle from her.
He leant down to kiss her cheek, lingering as she turned into him. "We figured that Scott is smart. He wouldn't be fooled by the party if it wasn't authentic. We even set it up for him. He overheard that one of the wait staff had fallen sick, had left their uniform and gone."
"You put a tracker in it," she said, looking impressed.
"Yup! Ryan and Espo were keeping an eye any movement. Everyone else was instructed to leave it alone. So once it started moving, we knew he'd shown up. There were other plain clothed officers around scoping the place for him too," he said, pointing at a couple of them that he knew.
"And the vest?"
"Well, we figured he'd take a shot at me for getting so…intimate with you, out in the open. That was quite a show we put on too."
She blushed.
"We knew it would make him angry enough to do something stupid, and it did. Gave him away."
"You still could've gotten hurt," she said. "But I'm glad it's all over. Let's go home, Castle," she said grabbing his hand and turning to leave.
"Hey, what about us?" Ryan yelled out.
"Seeing as how you could come up with this clever little plan all by yourselves, I'm sure you can handle this by yourselves too."
Esposito elbowed him, and nodded towards her, taking his punishment in a dignified manner. Still didn't stop Ryan from grumbling that Castle should get punished too. Castle wasn't helping by delightedly mouthing 'grounded' from behind Kate.
His face suddenly transformed as Kate turned back to him. She narrowed her eyes, not fooled for a second. "Oh, I'll figure something out," she said in way of replying to Ryan, while patting Castle on the chest. She looked him up and down, as if thinking of where to strike first – the woman was going to kill him, he was sure of it – bit her lip in that enticing way that she did, and in a flurry she turned and strutted out of there, her hips swaying their private tune.
He let out a breath he didn't realize he was holding, and hastened to follow.
