The changes were subtle, but they were there.
Standing in front of her bathroom mirror, Kate tilted her head, her eyes giving a critical examination of her underwear-clad body. It had been only two weeks since she learned she was pregnant, but the changes had already begun. While imperceptible to anyone but her, she had been quietly cataloging the shifts. For one, her breasts had grown large enough that all of her regular bras could barely contain them. The other issue, and the more worrying of the two, was her stomach.
A few weeks ago it had been flat and firm, but already the muscles of her abs had seemed to soften. It was due to hormone changes- she had done enough research to learn that much- and it was the first step in a line of preparations her body would make to get ready for giving birth. It seemed crazy that such a tiny fetus would already cause her pants to fit tighter, but that was yet another item on her growing list of changes. It wouldn't be too long before her friends and family would figure out what was going on.
With a sigh, Kate abandoned her examination in the mirror, walking towards her closet for a new deliberation of what to wear. For now, everything hanging in her closet still fit, but the time was coming where she'd essentially need a new wardrobe. She selected a pair of khaki slacks that usually had room to spare, sliding them off the hanger as her phone began to ring.
Hurrying from the closet with the pants in one hand, she scooped the phone up from her bed, thumb sliding across the screen to accept the call from the precinct's dispatcher.
"Beckett," she spoke into the phone, wedging it between her shoulder and cheek. For the moment the pants had to be discarded on the bed, both hands needed to locate the pen and notebook kept by her bedside for moments exactly like this, "Uh-huh, and CSU is already on the way?" Kate asked, scribbling a SoHo address onto the pad. "Great. I'll be there in twenty."
Another day, another dead body. Time to call Castle.
Well, maybe after she put her pants on.
"That's not your weapon," Lanie said, hardly glancing at the four inch stiletto blade Kate was holding.
The knife had been found in a car belonging to Trucho, their current suspect. She and Castle had found the man being beaten up inside of an Irish bar, and when they realized he wasn't a member of the Westies, they'd brought him in for questioning. All the signs pointed toward Trucho being their killer, and when Ryan and Esposito had brought in the man's knife, Kate had been certain that the man's fate was sealed. At least before the medical examiner had entered the equation.
"You didn't even look," Kate accused.
"Sure I did. And I'm telling you that blade is way too small to make these wounds," Lanie said, gesturing toward Jack Coonan's body on the table. "This Trucho guy, how tall is he?"
"About five foot six," Kate replied, dropping the evidence bag containing the knife on the table beside Coonan's left shoulder.
"Then he's not your guy," Lanie said with authority, glancing from Kate to the body and pointing towards the scars scattered across the torso. "The angle on these wounds indicates that the killer was over six feet tall."
"Well, maybe instead of using a stiletto, he was wearing stilettos," Castle said from his perch, leaning against the concrete block wall.
Lanie met Kate's eyes with a mixture of amusement and annoyance. Kate just shook her head slowly, rolling her eyes. In times like these, it was better not to encourage him.
The Imperial March from "Star Wars" began to hum from the writer's pocket as the two women had their silent standoff. But Kate could see him out of the corner of her eye tugging the phone from his pocket, and he sighed. "It's my publisher," he explained. "I should take this. She's been trying to talk to me for days. Excuse me for a moment."
With that said, Castle made a quick exit, phone already pressed to his ear. "Gina, are you calling as my blood-sucking publisher or my blood-sucking ex-wife?"
Castle's greeting shared and the morgue's double doors finally ending their pendulum swing, Kate turned back towards Lanie. "So are you sure Trucho isn't the guy?" she asked again, her full attention towards the medical examiner.
"Positive," Lanie said, raising her eyebrows as she looked at Kate. "But while you're here, you and I need to have a little chat. Sit," she commanded, gesturing at a chair a few feet away from the table.
From the tone of her best friend's voice, Kate knew the moment had come to confess. For two weeks she had avoided questions, with no shortage of help from Castle. They'd used every excuse in the book, from a forgotten badge to a bout of food poisoning, to deflect and distract from the fact she'd routinely began fleeing crime scenes when the sights and the smells became too much. Not that it had stopped there, though. A few days ago, she'd had to leave the morgue for the same reason, and without any attempt at an excuse for the hasty exit.
If Lanie hadn't already been suspicious, sending Ryan and Esposito to follow up on the forensics the next day had been more than enough to tip her off that something was going on. Kate couldn't even remember what excuse she'd handed the boys to deliver; maybe something about witness interviews and showing Castle that side of an investigation.
Exhaling slowly, she took her appointed seat without a word of argument as Lanie slipped off her latex gloves, tossing them into the trash can.
"There's something going on with you," Lanie said, sliding across the floor in the rolling chair that usually sat at one of the computers in the morgue until she was next to Kate. "I don't know what it is, but I'm worried about you."
"Lanie, I'm fine…" Kate started with a sigh, brain already churning for some excuse that might further delay the inevitable.
"Don't you lie to me, girl," Lanie said, eyes going wide with her no-nonsense approach. Her friend even added a finger point for extra effect. "Running from crime scenes? Avoiding coming to the morgue? That's not like you. So what's going on?"
Kate pressed her lips together, averting her eyes to her lap.
Lanie sighed, studying Kate carefully. "Something's different about you, but I just can't put my finger on it. You just have this glow…" she trailed off, mouth screwed up in a thin line while she tried to work out the problem.
"You know, if I didn't know any better, I'd think you were pregnant," she blurted, a small chuckle following the words that filled Kate with both shock and surprise.
"How did you…" she whispered, head snapping up to stare at her friend.
The change in Lanie was immediate; eyes sparkling with excitement. "Oh my God, you are?" Kate nodded slowly, tensing her shoulders as she took a shaky breath.
"You're pregnant! Oh, Kate! I'm so happy for you," Lanie exclaimed, jumping to her feet to throw her arms around Kate in a hug.
The moment she felt Lanie's arms wrapped around her body, Kate let out a sigh of relief. Tears weren't new, not after two weeks of stress and hormone swings, but the group of them pricking at her eyes now wasn't brought on by either of those things. These waterworks were caused by some of the weight finally lifting off her chest, having shared her biggest secret with someone she had known for years and getting a positive reaction. Kate had been so worried about the reactions of her friends and family, but Lanie wasn't upset at all. Maybe telling people wouldn't be so bad.
A few seconds after that conclusion, the bubble of happiness seemed to pop. Lanie was still touching her, both hands resting lightly on Kate's shoulders, but her friend had taken a step backwards and that critical look was back on her face. Before she added another word, Lanie's wheels were already spinning.
"I thought you and Josh broke up," she said carefully, an obvious effort to keep her voice neutral and unassuming.
"We did," Kate sighed. "Several months ago, before he left for Haiti. It's… complicated," she trailed off, unsure as to whether or not she wanted to tell her friend the full truth quite yet.
"Okay," Lanie replied, confusion evident in the way she held on to the vowel a little longer than necessary. "How far along are you?"
"I don't know. I haven't been to the doctor yet. I just found out two weeks ago, and…"
"Hold on," Lanie interrupted, instantly taking her hands off of Kate's shoulders. "You mean to tell me that you've known for two weeks, and you're still working in the field? Kate Beckett, do you realize how dangerous that is? If something were to happen…"
"Yes, Lanie, I know," Kate said, annoyance creeping into her voice, even though it wasn't her intention to put that particular emotion on display. But her friend had struck a nerve with her well-intentioned bluntness.
"You know?" Lanie asked, eyebrows arched up in skepticism, "If you know, then why the hell are you still out there, putting yourself and your baby in danger?"
Kate had never seen her friend so angry. Lanie's face was turning red, her eyes hardened, and she was growing increasingly louder with each word she spoke. Kate knew that her friend was right - she was risking more than just her own life. But fear had kept her from exposing her secret so far, and in a way, it still was. Telling Lanie and Castle was different than telling Montgomery and the boys.
"Lanie, I…" she started, her explanation interrupted by the ring of her phone. With a frustrated sigh, Kate pulled the device out of her pocket, pointedly ignoring Lanie's look of disapproval as she accepted the call and brought the phone up to her ear. "Beckett."
The police tech on the other end of the phone was quick with his information; a simple explanation that Jack Coonan's phone had been processed by the division and there was something she needed to see immediately. Even if the murder weapon, and a prime suspect, were still unanswered questions, this was a new avenue to explore that might lead her team to an answer. She couldn't just let it go.
"Okay, thank you. I'll be right there," Kate replied to the tech, hanging up the phone and standing to her full height, despite Lanie's disgruntled huff, "Lanie, look..."
"Nuh uh, Kate Beckett. You are making a terrible decision. What you need to do is turn this case over to Ryan and Esposito, 'fess up to Montgomery, and prioritize the safety of yourself and this baby," Lanie said, turning her back onto Kate in favor of returning to Coonan's body. "And deep down, I think you know that. You're just too stubborn to ask for help."
Lanie snapped a fresh pair of latex gloves over her hands as Kate gathered her jacket, shuffling only two steps towards the door before she spotted Castle, standing back in his former lounging position next to the double doors.
He had that look on his face again- the one that said he heard all the important details and was just dying to hash them out with her. And if she were honest, Kate figured it was probably a fair assumption to think that he was waiting to sing out an 'I told you so' regarding the medical examiner, who was staring with such intent focus at one of Coonan's wounds that Kate couldn't decide if it was an avoidance technique or simply Lanie being that absorbed in her work.
With a sigh, Kate stepped past Castle and out the doors of the morgue, surprised when her shadow followed without a comment or a quip all the way back to her car.
After two weeks of shadowing Beckett, Rick thought things were going well overall. It was the second day of his third case, and he could already measure the improvement of his relationship with Beckett in the smaller interactions they shared. This morning in the car, she had laughed with him and cracked a joke, which was far different than the usual snippy conversations. She had even stopped rolling her eyes when he presented her with ginger ale every morning, although it was carefully disguised in a travel coffee cup.
But even though Kate was warming up to his constant presence, Ryan and Esposito still seemed wary. The two detectives were always quick to dismiss his ideas, including a theory he posed yesterday about how a ninja assassin had killed Coonan by scaling the outside of the man's apartment building and climbing in through the living room window.
It wasn't all bad, though. He and Esposito had shared what Castle had decided to call a "bonding moment" over the Johnny Vong DVD, poking fun at Ryan and his gullibility towards the infomercial's promise of riches simply by sending $49.95 (plus shipping and handling) and following the 12 steps to success.
If you completed the program, you could also be the owner of a 45-foot yacht. I own a boat, indeed.
Making leeway with Ryan and Esposito was going to take time, and it was made even more difficult with their fearless leader always disappearing. He had only noticed Kate's absence at the crime scene yesterday when Ryan had quickly dropped the DVD cover back onto the table to put an end to the light teasing. Truthfully, it was the missing quip from Beckett that had highlighted the lack of her presence, and the boys had hopped on it by questioning Lanie.
Lanie hadn't known where Kate had gone, and when she'd posed the question to Castle, he'd been forced to stumble out some other half-thought excuse for her. The raised eyebrows and knowing glances had been enough to tell him they hadn't bought it, though no one had pressed the issue.
But even now, Rick could feel the stares from the two men as he and Beckett sat at her desk. The detectives were across at the murder board, supposedly batting around ideas for the case, but given the suspicious glances and the occasional whispers they were sharing with one another, Rick was willing to bet that not a lot of investigating was being done.
"Whoever Vong is working for scares him a lot more than prison," Beckett sighed, tossing her pen onto the desk blotter and forcing him to abandon his study of the other two detectives.
"There has to be a way to get it out of him," Castle commented, aware of how unmotivated and distracted he sounded. "Maybe we could force him to…"
"Yo, Beckett," Esposito interrupted, taking long strides towards her desk and planting his feet as if preparing for a fight. The sight of his arms folded across his chest only added to the effect. "Where did you disappear to this morning?"
"You just left the crime scene and never came back," Ryan added, following his partner across the room and taking a less aggressive stance beside his fellow detective.
Kate stiffened, refusing to let her emotions show. "I wasn't feeling well," she said with a shrug. "That was a lot of blood. I just felt sick."
"But that sort of thing never used to bother you," Esposito commented, raising his eyebrows.
"And this is the third crime scene in a row that you've 'gotten sick,'" Ryan said, making quotation marks in the air with his fingers on the last two words. "What's going on, Beckett?"
Rick watched as Kate bit her lip nervously, taking a shaky breath. For a moment he thought she would confess, laying it all out for the boys much like she had with Lanie in the morgue. But then the medical examiner herself stepped off the elevator, distracting all of them with her unusual presence in the bullpen.
"Beckett," Lanie called, looking grave as she gestured towards the middle aged man standing with her. "This is Dr. Clark Murray. He's a forensic pathologist, and I asked him to consult on the Coonan case."
"Hello, Dr. Murray," Kate said, pushing her chair away from her desk to stand and shake the man's hand, "Let's go into the conference room," she added, gesturing for everyone to follow her down the hallway.
Castle fell in line behind Lanie and the other doctor, the former of whom was still brittle with irritation at Beckett. Her frustration radiated from the slope of her shoulders to the swing of her arms as the six of them passed through the door and arranged themselves around the table.
Lanie's choice of a chair, the one to the left of Kate, was perhaps the most telling of the tableau that had naturally arranged itself. The medical examiner looked worn out, wrung dry by some revelation that went far deeper than a disagreement about Kate and her unborn child's personal safety. A glance at Ryan and Esposito was enough for Rick to realize that they had also read the emotional tension in the room, while Dr. Murray was too busy shuffling through his briefcase.
Castle couldn't shake the feeling that the world was about to tip sideways as Beckett took the seat at the head of the table, notepad in place and pen in hand to make notes on whatever their newest consultant had to say.
In the brief snatch of silence, he met Lanie's eyes, and his mouth immediately went dry. Whatever this was, it was very, very bad. He had never seen the medical examiner look so grim.
"What did you have to tell us, Dr. Murray?" Beckett asked. Rick couldn't tell if she was ignoring the tension in the room or just oblivious to it in the face of new information for the case.
The doctor had arranged papers and photos out in front of him, giving each a brief examination. "Dr. Parrish asked me to consult on this case after she discovered something interesting about the victim's wounds," he started, pulling a close-up picture of Coonan's torso from the top of the stack.
"Note the rectangular bruising around these wounds," he said, pointing at the unusual patterns around the wounds in the photo. "The bruises are caused by the hilt of the knife striking with enough force to compress the skin."
"And as a result, the injuries penetrate deeper than the actual length of the blade," Beckett surmised.
"Exactly," Murray confirmed. "Your killer has filed the blade down so that it is very fine, and brittle enough for bits to break when it strikes bone. That's why slivers of blade were found inside both of his victims," he finished, handing Kate a photo of an x-ray. "We now know that those slivers come from the same murder weapon."
"Wait, two victims?" Beckett asked. "How many people has he killed?"
"Five, that we know of," Lanie answered softly.
"So we're looking at a serial killer?" Ryan interjected.
"Well, yes and no," Dr. Murray answered, fingers spread wide across the remainder of photos and papers on the table. "We believe that we're dealing with a professional. Someone with extensive military training."
"So a contract killer?" Esposito asked.
Murray didn't answer the question, instead reaching into his briefcase and pulling out a clear bag. "I was able to create a 3D model of the blade used," he said, carefully pulling out a plastic knife from the bag and handing it to Beckett. "It's a special operations grip knife - the kind favored by special forces in the Gulf War."
"This man kills with a single blow," Murray said grimly, "using these other wounds to camouflage the skill with which the initial stroke was delivered."
The entire room seemed to hold its breath, attempting to hold on to the last moment before everything changed. Lanie had turned her head away from Kate altogether, eyes focused on the wood tabletop, while Ryan and Esposito were just staring at Dr. Murray, perplexed.
But Kate seemed to understand what Lanie and the doctor already knew, her hands trembling as they gripped the model of the knife.
"Detective Beckett, this was the very same method, and the very same weapon, that the killer employed twelve years ago," Murray said. "There is no doubt in my mind that Jack Coonan was killed by the same man who murdered your mother."
The questions that began to race through Rick's mind were instant. Why had a contract killer murdered Beckett's mother? Had the case never been solved? Why hadn't it been? Was this the reason she became a cop, to find justice for her mom?
The object of his questions was shaking again, her shoulders trembling slightly with the knife still gripped tight in her fist.
"Lanie," Kate whispered, turning slightly toward the medical examiner.
"I'm so sorry, Kate," Lanie answered, gently placing a hand on Beckett's arm.
The room fell silent. All six of the people at the table needed the silence in that moment, busy processing the new information. Beckett was the first to break, shoving her chair away from the table and dropping the plastic model of the knife onto the top of it.
And then she walked out without looking back.
It had been years since Kate had allowed herself to investigate her mother's case. She couldn't avoid thinking about it, even dwelling on it, but she had made an active attempt not to pursue leads. But here it was again, forcing itself on her in a way she could have never imagined. A very public way, at that.
Castle had known nothing; not even that her mother had died. Ryan and Esposito knew the components of the police file, but very little of the personal trials that had accompanied her mother's death. Lanie was the one she had told everything to, the one that she had asked to examine the forensics report to spot any inconsistencies, all those years ago. Her best friend had been able to spot the similarities between the cases.
Kate was still angry with Lanie. Angry and a little betrayed by the fact her friend hadn't come to her the moment she'd noticed something strange. Between that anger and the ongoing saga of her pregnancy, she was due for an explosion of sorts.
So she'd gone at her best friend, right in the middle of the bullpen. Predictably, Lanie hadn't taken it sitting down, yelling her own explanation of attempting to protect Kate until she had known for sure that her guess was correct.
Not that Kate cared, a fact that she'd shared to more than a few raised eyebrows and open mouths when that particular line had bounced through the homicide division. But it had been enough to end their fight, Lanie making a quick exit towards the elevator while the rest of the bullpen jumped back into their tasks, lest Kate turn some of that leftover ire on them for eavesdropping.
Rubbing absently at the space between her eyebrows, she forced lingering thoughts of Lanie to the back of her mind. This case, this connection, marked the first new lead in her mother's case in a decade. Kate was close to tracking the man down, close enough that she could taste it.
It was surreal how solving the Coonan case could also solve her mother's. Whoever had killed Jack Coonan was a contract killer, and once they caught him, they'd make him divulge who had hired him- not only for Jack's murder, but for her mother and, a little further on the priority list, the other three victims Dr. Murray had referenced.
The dizzy spell came suddenly, hitting in tandem with the overwhelming realization that this could be the break she had always needed. Leaning forward in her chair, Kate rested her elbows on the desk, allowing her head to drop into her hands for a moment to restore her equilibrium. She'd been feeling dizzy frequently lately—yet another annoying side effect of pregnancy.
The sound of Montgomery calling her name made her jump, and she quickly raised her head, finding the captain standing in the doorway of his office.
"May I have a word with you?" he asked, making the question seem rhetorical as he retreated from the doorway and back towards the desk in his office.
Heaving out a sigh, Kate took her time in standing, testing out the waters to make sure dizziness wouldn't cause her to stumble her way into a meeting with her Captain. Satisfied she could manage, she stepped into the office, shutting the door behind her.
Immediately, Montgomery pulled a small flask from his desk. "Poor man's painkiller," he said, offering it to her.
"Sir, I…" Kate started, staring at the flask. This was an impossible situation. If she declined it, the captain would certainly suspect that something was wrong, and she might have to admit her pregnancy now, and this wasn't a good time for that. Alcohol was detrimental to the baby growing inside of her. A small sip might not hurt, but Kate didn't want to risk it.
Montgomery gave her an expectant look, extending the flask out to her, and Kate finally took it from his outstretched hand. Twisting off the cap, she raised the flask to her lips, tilting her head back. She kept her lips pursed tightly together, only allowing the smallest amount of liquid possible to enter her mouth. With that minimal amount swallowed, she passed the flask back to the captain.
"I know your mother's murder was the reason you became a cop," Montgomery said, putting the flask back in his desk drawer. "You're the finest homicide detective I've ever trained, bar none. And I want you to stay on this one, if you can. But I wouldn't be doing my job as your captain if I didn't ask: can you handle this?"
The sympathy written into his eyes was genuine, and Kate was grateful that he was giving her a choice. As much as she wanted to be strong and help with this case, she had too many new feelings to sort through first. She couldn't take care of her mother's killer until she'd stabilized herself first.
"I'm sorry, sir," she whispered, swallowing thickly. "I can't."
"Fair enough," Montgomery replied, "How about you take a day or two away from here. Get some distance from this. When we've got something, we'll call you."
Kate nodded firmly, blinking back tears, and flung the office door open, carving a path straight to her desk with her emotions on a tether. She barely noticed Ryan, Esposito, and Castle standing by her desk, watching her with concern in their eyes as she grabbed her jacket, flinging it over her shoulder. The elevator had just arrived as Kate approached the end of the hallway, Castle's call of her name ringing in her ears. But she ignored him, pressing the lobby button and door close button simultaneously as tears blinded her vision.
She'd talk to Castle later. There was someone else she needed to talk to first.
The sound of his fingers flying over the keyboard kept him company. Castle was typing furiously, pounding out his emotions after a trying day shadowing Kate. Since they'd begun their arrangement, he'd scarcely had time to write more than a few sentences, but he'd been writing since the moment he had arrived home this afternoon. The words just kept coming, keeping his mind and his hands busy for almost four hours.
Rick hadn't even stopped for dinner. Alexis had finally brought him a plate a few minutes ago, insisting that he eat his food before it went cold. He had taken a few bites to satisfy her, and then abandoned it for the lure of more words.
His fictional detective was finally coming to life. It was terrible that the worst thing in Kate's life had been the catalyst for his inspirational surge of content, but the new knowledge had provided him with the last piece of her backstory that he had needed to give Nikki Heat her life on the page.
Two chapters were complete already, and the third had just opened with his detective and her pseudo-partner, Jameson Rook, visiting the office of Nikki's latest murder victim when the buzz of his doorbell halted his work. His mother wasn't home, and he wasn't expecting any visitors, and surely, Alexis would have told him if she had invited someone over, since she almost always did. He had no idea who could be at his door.
Saving the document and quickly closing his laptop, Castle hurried towards his front door, opening it with a bit of caution. Not that he expected a murderer to knock first, but you couldn't be too careful.
"Beckett!" he said, surprised to find her standing in the hallway. Her shoulders were bowed, and her eyes were red-rimmed, an obvious sign that she had been crying recently.
"Hey," she whispered hesitantly. "I, uh… I'm sorry I didn't call, but I…"
"No, no, it's okay," Castle reassured, gesturing into his living room as he swung the door open wide. "Come in."
She stepped into the loft cautiously, raising her head and looking around. "Wow," she murmured. "You have a nice place. I kind of feel like Alfred in the Batcave for the first time."
"Ah, a Batman fan, huh?" Castle asked. "It figures."
Kate stopped, turning to face him. "Why?" she asked, tilting her head to the side.
"Similar backstories," Castle answered nonchalantly, shrugging. "You know, loss of a loved one, a life of fighting crime…"
He stopped when he noticed the immediate change his words had caused in her. Kate's shoulders had dropped even more, and her eyes were downcast, her chin quivering.
"Hey, I'm sorry," he said gently, placing his hand on her shoulder. "I didn't mean to…"
"It's fine," she interrupted, a sniffle punctuating the end of her sentence. "That's actually why I'm here… can we talk?"
Castle nodded, removing his hand from her shoulder and gesturing towards the couch. She walked toward it, and he followed her, placing himself on the far end of the couch once Kate had chosen the side closest to the door. She didn't look like she planned to stay long, perching at the edge of the cushion with her back straight and her hands folded tightly in her lap.
"I was nineteen," she said quietly, studying her hands. "My parents and I were supposed to go to dinner together that night, and Mom was going to meet my dad and me at the restaurant once she got off work. But she never showed."
Closing her eyes, Kate took a deep, slow breath, as if she were trying to find some well of courage to explain the rest of the story. A few more heartbeats, a couple seconds of silence, and she opened her eyes again to look at him.
"Two hours later, we finally just went home, and there was a detective waiting for us at the front door. Detective Raglan. They… they found her body," she said, pressing her lips together. "She had been stabbed multiple times. She still had her money and purse and jewelry, and it wasn't a sexual assault, either. They attributed it to 'gang violence'... a random, wayward event." She paused, her face going hard with the knowledge that it was anything but. Her mother had been killed by a contract killer. Someone had wanted her dead and hired a man to do it. "They just packaged it up nicely, and the killer was never caught."
Beckett dropped her eyes to her lap, that momentary flare of anger burning out quickly to bring back the grieving young woman who still missed her mother. "My dad and I both took it hard," she explained. "He started drinking, and I poured my life into her case. We were both destroying ourselves."
The shrug she gave at the conclusion of her story was probably meant to be nonchalant, but it didn't really sell. Like a lot of things with Beckett, it was a coping mechanism, some sort of outer armor to both keep of the facade of this iron-willed detective and to keep everyone at arm's length from her true feelings. But she had tells, just like anyone else Castle had ever met. One of them happened to be the fidgeting of her right hand, smoothing over the face and tugging at the leather band of the watch she always wore.
A man's watch, at that.
"So why do you wear the watch?" Rick asked carefully, eyes flicking from the startled look she gave down towards her fingers.
"My dad finally got sober. He has been for seven years now. And when he agreed to try rehab again, I also agreed to stop investigating my mom's case and to move on with my life. I started wearing his watch as a way to keep him close while he was in rehab, and when he got out he told me to keep it," she replied, holding out her wrist to give him a better look at the timepiece. "So I wear his watch because he's the life I saved."
She reached under the neckline of her shirt, withdrawing a delicate chain between her thumb and forefinger. The diamond caught the light when Kate extended it towards him, and for a moment he thought that she was wearing some sort of pendant; at least until he recognized the round shape of the setting.
She was wearing a wedding ring on a chain around her neck. A very elegant, simple diamond.
"And this is for the life that I lost," Kate added, giving him a small, sad smile.
"When I left the precinct this afternoon, I went to go talk to my dad about all of this," she said, tucking the makeshift necklace back under her blouse. "I want to solve this case, but I don't know how to without losing myself again. Especially now that it's not just my life that I'd be destroying." Kate sighed, brushing her fingers across her stomach with a slight frown.
"And I told my dad about the baby," she added, looking up at Castle. "I told him everything."
"What did he say?" Castle asked.
She took a quick breath, her eyes roving up to look at the ceiling. "He was disappointed with me," she answered, quickly brushing at the newly-formed tears in her eyes. "The usual reaction you might expect from a father. He has every right to be disappointed with me. But he's happy," she said, a smile beginning to play at the corners of her lips. "He said he can't wait to be a grandpa."
With that said, Kate fell silent again, dropping her eyes back to her lap. Even with the admission that her father was excited about becoming a grandfather, a few more tears trailed down her cheeks, and she brushed them off with her thumb.
"So I guess the character you're basing on me has a tragic backstory now," she finally murmured, laughing nervously.
"Just like Bruce Wayne," Castle joked, attempting to lighten the mood with a quip that felt a little hollow under the circumstances. But Beckett seemed to appreciate his attempt at humor, giving a slow nod and that purse of her lips that he saw all too often at the precinct. If she was doing that, she was trying to hide a smile.
Sure enough, when he waited her out, the grin finally came. It was small and reluctant, but there nonetheless.
"Beckett," he started, seizing the moment of lightness and preventing a potential shift in topic, "I will do anything you need. Including nothing, if that's what you want."
"I want to solve this case. I want to find my mom's killer," she replied, squaring up her shoulders with that spark of determination that he hadn't seen since they walked into Jack Coonan's apartment yesterday morning. "And I want you to be there to help."
"Then we need to break Johnny Vong," Castle replied.
Kate grinned, pushing off the couch to bring herself to her full height. "So let's break him."
Author's note: I know that the case I use in this chapter happened in season 2, and this is a late season 3 AU. I know. You don't have to tell me. I figured that since it's an AU already, I might as well alter the timeline a bit. :)
Thank you all for reading. Your reviews mean a lot to me.