He buries his face in the crook of her neck.

Oh Kate.

"Don't be angry with me, Castle. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry I made you doubt me. Doubt us. Help me, okay? I want you to. I need you to."

"'kay," is all he can manage as he squeezes his eyes shut, squeezes her body too hard. He loves her too much sometimes. It's possible to love her too much.

She can barely breath, but she lets him, she owes him this much.

And when he finally relaxes, she finds his lips, working them both into a frenzy of want. She hooks her fingers in his waistband, tries to get to his belt. He helps the process along, not leaving her embrace.

Her sharp intake of breath as he slides a hand over her flat stomach and down to the edge of her panties, tells him she wants the physical act, but her words tell him she wants their connection.

"Make love to me, Rick."

So he goes slow and holds her close, face to face, until he really forgives her, until she really believes it.


She always wakes up before him, but this time she nestles into his embrace before rising up to kiss his jaw.

A slow smile spreads across his face before he opens his eyes.

Kate.

"I'm going to take a shower, get up, we've got a murderer to catch, partner."

"Hmm, too early, come back to bed." An arm coming around her to hold her in place, nuzzling her hair.

"I'll let you take a shower with me if you get up right now."

"You say that to all your partners?"

She inches into his space,"no, lover, I only say it to you, come on." It doesn't take any more convincing for him to stumble into the bathroom behind her.


Ryan and Esposito listen as she tells her story. Wet hair and drowning in one of his sweatshirts make her seem smaller, frail somehow. Her story is harrowing.

After discovering Josh's body, she'd tried to hold his hand, discovering a thumb drive in his palm just as she'd heard a door close. Hoping to catch a glimpse of their suspect she'd given chase, losing the suspect several blocks away in an alley. A man, early 30s, brown hair, chiseled jaw, athletic, a little over six feet.

She'd made her way back to the hospital but was blindsided by a pistol placed to her temple as soon as she'd entered the garage. The man she chased was obviously not concerned about her seeing his face, took her gun, wallet and cell phone. It didn't bode well for her. He'd demanded to know where 'it' was. She'd played dumb, telling him it was at Josh's apartment, once he took her there, she'd been able to get away. By then, it was clear she was in danger, and clear that the drive she possessed was important. Going back to the hospital seemed too risky, and now the guy knew where she lived. She'd ducked into a library to check the contents of the thumb drive and found Karen's name listed as the author of several medical papers although she didn't fully understand their value. Kate made a rash decision to pursue a conversation with the woman, instead of contacting her partners. She'd had no idea this woman was dating Josh, although this became apparent from pictures around the woman's apartment. The doctor had been shot in the same manner as Josh. It had been her misfortune to discover the second doctor's body as well, only now, it looked bad for her. Getting into the doctors' offices in the hospital seemed imperative to figuring out what this was about, hopefully get ahead of the trail of bodies. After finding the addresses of others mentioned in the documents, she'd gone to question one who lived nearby. She'd hope to have more time to figure things out when she was arrested.

"We'll go over things, see what we can come up with. We got your back, Beckett." Espo's talking to Kate but looking at Castle.


The moment they're gone he wraps her up tightly in his arms.

"Stupid woman," he whispers, kissing her temple. She buries her head in his shoulder and lets herself be loved.

He encourages her to nap while he looks up the name of the drug in the research she described.

"Don't wanna," she whines sweetly into his neck.

"Come on, I'll lie down with you," he leads her by the hand through his office, grabbing his laptop on the way to her side of the bed. The soft sheets beckon her and she curls up as soon as he pulls back the comforter. He tucks her in before coming around to his side, where she quickly claims a spot at his hip, pushing her pillow up against him.

"Pretty girl," he murmurs, stroking a hand through her hair and down her shoulder before opening his laptop to save her. And himself.


When she wakes, he's gone.

The soft lilt of his voice carries to her and she smiles into her pillow before she stumbles out to find him. Lucky.

Forehead touching him first, she fumbles into his solid mass standing at the counter in his kitchen.

"Hey kitten," Castle rings an arm around her neck pulling her to him.

"You ruined it," she says sleepily, pushing off him to sit on the stool.

"Nah, can't ruin us," he says holding the back of her head in place to kiss her. Reassurance, they're still them. The tenderness of Richard Castle that has always reached for her, stretches out again. "Let me get you something to eat."

"Hmm," she sighs,"coffee."

"Coming right up. Ryan called," he works around the kitchen," he says someone broke into Dr. Hayward's apartment, he's another one of the researchers on that drug study. Only he was in the Hamptons at the time. He says the place is a wreck, papers everywhere. No computer."

"Castle," she reaches to take the mug he offers her, "whoever he is, he's looking for something related to that study."

"I can't imagine why. Looks to me like by all accounts it was a terrific failure, none of the trials indicate anything positive that I can make out in the medical jargon."

"Maybe we need to ask Lanie to look it over."


"I don't see anything here worth killing over," the petite ME leans over the papers, "looks like the drug trials were a failure. Not only did it not show a statistically significant outcome, looks like there was an unreasonably high mortality rate during the study."

"Are you saying this drug kills people?"

"Not exactly, it's not a cause and effect kind of thing, just that an unusually high number of people died during the course of the study. Certainly not something you want to bring to the FDA when you are trying to get approval for a drug that doesn't work." The feisty ME slaps the file shut, "if I were you, I'd start looking at how this study was conducted."


"Hey Kate," they both turn to face the baby-faced white coat coming down the hospital hall. The detective obviously knows him.

"Brian, good to see you," she doesn't introduce him to Castle.

"You heard about Josh?"

She nods.

"He's not the only one, they got Karen, too, although I heard they arrested someone."

She takes a deep breath before continuing, feels Castle at her back.

"Brian, we're hoping you can help us with something," she pulls the file open as she speaks, "Josh and Karen were reviewing a research study. Do you know anything about where they found the participants?"

A look crosses his face and he hesitates before he responds, "No, I wasn't involved in that study." He fumbles for a moment before reaching for his pager, "I've got to go." He's gone before they can get another word out of him.


Kate leans her cheek against his back as he fumbles to unlock his front door, a long sigh escaping her.

"So glad to have you," she whispers against him.

"Come on, let's see what the boys have come up with," pulling her around him to plant a quick kiss on her before pushing her through the door.

"Matched your service weapon to the murder of the girlfriend," Ryan is saying even as she plants her face in her hands.

"Ryan, you're supposed to be proving someone else is the killer." He's genuinely afraid for her, reaches out to stroke the back of her head from across the counter where the speakerphone lays.

"No, this is good news, actually, it takes away the link between the two crimes, gives us a legitimate reason to run this investigation. Anyhow, that isn't all we found."

Beckett perks up, "what?"

"Seems like you were caught on tape chasing our suspect, bank down the street has a great angle on it. Confirms your story."

"Awesome," Castle's comments earn him the evil eye.

"Also, we reviewed the financials on Josh and Karen, didn't find much except for a whole lot of monthly auto-drafts from both their bank accounts."

"Wait, auto-drafts from both accounts?" Castle can tell she's on to something.

"Yeah, probably because of the time they were both spending outside of the country. Amazon river basin mostly."

"If they were out of the country, how were they participating in this drug study?"

He's picking up on where she's going, "Unless they were conducting the study on foreign soil."

She's nodding, "Where the mortality rate wouldn't get the attention it would get here."

He finishes their thought, "they were planning on obscuring the data. That's why they need the original research. That's why they need to get rid of the doctor's involved."

She's smiling at him.

"Hey Ryan, got to go. We'll start fresh in the morning," Kate can hear him rushing to end the conversation, even as he's working his way around the counter.

He yanks her by the waist to him, "Solving crime with you is such a turn on." He emphasizes his words with a little hike of the arm encircling her, making her gasp.

"Easy there, I'm already suspected of killing my last boyfriend."

Castle rolls his eyes to the ceiling considering her statement and then he looks back at her, hikes her up enough to tilt her body into his, "I can think of worse ways to go," and then he kisses her.


Kate has to physically untangle his limbs from her in order to get out of bed. He wakes enough on her final shove to snatch her pillow and substitute it for her in his embrace.

She turns back long enough to appreciate what she has, he's adorable. He's hers.

By the time she hears his shower running she's dressed and caffeinated and headed for the paper outside his front door.

The click of her own Glock, pointed at her forehead as she leans down to pick up the newspaper gives her pause. She swallows and looks up into the eyes of the man she's already chased away from a murder scene, the man who shot two people in cold blood, the man at the center of this.