"Dad?"

The whispered voice startled Rick from a deep slumber, and he sat up in bed, disoriented and disheveled.

"Dad? It's just me…"

"What's wrong? Are you sick?" He cleared his throat and forced himself to wake up enough to process what Alexis was saying.

"No – I came downstairs to get a drink of water. I can hear Kate moaning and crying in her sleep, Dad. I think she's having a nightmare."

He was awake now. Throwing the covers free, he swung his legs over the side of the bed and followed Alexis to the door of the guest room. She was right – it sounded as though Kate was completely engulfed in a dream from which she couldn't break away.

"What should we do?" he asked his daughter in a hushed voice, thick with sleep.

Alexis shrugged, her eyes slightly panicked. "I don't know. One of us should go in there, I suppose. Try and wake her up."

"Which one should it be?"

"Well… I'm another woman so she might be more comfortable with me seeing her in whatever clothes you dug up for her."

"Yeah … about that, Miss 'I've got just the thing'," Castle's lips had puckered on the brink of a mild chastisement when another whimpered moan from Kate's room stole his heart from his chest.

"On the other hand," Alexis went on, taking in the look on her dad's face with an understanding beyond her years. "She knows you better. Plus, even if I went in there, you'd be hovering at the door."

"True. I do hover."

He placed his hand on the door, still hesitating to push it open as he debated how much trouble he'd be in for being the one to wake her up. Another cry sounded, this one calling his name, and the decision was made for him. Without another thought, he slipped inside the room and cautiously approached the bed. Just because she knew him better didn't mean she still wouldn't shoot him – especially if she was still in that place between dream-world and reality.

Sliding beneath the covers, he caught her flailing body in a tight embrace, keeping her arms pinned to her sides. "Ssh, Kate, it's just a dream. Wake up, sweetheart. You're safe. I'm here."

"Rick…" She was still asleep, still held hostage by her nightmare, and her forehead scrunched in a mixture of fear and pain. "Rick, no… Roy… let me go. Let me go. No!"

And then she was sobbing in her sleep, in his arms, all fight draining from her body as tears flooded her face. He held her against his chest, brushing his hand down her hair, trailing his fingers along her spine, whispering soothing words of comfort against her temple. "It's okay, Kate. I'm here. I'm here."

Alexis moved from her spot in the doorway to head back upstairs, feeling as though she were intruding on an intensely private moment between her dad and the woman he loved. Kate would be fine, she knew; she had the best nightmare-comforter anyone could ask for – something Alexis had experienced firsthand. There was something about her father's hugs that made Alexis feel like everything would be right with the world – even if it was a horrible impossibility.

Rick could tell when Kate began to wake and kept his caresses steady and reassuring. Her sobs faded into hiccups of emotion, and her breathing gradually became less ragged. His lungs constricted when she snuggled into his embrace rather than pulling away – something that in turn surprised and elated him.

"How often do you have these nightmares?" he murmured into the darkness.

She shuddered in response, and he nodded against her hair, pressing a light kiss to the silken tresses. "Too often, huh?"

"It's – always – the – same," Kate forced out, her voice trembling and raw.

"The night Montgomery died?"

Shaking her head, she raised her hand to glide across his shoulder, coming to rest over his heart. "Not really. I mean … it's that night but …"

He could feel the tension return and wove his fingers through her hair, letting the locks cascade over his palm and gently massaging her scalp. When she began to relax again, he slowed his pace but maintained the tactile connection. He'd wait until she was ready to talk about it – at least until she wasn't so exhausted.

Her breathing evened out after a few moments, and he could tell she had fallen asleep. Waiting until he was sure she was resting deeply, he shifted their bodies to allow him to find a more reclining position, his arms still holding her against his heart. Her hand rose in her sleep to cradle his face, and he turned his lips to caress her palm with a gentle kiss.

"Rick," she sighed, but this time it was peaceful and contented. His heart felt like it would burst out of his body if given the opportunity, and a lump grew in his throat as protectiveness and love battled for dominance. It wasn't often that he got to see her vulnerable like this – though it had happened more frequently over the past year or so. And the fact that she trusted him enough to lean on him in her moments of fragility made him feel strong enough to crush a mountain with his bare hands.

Sunlight filtered lazily through the window of the guest room, coaxing Rick into wakefulness and waiting for him to acclimate to the unusual setting. He was still in bed with Kate, she was still in his arms, but over the course of the night she had flung a slender leg over his and the hand that had been at his cheek now lay across his abdomen. He could tell by her breathing that she was awake, and he began tracing the outline of her spine with a light touch, giving her the space she needed to process the intimacy of their positions.

"You're in Roy's place," she finally whispered.

His hand stilled, and he shifted a bit so he could gaze into her red-rimmed eyes in confusion. "What do you mean?"

"You … you're the one sacrificing your life for me," she wept, her face crumpling against the strong emotions that pummeled her spirit. "Roy pulls me away, takes me outside the hangar. Everything he did that night – is you in my dream. You died."

"I didn't have anything to do with your mother's death, did I?" he asked, concerned. "In the dream."

"No." She shook her head, her hair tickling his neck and putting his senses into overdrive. "In my dream, the hangar – you're just protecting me from the people who killed her."

He thought of his murder board, the one on his computer, the one about her mother's case. A thought crossed his mind, making his heart swell with male pride. On one level – maybe just subconsciously – she knew that he would do anything in his power to protect her from harm.

"Have you talked to anyone about this?"

This time, she nodded. "Yeah. The shrink from my psych review – after the shooting. I've been seeing him since then – to help me work through some stuff."

"That's good," he told her, rubbing his hand along her upper arm. "A lot happened."

Then, "What does he think about your dream?"

"He says it's because I heard you say—" Kate's answer had begun as an automatic reflex, brought on by sleep deprivation and the vestiges of the nightmare, but she cut herself off abruptly and attempted to pull out of Rick's embrace, his spine stiffening at her words.

She tried to salvage the conversation – "I mean…" – but she cursed out loud as she realized there was no redemption after the words that had slipped past her defenses.

"Because you heard me say what?"

His voice was slow, almost cold in its delivery as though he were trying to distance himself emotionally from her answer.

"Castle… please, understand." She extricated herself from his light hold and sat up on her knees, taking one of his hands in hers and silently pleading with him to forgive her. "I … I couldn't deal with what you said to me in the cemetery."

"What did I say, Kate?" He sat up too but didn't disengage his hand.

She wanted to sob at the frostiness in his words, but forced herself to continue, hoping she could persuade him to see things from her perspective. "You said that you love me, Rick."

He held her gaze for a millisecond before averting his eyes and setting his jaw. "And your answer to that was to send me away for three months? Thanks, Kate."

When he tried to pull his hand from her grasp, she tightened her hold and tugged him back to her. "Rick, no. Don't do this, please. Put yourself in my shoes. Everything I'd ever believed in had been turned upside down. I needed a constant. I needed things between us to stay the same."

Relief washed over her when he laced his fingers through hers, though he kept his eyes trained on the opposite wall. "And now?"

His question was so soft she almost missed it, and her throat ached painfully as emotion clogged it. "I don't know," she admitted. "Part of me wants more. Most of me is still terrified of screwing it up."

"The wall?"

She nodded, suppressing a sob with the back of her hand. "More than anything, Rick, I can't lose you. You… you're too important to me."

His eyes finally migrated back to her face, and her heart broke at the depth of love she saw shimmering in the blue irises. "You won't lose me, Kate." He squeezed her hand. "I promise."

Her body felt drawn to him like a moth to a flame, and she pressed her lips to his in a tentative kiss. He groaned raggedly beneath her, his mouth trembling with the force of his restraint, and his hands fisted the sheets to keep from reaching out to pull her into the kind of kiss he so desperately wanted to give her. When she broke the kiss, she rested her forehead against his and fought to regain control of her wildly racing heart.

"Kate?"

"Yeah?"

"You're pressing your luck."

She laughed – a throaty chuckle that nearly undid his resolve – and she wriggled back to her side of the bed. "Got it." Throwing on the robe he'd loaned her, she set her feet to the carpet and headed for the bathroom. She paused in the doorway and glanced back to the man who lay, a bit rumpled and shell-shocked, against the sheets.

"Castle?"

He turned to look at her. "Yeah, Kate?"

"Thanks."

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