A/N: • Thank you to everyone who has been keeping up with this story. I honestly appreciate every single review and more.

• To the reviewer who pointed out my grammar errors, I found myself a beta and hope the story improves overall.

• I'm also sorry this is so late, with so much pressure from my summer college courses, not feeling well, and life, I sort of hit my first writer's block. It drove me insane the past three weeks.

Disclaimer: Still don't own it, I should, though, we would still be watching new episodes.

The paperwork, the case, the boys, everything, can wait tomorrow. Today, her partner needs her and fours day is already too long without knowing the entire story.

The ride to her apartment is in silence but comforting, nerves in the air, but reassuring, they're going to get through this. She makes quick work of getting wine when they get to her apartment. Another quick work of settling them on the couch, even faster work of avoiding the topic with jokes between the both of them.

And that's all it took, a second, the sadness of the situation hitting them abruptly. To see what her shooting has done to him. The way his head is lowered down in defeat, his shoulders hunched, the energy too intense – different – not – not her Castle.

A reminder of how she didn't see her writer, her partner, hurting all of these months.

She wishes that she could take it all away. Help capture the invisible enemy that's physically hurting him, her – them by the neck, lock it away and throw away the key. Only this is not a fairytale, and she can't capture his invisible enemy for him but she can – will help him slay it, together.

She watches him as he sets his glass of wine on the table, and chooses to rest his elbows on his knees, lower his face down to his hands. She finds herself wishing he never followed her, even though just the thought of that happening makes her sick.

She can't help but blame herself or to think if maybe he never followed her, if she would have stopped looking into her mother's case, if her mother made it home for dinner, if –

"It's not your fault." The rasp of his voice thick with the anxiety she can tell he's trying to contain.

She doesn't reply, well as a result of, she doesn't agree. It is her fault.

"It's not your fault."

She lifts her legs to bring them close to her chest, wraps her arms around them, choosing to rest her cheek against her knees and look at him. Protecting herself – him, them, her.

"When they did they start?"

He looks her, his eyes clouded over, she can see the internal struggle with trying to tell her the truth until he sighs in defeat, the sadness creeping in before it takes over completely.

"I'm not sure," his voice cracks slightly. She watched as he takes a moment to cover his face with hands, as if he's trying to hold himself together, and her hands itch. She wishes that her fingers could etch the open space of his and create the barrier he wants to hide behind but only if she's there so that she can help knock it down when he's ready. Regardless, of how hypocritical it sounds.

"I couldn't sleep for days; it just kept replaying in my head you know?" Swirling his finger against his temple repeatedly.

"The panic attacks, they just, they just started I'm not sure when exactly, the very first one must have been the same day of your–" and the sentence runs out.

The same day as her shooting. She should reassure him, but she's stuck in his place, and he needs to do this for himself, so she can help him and help herself.

"The same day, I – I didn't know it was one, Lanie found me and she helped calm me down, even while she was having one herself," he strains in a laugh.

"I didn't know at the time until it happened again, again, and again. That's when Lanie told me what it was, I'm a grown man, I should know this by now Beckett, you would think? Only it didn't hit me until she was telling me I needed help."

"I could deal with it, but then you didn't call, and it just got worse-"

He stops for a second, and the barrier she's created with her arms does nothing to eliminate the guilt choosing to wrap itself around the already flimsy wall placed around her heart. Still, she urges him to continue, carefully unwraps herself of her carefully placed cocoon of a shell to reach over and wrap her hand around his forearm.

He lifts his eyes to meets hers and she hopes her eyes are enough to communicate what her words can't seem to form against her lips. He nods, whether in an understanding of her words or agreement she doesn't know, he continues regardless.

"They just kept happening and happening. When you came back, it was okay until the risk of a gun being pointed at you was enough to drive me crazy.

I did, and I'm doing everything I can to stop them. I see a therapist, I workout, I write, it's the nightmares. They come and go, but when they come, I can't stop them, and I end up," he laughs, a half sob in the wake "I end up in your front door, ruining your girl's night, and halfway to crying over wine, allowing me the chance to realize that we're doing this wrong, the ice cream is missing, Beckett."

That's when she realized she's crying because the laugh that escapes her is more connected to the sob he just hashed out moments ago and he's lifting his hand up to her face to wipe away the tears, and even that little movement is enough to fill the small gaps of her broken interior. It's what he's always done, help filled the broken gap between her wall, filling her with everything that is him.

She reaches her hand to cover his over her cheek. Assures him she'll cover them when they're finished. "We'll go the deli after, pick up some ice cream when we're done. Whatever flavor you want, my treat." He nods his eyes swimming with tears but the love still shining in them, directed at her, always her. The blue a reminder of the wave that's overcoming in her own eyes.

"Castle, I'm so-"

He cuts her off with a sharp nod of his head and a soft grip of his hand against her cheek. "Don't."

"No, listen to me okay," she lowers his hand against her check, allowing them to be wrapped around the both of hers, tightening her hold.

"I'm sorry, for closing you out, for leaving you without a word for months. I'm sorry for not noticing that you needed my help, that you needed me to be your partner," she half chokes on the word because, in reality, she knows she should be more, for him, her, them. She wants to be more. Partners at work, Partners in life.

"Even if I wanted to help, I could barely lift an arm without losing my breath, but once I was able to, once I was able to steady myself, I should've reached out. All of those mistakes are mine to own because you would do anything for me and I should have never allowed, even for a second for you to think I wouldn't do the same, and for that I'm sorry."

"Kate –"

She holds up a finger; she's not finished, and she owes him this, owes them this.

"I'm seeing a therapist too."

She swallows down the urge to run and stop this conversation from continuing any further. "My therapist, the one that cleared me to go back to work, I still go to him. They, they – um – they diagnosed me with PTSD," she rushes out.

He looks at her, the confusion and understanding of her words hitting him straight but she wasn't ready for the sadness that becomes more visible among his features. He always knew when she was in pain, and he was aware every time she denied it. Still, the surprise is written across his face of the openness he didn't have to pry out of her.

And like an abrupt halt that happens when trying to prevent a collision, the thought slams against her chest, momentarily knocks the wind out of her system, she needs to tell him that she remembers her shooting.

She squeezes his hand that is wrapped her own, the tears threatening to spill once again.

"Kate, hey, it's okay you, – he wipes away the single tear that manages to escape – you don't have to talk about your PTSD."

And she wishes that, that was what they could be talking about because she's certain she can't handle what needs to be said, but if she doesn't say it today, she's not sure she'll ever say it.

And everything inside is screaming at her to stop lying to him because he doesn't deserve it, and she can't say what he wants to hear but she's almost there. She just needs a little more time. She just needs him to wait a bit longer, wishes him to understand that it's not because of him it's because of her, that –

She cuts off her own thoughts, "I lied."

He raises his eyebrows at her in response, unaware that she's about to break the small progress that they just built, but it wouldn't be genuine progress if she keeps lying right?

"About?" He questions, a small amount of amusement in his voice, marked with the confusion of her abrupt confession.

She swallows down the vomit that wants to escape, the bitter acid taste making her nauseous. "About my shooting," she whispers.

This time, his face is nothing short of hurt, confusion and curiosity.

"I remember."

The moment of silence is enough to hear her rapid heartbeat ringing loudly against her. If she can hear it so clearly, she's positive so can he. Forces herself to focus her eyes on him, preparing for a fight, an outburst, ready to make him see her side.

Only he abruptly stands up, walks to the other side of her living room, his eyes opened in shock. His words don't match what he's trying to say; she can tell from the clear frustration spoken between the few words he does get out, "You — months — you –." He covers his face again, his eyes a mixture of everything she wanted to avoid.

She lied for months and a part of him knew, the little things that didn't add up, the way she was growing with him, the touches, the flirting, the, well the everything.

She lied, of course, she lied because – well he has no idea why she lied.

All he knows is that he's standing across her living room pouring his heart out to the girl he – he what – he loves, and he can't assemble the necessary processing required from his cerebrum to form a complete sentence, the anger rising from the depth of his own inner turmoil.

No, Richard Castle, is looking at the girl he loves and the emotions linked very close to insanity is not because she was shot and shut him out for months, neither a result to him knowing that she's been lying this entire time, or due to any of the signals he has picked up over these past couple of months, and whether they actually meant anything anymore. No, it all falls on him, Richard Castle who has been lying to her about his own secret, who's questioning whether or not they can ever communicate with each other instead of playing this ring around the rosie game.

She told her secret, and now, he has to tell his too.

His sudden movement has her standing, quickly trying to plead her case, "Castle, let me explain okay? Before you get upset, and we can't talk because we'll start yell –"

He swallows because he knows after this, he definitely won't be able to hold the wine or the lunch from earlier down.

"I've been keeping a secret, too."

That stops her from trying to explain her side; she raises her eyebrow at him in question. "About what?" The confusion is ringing loudly against the walls of her living room, echoing against his ears and he swears he can her her walls rising back up, bracing for impact.

He grips his neck tightly, shakes his hand slightly, trying to shake the grip of his spine to get together, muster the courage.

"Your mom's case."

And before he can plead his defense, he watches the blood drain from her face.