Close Encounters 4
When they came down the stairs into baggage claim, Kate moved for the wide bank of doors where the taxis were waiting, but Castle snagged her by the elbow and made her turn back.
She lifted an eyebrow even as she twisted her arm in his grasp and caught his hand instead; they'd been pulled apart in the flow of people moving through the concourse and getting onto the crowded train. But she had him now.
He grinned and nodded his head back towards the baggage offices. "I sent something on ahead."
"You what?" she laughed.
"I marked it as lost luggage in the airport in Rome."
"We were never in the airport in Rome."
"I was - before. When I did recon work on the site."
"Oh," she murmured. "When I was still-" She made a gesture with her hand that Castle took to encompass the whole shot in the back thing. "In recovery."
"When you were doing the training, actually." She'd spent an entirely too short two weeks at Langley undergoing an intensive course training. He didn't think it was near enough, but she'd go back and get another four weeks later. He wasn't looking forward to that either, but she kept insisting on it.
"So what did you get?" she murmured. "And how did it get here?"
"Since it got redirected in Rome - or so the airline thinks - it gets sent on to its original destination. The origin barcode on the sticker tags, you know? I just printed one out saying it was supposed to go here. But now I've got to go claim it."
She was shaking her head at him and he grinned back.
"What?" he said. "These are the tricks of the trade."
"I guess so."
"It's not like I can buy you presents and send them directly here. That's dangerous, Beckett."
Her lips quirked at the corner. "You bought me a present?"
He nodded. "A wedding present."
"Well, what are you waiting for? Go get it, super spy."
Beckett saw the man before he saw her.
Maybe it was spending so much time with Castle on the job, the way he checked his surroundings obsessively, counted the people on the street, routinely scanned the crowds.
Maybe she just had an internal alarm that was tripped whenever he showed up.
But Agent Black was lurking at the edge of the baggage claim, evidently searching for his son.
Or, no.
Searching for her.
Of course he was.
His eyes landed on her and he came smoothly forward, the crowd seeming to part before him like some sinister Moses. She stood her ground, proud that she was at least prepared to face him; every other time he'd confronted her, she'd been caught off guard.
And naked.
And wounded.
Either physically, the gunshot, or emotionally, Castle stabbed and unconscious in her arms.
But not today.
Black's eyes perused her slowly, as they always did, and then his twisted smile flickered to life. "Did he give you the ring finally, or are you still playing at this?"
She couldn't answer that without sounding childish or defensive, so she said nothing.
But he seemed to know it anyway. "Well, well. You've really hooked your claws in him."
"It's a mutual thing," she said, barely suppressing the urge to roll her eyes. If anyone was hooked, it was Beckett. Castle had abducted her from the side of the road, and he hadn't let go since.
Black made a disappointed sound in his throat and positioned himself to stand beside her, like they were two unknown travelers. She wished that were the case.
"You do know he can never be what you need. When the fucking gets stale, you'll want things from him that he can't give."
Her nostrils flared but she crossed her arms in front of her instead and kept her eyes firmly on the office where Castle had disappeared inside.
"Even now, it's not mutual," Black continued, his voice calm but tinted with disdain. "You think this is a mutual thing? With the kind of life he leads? He's taken you on a world tour only, sweetheart. You've done nothing but see the sights."
The tight fist in her chest wouldn't ease. She'd - wondered. She'd suspected it, had even called him out on him, hadn't she? That he was taking it easy on her, arranging innocuous things to do in the beautiful places of the world rather than really letting her partner him.
She'd never really been a partner to him. And he would never let her. She-
"No," she scraped out, shaking her head clear of him. "You don't get to to do this to me. Not today." She pressed her thumb to the band of the engagement ring, bent her finger so she could rub the stone.
It would be cloudy and grey, she knew.
"Do what to you?" Black said lightly. "Tell you the truth? Prepare you for the time when he remembers who he is and finally leaves you?"
"It doesn't work on me anymore," she said quietly, turning her body to confront him. "You can say anything you like. I know I'm often a fucked up person, and I know how dark it is for him as well. But together we manage to make it good. And I won't let you take that from either of us."
"Pretty words," he murmured back, so quiet, so deadly that she nearly didn't hear them at all. "But words are nothing against the history of his life. You think you're the first? That there haven't been others?"
"I don't care," she said simply. "Nothing matters but him."
And then her eyes caught on Castle, the dark cloud of his face as he moved through the crowd for her, his eyes taking in the sight of his father next to her. He moved slowly because he was carrying a massive package (oh, wouldn't he love that, a massive package), but even though it was laborious, it was inevitably and dangerously forward.
She smiled at him to let him know - I'm fine, I love you - and then she turned back to his father.
"We're in-laws, you and I. But we will never be family."
And she strode forward to meet Castle in the middle.
He might need help with that massive package.
God, help.
He wanted to kill the bastard. He wanted to physically get his hands on his father's throat and dig his fingers into that vulnerable skin until he was clawing the blood from him and ripping open his jugular-
"Rick," she murmured. All of it in her eyes. Hurt and fear and anger and love and mercy. So much mercy. He wasn't able to do that. He couldn't move past the flood of grief-filled rage that pushed and pulsed hotly in his chest.
"Kate," he scraped out.
She had her fingers around his wrist, was tugging him away, and his legs obeyed even as everything in his chest screamed.
"I'm okay. It's fine. Let's go home."
"Kate." Because no other word would come, nothing; he was dry as the desert and the mirage shimmering in front of him depicted the detailed evisceration he could perform in under thirty seconds right here in this airport.
"Please, baby." She was pressed into his side and he realized he was unconsciously pushing them both towards Black, to get at the man before he could disappear into the crowd, but Kate was resisting him, and hard.
"Kate. Kate, he-"
"I want to go home. I need to go home. I want to open my present and fall in bed with you and celebrate getting engaged or married or whatever this is. Can we do that? Castle. Please."
"Of course," he grit out, an automatic agreement that came whenever she pleaded with him. His blood tasted thick and sour in his mouth, his arms were laden down with the thing he'd bought her in Rome weeks before they'd ever gone, and he wanted only to shelter her, make himself into a living shield so it would never, it would never never-
"Don't," she said in warning, her grip tightening on his wrist. "Are you crying? Come on. It's not that bad. I promise. I'll tell you what he said, but it's nothing I can't handle."
Fuck. Was he crying? No. But a near thing.
He felt slow and weighed down; he wanted to do damage but all that was left to him was tactical retreat.
"Come home with me," she said again, her other hand stroking over his bicep like she was petting him. "I want to go home."
He followed because he didn't know what else to do.
His whole being was at war.
He'd waited until they got through her apartment door and he'd put the box down on her coffee table. She hadn't spoken a word of what his father had said to her, what had put that terrible ache in her eyes, and even though she'd tried distracting him - her fingers stroking, her body close, her mouth skimming his jaw - he couldn't stop thinking about it.
About cutting open his father's guts and ripping them out with his fist, squeezing. Squeezing. He wanted to crush the murderous, manipulating life out of him.
"Castle, stop. I want you to stop."
He jerked his head up, his eyes tracked to her, and instead of all that soft and soothing Kate, there was Beckett. The warrior.
His heart flipped and caught.
She pushed him onto the couch and pressed her fingers into his forehead to keep him there, moving past him to sit on the coffee table. "No more."
"Kate-"
"I said no more. You need to calm down. You're not responsible for him, and I am an adult. A grown woman. You think I haven't heard this before, Castle? I interrogate lowlifes and scum and depraved psychotics regularly."
He sucked in a hard breath, felt the beat of his heart start up again.
"I've been spit on, punched, body slammed into a wall. I've seen a degenerate fondle himself the moment I walked into the interrogation room. And far fucking worse. Your father doesn't even begin to compete."
He blinked and bowed his head into his hands, took gulping breaths. He didn't like that either, at all, none of it, but when he'd first met her - that'd been one of the things that drew him like a moth. How hard she was, take no prisoners, intense and demanding and brave.
"And Castle?"
He lifted his head, swallowed hard at the steel in her eyes.
"We're not going to keep doing this. Do you hear me? This macho-spy bullshit. Shielding me at your own expense and hovering over me and twisting yourself up inside when I hurt. This is our life; we both chose it long before we knew each other."
He nodded but he wanted to unmake a lot of choices when it came to this new thing with her. He wanted to not be this - twisted up inside, just like she'd said.
She rose suddenly from the coffee table before him and put her knee into the couch at his hip, did the same with the other one so that she was straddling his thighs. Her hands lowered to his shoulders and she sank down over his lap.
"Rick," she murmured, her hot breath skirting his jaw. His eyes slammed shut and he pressed his fingers into her hips.
"Yes," he said when he realized she was waiting on him.
"In our own room, our own bed, I want us to make love. Do you understand me? No handcuffs. No hood. No anger, no grief, no guilt. Can you do that?"
He nodded wordlessly, wrapping his arms slowly around her waist and tugging her closer.
"I want it slow," she said lazily. "I want to take my time with you."
He shuddered and squeezed her thighs, cleared his throat but still had no words.
Her mouth came to his ear with a soft kiss. "And when we're both warm and satisfied, when we're clean of it, all of it, I want to come back out here and open a bottle of wine with you, celebrate, and then get at your package."
He sucked in a breath and let it out. Found he could smile and nudge his nose against hers.
"I think you can get at my package anytime you want, Kate Beckett."
She hummed a laugh into his ear, easy and light, and rocked her hips into his. "Take me to bed."
Yes. Oh, yes. She was right. And he'd never had anyone so relentlessly good for him.
He stood up with her wrapped around him and carried her to bed.
She was lying on top of him now, and he ran his fingers up and down her spine, around her shoulder blades, down her arms and back. Ceaseless, warm, loving.
She knew that now. He was possessive and uncut and hard to tame, but this was how he loved. The only way he knew. She imagined him as a boy, trying to figure out how he was supposed to act, what was okay behavior, where he was allowed to go. He'd cobbled together a rich inner life that - until now - had no outlet, no expression or form.
But now he had this - their relationship - and so of course it looked strange and heavy-handed at times. Of course he had to touch and claim and put everything in order, arrange them and her and their togetherness to his exact specifications. He had never held on to anything of his own before.
She could bear with him on this. She could. She'd not be as patient as she ought to be, but she could allow him the small things, like having her body draped over him and his hands unable to stop roaming.
Perhaps now was the time.
Kate curled her arms up into her chest, stroked her fingers at his pec, shifting her hips as they started to ache. Her legs were tangled with his in the sheets, but he'd grabbed a blanket and had pulled it up over them, so she was warm enough.
"He said we wouldn't last," she finally began. "He said it wasn't real, that you weren't this man and you'd remember your true self and you'd be gone."
She felt the catch in his lungs, and his hands stopped at her shoulders, tightened. But before he could defend himself or grow angry again, she pressed a kiss to his sternum and kept going.
"But you are this man," she reassured him. She didn't need it for herself; she already knew. "I know the man you are and I'm not afraid. Maybe I was at one time, and I don't know when it happened, but this is real. This is probably the most real thing in my life."
His arms wrapped tightly around her and his palm came to her neck, cradling her head against his chest so that she couldn't look at him even if she wanted to.
She didn't. She needed not to look at him while she said this.
"But I do want us to be partners, Castle. Not just professionally. In our marriage as well." She could feel her heart picking up now, her palms sweating at just the idea of marriage with him. "But for that to happen, we have to be partners in all things."
He cleared his throat and his fingers curled in her hair, gripping. "I know. I'm - I know."
"If that means I have to report to your father for mission briefings, fine. I can do that. If it means more time training at Langley, I'll do that too. Even though I'll miss you," she added softly.
"I know," he said again, but his words were ragged.
"I understand there's a line we walk - being together and also working together. I don't want anything to happen to you either, so in some ways, I've let it go - not doing real work out in the field, dropping messages and meeting contacts. When the man in Versailles was killed in front of us, I saw your face, Castle."
"Scared the shit out of me," he admitted. "Never supposed to happen. Not just doing small stuff like that."
"You're trying to keep me safe, and I - I don't like that, but I do understand. I was kind of relieved because it meant you were safe too."
He let out a breath that sounded like a strangled laugh, maybe. She rubbed at his skin under her fingers and turned her head so she could press her lips to the inside of his wrist. He stroked her ear and let go of her neck, like he'd just realized what he was doing.
She lifted up to look at him.
His eyes were closed.
"Castle."
"I'm here."
She smiled at that, but she had to get back on track. "I need to do a worthwhile job if I can't be a detective right now. Something that brings justice, something that is right and good - not the shadows and greys of dropping off information or slow dancing with a Scotland Yard inspector."
"I don't want you to slow dance with him, either," he muttered.
She pressed her fingertips into his chest, hard, and he opened his eyes, finally looked at her.
"That was a joke," he sighed. "Sort of."
"Something worthwhile, Castle. I'm not made to waltz around the world."
"It was the tango."
"I hate you," she laughed, unable to keep serious when he kept pouting. "Come on, you know what I mean."
Castle shifted to prop his head up on his bent knuckles; his other hand came to her back and soothed - lightly this time, not so demanding or possessive.
"I know what you mean," he said finally. "You do need more training, that was part of why I kept it easy. But mostly it was me."
She watched him wrestle with it, knew he'd get where they needed to be.
"All right. I can - we'll step up our activity, do less globetrotting and more real work. Might have to start off in some nasty places-"
"After Ryan's wedding."
He chuckled at her. "After the wedding. Fine."
She smiled at him and pushed her knees into his thighs so she could lift up and kiss him. Slowly. He was smiling into it as well. Good. She wanted him to be good about it.
"You will go back to the NYPD, Kate. I promise you that. It might seem that we're not getting anywhere on Bracken, but Black really is doing everything he can-"
"I know. He wants me out of his organization, Castle. He's going to do everything in his power to nail Bracken. At least there's that."
He didn't smile, but she knew he'd seen it too. "Kate. What else did he say?"
"Nothing."
He let his hand drift to her ass, nudged his hips up into hers. "Not nothing."
She battled back her reaction, tried to focus. "Really nothing."
"Kate. Partners, love." He craned his neck and feathered a kiss at her temple that made her shiver.
"Really. More of the same. I hold you back. Which is true - I know I do. But as you said, that's also partly your fault." She tilted her head to look at him, saw the grin crack wide over his face. His hand at her back dipped low, teasing, and she grunted and couldn't help the urge of her body into his.
"You don't hold me back, Kate. I do what I want."
"Well, that's for damn sure," she laughed. "Now stop teasing and let's go open my wedding present. I wanna know what it is."
"Wedding or engagement?"
"My proposal to you didn't count? Is that what you're telling me?"
He laughed. "Not - it counted. But isn't that my job?"
"So, you're saying you just re-proposed and Rome was. . .what?"
"Dry run?" he murmured.
"I hate you."
Castle sat up suddenly, and she tumbled off of him, laughing as he rolled over her. His eyes were dark and warm, a blue that spoke of sleeping in bed all day while it rained outside.
"Let me open my engagement present first," he murmured.
"You already did," she hummed back, arching into the stroke of his hand.
"One more time, baby."
"Just one? I was hoping for two or three."
He laughed and bent down to claim her mouth.
Castle caught the pair of pants she threw to him right as he stepped out of the bathroom, laughed at the look on her face.
"You cover that up," she muttered, gesturing her hand up and down the length of his body. "I can't resist and I want my present first."
He laughed harder and fell against the wall as he struggled to pull on the sweatpants, his shoulder hitting hard. It wasn't like he was naked either. He had on clean boxer briefs.
She raised her eyebrows at his comedic attempt to dress himself, nodded her head at the tshirt she'd left out on the bed. "That too, buddy."
And then she turned swiftly and left him in her bedroom to get dressed. Castle shook his head and pulled the black shirt over his head, left his sweatpants slung low on his hips. His hair was still wet and spiked up in every direction, but he wanted to watch her open her gift.
He shuffled down the hall in his bare feet, scraping his fingers through his hair but mostly giving it up. When got to the living room, she'd pulled a steak knife from the kitchen and was hacking at the packing tape.
"Whoa, look at you," he laughed.
She lifted her head and wrinkled her nose at him. He was reminded of that candid photo she'd set on his phone one time, and he turned around and went back for it, wanting pictures of this. "Hold on. Don't move."
"No way. You're too slow," she called after him.
He found his stupid phone finally under her bed and raced back into the living room in time to see her rip the packing tape off one side and attack the other.
"Hey, it won't - it's not breakable, right?" she said suddenly, lifting her head to him. He'd just managed to get the phone unlocked, and he took a photo of that cautious, optimisitic concern.
"Nope, not breakable. Well. Maybe. It's not glass or porcelain or anything."
She was gentler on this side of the box, but when she finally got the flaps open and the packing crate pulled out, she went for it again with an eagerness that didn't look at all like Kate Beckett.
He noticed her ring was still on. She hadn't taken it off. Not even for the shower.
Her breathy ohhh made him look up at her face as the crate finally opened. She turned her head back to him even as she pulled away the last of the packing material from the piece of art he'd bought. "Castle."
He grinned and came into the living room, framed her shocked, beautiful face against the backdrop of her windows, and took the photo.
"Castle. How - you said you did this before we ever went to Rome."
She was cradling the metal base of the statue in one hand, her eyes going back and forth between him and it. He'd found an artist's representation of the angel Gabriel's wings from the Castel in Rome. Metal feathers were woven around a thick metal frame and they came together to a plate that read on the wings of truth in Latin. It was mounted to a metal pole and seemed to be ready to lift up into the air.
"You have some interesting pieces of art here," he said when he was certain she really did like it. "And the wings are from the angel statue-"
"Where we were married," she said softly, and her fingers stroked the metal feathers.
Oh. Wow.
Yes.
That too.
She'd almost forgotten.
Shit, how could she have let this happen?
Kate Beckett crawled out from under him and snatched her phone before it could ring again, answered quietly. "This is Beckett."
"Ah, Kate? Darling, this is-"
"Yes, ma'am," she said quickly, shivering in the chill of her bedroom as she stalked towards the bathroom and slipped inside. "I'm so sorry I didn't call you back, but we just got into town."
"Darling, I don't think this is a good idea."
"Oh no, please," Kate said, pressing her hand to her forehead. "He's - he should - you guys should meet. Just once. Please."
"Have you told him? Does he - he must hate me. I know he must. I'd hate me. Abandoned at school when he was only a little boy, never to return - it has the makings of a Greek tragedy."
"Please come," Kate said quickly into the monologue. "He'll be there." She carefully didn't mention that she still hadn't figured out a way to break the news to him.
A soft sigh greeted her ears and Kate was once more reminded of the deep and wounded heart behind the woman's drama and flair. She'd only had a handful of phone calls and a flurry of emails; she'd never met her face to face. But she'd seen the pictures, had even gone to one of her shows on Broadway when Castle was in Brussels.
"All right, my dear. I - I shall be there. Three o'clock."
"Yes. Three o'clock. Thank you."
Kate hung up before Martha could change her mind.
She stood in the middle of her bedroom watching the man sleep.
She dreaded this. He'd reacted strongly when she'd first begun investigating, had practically cut her off, had tried everything to seduce her away from it. At the time, he had taken over her mother's case and she'd needed the distraction so desperately that she hadn't given it much thought.
Be honest, Kate.
She'd wanted him to feel it too. To hurt like she hurt. His mother for hers. So she'd been manic in her inquiry, had even run afoul of his father a few times-
Oh, was that it?
A relative of Martha's had mentioned something about her needing help for a difficult decision - it'd been about the same time Martha might have found out she was pregnant. And then again a few years later, a second relative - a cousin who lived in the city - had admitted that Martha had come to him with complicated questions about parental rights.
He'd not been able to help her all that much - it wasn't the area of law he practiced - and at the time, Kate hadn't been thinking about Black. She'd been thinking about this woman who'd wanted to cut all ties, disavow her own son, but-
But what if that wasn't the case at all?
It'd been pulling teeth to get Martha to agree to this at all, and yet Kate had almost tasted the longing in the older woman's voice, in her effusive emails. She craved knowledge about her son; it'd been the thing to convince Kate that their meeting was a good idea.
She had never sounded like a woman who had intended on giving up her only child.
And Kate knew firsthand how devious Castle's father could be when he wanted something. When he wanted Castle.
A wash of horror settled hard in her stomach and she stared at the spy in her bed.
This could be a whole lot worse than she'd anticipated.
Shit.
She had to tell him.
