DISCLAIMERS: No, still not mine.
SUMMARY: As the investigation continues, Beckett feels herself spiraling out of control. Kate begins telling Castle about the house. This chapter will be M-rated for comfort lovemaking.
A/N #1: I want to thank my reviewers for the wonderful reviews so far. Thanks to all of you for putting me on your alerts list.
Chapter 7: Clinging to the Edge
Kate was quiet during the ride home from town. Castle was beginning to worry about her. He knew that she'd talk to him when she was ready, but he also sensed that she was pulling herself away from him. He pulled the car up to the front of the house and turned off the engine. Kate was out of the car before he could come around to open the door for her, so he walked up and unlocked the front door.
"Do you want me to turn on the press conference? It should be online," Castle walked toward his office.
"I don't want to see it right now," she followed behind him. "I'm going to go for a walk. I just need some time to think."
"Are you okay?"
"Yeah, I just need some space," she walked over and took his hands in both of hers. "I won't be gone long. When I get back, we'll talk." She pressed up on her toes and pressed a soft kiss to his lips. "I love you."
"I love you, too. Take your phone with you please."
"I'll be back soon," she walked out of the back doors and softly closed them behind her.
Castle brought up his laptop and opened his email, seeing an email from Esposito with a link to the press conference. He watched it as well as the Q&A that took place afterwards. He was watching it a second time when his cell phone rang. He saw that it was the 12th Precinct. "Castle."
"Mr. Castle, this is Capt. Gates. How is Det. Beckett?"
"She's not doing very well at the moment and she hasn't even watched the press conference yet. Kate refers to it as falling down the rabbit hole. Right now, she's clinging to the edge of that hole."
"Mr. Castle, I don't even pretend to understand what she's going through. None of us can because we've never experienced that kind of loss. But she has to understand that until we get every member of this conspiracy, she's not going to be safe."
"Believe me; she's well aware of that. I think it just brings all of it back. Coming home to that detective on her front porch, watching her father self-destruct, being forced to kill the murderer in the precinct. I think it also reminds her of the person she was back then."
"Please ask her to call me when she gets a chance. I have a few more questions for her."
"Yes, sir," Castle pressed the 'End' button on his phone.
Kate loved the beach in front of Castle's house. In front of their house, she mentally corrected herself. She wasn't crazy about the water at the moment, but she loved the solitude of the beach. During visits, she'd go out for a jog early in the morning before Castle woke up. But now she just wanted to sit and think, to clear the jumble of emotions in her head.
She found a place to sit on the sand, far enough from the water so that the sound didn't overwhelm her too badly. Her mind went back to so many conversations that she'd had over the years. But the one that came to her mind was when she'd talked to Castle about always having one foot out of the door. She had been that way for so long. It was just always easier to run and hide than to face up and let someone love her. It was as if she'd always felt that she didn't deserve to be loved fully and unconditionally.
But with Castle, she'd had both feet firmly planted almost from the very beginning. Rick knew all of her fears, all of her deepest, darkest secrets. He knew what made her laugh and what made her cry. He had stood by her during the worst of her PTSD attacks. She knew that he felt responsible for so many things. He felt responsible for her having to kill Dick Coonan, he felt responsible for the shooting in the cemetery. She knew that in his mind, if he'd never asked for that file that day, none of this would've happened.
But Kate didn't see it that way. If he hadn't asked for that file and told Lanie what he'd found, she never would've noticed the wound similarity between her mother and Jack Coonan. And they never would've arrested Dick Coonan, although she regretted being forced to kill him. But even now, she wasn't sure he would've given up Bracken.
She just wondered how deep this conspiracy went. What part did Vulcan Simmons play in all of this? And who else was involved?
Her phone chimed, signaling that she had a text. At first, she was slightly irritated, thinking that it was Castle, checking on her. But she saw instead that it was Lanie. 'Hey, girl. Javi told me about the press conference. Are you all right?'
Kate waited several minutes before formulating a response. 'I'm ok. I'll talk to you soon.'
A minute later, a response from Lanie. 'Girl, you had better not be running and hiding. Let Writer Boy take care of you. You know that he will.'
'Running and hiding.' Two things that Kate had been doing for as long as she could remember. Before Castle had come along, she'd done little else. But Rick seemed to understand when she needed her space, unlike Will, and later Josh, who constantly needed some kind of reassurance when her moods got dark, which often happened. They needed reassurance that she still cared about them, that they hadn't done something to upset her. They didn't understand that she just needed space. Space to work things out in her head. Space to think about her mother in peace.
Her fingers went to the ring that hung on the chain around her neck. But she smiled when she remembered her morning with Rick in South Hampton. She loved how he so wanted this wedding to be special for her. But what he didn't realize was that she didn't need all of the bells and whistles. As long as he was standing at the altar, looking more handsome than she'd ever seen him in a dark suit, her day would be complete.
Her mother would have so loved this. Kate remembered looking at pictures of her parents' wedding when she was a little girl. The two of them smiling in each others' eyes at the altar, sharing their first kiss as husband and wife, their first dance, cutting the cake, all of the flowers. 'One day, you'll be a beautiful bride, too,' she could hear her mother's voice telling her.
Like she'd told Rick after she'd gotten the dress from Matilda, her mother would've loved him. He was so sweet and so patient on the days when she could feel herself free falling. When she'd first met him, she never would've imagined that he could be the man that she was engaged to today. He had so many sides to his personality and Kate loved exploring all of them.
***CCC***
Castle was sitting in his office, fingers busily flying on his laptop when he heard the back door open and close. His first inclination was to go to Kate, but he knew that she'd come to him when she was ready.
Kate closed the back door and walked upstairs to their bedroom. Her purse was hanging from a chair in the corner. She opened it and removed the plastic evidence bag containing the letter that she'd written him in that house. Clutching it to her chest for several minutes, she left the bedroom and went back downstairs.
Castle looked up from his laptop when Kate walked into his office. "Hey," he sat back in his chair, watching her carefully.
"Hey," she approached him, smiling that shy smile that he loved. "Can we go outside and talk for a few minutes?"
He quickly saved the document on his laptop before standing up. "Let's go out back."
They walked to the wraparound porch and sat down in the swing. "I want you to know that I am going to watch the press conference. Just not yet."
"That's okay. Oh, before I forget, Gates called and she wants you to call her when you get a chance. Something about some more questions. So, what's on your mind?"
"When I was in that house, they had me locked in a room. This was after I'd asked to meet Lazarus. I didn't know what was going to happen, so I wrote a letter," she held out the evidence bag. "Castle . . . Rick, you're the one who's so wonderful with words. I could never even begin to do what you do. When I went to see Dr. Burke after Javi killed Lee Travis, I remember talking to him about how my mom's murder had defined me, driven me for so long. I told him that I wanted to be more. Sometimes I'm so tired of being the daughter of a murder victim, always seeking justice that is just out of reach. I'm glad that Capt. Gates is searching for new evidence, but at the same time, I ask myself it it's ever going to end. I want to be your wife; I want to be the mother of your children. I just want all of this to go away."
"I know," he reached out and stroked her cheek as she pressed herself into the warmth of his palm.
"This is your letter, Rick. I wrote it . . . well, you know why I wrote it," she looked at him, seeing the tears sparkling in his bright blue eyes. "It says everything that I've ever felt. Everything that I've always wanted to say, but haven't had the courage. You can read it if you want to. Or I can just tell you what I wrote."
"Tell me," his voice was a low, almost seductive whisper as her eyes continued to burn into his.
"I thought that I was going to die in that house," she swallowed thickly, feeling her voice choke up. "And then, after I heard Simmons' voice, I knew I was going to die. You've saved me, Rick. You've made me want to be more. You are the best, most wonderful thing that's ever happened to me. When I was at my lowest point in that house, and there were a lot of them, I just focused on you. On what you would tell me. And you kept telling me the same thing over and over. You kept telling me that I had this. That I could do this. I know that it's eating you alive that you weren't there with me. But you were. In my heart," she took his hand and placed it over her heart. "I'm sorry that I ran when we got home."
"Kate, you didn't run. You were overwhelmed and you needed space. If you had run, you would've hotwired my Mercedes and driven back into town," he teased as she couldn't help but smile back. "Are you ready to call Gates back?"
"I wonder how it went with Bracken."
"Only one way to find out," he stood up and held a hand out to her.
Kate walked into the house and retrieved her cell phone before hitting Gates' name in her contacts. "Sir, its Beckett," she said when her superior answered the phone.
"Det. Beckett, why didn't you tell me that you had a run-in with Sen. Bracken? I can't believe that you actually assaulted the man."
"Yeah, well, he's kind of lucky that I didn't kill him, since that was my original intention," Kate answered drily.
"I'm going to pretend that I didn't hear that, Detective. I wanted to fill you in on a couple of things that we've found. But I want to make sure that you're all right."
Kate couldn't help but smile. She'd never known that her tough as nails captain had such a maternal side. "You did promise to keep me apprised," she reminded her.
"Two things. First, we found several photographs of the senator with both Capt. Fowler and Vulcan Simmons. And Scott Murray's wife said that after her husband's death, she found some photographs of an alley. She's going to bring them in later this morning."
"Pictures of an alley?" Kate looked at Castle. "Sir, a couple of years ago, Castle and I found some negatives among my mom's things. They were pictures of an alley. If these are the same pictures, they're going to be pictures of the alley where my mother was murdered. Before she was murdered, my mom had requested a file. This file was never found. It's possible that she gave the file to one of her murdered colleagues for safekeeping."
"You have no idea of what was in that file?"
"No, sir. I was in school at the time and to be honest, I didn't pay much attention to my mother's cases."
"Okay, we'll be on the lookout for that file."
"Did Capt. Fowler explain the pictures of himself with Bracken?"
"I haven't talked to him. I've called and left several messages, but he's yet to return my calls. Frankly, it's starting to piss me off."
Kate began to get a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. "Has anybody done a welfare check on him?"
"You're thinking . . . of course, it would make sense. Bracken's trying to tie up loose ends. I'll do the welfare check and get back to you. I feel incredibly stupid for not thinking of it myself."
Kate hung up and looked at Castle. "I think I'm ready to watch that press conference now."
Castle found the link and brought up the press conference. Kate sat in front of his laptop, listening to Capt. Gates and then the Q&A with the PIO. She recognized the family members of her mother's colleagues, even though she hadn't seen any of them in years. Their images were forever burned into her memory. Hearing the captain speak of the terrible injustices that had been done to all of them just made her feel sad. Why didn't anybody take this seriously in 1999? Oh, that's right. They were blown off as random gang violence. Only her mother still had all of her jewelry on her, along with a wallet containing cash and credit cards. Gangs didn't kill for the hell of it.
Castle could see her hands trembling as she reached up to wipe at her eyes. He knelt down beside his chair and rubbed her arm. "Kate?" She turned the chair and simply wrapped her arms around him, burying her face into his neck. "They're going to get him, Kate."
"I need to call my dad," she pulled away after a few minutes and wiped at her face once again. "I have to make sure that he's okay."
***CCC***
Ryan and Esposito pulled up in front of the small frame house owned by Capt. John Fowler. After she'd gotten off of the phone from talking to Beckett, Gates had ordered the two of them to go check on Capt. Fowler's wellbeing. The two detectives walked up the small porch and Ryan rapped on the door. "Capt. Fowler! It's Detectives Ryan and Esposito!"
When he didn't answer on the second knock, the two detectives made their way to the back of the house. The moment that they looked through the small kitchen window, Esposito got on his radio. "Dispatch, this is Det. Javier Esposito. I need CSU and the medical examiner at 527 Oak Street."
"Roger."
After he got off of the radio, Espo and Ryan entered the house through the back door. Ryan knelt beside the body of Fowler, checking for a pulse, but it was clearly unnecessary. "He's cold. Judging by the amount of congealed blood, he's been dead for a while."
"His throat's been slashed. My guess is our favorite neighborhood contract killer's handiwork."
"If she's working for Bracken and he's tying up loose ends that means Simmons is probably going to be next."
"I wouldn't exactly lose any sleep over that," Espo said.
***CCC***
"I'm fine, dad," Kate was sitting in a lawn chair in the middle of the back yard, with the sound of the ocean in the background. "I was just checking on you."
"I'm okay, Katie. I've talked to my sponsor. Katie, does your captain really think that she can take down a United States Senator?"
"I don't know, dad. But, at least she's willing to get to the truth. That's more than anybody else has been willing to do."
"Tell her to watch her back, Katie. This guy has a nasty habit of killing people who get in his way. You and Rick please be careful."
"You, too," she smiled. "Dad, we picked out our wedding cake."
"Did you?" He chuckled. "So, tell me about this wedding cake? Is it eight tiers, chocolate with white icing or that awful fondant stuff that I hate?"
"It's three tiers, its honey with vanilla butter cream. You're going to love it. We've also been talking about getting married here at the Hamptons house."
"I'm happy to see that my future son-in-law has been keeping your mind occupied on other things besides what's going on in the city."
"He's been great," she glanced toward the house.
Inside of the house, Castle watched Kate from the French doors before looking at the plastic evidence bag he still clutched in his hand. He sat down in an armchair and opened the bag, taking out the folded sheet of paper. Unfolding it, he smiled at Kate's familiar handwriting. He could almost sense how scared she must've been to write this letter. He took a deep breath before he started reading:
Dear Rick,
I don't know how much time I have, even to write this letter. What I do know now is, that I'm in this. And the only way I'm gonna make it out alive is to see this through. I'm sure everyone is looking for me, and if they figure out I was here, CSU is gonna search this house. They're gonna look for blood and they will find it which will lead them to this letter.
Babe, it's your letter. And I hope you never have to read this, that I can tell you all of these things in person. But, if something happens, and I don't make it, I need you to know that our partnership, our relationship is the greatest thing that has ever happened to me. You're an amazing man and I love you with all of my heart.
Always
Tears were freely falling down his face as he read the letter a second time. He took another deep breath and refolded the letter before placing it in a drawer of his desk. He then wiped at his wet face before going to look for Kate, who was just coming in the house.
Taking one look at his red-rimmed eyes, she reached her hand up to touch his face. She then leaned in and gave him a soft, reassuring kiss. "Is your dad okay?"
"Yeah, he's talked to his sponsor. He thanks you for keeping my mind occupied. I told him about the cake and our plans to have the wedding here."
"I can't wait to see you on his arm on our wedding day. You've made me so happy," he grinned brightly, wrapping his arms around her and pulling her close.
"You've made me so happy too, Castle. I used to feel like I was drowning. I can't remember the last time that I had that awful feeling."
"I have a surprise for later," he whispered against her lips.
"Can you help me try to take a bath? I know it might be a little soon, so if I freak, we still have the shower."
"After my surprise," he nipped at her bottom lip.
"Are you telling me that I might need it after?"
"Maybe," he soothed the nips with a gentle swipe of his tongue. "You might want to use it to warm up or we can always use the hot tub."
***CCC***
"Well, cause of death is obvious," Lanie said, kneeling over Fowler's body. "He's passed out of rigor, so I'm guessing his time of death was 12 to 18 hours ago."
"His neighbor said that he saw him out in his yard to get the evening paper at six o'clock last night. As far as we know, that's the last time that he was seen alive," Espo checked his notes.
"He received a call on his cell at 10:43 last night. We'll run down the number," Ryan looked at Fowler's phone, which had been lying by his body on the floor.
"Well, that narrows ToD," Lanie made a note before standing up as Fowler's body was zipped into a black body bag and loaded onto a gurney. "Did he have any family?"
"Neighbor said that he was married, but that his wife moved out two or three years ago," Espo said. "I don't know if he had any kids. I'd never really met him until this thing with Beckett went down."
"How is she? I texted her today after you told me about the press conference. She just said that she was okay."
"Castle took her out to the Hamptons to get her away from all of this," Ryan told her.
"We all know that she's not going to stay away from this, guys. I mean, it's her mother."
"We know that, Lanie. But, Castle's always been able to rein her in. It'll be okay," Espo tried to calm the M.E. down.
***CCC***
After dinner, Castle grabbed some blankets as well as a double sleeping bag, before taking Kate by the hand and leading her out to the middle of the backyard. "You said last night how much you enjoyed the stars out here, so I thought that we could lay out here and look at them together," he unzipped the sleeping bag before lying down and pulling Kate down with him. He then pulled the bag over the two of them.
The two of them lay on their backs, gazing up at the millions of stars in the sky. "Did you bring me out here to take my mind off of the increasing body count?"
Gates had called them earlier to report the death of Capt. Fowler. "I'm just wondering if I should hire bodyguards."
"She told me that he wanted me to live," she reminded Castle of Elena's words after she'd slit Harden's throat in the woods.
"But, something tells me that was before he knew that he was going to be investigated as a suspect in multiple homicides."
"Castle, I don't want to talk about it right now," she propped herself up on one elbow to look at him. "I want to lay out here and look at the stars with you. I don't want to talk about Bracken, my mother, or anything related to what's going on in the city. Is that clear?"
Her eyes were telling him that she'd had enough. That she was just inches away from that rabbit hole, holding on with all of her might to the edge. "I'm sorry," he reached up and softly stroked her cheek. "We'll talk about anything that you want to."
"I don't want to talk, at all," she moved closer to him. "Love me, Castle."
"Here?"
"Right here, under the stars. I want you, Castle."
He pulled her tighter against him, his lips closing over hers, drinking her in. He slipped his hands under her shirt, feeling the warmth of her bare back. She moaned as his hands roamed higher. She hooked her leg over his, moving closer in his embrace. She tugged on his shirt, pulling it free from the waistband of his jeans, letting her hands do some roaming of their own. She loved the warmth of him, the solidity. She loved the way that he could wrap around her when they made love, how safe he made her feel. How loved.
Castle rolled them so that Kate was lying under him. Their kisses remained soft, warm, as he unbuttoned her shirt, exposing her naked torso to the cool March night. His hand closed over her breast, soothing the Goosebumps that dotted her flesh. Her hand rested lightly on his jaw as they continued kissing.
Kate absolutely loved kissing Castle. But if she had to pick her favorite kind of Castle kiss, it was the kind that they were sharing now. The slow, soft kisses that would build her up so slowly and exquisitely, before sending her on a freefall of sensation. She moaned into his mouth at the feeling of his hand stroking her breast, her nipple hardening under his palm.
His lips left her mouth, finding the sweet spot under her ear. She shivered against him, but at the same time, she felt warmth spreading through her body. Castle's lips were creating the most wonderful feelings in her whole body. But as much as she was enjoying the feeling of his lips, she wished that he'd touch her. She slid her hand down to the front of his jeans, feeling the hardness of him straining against the zipper. "Kate," she loved the way that her name came out of his throat as a strangled growl. She rubbed her knuckles against him once again just to hear him repeat her name in that same way.
Deciding that two could play that game, Castle reached down and popped the button on Kate's jeans. He then lowered the zipper and reached his hand into her panties, feeling the warm wetness of her on his fingers, feeling her buck up against him. His fingers dipped and swirled, as she could hear herself groaning and whimpering as she sought more and more contact.
The closeness of the sleeping bag was keeping them from moving as much as they normally would if they were in bed together, which was making this whole experience extremely erotic. "Castle, please," she pleaded. "I want you."
Instead of listening to her request, he moved back up to her mouth, his kisses hot, soft, and very sweet, the whole time his fingers kept stroking through her tingling folds, eliciting some incredibly sexy moans from her. She slipped her fingers into the button of his jeans and opened it. After lowering the zipper, she reached into his boxers as his erection pressed into her hand. He was so hard and hot in her hands, yet velvety smooth at the same time. He reached down to stop her stroking of him, but she slapped at his hand.
Castle pulled back from her, removing her hand as he struggled to sit up in the confined space of the sleeping bag. "So, I might not have thought this out as much as I thought."
Kate stood up in the middle of the sleeping bag and blanket, giving him a Mona Lisa smile as she stripped out of her clothes before dropping down back beside her slack-jawed fiancé. "I'm naked. What're you waiting for, Castle?"
He broke out of his trance, and stood up to strip out of his clothes before lying back down and pulling the sleeping bag back over the two of them. Kate hooked her foot over his calf and reached down to guide him into her entrance. They both groaned out their desire at the feel of him slowly sinking into her, stretching and filling her.
Kate wrapped her arms around Castle's neck, bringing him down to share more kisses as he slowly moved inside of her, brushing up against her clit with his pelvis on every stroke. She moved her hands from his neck down his back to his ass, pulling him closer into her as she raised up to meet his thrusts. He pulled up so that he could stare into her eyes as they continued moving together. She gasped loudly when he hit that special spot inside of her that only he'd ever been able to reach. "Oh, Castle," she gasped. "Right there. Please do that again."
He pulled almost all of the way up before sliding in again, feeling Kate tighten her muscles around him. "Fuck, I love it when you do that."
"I know," she gave him a mischievous smile. "You told me the . . . first time that we . . . were together. Oh fuck, Castle!"
He placed his hands on her butt and raised her up, changing the angle of his thrusts along with the depth of penetration. The results were nothing short of explosive. She gave a loud keening cry as she came hard around him.
Feeling her clamp down around him and hearing her cries of release was all the incentive that Castle needed. After four more thrusts he came with a loud cry of his own, collapsing onto her shoulder as he felt her fingernails lightly scratching his back. "I'm sorry," he finally propped himself up so that he could smile down at her. "I must weigh a ton."
"That's okay. I like this part," she brought him back down for another long kiss.
"Cold?" He asked as he rolled over, tugging her into his shoulder.
"I'm okay," she stared up at the sky. "I want to get married at sundown. We can set some tables out here for the reception after. That way everyone can look up at the stars."
"And get eaten by mosquitoes," he kissed her temple.
"We'll set up some citronella torches. It'll be perfect."
"Or," he kissed her temple once again, "we can come out here after all of our guests leave and consummate our marriage out here under the stars."
"And what's to stop us from getting eaten by mosquitoes?"
"We'll be so caught up in the moment that we won't care."
Kate rolled so that she could rest her head on his chest, feeling his arm come around her. This moment right now was so perfect, but she knew that in the city right now, her arch enemy was circling the wagons and taking out potential witnesses. When was it ever going to end?
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