In Pieces
By
A.K. Hunter
Chapter Seven
Kevin Ryan was breaking all the rules. Rick stood back and watched him question yet another member of the Odessa syndicate about their involvement with Dimitri, using information that Alexis had given him, no doubt.
Rick would have been glad for the progress on the case, and the progress toward safety for the young redhead, if the whole thing hadn't left a slightly bitter taste in his mouth.
A few mornings earlier, when Rick had stepped onto the homicide floor, his customary coffees in hand, he'd been met with a haunted looking Irish detective. After weeks of the redhead evading him, it seemed he'd finally got the evidence he needed, but it had come at a cost. A hefty one, too, if his somber mood was any indication. Rick had been surprised to find Kevin showing up with new leads, which inevitably led to new evidence, but no new witness. Rick had hoped that after her convalescence, Alexis would stop hiding and turn herself in. Her cooperation would go far in a case like this; she'd have a better and brighter future ahead by becoming an asset to the NYPD.
Kevin stepped out of interrogation and into observation, emitting a tired sigh.
"Trouble in paradise?" Castle asked.
Kevin looked surprised to see the writer there. "Why aren't you following Beckett like a lost puppy?"
"She's busy with a court case. Besides, you look like you could use some help."
"Yeah…" Kevin trailed off, watching the thug in the room.
"Can I help?" Castle pressed.
"I don't know."
"You wanna talk about it?"
With a sigh, Kevin rubbed his face. "I can't protect her forever, can I?"
"It was never meant to be a long-term arrangement."
"We're on the right track, but none of this is going to mean a damn thing if she won't testify. If she doesn't face what she's done. But I can't be the one to make her." Kevin paused, as if unsure how much more to say. "She already looks at me different..."
That haunted look had never quite left the detective's face, and no matter how many times Rick asked what sequence of events had put it there, Ryan wouldn't confide. "Tell me how to help."
After a beat, Kevin turned to the writer. "You up for a field trip?"
And that was how, not thirty minutes later, Rick Castle found himself knocking on Kevin's door before sliding the key into the lock.
"Hello?" he called as he stepped inside the neat apartment. Silence answered back, so he stepped a little further. "Hello? Alexis?"
"You're Richard Castle."
Rick spun around his heart palpating to find the petite redhead behind him, a kitchen knife held down at her side. Her other arm was wrapped in a tight black sling.
"Um, yes. Call me Rick." He frowned, not sure which was more disconcerting, the large knife or the sling that he didn't remember being part of her treatment plan. "What happened to your arm?"
Alexis paused, frowned, and then deliberately looked him directly in the eyes. "Fell out of bed and tweaked my shoulder. It's fine."
Castle held her gaze. She wasn't telling the whole truth, but it didn't feel like a lie, entirely, either.
She set the knife on a nearby end table. "What are you doing here?"
"I'm sure Ryan told you my part in your being here."
"Yes. The good Samaritan with a big checkbook. Thanks for that."
"You're welcome." He shrugged, the back of his neck heating up. He hadn't come over for a thank you. "Anyway, I thought you might want a field trip. You've been cooped up here a while, right?" He looked around the neat apartment, noting the not-so-neat living room area that was haphazardly stacked with books, one of which was his latest best-seller, notes written on random slips of paper, and what looked like a bowl of ranch dressing with salad on the side. "Unless I'm interrupting your lunch? I'd forgotten about ranch being a food group."
His joke, though about as pathetic as they come, earned a small smile at the corner of the redhead's mouth. "It's the closest thing to junk food that Kev—" she caught herself, "that Detective Ryan keeps in the house."
"Ah." He nodded, still standing awkwardly in the foyer. "How about pizza?"
Her head tipped to the side. "You want to get pizza?"
"I want to take you to eat pizza," he clarified. He could see the hunger in her eyes. While eating according to Kevin's preferences meant that she'd probably never been healthier, Castle couldn't remember the last time he'd seen the detective eat anything that wasn't center stage on some super-food-clean-eating-all-natural-gluten-free mega menu. Still, despite the clearly mouth-watering offer, Alexis looked confused.
"Why?" He watched her good arm cross protectively over her middle. "What do you want from me?"
Castle knew about as much as anyone else about the young redhead's upbringing, and while her behavior didn't surprise him, it did make him a bit sad. "Just your company. Come on, there's a pizza place around the corner. It won't take long."
"Umm… okay." She crossed over to the messy couch, pulling a jacket off of its back and slipping it over her shoulders. She paused at the threshold of the foyer. "I mean, Detective Ryan knows about this, right?"
"He's the one who suggested it," Rick clarified.
If anything, his response seemed to confuse her more, but she allowed herself to be led out of the apartment and into Rick's car. She was silent, observing every little thing on the journey to the pizzeria. Rick didn't push her, or try to get her to make conversation. He could understand why she'd feel somewhat agoraphobic after being attacked and taking refuge inside his friend's apartment for the last month. And it wasn't until they were seated a cozy corner booth with a clear view of the door, their orders placed for a large combination pizza with extra olives, that the redhead finally spoke.
"Don't you have anything better to do?" she asked, picking at the straw wrapper.
"Like what?"
"Like writing. Or chasing after your partner. Or literally anything besides what you're doing right now."
"Ryan's told you about me and Beckett?"
"He's got a big mouth." She smiled, then her expression dimmed a little bit, changing from affectionate to wistful.
"He can keep his mouth shut when it matters," Rick said kindly. There was clearly something going on between the detective and the girl—something heavy. Not surprising, considering their relationship was messier than a prime-time drama.
She crumpled the small wrapper in her good hand. "You didn't answer my question."
"Well, I'm getting the best pizza in the city with one of the most interesting people I've met in a long time, so, no, I don't have anything better to do."
The redhead scoffed. "I didn't realize 'interesting' was a synonym for 'delinquent.'"
"Potayto, potahto." Their pizza arrived, and he thanked the waiter before dishing up a heaping plate of the stuff for Alexis. "Besides, a person's track record is never the most interesting part. That's just the what. You want to know what really makes a good story?"
"What's that?" she asked, keeping her eyes on her plate while she awkwardly cut her pizza into bite-sized pieces with one good hand.
"The who; the why. It's not necessarily the actions that make a story interesting. It's the characters, their back stories and baggage and failures and triumphs—that's what makes a good story."
She didn't respond at first, either because she didn't know how to respond to his statement, or because she was too lost in the heavenly flavor of pizza. Finally, after carefully chewing and wiping her mouth with a napkin, she said, "Is that your sly way of trying to dig into my back story?"
Castle barely held back the grin. He had to hand it to her, she was good. "Not sly enough, clearly."
"There's no story here, Rick," she said. "My baggage is growing up in the system. I don't have triumphs, and, well, if you know anything about my case, you've seen my failure list already."
"I'm sure it's not that simple."
"Actually, it is."
He shook his head. "There is nothing simple about your story. A vagabond hacker operating on the wrong side of the law to save her closest friend? Scoff all you want, but it's the story writers and Hollywood execs dream of."
Alexis grimaced. "No Hollywood, please."
"They'd take some liberties with your story, of course," Castle continued, cutting into his own pizza. "Give you a royal bloodline and a big inheritance or turn you into a delivery room mix-up with a family who's been waiting for you all along. Throw in a handsome hero to whisk you off your feet..."
The redhead snorted. "The only thing I've inherited is red hair and a penchant for making poor decisions. And as for the hero," she frowned, "why don't you ask Detective Ryan how that's going."
Something about Alexis' response took Castle off guard. "Not all of your mom's decisions were bad. Some might say it's noble for an unfit mother to give her child up for adoption."
Alexis shook her head. "There's nothing noble about losing custody of your kid the day she was born because you're too strung out on alcohol and diet pills to even care."
Rick felt his eyes widen. "You broke into your birth records."
"Government-funded tech is child's play to hack. No, there's no great back story there. My mom was just a B-list actress who slept around and left a mess everywhere she went. Sound familiar?" She smiled humorlessly.
"Did you meet her then? After you found out who she was?"
"She died when I was two. Car accident. She was drunk, of course," Alexis sighed. "I guess it's not all bad. I have some of her movies to remember her by. She did this great low-budget vampire flick. God, I've never laughed so much in my entire life."
"And your father?" Castle asked.
"In the wind," she shrugged. "If Meredith even knew who my father was, and based on the research I've done that would be a miracle in itself, she never added his name to the records. I don't know who or where he is."
"Meredith?"
Alexis nodded. "Yeah, Meredith Harper. You should watch her stuff sometime, when you're in the mood for a laugh. I'd recommend starting with 'Love Bites Softly.' It's a classic. And if you like that one she's also in this terrible musical called… Hey, are you okay?"
Castle couldn't form a response; his mind was too busy running through his mental Black Book and cross referencing against a twenty-two year old calendar. Meredith Harper. What kind of coincidence—
"Your phone's ringing," Alexis supplied helpfully.
"Um, right."
"Are you going to answer it?"
"Oh." He pulled the plastic device from his pocket. Ryan was calling. "Castle."
"How's it going?"
"Fine," he said shortly, then covered the receiver and turned to Alexis. "Hey, do you wanna ask them to box up the rest?"
"Sure." She sidled out of the booth and approached the counter, Castle watched from the booth, only half listening to Ryan's report on the other end.
"—okay?"
"Huh?" Castle asked thickly.
"Is she okay?" Ryan repeated. "Does she seem happy?"
"Happy as a clam." Alexis returned with the box, and Castle felt an anxious sort of over-stimulation, his mind working in triple time to solve a new mystery while trying to carry conversation with two different people. "Listen, Ryan, I've gotta go. Call me if something new comes up."
"But–"
"I'll have her home by curfew. Give Espo my love." Castle hung up the phone, quickly shoving it in his pocket. Alexis watched him from across the table.
"What did Detective Ryan want?"
"Just the usual mother hen bit. Something about making sure you eat your vegetables and wear a hat so you don't catch cold, you know how it goes."
Alexis laughed, and something about that gesture seemed familiar, like a ghost of memory, a recollection of an observation he'd never thought twice about. If Rick closed his eyes, he could picture another redhead twenty-odd years earlier whose laugh was almost identical. The vision made his stomach do funny things, and in a terrifying moment of possibility, Alexis' last name, which she clearly hadn't inherited from her mother, suddenly didn't seem so random.
"Are you sure you're alright? You look like you're gonna be sick."
"I'm good," he said automatically, shoving that train of thought away for another time. "How about ice cream?"
"Umm... Do you think that's a good idea?" Alexis asked skeptically.
"It's a great idea," he insisted. "Besides, you gotta binge on junk food while you can. Ryan's probably researching kale smoothies as we speak."
"Ice cream it is."
Castle held the door for her on their way out. "Does our mysterious heroine have a favorite flavor? Wait, let me guess. Rainbow sherbet?"
"Sounds fine to me. In any case, it's much easier to find than my actual favorite."
"Which is?"
That small smile tugged at her lips again. "Have you ever heard of potato chip fudge ice cream?"
His heart tripped over itself and collapsed into his stomach before he affixed a smile to his face. That was his favorite flavor, too. "I know just the place."
Author's Note: These two are just the best. Thanks so much to everyone who read and reviewed the last chapter. I hope you enjoyed this fun little reunion. Please review! I'd love to know what you think.