Memoir
Chapter 6: Actions Versus Words
Cobalt blue eyes were fixated on the notebook of blank lined paper before him. The clickable blue ballpoint pen clutched between his fingers had not done an ounce of writing that night, but he had not expected it to. Regardless of the ideas and plot bunnies that had multiplied in the writer's mind, he hadn't been able to put a word down on the paper. The mere act of sitting with the pen in his hand was oddly therapeutic. The lure and the seduction of falling into another world was attractive, but not what he was after tonight. He found it easier to think when he held a pen. If something were to flow onto paper because of that, it was an unexpected but appreciated bonus.
He clicked the pen once, twice, but no applicable thoughts came to mind. His mind strained to come up with something – anything – a connection, for her. He needed her to be able to breathe, to think, to sleep. After everything that she'd been through in the past few months, she deserved that at the very least. He wanted, needed, to be able to do that for her.
The answer had to be here. Even after she'd pushed him away like she had, Rick was reluctant to back down.
"Dad?"
He lifted blue eyes to his daughter, standing at the edge of the stairs. One hand rested on the wooden banister, the other fallen by her side.
"Alexis." He said, head tilted slightly to the side. His fingers still clutched the pen. "What are you doing up?"
"You're writing." Alexis' voice held a hint of pleasant surprise as she moved from the stairs to come sit on the arm of the couch, next to him. Blue eyes that were a mirror of his landed on the notebook. "Or not. And it's not that late, Dad. It's midnight." She watched her father's face for a second. "Writer's block?"
He ran a hand through his hair, deliberating momentarily. "Wasn't really trying to write." Rick answered finally, placing the pen down on top of the notebook. Then his eyes narrowed. "And what did we say about mentioning writer's block?"
"Dad, the line about not talking about Fight Club, was better in Fight Club," she told him with an affectionate roll of her eyes. Then she sobered. "Something's wrong."
It wasn't a question, and he lifted his eyes to her.
"It's written all over your face." She answered, moving from the arm of the couch to sit next to her father. She leaned her head against his arm. "And you taught me to be observant, remember? Is it Kate?"
He had, and it was, but he wasn't sure he wanted to talk about it with his daughter. "You said you were going to bed." He reminded her, as a futile attempt to change the subject. "Are you alright?"
Alexis sighed suddenly, placing her chin on a fist. "Just high school drama. Things were so much easier in elementary school, you know?"
Rick wrapped an arm around his daughter's shoulders. "Ah, the days when boys had cooties." He teased, smiling when he heard his daughter stifle a laugh. As long as he could still do that, as long as he could still make her laugh, everything was alright, wasn't it?
His mind turned to the body they found, the nearly violent reaction Beckett had to his being near the scene, to having him near the scene. He remembered the way the young teen's face had seemed so hopeless, so afraid.
"You look like someone's trying to choke you, Dad. Want to talk about it?" There was a pause before she said, "This case is really affecting Detective Beckett, isn't it?"
Rick was reluctant to tell her even a little, let alone anything, about the case but having seen the bowls of ice cream on the table the other night, Alexis was already privy to knowing it had disturbed Kate. The writer lifted the pen from the notebook and clicked it several times. He hated seeing Kate like that, so out of her element.
"She's shaken up, but we'll catch the guy." He was sure to add that last part in, though he wasn't sure whether it was for his benefit, or his daughter's. "It's hard to write at the moment." He commented when he saw her eyes on the pen.
"But this case gave you an idea for the third Nikki Heat, yes?" She prompted, raising her brow.
He was able to smile, remembering the way that the spark of an idea had felt, burning in his veins. "The serious, single father tortured by a past so recent he can still walk it in his memory and the teammate who wants to help him get through it – but doesn't know what to do with the feelings she's developed. And, of course, the roguishly handsome Rook decides to play matchmaker." His heart always beat faster at the thought of words, ink on paper.
"The Behavioral Analysis Unit?"
Rick nodded and placed the pen back down atop the notebook. "But it's hard to write during this case." He'd said it a million times in hopes that it would make him feel better, that he could feel like he was still giving something to the world, even if he couldn't write at the moment. Like he was still doing something for her.
"I see." She didn't pry, didn't ask questions. "This calls for muffins, then. Come on, get up." She stood and tugged at her father's sleeve.
He stood and somewhat reluctantly followed Alexis into the gigantic kitchen, where she began searching through the lower cabinets and removing various ingredients.
"Banana nut?" Alexis asked but didn't wait for an answer. Rick leaned against a cabinet, watching his daughter work. She was truly everything to him – he could feel the chill in his blood when he considered what must have been that single father's thoughts. He could not fathom leaving Alexis behind, not knowing what would become of her without him.
"Dad? Can I ask you something?"
His mind returned to reality. Alexis had paused and was leaning against the cabinet, blue eyes on him. "You can ask me anything, sweetheart."
"This case isn't like the other cases, is it?"
He took a breath and let it out through his teeth. "This one is more … difficult." He answered carefully. The word 'serial' buzzed on his tongue, leaving a harsh after taste and sense of foreboding. "People are getting tired."
"Detective Beckett is getting tired." Alexis, once again, had not been asking a question. The teenager turned, beginning to mix the batter together – but not before he saw something almost mischievous in his daughter's eyes. "Where is she tonight?"
"Where's Beckett?" he parroted.
Alexis nodded without turning around, adding walnuts into the mixture. "She's been here a lot, so I wondered."
"At her apartment, I'd think." Rick answered, but his heart skipped a beat and his stomach churned. He couldn't do anything for her when she was there, couldn't pull her from a nightmare …
"I'll make extra, just in case."
Kate sat at her desk longer than she should have. At some point, an irritated Jenny had come by to drag Ryan home and even the BAU had called it quits for the night after instructing their tech genius to do some more cross-referencing and searching and digging and God! They had nothing! She wasn't a profiler, but she could tell even the Bureau agents seemed uncomfortable. The Annie Bryers murder had thrown them off. All of them. Big time.
"Oh good, you're here."
Kate looked up at Lanie, unable to stop herself from hoping… "You got something?"
Lanie's steps didn't even falter, even as she raised an eyebrow. "Good to see you too. I'm good, thanks."
Kate sighed and rubbed at her temples, missing the significant look that passed between Lanie and the still-present Esposito. The male detective had refused to leave until his boss did.
Lanie took pity on her best friend. "I do have the autopsy results for the Bryers homicide, but there's nothing in there we don't already know." She plopped down in Castle's chair. "Girl, when was the last time you had a good night's sleep?"
"Does it have to be a full night?" Kate inquired. Her mind flashed to waking up in the Castle loft, the sense of safety, security and the realization that she'd slept. She looked over at the ME. "Yesterday." Her brow wrinkled. "I think. What day is it?"
Lanie's jaw dropped open. She closed it a second later with a snap. "I think you just proved my point."
"Lanie, there are families out there. They want answers. I can't fail them."
"You will if you kill yourself in the process. Contrary to what we all like to believe, you're not Superwoman." The ME reached over to take her friend's hand. "You need a break, Honey. And you know it as well as I do."
They all needed a break. Lanie had seen the stress growing in Kate, in the set of her shoulders, the shortness of her temper. Castle's return had lessened the load, but Lanie had it on very good authority that it wasn't enough. In wanting to maintain some of Castle's innocence, Kate was pushing him away. She'd seen it in the detective's face when Kate had stepped into the crime scene.
"What I need to do," Kate's voice broke into Lanie's reverie, "is to get this case closed and off my desk."
"You need to go home," Lanie argued. Then a sly smile slipped over her face. "Or to Castle's."
Kate's eyes widened marginally, but enough that her best friend noticed. The detective looked away.
"Hey." Lanie reached out and rested a hand over Kate's. "It's not against the law to look for comfort, Girl. Especially when it's someone who so obviously cares about you."
"I shouldn't have pulled him into this, Lanie," Kate confided in a low voice. "I'm a cop, I signed up for this. I accepted the badge and the responsibility. I accepted that I was going to see the worst of the worst in terms of the things one human can do to another. He's a writer for God's sake. He's supposed to make this stuff up. Not see it."
"But he does see it. And he sees it because you see it. He jokes and he laughs and he says stupid things because he knows it brightens your day. He makes you laugh because it's how he helps. It's the only way he knows how to help. Because you won't let him find another way."
Kate let out a heavy sigh and shook her head in denial.
And Lanie lost it. Just a little.
"Fine. Then try this: you're afraid to be weak. You're afraid to be broken. Maybe you think it'll scare people away, maybe people will think less of you for it. Maybe you're afraid of falling and never getting back up again." Lanie gripped Kate's hands when the detective went to pull away. "But you've fallen apart before and Writer Boy's seen it. It's not going to scare him away and I sincerely doubt it'll make him think any less of you." She cocked her head to the side. "In fact, I think he would love you a little bit more."
If Kate noticed the deliberate wording, she steadfastly ignored it. "I can't just… show up."
"Oh, Honey, of course you can," Lanie encouraged. "You're not pouring your heart out and you're not moving in together. Everyone needs help and comfort sometimes. It takes a very strong person to ask for it."
"Thanks Lanie," Kate finally said after a moment. "But I think I'm just going to hang around for-"
"Kate Beckett, you listen to me," Lanie hissed, her anger coming through in the low whisper. "I get that this is eatin' at you. You don't wanna take care of yourself, that's all peachy keen for you, but he," she jerked her head in Esposito's direction. "ain't goin' home 'til you go."
Kate felt embarrassment flood through her along with a thread of affection. "I guess I could head home. Drown myself in the tub."
"Now there's a better idea," Lanie agreed. She waited until the detective actually shut down her computer and was pulling on her coat before calling out, "Hey Javi. Give a girl a ride home?"
Esposito looked up, worn and exhausted. When he noticed Kate pulling on her coat, his eyes sparked a little. He grinned. "Sure, but you know Beckett doesn't like givin' out her address."
Lanie rolled her eyes as she pushed herself up. "Ha, ha. You think you're so funny." Then she turned serious eyes to Kate, reaching out to run a hand comfortingly down her arm. "Think about what I said, okay? Castle wouldn't think less of you. He would take it at face value and leave it at that."
"Goodnight, Lanie," Kate said forcefully.
Lanie just grinned, then headed over to Esposito. "Bets on where she ends up tonight?" she teased good naturedly as they made sure to watch Kate head for the stairs.
Esposito looked down at her. "Do I look like an idiot to you?"
Lanie snorted in amusement. "Oh, Detective, you really don't want me to answer that."
Rick couldn't focus.
Since Kate's nightmare in the precinct, he'd been getting more and more worried about her. It was so terribly obvious that she wasn't dealing with the case well. He didn't blame her in the slightest. He couldn't close his eyes without seeing blood painted on the back of his eyelids, and she was stronger than he was. She'd seen worse. Which was why it was so much more terrifying that she was afraid.
He almost jumped when the buzzer sounded, glancing at the clock. It was late, his mother and Alexis long in bed. Great curiosity pulled him to the door and his eyes widened as he identified the woman on the other side.
"Kate." Her first name came out without thinking.
"Hi," she said, her shoulders rising and falling with the inhale of breath.
"Do we have another body?" Rick knew there was apprehension in his voice. He felt himself relax in relief when she shook her head, then his brow wrinkled in confusion. "Is everything okay?"
He knew both by the way she bit her lip and by the way she wouldn't meet his eyes that he was about to be given a piece of the illusive Katherine Beckett.
"I don't… I can't…"
Rick reached out, grasping one of her hands and tugging. Kate stepped closer and he was assaulted with that familiar scent of cherries before he found his arms filled with the one woman who had blindsided him from day one. He wrapped her up against him, honoured and blessed that in her pain and fear, she'd come to him.
He pulled her into the apartment, walking backwards and pushing the door shut. Then he just stood there, feeling her tremble against him, feeling her fingers clutching his shirt. He had no idea how long they stood there, but he refused to let her move until the trembles had lessened. Even then, he merely loosened his hold if she wanted to escape. Much to his surprise, Kate burrowed closer.
It actually hit him then, that this incredibly strong, brave woman was almost breaking before his eyes. They dealt with murder cases, but this was by far the worst, even worse than the Russian mob who had removed a man's internal organs. At least they had been partially prepared and that hadn't been a serial. This was different.
He all but carried her over to the couch. He sat her down, crouching in front of her. "Kate?"
She sucked in a deep breath. "Can I stay here?"
Rick leaned forward, gently pressing his lips to her hair. "You are always welcome here." He flashed her one of his cockiest grins, or the best he could considering how worried he was. "This calls for sundaes."
Kate actually managed a small smile. "Is that the Castle cure-all?"
"Pretty much," he replied, unable to stop himself from brushing his thumb against her cheek. "The works?"
The brunette sniffled and he wanted nothing more than to pull her close. "The works?"
He grinned. "It's a Castle masterpiece." Part of him was inordinately pleased that she actually got up to follow him. She slid onto one of the breakfast stools. "Chocolate, vanilla and cookie dough," Rick said, pulling the containers out of his freezer.
"And strawberry," she said.
He looked surprised for a moment, then smiled. "Alexis," he deduced as he went to another cupboard, pulling out what he and his family called the Super Sundae Bowl. "You don't like strawberries."
Kate looked utterly shocked. "How do you know that?"
"I'm kind of like your profilers," Rick said, then shrugged. "I pay attention." He pulled out Tupperware containers and watched his detective's eyes widen. "The Super Castle Sundae with the Works is an art."
"Apparently," she quipped as she watched with absolute awe. He moved swiftly and efficiently, putting six scoops of ice cream in the bowl and topping it off with chocolate and butterscotch sauce, chocolate chips, candy-coated chocolate chips, nuts, and cherries. It was the biggest sundae she'd seen since childhood. He finished it off with two spoons.
Kate arched an eyebrow. "I didn't know we were sharing."
"As much as I fully encourage sugar comas, we do have to go to work in the morning," he replied, eating a spoonful of the concoction. "Though, if you want to take advantage of me, all you have to do is ask."
She cracked a smile at that. "Maybe another time."
"Why, Detective Beckett, am I wearing you down?"
She rolled her eyes, but he took comfort in her perceived annoyance. They ate in silence for a few moments, clearing the bowl, before Kate spoke. "Hey Rick?"
He ignored the shiver his first name evoked. "Kate."
She slipped the spoon from her mouth, then started moving the left over candy pieces around in the bowl. "We're going to catch this guy, right?"
Rick blinked. He'd never heard such a question, let alone such a vulnerability from the woman across from him. He slipped around the counter, sliding his fingers under her chin until her troubled hazel eyes met his. "We'll find him," he swore. "I promise you."
It was 3AM.
Emily hated 3AM.
Well, that was a big of an exaggeration. She only hated 3AM when she was working a particularly difficult case. And this was proving to be a very difficult case. The worst part was that they'd been thrown a rather nasty curveball in the form of a sixty-five-year-old public school teacher.
They'd been trying to work her into the puzzle all day, ever since they absorbed, noted and left the crime scene. In some ways, Emily felt bad for Doctor Paris. There was a hell of a lot of blood in that scene and though Emily hadn't shown it, it had been enough to churn even her cast iron stomach. No matter what they did, they couldn't seem to come up with a new theory to adequately explain everything that was going on.
Neither had the resident writer.
Emily had caught on by now. She could see the way Detective Becektt and her team turned to Castle for the absurd. And she could understand why. The brain worked in funny ways and she could tell that Castle's not-always-so-crazy stories had triggered connections in the past. Emily doubted he'd be around otherwise. There was something in the dynamics of that particular team that spoke of a genuine affection for the writer, even as Detective Beckett fought to keep him at arm's length.
It was a surprisingly familiar scenario.
Aware that she'd let her brain wander and acknowledging that she needed a break, Emily pushed herself off the bed with a heavy sigh. She splashed water on her face in the bathroom and secured her hair in a ponytail before deciding on searching down some sort of snack.
She had a hankering for peanuts.
Sliding her feet into the slippers she always packed – JJ's fault because the blond always packed a pair of her own – Emily snatched up her hotel room key and a couple of bills before venturing down to the lobby. The hotel was surprisingly silent. After all, this was New York City and Emily had expected there to be at least a handful of people stumbling back after late night partying. But the only person in the lobby was a dark-haired man Emily recognized all too well. She padded over, recognizing the case file in front of Hotch immediately.
"You know, when you tell us to get some sleep we expect you to follow your own orders."
He glanced up to acknowledge her, then back down at the file. The old Emily would have felt the sting of rejection at how easily he seemed to shrug her off, but that was the Emily from before his divorce, before Foyet, before she realized that staying late in the office with him was less about proving she was good enough and more about making sure he wasn't lonely. A friendship had developed after that predicated on Emily's stubborn determination and Hotch's deeply buried need for friendship and companionship. This wouldn't be the first time they looked over case notes at a stupid hour of the morning.
And that was how it had started.
So neither of them felt anything but a comforting sense of normalcy when Emily plopped down beside him, pyjamas, fuzzy slippers and all.
"You're not sleeping either," he pointed out as he shuffled pages and pictures around.
"Chocolate," she shot back. "And I wasn't sleeping anyway."
She didn't have to explain further. Cases made more than one of their team members an insomniac.
"Find something?" he asked. Sometimes it was scary how well they knew each other. Of course Hotch would know that she had been looking over the case since she couldn't sleep.
Emily rolled her eyes. "Nothing useful. Nothing we don't already know."
"This is intensely personal," Hotch murmured and Emily vaguely wondered if he'd even heard her. "He deliberately chose each of his victims for a very specific reason."
"Why?" Emily asked, her head rolling across the back of the couch to pillow on his shoulder. It wasn't that she didn't want to know, really. It was more that she knew her brain wasn't functioning anywhere near where it needed to be to make sense of and deal with the information he was trying to tease out. Between that and the lulling comfort of having him near – which was a quirk she'd continually ignored since discovering it – was making her drowsy.
"Personal vendetta," he replied with strong conviction. "Something these people did, something they said."
"The Loser in High School Theory?" Emily questioned, eyes fluttering open to look at his files. God, for someone so strict, his case notes were always disorganized. She resisted the itch to go get her own. "We're still merely narrowed down to the class. And even then, maybe it's a loser from another year."
He ran a hand through his hair, dislodging her head. She growled at him. He glared back.
She rolled her eyes. "What if the significance isn't in the victims then? We've started with victimology and that didn't help. So what if it's something else?"
"Like the method of death," he murmured. "His MO includes more than just his victim choices-"
"-it includes the how."
They grinned at each other – Emily tried to pretend that his dimples weren't actually that adorable – and Hotch reached over to the table, pulling out the crime scene photos. He spread them out on the table, all four of their victims, all of the face on crime scene photos.
"So why this particular method?" Emily murmured, leaning forward over the photos.
Hotch's shoulder brushed against hers. "He's spilled their guts."
"Garcia didn't find anything truly secret-worthy when she went through their backgrounds," she pointed out. She was running on adrenaline but the adrenaline of a lead. It had been a kick for her mind.
"There are plenty of secrets to keep that aren't written down anywhere," he replied. "Things brushed under the rug, never mentioned, paid in cash…"
"And you're the expert," she murmured though her heart tripped too. "But anything odd… Garcia would have picked up on it."
"She is still looking," he responded, shifting the pages around in front of them, trying to get a feel. "This kind of violence… It has to be significant."
"Hate," Emily blurted suddenly, eyes going very wide.
Hotch looked over at her in anxious confusion.
Emily was all but bouncing in her seat. "It's not about spilling their guts, it's about hating their guts."
Yeesh! You know how so many authors are talking about how they've had to battle with chapters recently? This is honest to goodness no different. We had the longest fight with this bloody thing.
To that end, no, and I can't repeat 'no' enough, we're not letting this go, and we haven't forgotten it. We're looking at two schedules that are often incompatible so it takes a bit more time than usual to get chapters up. That, and it's March, and I know for most college and university students (of which SSW and I both rank) it's like the month from hell. Or the month before the month from hell.
As usual, we as for your strongest exercise in patience so we can give you the best chapters we feel like we can.
The reviews are pretty cool too.
PS: for those of you who voted for this story months ago in the Profiler Awards... you guys won us Best Crossover! So we thank you and we love you and we are so endlessly glad that you're enjoying this enough, despite the long updates, to not only nominate us, but to help this baby win!
