Castle shows up on Kate's Beckett's doorstep with a bouquet of flowers. He hadn't planned on seeing her today, and he hopes she doesn't mind, but on his way home from Black Pawn, he had noticed the vibrant bursts of yellows and purples and oranges on a vender's display and couldn't resist picking some up for her.
But he immediately regrets the decision when she answers his eager knocks with bloodshot eyes and wet lashes.
"Hey, Castle," she offers, swiping the heel of her palm across her cheek to dispose of a stray tear.
"Kate? What's the matter? Are you okay?" he shoots out question after question without thinking, but she just shakes her head, scrapes an unsteady hand through her hair.
"I'm fine. Today just hasn't been too great." Her eyes fall to the flowers in curiosity.
"Oh, I got these for you," he says dumbly, thrusting the arrangement forward, like a graceless idiot.
But Kate doesn't seem to mind his lack of finesse, accepts the flowers with a soft smile. "That's really sweet," she murmurs, the cellophane crinkling against the cradle of her arm. "They're beautiful. Thank you."
Her eyes abandon the flowers to meet his and he stiffens, realizes he's just been staring at her this entire time.
"I'll, uh - go now," he stammers, hooking his thumb over his shoulder, but Kate catches his arm, ushers him in.
"You're already here," she rasps before she can clear her throat. "And I don't mind the company."
He could have sighed in relief.
"How was the meeting with Black Pawn?" she asks from the kitchen as she extracts an elegant, white vase from a cabinet.
"Boring," he mutters and she chuckles, arranging the flowers in the vase so that they spread like a kaleidoscope of colors. "I'm sort of on the verge of being let go."
She stops in the middle of the kitchen. "What?"
He didn't want to talk about it, doesn't even know why he's allowed himself to speak a word of it to her when there's obviously something's bothering her that he doesn't plan to ignore.
"Rick," she presses, standing in front of him now, concern coloring her glassy hazel eyes.
"I haven't produced any new material in a long time. After I killed off Derrick Storm, I failed to find inspiration for a new story, so I worked on the graphic novels and some short stories here and there. It's been over two years, they want a new book, a new series."
"You don't have any ideas?" she questions, not demanding, not like Gina and the rest of the people at the meeting had been. Just write something, they had all told him in exasperation, like creating a new world, new characters, and new plotlines was the easiest thing in the world.
"I have bits and pieces of different things, but nothing worthy of turning into an actual story."
She purses her lips, furrows her brow, and he knows that look, knows she's trying to think, brainstorming like he's seen her do plenty of times. "Well, what do you want to write about? There has to be something."
She's right, there is something he's been secretly writing about in his free time – someone – but he isn't sure how she'll take it.
Castle shrugs, maybe if he plays it off as casual, there will be less of a risk of her getting upset. "You."
She blinks, surprised, but then she swallows, ducks her head to hide the subtle blush crawling up her neck to her cheeks.
"That's a start, I guess," she murmurs, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.
"I was thinking, maybe you could help me," he starts hesitantly, but she looks up at him, like she's actually willing to consider whatever he's about to suggest. "Lately, when I do actually write, I write about this female homicide detective. She's smart and savvy and really hot." She scoffs, bumps his shoulder as she passes him. "I wasn't serious about it before, but this is the first character I've actually felt passionate about writing since Derrick Storm."
Kate leans back against the arm of the couch, crosses her arms over her chest, assessing him. "And how would I help you?"
"Research," he grins, but the arc of her eyebrow demands he elaborate. "I have a few ideas for a case. We could go over them together, you could help me with the technicalities, maybe even read over what I have so far before I show it to Gina."
He expects reluctance, even outright rejection, but he swears he spots a flicker of excitement in Beckett's eyes. He wonders if there is even the slightest chance that she could be a fan of his work.
The eager shine of her eyes simmers into indifference as she shrugs. "Sure, Castle. I wouldn't mind."
He claps his hands together. "Perfect! If this works out, I'll write you the best dedication ever."
She rolls her eyes, but doesn't resist him when he finds her hands, hauls her up from the couch.
"Now, are you going to tell me what's wrong?" She sighs, as if she was expecting it, and retracts one of her hands from his to knead her fingers into her eye socket. "C'mon, Kate, sharing is good," he needles, receiving a glare for it.
She turns away from him, starts leading him out of the living room. "I'll show you."
Her hand drops his once they reach her office and he waits patiently in the doorway, unsure of what to expect. She drifts towards the closed window shutters behind her desk, her shoulders slumping as her fingers close around the edges of the ivory-colored wood. He watches her ribs expand when she takes a deep breath and draws the shutters back, unveiling a shrine of photos, index cards, and printed files.
He stands planted to the floor for a second, confused by the array of random information, when he realizes there's a familiarity to the arrangement. This looks like the outlines he makes for his characters on his computer at home, the ones he projects onto the wall of his office, but this isn't an outline. This is a murder board.
Kate's watching him, chewing on her lower lip, but his eyes are glued to the case illuminated by the sunlight as he finally steps closer to examine, to understand what she's actually trying to show him.
He knows he must appear torn between horror and intrigue as his eyes scan over the homemade murder board that consumes the shutters and glass of her windows, over the index cards covered from top to bottom with her neat handwriting, over the crime scene photos of a woman colorless and crumpled in an alley with blood staining her blouse.
His gaze falls to the picture of that same woman, alive, in the middle of the web of information, a personal photo he assumes by the blurred Christmas tree in the background. Before he even reads the name printed across the bottom of the photo, he feels a striking recognition for her. The defined jawline, the smooth slope of her nose, the dazzling smile. Oh, god.
"Your mother."
She wraps her arms around herself, levels her gaze directly at the woman smiling back at them. "We were supposed to go to dinner. But she - my dad and I waited, but she never showed. Two hours later, we went home, and there was a detective waiting for us."
He wants to weep for her, for the gravelly pitch to her voice, for the steel in her eyes that hides the inconsolable pain of losing her mother.
"They found her body, she had been… stabbed." Her throat constricts around the word, as if the thought of the knife made her own body coil with agony.
"A robbery?" he inquires, just to give her a moment, to pull her from this devastating narration.
"No," she mumbles. "She still had her money, her purse, her jewelry. It wasn't a sexual assault either. They attributed it to gang violence." The last sentence leaves her mouth stained with bitterness. She shakes her head, as if to dismiss the simmering anger of a long held grudge. "The killer was never caught."
She strikes him as the type who doesn't like to be held when upset, but he can't help reaching for her, pulling her into his chest and wrapping his arms around her, purposely hiding her face from the tragedy, the injustice, spread like a tapestry in front of them.
He's surprised she returns the embrace, lacing her arms around his waist and pressing her cheek to his clavicle.
He rests his chin atop her head, rhythmically rubs his palm up and down her back.
"My dad, he took her death hard. He's sober now. Eight years." He smiles softly at the pride in her words. "So this…" Kate straightens in his arms, puts enough space between them to show him the man's watch on her wrist. "This is for the life that I saved," she says, circling her index finger over the cracked glass before reaching around her neck, fishing the hidden chain from under her shirt to show him the ring hanging at the end. She sighs, sweeps her thumb over the modest jewel set in the middle. "And this is for the life that I lost."
He presses his lips to her forehead, listens to the trembling breath she takes.
"What happened to the watch?" he asks, remembering the crack running down the middle.
"I - I broke it," she croaks, cradling the wrist carrying the watch to her chest. "I guess I should have known it would break sooner or later, it's old, and with my job, it's been through a lot. Today, I tackled a suspect. We both went down on the sidewalk and the face of the watch hit the concrete. It's - it's stupid-"
"No," he murmurs, extracting her wrist from its hiding place against her chest and glancing down to study the damaged glass. "You know, Kate, I have a friend who could probably fix this."
Her eyes dart up to meet his, hopeful and pleading, not at all what he's used to seeing in the fierce pools of golden brown and bottle green. "Yeah?"
He nods. "I can take it to him tomorrow morning if you want."
The relief that floods her smile tempts him to go track down his friend right now. "That'd be perfect, Castle. How much do you-"
"Negative, Ghost Rider. This is free of charge."
"Rick-"
"Calm down, Beckett. He owes me a favor."
She narrows her gaze on him, scrutinizing his words, attempting to determine the truth or the lie in them. He has a fantastic poker face, she'll never know.
Kate huffs, but still smiles up at him in appreciation. "Thank you."
"Not a problem," he smiles back, tries not to stiffen in surprise yet again when she drops her head back to his chest.
They exist in comfortable silence for a while. His hand returns to travel up and down her back, her fingers curl into the back of his shirt, and he wonders – he hopes – if she feels as content as he does.
"When did you create this?" he decides to ask, tilting his head towards the murder board behind her.
"Last summer," she sighs, her warm breath whispering across the exposed skin of his throat. "It's been pointless, I've gotten nowhere."
The defeat in her voice squeezes his heart. She lives with the loss of her mother everyday, the injustice of her unsolved murder, and he wishes he could hire an entire squad of investigators, unearth a plethora of resources that could help her put this to rest, but she would never allow it.
"Does Josh know about this?"
"No." She untangles her arms from him, steps forward to fold the shutters closed. "He doesn't know anything."
As she eases she shutters shut, he gathers his courage. He hadn't planned to bring this up yet, but it seems like as good a time as any.
"You have a few vacation days saved up, right?"
She glances to him over her shoulder, one eyebrow raised skeptically. "Yeah, why?"
"Well, as you know, Alexis will be back tomorrow." He smiles and she does too, because she's well aware of how excited he is for his daughter's return. "And I was going to give her a week to settle in, adjust to the change in time zones and life in the city again, but after that, I was thinking of taking her to the Hamptons."
"You have a house in the Hamptons?"
"Yep, we go there every summer. It's kind of like a tradition, you know? Bonfires, roasting marshmallows, telling ghost stories, sleeping late. We've done it since she was five," he explains, following her out of the office, back into the living room.
"Sounds nice. Kind of magical, actually," she muses, drifting into the kitchen. "You staying for dinner?"
He glances out the window, realizes the sun is setting, and nods. "You should come with us. It's right on the ocean. There's a secluded pool. You could lay out, work on your tan."
"Wow, Castle, you're working really hard to see me in a swimsuit."
"If you are not comfortable in a swimsuit, you can just skinny dip."
"You sure Alexis would approve of that?" she quips, raising questioning eyebrows at him from the countertop near the fridge where she's sorting through takeout menus.
"Now my fantasy's ruined, Beckett. Thanks," he huffs, dodges the paper menu she tosses at him. "But it will give you a chance to meet Alexis."
Her fingers trip over their food options, hesitation causing her teeth to sink into her bottom lip. He knows introducing her to Alexis is a big step, one she may not be ready for, but Kate has become a huge part of his life within the last two weeks and he doesn't see that changing anytime soon. He doesn't want it to change.
"Are you sure you want to do that?" she questions, abandoning the menus scattered on the counter to give him her full attention.
Castle joins her in the kitchen, tries to keep his hands to himself as he props his hip against the counter beside her. "I'm positive. Alexis is the most important person in my life, you're important to me too, therefore, you two should meet."
Her lips quirk at his reasoning before she ducks her head to hide the shy smile behind her hair.
"Seriously, Kate. You could just come for the weekend. It'll be fun."
He listens to her sigh and watches her eyes lift, he can already see what her answer's going to be and he feels the grin spreading across his lips.
"I'll ask Montgomery about it tomorrow."