CH10
It is now 1 month later: (July)
Kate was lounging in the pool right next to Alexis. Kate had barely left Alexis's side since that one night. Kate had on purpose made sure that where Alexis went Kate followed, while not trying to smother her.
Kate didn't know if Castle had noticed or not, however he hadn't said anything and when Kate asked if Alexis had talked to her father about it, all Alexis did was shake her head.
IT! It had broken Kate's heart listening to Alexis's fears about her future or lack thereof. She had spent years in school applying herself to her studies. Doing countless summer projects that would only add to her ability to learn and learn about herself.
College was the next level and Alexis had plans, really big plans. She had three different majors that she was thinking about and she was thinking of pursuing them all. And when college was out she had still more plans.
All of that was up in smoke now. All she had left was her father's new dream and now even it was likely in dust. Who was going to come all the way out here to get away from it all now. Who was alive to come? Was money even worth anything anymore? And if she left her father to chase her dream, was there even going to be a college to go to?
It was the first time in a long time that Alexis felt lost and she didn't want to burden her father with her fears.
Kate had however noticed that Alexis's long term vision for herself didn't seem to include getting married and having kids. Kate didn't bring it up, however its absence was noticed by Kate.
The two of them didn't leave Alexis's room till almost lunch. Kate sat there or lied on her bed with her talking or just listening.
It was here talking with Alexis that Kate spilled her story about her mother being murdered and that was why she was a homicide detective, except for all the cases she had solved, who killed her mother still escaped her. And that it still haunted her even today.
"Some cases can't be solved, did that ever occur to you?" Alexis had asked.
"Someone knows, someone did it, all I need is information that I don't have. I just don't know where that information is or who has it." Kate countered, still praying that she could solve it one day. Without that closure Kate felt like she had let her mother down.
"Kate, dad used to write about murders, maybe he can help. He thinks like bad guys and the good guys, maybe dad can see something that you can't." Alexis offers.
"Everything I know about the case is at home." Kate points out, meaning this line of thought was going to get them nowhere. Plus not even contemplating telling Castle about her past. Alexis had needed her so she had told her, while telling Castle was out of the question.
"We talk to your friends weekly, have them scan everything and send it. We can plug one of our phones into the equipment in the office and print it all out for you." Alexis offers. "Please Kate, my dream is crumbling. If I can't have mine anymore maybe we can get you yours." Alexis begs.
It took four straight weeks to transfer what Kate had all the papers they had printed out in her bedroom. Espo and Ryan had taken it upon themselves to take a trip to Kate's apartment, scanned everything and sent her the information weekly.
Just one more week to go, after they scanned everything that was down in the archives, plus a trip to the precinct that had been abandoned to search their archives too. Espo and Ryan knew that this trip would require some support so they called in a few favors that included someone who had the key.
Rick approached the pool and looked into it finding Kate holding Alexis's hand while they floated in their blown up air mattresses. He didn't know where this came from, but he had seen it for almost a month now. Rick didn't understand the reason for the bonding, but he approved.
Rick had also seen one other thing, Kate was smiling a lot more and his attempts at getting Kate to have fun were meeting with more success, though she still fought him from time to time.
"Time to make a phone call." Rick offers, watching Kate let go of Alexis's hand like she had just been caught with her hand in the cookie jar. However she also rolled off of her mattress, stood up in the pool and walked for the ladder to get out with Alexis right behind her.
Rick didn't know what was going on and it had Rick very curious, just now sure how to get invited.
Kate was mostly dry and had a towel wrapped around her with Alexis standing next to her and Kate made the phone call. "Hi Espo!" Kate was still glad to hear his voice. It meant her old friends where still out there.
"It's good to hear you Beckett. How is island life?" Espo started out with light talk to lighten the mood.
"Hot actually. We've only had that one big rain storm almost a month ago, since then nothing." Kate however was learning to like the sun. And that one rainstorm had actually been a hurricane that was far enough out to sea that all they got was rain. It had started raining as the hurricane headed their way, roughly. Rained as it passed them by and then rained on the trailing edge.
It was one solid week of down-pouring rain, that had filled the cistern from just a week's worth of water to having water spill out of the cistern through the overflow pipe, leaving them with month's worth of water.
It had also put a damper on Castle's enthusiasm for it being the 4th of July. It hadn't helped his mood any when he didn't have any fireworks to shoot off. He had planned on getting a lot so he could shoot them off for any guests if they managed to open in time. They had left too fast for Rick to plan far enough ahead to stop and get any.
"Just don't go getting a sunburn Beckett." Espo teased.
"How are things there?" Kate wanted an update.
"Still lots of food, we finally found an electrician who could hook up the ranges that we have down in the garage. We have real meals now. People were starting to get restless around here. It really is crowded here Beckett." Espo points out. Not going into detail about where all the people were sleeping.
"We got word that one of the gangs made a run on the hospital that the 54th had turned into their headquarters. The 54th called and we sent 6 cruisers as back up and broke it up. It's been mostly quiet since then. Just minor little things. I think that's what's got Montgomery so antsy." Espo was guessing even if he was actually wrong.
"The main power is still on though Montgomery is starting to worry that someone will figure that out and take down the wires or shoot up the transformers putting all of us in the dark." Espo adds which he thought was a wise tactical move.
Roy had actually worked out that Kate while far away was working on her mother's case again and Espo and Ryan were helping her. However he didn't try to stop it. Everything was changing so maybe letting her was the right thing to do.
"Have you got everything Espo?" Kate wanted the last of the information.
"Sending it now." As Espo nodded to Tori who was actually doing all the tech work to send all of this.
Alexis was soon printing it out as she brought it up on the laptop, while downloading it onto the laptops hard drive under an encrypted section of the hard drive and then downloaded it all onto a flash drive that was easier to carry around, and hide for later if it came to that.
The rest of the phone call was spent with Kate talking with her father and Alexis and Rick talking with Martha.
Kate had everything all stacked up on the dresser in her room. So far Castle hadn't made any attempts at entering her bedroom, leaving Kate to strip off the bed sheets for herself. There were items that Kate had at home and yet here all she had were photos of it all that Espo had taken for her, it was everything Kate could think about that had anything to do with her mother.
"Dad, can we talk to you." Alexis approached her father with Kate right behind her, quaking in her boots, still not sure how Alexis had talked her into this. Kate was a very private person and letting Castle into her life was really something that didn't sit well with her.
"Kate has an open murder case that she has been working on for the last 15 years without success. …. We want you to study all of the information that is in Kate's bedroom." Alexis hands over Rick's laptop to him. "I, …. we want you to write another murder mystery using the information in Kate's bedroom.
Please dad, you used to write murder mysteries. … Write one more please, pretty please dad. …. Please." Alexis knew he was a writer and always would be, he just needed something to reignite his fire to write again.
"This has something to do with what you two have been doing together for the last month?" Rick asks not yet taking the laptop from Alexis.
"Partly yeah." Alexis wasn't willing to share it with her father just yet. Kate's need had given Alexis something to replace her fears about her future.
"Ask any question you need to Castle." Kate was willing to talk, even if her life was on all those pages that he was about to look at.
"Write you two a murder mystery based off of what you have in that bedroom?" Rick was actually hooked already, since he wanted in that bedroom to see what this was all about. A peek into Kate's life was just too irresistible.
"Please dad, you're a writer, write us another story that makes sense based off of what we have." Alexis pushed the laptop at Rick again.
If this was why these two were bonding and he really did want to know what it was. "It usually takes months to write a book." Rick warns them as he takes the laptop from Alexis.
Alexis looked back at Kate as Kate moved in behind Alexis and wrapped her arms around Alexis from behind and looked at Castle. "Then it takes months." Kate tells him. "Take the papers and move them to where you feel comfortable to write."
Holding onto Alexis was the only thing keeping Kate from running for her bedroom, closing the door and burning all those papers. What they were asking Castle to do was going to allow him to see into Kate's soul. This would put him into her life more than any man had ever before, except for Sorenson, and even he was never this close.
Rick took the laptop and left it on the breakfast bar and went back to working on their early dinner. "You two might need more sunscreen." Rick points out since it looked like they were both starting to look a little pink.
"SHIT!" Kate took Alexis's hand and dragged her to their shared bathroom, letting Alexis do her back while Kate did hers.
"It'll be fine Kate, dad has a very active imagination, he'll come up with something you've never even thought about." Alexis tries to calm Kate's fears.
"It's not what he'll dream up that worries me. My life is in those papers." Kate looks at the pile of papers on her dresser. "There are things I've never shared with anyone before. You're the first and Castle will be the second, it's just, …." Kate didn't know how to express just what Alexis had talked her into doing.
Kate soon found Alexis hugging her. "Dad can be a child some times. … Ok maybe most times, but he takes his writing seriously. Or at least he did. Maybe this will bring the writer that is hiding in there somewhere back out." Alexis preferred that her father was writing. It was too late to drop this place, but that didn't mean he couldn't write while he ran this place.
Kate extracted herself from Alexis's arms and went over to the dresser and opened the drawer and pulled out a book and took another deep breath. She was in this far, what was just one more step? Besides Alexis had bared her soul and she was 16, what did that make Kate at 32?
Kate handed over the book and got a surprise look from Alexis. "My mother forced me to go with her to get it signed. We waited for hours in this incredibly long and boring line. I was just a 15 year old flat chest child back then. Castle talked to us more than any of the ones in front of us. He asked questions, that I don't remember anymore.
After my mother died I started reading his books. Her death was really unexplained and the killer was never captured, while all the killers in his books where captured or killed.
It was a really dark time in my life and his books gave me hope. I've solved a lot of cases over the years and gotten justice for a lot of people." Kate bares more of her soul to Alexis.
"Everyone but you." Alexis understands.
"I've failed her. … I can't solve her case, after all these years I've got nothing." Kate admits to Alexis and herself yet again.
"Give dad a chance Kate. …. We should get some more cold drinks out of the store." Alexis offers, to get them out of the room and off this subject.
This got Rick to run for it as he was standing just outside Kate's bedroom door because he had wanted to ask Kate a question and got more of an answer than he had ever anticipated.
Rick ran out the back patio door to avoid the two women because he knew he couldn't keep his face straight if he saw them, and give himself away that he had overheard what they had said, even if he hadn't meant to.
Once he was sure they were gone, he went back into the kitchen and picked up the laptop and then went into Kate's bedroom to gather up all the papers.
"WOW!" Rick was now very impressed by the amount of information that was on her dresser. This was going to take some time, more than he gave credit.
He was still in his bedroom sorting the papers into various piles based on what a cursory examination told him.
"Looks like dinner is ready." Alexis mentions stepping into the kitchen, finding the casserole her dad had put together keeping warm in the oven.
"But where's Castle?" Kate questioned, not seeing him.
Kate went outside while Alexis headed for his bedroom.
It was a few minutes later when Kate came up behind Alexis who was standing in the doorway leading into the master bedroom. "Did you, ..." Kate stops when Alexis raises a hand.
Inside Kate and Alexis can see Rick deep into the paperwork that Espo and sent them and Alexis had printed out. It left Kate standing there with her mouth open, seeing Castle this engrossed in working on what they had asked of him already was surprising. Kate was sure Castle would simply use the papers to find out about Kate and her past.
Alexis however was just standing there with a large smile on her face. Neither of them were hiding while they watched Castle work and yet he gave no indication that he knew they were standing there watching.
Kate eventually pulled Alexis away and went to eat dinner. After they had finished eating Alexis put some on a plate and took it and a drink into her dad's room and left it there for him to eat.
Kate and Alexis however sat down to watch a movie. Kate however wasn't watching, her eyes were not focused on the TV, on the images that were there. She was looking that way, but her mind only knew Castle had her life in all those pieces of paper in his bedroom. Nor did she feel Alexis's hand in hers, occasionally softly squeezing it. Trying to reassure this woman that her father wouldn't do something stupid.
Alexis knew for all his faults, he would never do something to hurt her. Castle had been hurt before and knew what it felt like and would never do unto others what has been done to you.
Alexis had somehow gotten Kate to go to bed after the movie and Kate still didn't understand how she did that, but here she was, lying in bed wearing her night shirt. The only one she had really.
It's just that her mind wouldn't shut down and let her sleep. Not while Castle had all those papers.
Kate finally gave up and put one of her bikinis back on, a wrap around her waist and slipped into her flip flops and left her room to go into the kitchen to find something, even if there was still nothing on Direct TV to watch.
Stepping out into the hallway she could see that the door to Castle's bedroom was closed, however the light was still on. It was like a magnet and had Kate walking over to his door and even had her hand on the doorknob, ready to open it without knocking.
Instead she put her ear to the door and listened. However all she heard was her own breathing.
Kate chastised herself and left to go into the kitchen to find some kind of snack to keep herself busy with. Anything to occupy herself so that the knowledge of what Castle was reading didn't get to her, even if it already had.
Kate was oblivious to when Alexis joined her on the sofa, oblivious to when Alexis had taken her hand in her own too. It wasn't until Kate felt Alexis's head on her shoulder that Kate ever noticed that Alexis was even there.
"Couldn't sleep." Alexis whispers out, neither knowing if it was a question or a statement.
It was sometime later and the sun was up enough to get Alexis up to turn off the A/C units in the bedrooms and turn on the ones in the living room. "Breakfast?" Alexis offered, only to see Kate shake her head.
Kate's mind wasn't on breakfast, movies or anything else really. It was in Castle's bedroom, in the papers that he was reading. What Kate really wanted to do was go in there and take all those papers away from him.
(How did I let Alexis talk me into this? I've lost my mind)
Kate did however finally notice that Alexis had her up and walking into the kitchen where Kate sat down at the breakfast bar and silently watched Alexis go outside and come back with eggs. The onions were fresh, however the tomato's and spinach were from a can as Kate sort of watched Alexis making omelets for them, along with some toast using the bread made the day before.
Kate was still amazed at what you could do with a bread machine. It was a BREAD machine after all. Just where did these two learn how to use it like this?
"How do you know how to use a bread machine to make more than just bread?" Kate was finally awake enough to talk.
It got Alexis to start breathing again and got her to smile at Kate. Kate was back among the living!
"Dad does a lot of research when he writes, he wants to get the details right so that it sounds real. It wasn't even a main character for his book. Derek Storm was after some guy and found him at home playing family. He had some woman he had charmed in off the street thinking that he loved her and she was using a bread machine to make things to cook with.
So dad came home with two of them and we started making stuff to find out what you could make and how hard it was to do. It's amazing what you can find on the internet using Google. Dad had us making all kinds of stuff.
Jam for peanut butter sandwiches, various types and flavors of pudding, … even bread pudding." Alexis was grinning wide over that one, which had Kate grinning lightly at the joke.
"Dad wanted to know how to get out of a chair when the person was wrapped up to it in an entire roll of duct tape. So he had me tape him to a chair and go visit Paige for a few hours." Alexis offers a little insight into her dad.
Alexis could see the 'AND?' written all over Kate's face and simply smiled at her, letting her suffer for a moment. "When I came home, the chair was broken, the coffee table was broken. I found dad asleep on his bed and pulled the comforter over him and went to my room.
Next morning Dad was walking all stiff like he was a robot or something. A couple of days later his arms were all bruised from whatever he had done to get out of all that duct tape. I never did find out just how much more of him was bruised." Alexis started grinning while drinking her drink.
It had Kate grinning wide now and shaking her head. "I guess what I'm trying to say, is that dad goes to extreme lengths to make sure that whatever he thinks up will actually work in the real world. I think that's why his books sold so well. Dad would explain each and every little thing so that the reader would understand it and see just how possible it really is." Alexis offered some insight into what Kate could expect when her dad was done writing her a book.
"And does he do this?" Kate nods her head towards the bedrooms and motions her her hand like she was thumbing a ride.
It had Alexis grinning again. "When dad gets lost in what he is writing he just zones out. It used to bug me that I could stand in the doorway to his study and yell at him and he would just sit there typing away as fast as his fingers would let him. I could even hear his fingers tapping on the keyboard.
He'll eventually stop and end up dead on his bed still dressed. I'd work at getting his shoes off and some of his clothes and then pull the comforter over him, only to find him madly typing away again in the morning when I came downstairs to check on him.
He's probably sitting in there doing who knows what and hasn't touched the food I left him. I'll leave him something for lunch and again for dinner and pray that he slows down enough to eat it." Alexis didn't know when she was going to see her dad again. However it did make her feel better knowing that he was writing again. It's who he was, he had just lost sight of it for a time.
Kate turned to look at the bedrooms and wonder just who was Castle? She thought writers would write like most people worked, except for her of course, 9 to 5. Forcing words out onto a page only to have an editor somewhere rip it to pieces forcing him to re-write it.
It still didn't explain the playboy part of him, that part that was still securely in place in her mind.