(Despite all of my hopeful promises, I am absurdly late posting this again! I really don't mean to leave those of you that are reading and reviewing this hanging; I just can't seem to go any faster at present. Here is the next-to-last chapter; things are starting to be resolved, but there are still some lingering loose ends too. Please enjoy, and know that (of course) I still don't own them, no matter how much I wish I determined their storylines!)

The Walls Fall Down

Chapter Ten: Darkest Before Dawn

Though thrilled beyond measure to have his darling only child back where he could watch over her, talk to her, and touch her to make sure she was really there and safe at last, Rick Castle couldn't help anxiously pacing across the hospital room to the door to peek into the hallway every few minutes. Kate was supposed to be bringing him updates, and it had been some time since he had heard anything. He hated that Esposito had been injured trying to help his daughter, hated that she still hadn't spoken and must have been through Hell and back, hated everything about this situation, but there was absolutely nothing he could do.

Watching the video of Tyson toying with him through Alexis had been horrifying enough, but Castle honestly couldn't let himself think for long on what might have happened to Alexis off-camera without becoming physically ill. Stopping his pacing near the door and coming back to the side of her bed again, the writer forced himself to sit and put out at least somewhat calm vibes. He reached out to run a loving, wistful hand over her vibrant, silky, red hair that he adored and to tuck it behind her ear like he had done at night when she was a child and he had just finished reading her to sleep.

"Alexis?" he whispered, hating that his voice sounded so tentative and scared, but finding that he was unable to change it much. He wanted to be encouraging, reassuring, for her – just in case she somehow was hearing him – but fighting against his own doubts and worries over her condition was proving to be an uphill battle. He was just searching his thoughts for something to say, something that might make her wake up and give him one of her dazzling smiles, and was telling her that Grams was on her way, when he heard soft footsteps behind him and turned to find Kate Beckett lingering in the doorway, looking on with both concern and something softer and more affectionate in her eyes. If he had been in the frame of mind to recognize it, Castle would have realized that it was the type of look he had been waiting to get from her for as long as he had known the guarded, enigmatic female detective – his muse. Instead, he merely shifted his gaze to her hopefully, needing some good news in the midst of all this not knowing.

At his open response, Kate Beckett stepped further into Alexis's room, and even reached out to pat the lump that was Alexis's foot under the blankets. "How is she, Castle?"

He found that voice of hers, low and husky, showing concern and care, but also control, as intoxicating as always, but grounding as well, giving him something to cling to in this mess that kept throwing him off balance.

"No change," he heard himself saying as if through cotton, or like someone else entirely was speaking for him. "Her doctor was in here briefly. He said that physically she's got a fractured cheekbone, and it will give her a fair amount of pain, but other than that it's cuts and bruises…nothing that won't heal. They did a …a…" Castle stumbled on the words, looked away from Kate to his daughter's still form again, and she jumped in to his rescue.

"A kit?" she supplied helpfully, mercifully leaving unsaid what kind of kit they both knew she meant.

Castle nodded, met her eyes again, swallowed hard, gulped in a large breath in the manner of a fish gasping out of water on the deck of a boat, and took the line she had thrown him. "Yes. Right. The results of the kit came back negative."

"Thank God," she whispered, touching his shoulder, then waiting patiently for him to continue.

"The doctor seems to think she may be in shock, or that she may have simply shut down as an emotional coping mechanism. She isn't comatose; there's no concussion; she isn't sleeping, but she is unresponsive. They're running a tox screen, to be certain he didn't inject her with something…" He trailed off, and his partner waited, not wanting to interrupt, but hoping to be there and comfort him if she could.

The early evening dusk washed over the world outside the hospital windows, and the NYPD detective couldn't help admiring the way it threw "her" writer's craggy, masculine profile half into shadow, even while it lit other planes of his face and the tips of his sandy, disheveled hair with a fading golden light. She would deny it until she ran out of breath, but in that moment, Kate Beckett wanted to grab him up, hold him to her, and kiss his pain away so badly that it created a physical ache in her chest. There was not much room within her for mushy romantic notions and fairy tale fluff, but she wanted to save the day for him just then. Knew that he would run into hell or high water to do the same for her.

It hadn't even register with her just how much time had passed in silence until she saw his face crumple in on itself, and he ducked his head to hide it as his shoulders shook. "We – we found her, Kate. It ought to be enough. Why can't she come back to me?"

In the space of an instant, she was kneeling before his chair, pulling him into her arms, guiding his head down to rest on her shoulder. "Rick…shh…it's okay. Alexis is okay. She will come back. Don't give up now." It became a low, soothing murmur of a mantra that she repeated, rubbing her palm over his back as she did. There was no way this couldn't be the truth; it was unfathomable, and she would not allow it.

Sadly, they had rescued the princess, but none of them were out of the woods yet. With that somber thought in her mind, she also realized that Castle was in her arms at last, but in nothing like the way she had hoped.

CASTLE~~CASTLE~~CASTLE~~CASTLE~~CASTLE~~CASTLE

Javier Esposito's face was as cold and motionless as stone when Lanie was finally allowed in to see him and sit with him. She found herself more discomforted by the usually warm and vibrant man's quiet stillness than she had any understandable right to be; she was after all someone who spent the majority of her days examining the forever-silenced victims of violent crime. Still, there was no denying the shock that the sight of her favorite detective, as she often secretly thought of him to herself, lying there in that bed without a smart aleck remark or jibe at her worry, bandaged and hooked up to machines. In truth, Lanie wanted nothing more than to either grab his shoulders and shake him back into consciousness, or smack him for being so stupidly reckless before she kissed him senseless for being so irresistibly heroic. She was a mess; this whole situation was, and he should be awake sweating this out with her, not lying there giving her heart palpitations.

Ryan, who had met her in the waiting room and directed her this room, squeezed her shoulder encouragingly for a moment, nudged her forward slightly, and then slipped out, obviously sensing that she needed a second alone with his injured partner. According to what both Kevin and Kate had told her, Esposito was expected to make a full recovery, but they had sedated him in order to keep him from moving around and aggravating either of the bullets' entry and exit wounds, and until he was built up again from the blood loss. She shook her head at the mental image of him fighting with doctors and EMTs alike, trying to convince them that he was alright, he could get up, check himself out of the hospital and get back into the fray.

By now, she had reached the side of the bed, and she couldn't help reaching out a gentle hand to smooth over his forehead and down his cheek. "You just take it easy for awhile, Javi," she murmured in what she hoped was a soothing tone. "I think you've earned it."

With that, she pulled a chair up to the bedside and prepared to wait until he opened those deep, luscious eyes and smiled at her again. Sure, there had been plenty of times when she had wished he would lay off the charm and stop turning those sinfully melting looks in her direction, nearly convincing her to do anything he wished. Now, though, she wouldn't have cared what he wanted or how he pled his case; she would give anything to see into the depths of his chocolate eyes and let him beguile her with a glance.

Stroking her hand along his well-muscled bicep and down his arm, before eventually covering his still motionless hand with her own, Lanie felt she had to get something out in the open between them, whether he heard her somewhere in his unconscious or not.

"Javier Esposito…" she began haltingly, then forced herself to put all of the spark and determination she normally spoke with into her voice for him to hear. "Let's just get one thing straight right now. I know we've never really talked about what's going on between us. Maybe there's nothing between us but flirting and jokes…" She forced a deep breath and blew it out in frustration, knowing that the last bit wasn't true and wondering why she was being such a coward when he wasn't even awake and listening. "I think we both know there is something here though, and we dance around it because neither of us wants to be hurt, or to hurt the other one. Well, no more. You hearin' me, Detective? We are gonna take a chance, see where this chemistry of ours leads us, before…before you do some other fool thing…and…and it's too late."

She kept it together and sounded like the tough, no-nonsense medical examiner she always showed everyone until that last thought escaped out loud. She had almost lost him, before ever really telling him how she felt, and it was more than she could bear. He was going to know, just as soon as he woke up.

Wiping away the couple of rogue tears that had escaped down her cheeks, Lanie sniffled, then had to chuckle at herself, even as was crying at his bedside like some pathetic sap in some overblown chick flick. The tears were winning, and she hated them for it as she trying to wipe them away quickly while still clinging to his hand. It was then, to her surprise that his hand twitched in hers. She stared for a moment, at their fingers interlaced on the white sheets, then startled again as she glanced up to see his eyes open and looking apologetically at her.

Javier raised his hand, still holding her tightly, and gingerly wiped the last couple tears from her cheeks with the pad of his thumb. He gave her a hopeful half-smile and raspily whispered, "Hush, Querida, I'm right here."

She nodded at his words and leaned in to smile at him, but the tears seemed to flow more freely with her smile. He couldn't help a gentle grin, knowing she had to hate that she was crying over him, even though he was more touched than he could say and wouldn't begin to give her grief about it. He used the functioning arm that was bandaged and out of commission to pull her to his chest and hold onto her. "Please, Lain. Don't cry, okay? It's going to be alright."

It felt so good to know they had Alexis back, know that he was still alive, that Lanie obviously cared for him, and told lay there with her in his arms, that Javier Esposito drifted right back off into healing sleep, hardly caring anymore that it had taking two bullets to get him to where he was.