"Will you - " Her voice is thin and watery, the words coming out haltingly. "Will you stay until I fall asleep?"
"Are you sure?"
There's a long pause.
"Yeah."
"Okay. I'll stay."
It takes a while, her breath slowing gradually, the spaces between inhalations lengthening as she surrenders to the emotional toll of the day. Night creeps in from the corners of the room, the shadows growing deeper and darker with each passing minute. She twitches in her sleep, her muscles contracting and releasing at random. The sliver of amber light slicing across the hardwood floor flickers and Kate looks up, sees him standing in the doorway.
"She asleep?"
"Yeah."
Castle pushes the door open and steps quietly into the room, the cuffs of his pajama pants dragging around his heels. Alexis mumbles in her sleep and rolls over, curling in on herself; Kate smoothes her hand over the young woman's hair, humming softly in the back of her throat. He kneels down next to the bed and rests his head against Kate's stomach as he stares at his heartbroken daughter.
"I wish I could fix it," he murmurs and Kate wraps her hand around the back of his head, nails scraping lightly against his scalp. "I hate seeing her like this."
"I know," Kate replies softly. "But you can't. All we can do is be here and help her through it."
"I want to kill him."
"Me too."
They sit in silence, watching his daughter sleep peacefully, her chest rising and falling steadily. Castle sighs and braces his hands on the edge of the bed, groaning quietly as he pushes himself up. Kate looks at him questioningly and he holds out a hand.
"Come on. She'll be embarrassed if she wakes up with us both hovering over her."
She takes his hand and lets him pull her off the bed and into his chest, his arms wrapping around her waist. "Thank you," he whispers, his lips pressed against her temple.
"For what?"
"For taking care of her. For being someone she can trust." His arms tighten slightly. "For wanting to kill the bastard that broke her heart just as much as I do."
"If anyone could get away with it, it'd be us."
Castle chuckles and presses a kiss to her forehead before dropping his arms and stepping back. He twines their fingers and starts to walk backward out of the room, his eyes trained over her shoulder at the figure of his sleeping daughter. A flash of light catches in the corner of her eyes and Kate turns her head, sees the ring sitting on the nightstand.
"Do you think we should -" She nods toward the wall. "I don't want it to be the first thing she sees when she wakes up."
"Leave it," he responds. "It'll hurt but she left it there for a reason."
Kate pulls the door closed and they make their way downstairs, hips and shoulders bumping as they lean into each other. He crawls into the bed first and she slips in next to him, pressing her nose into the crook of his neck as his fingers twist lazily through her hair. Her hand rests on his chest, fingers curling into the soft blue cotton of his t-shirt, her own rings glinting dimly in the moonlight.
"She'll be okay." She's not sure if he's saying it for her benefit or his own but she nods anyway, her lips brushing lightly over his skin. "We'll get her through this."
"Yeah, Castle," she assures him as she starts to nod off, the steady pound of his heart under her ear pulling her under swiftly. "We will."
