A/N: Hello all! I want to thank you readers out there for sticking with this story, even through the time it took to finish. It was a fun ride, but now we've reached the end, and it's time to disembark. A few of you have mentioned wanting a prequel of sorts for this story, and I could be persuaded to create one, but right now I simply don't have any idea on what I would do for that. (I'm okay at action scenes, I'm working on it, but I don't know how a whole story about Castle's kidnapping would go.) If you do have any ideas or suggestions for that, please pm me or let me know in your reviews. I am also planning on returning to my other stories on here— slowly— and finishing them up. (Right now the tossup is whether I work on Broken Bottles or Live Fast Die Young next.) So keep your eyes peeled if either of those are in your wheelhouse. :-)

Other than that, I guess there's nothing left to say than enjoy the rest of this story, and thanks again for making me feel apart of a wonderful fandom.

Disclaimed, because I still don't own anything.

"Johanna."

"He's a boy, Rick. It's sweet to suggest, but I don't want him to get beat up on the playground."

"Jackson?"

"After your no-good father? No thank you. Not with everything he's put us through recently."

They sat in silence for a beat, Kate completely absorbed in her son's perfect features. His perfect, tiny nose, tiny fingers, the tiny toes that were hidden from sight due to the nurse's thorough swaddling job. The shock of dark hair that dusted the top of his perfect little round head, peeking out from underneath his little yellow hat. She thought for sure her heart was going to just explode, it was so overflowing with love for the seven pounds two ounces of tiny human in her arms.

Their son.

She was about to cry again.

She felt her husband's muscles grow taut with excitement at her side as she sensed he had another "great" name idea, and she prepped an eyeroll for him.

"How about Nobel?"

Kate wrinkled her nose in confusion. "It's an interesting choice. Pretty. Sort of sounds... oh. Castle! No!"

"What?" he feigned shock as best he could, but she could see the mirth shining in his bright blue eyes. "It's pretty."

"Right. So you can go around telling people how you got a Nobel and a Pulitzer prize in one night."

He grinned like the cat that ate the canary. "But Kate, it would be just the best story! How many people can say that? Plus, he's better than a pulitzer."

She laughed, surprising herself. She tossed the name around in her head for a few seconds. "It's actually not half bad. But not as a first name."

Rick's eyebrows jumped practically up to his hairline as he smiled. "Seriously?"

Kate grinned. "IF we come up with a good first name, I MIGHT allow it."

"Jameson. Rook. Richard. Alexander. Nikk— ooh, Nicholas? Nick isn't bad."

"No, we're not naming him after any characters from your books."

"That's excluding a lot of names, Beckett."

Kate's eyes seemed to keep on rolling. "The big ones anyway. No Derrick, Jameson, or Nicholas."

Rick pressed a kiss to her temple and grinned. "I know, sweetheart. I'm just teasing."

Kate smiled back at him. She knew he was. He was such a sweet lovable goofball.

"What about James, though?"

Kate turned back to look at him over her shoulder in mild surprise. "James? That seems a bit conservative coming from you."

"Yeah, but it's a good strong name. It's your dad's name. And there's not really anyone I respect more than him," he admitted, looking down at the tiny little snuffles coming from the tiny little person who was at the heart of this conversation. Kate smiled at her husband's face. Staring into their son's face, he looked so... awestruck? Amazed? She didn't quite have a word for it yet.

He made a light groaning noise before settling back to sleep in her arms, nuzzling against her, and her heart tumbled head over heels in her chest.

Twitterpated. That was the look. More than reverent, distant awe. It was the purest, most warm, flustering kind of love she'd ever felt in her life. It felt like a love that could never possibly end, a bond that would never, ever be broken.

"James Nobel Castle," she murmured, pulling the baby blanket just slightly higher to cover his tiny hand. "I like it."

Lips pressed searingly tight against her forehead, and she could practically feel him breathing her in. "It's crazy, you know? How we ended up here? Who would have thought that all that pain and torture and heartache... it was all for this?"

She smiled, glancing at Rick over her shoulder. "It is pretty amazing. I thought you were gone, that we might never get a chance at this. At him."

"I know," he nodded sympathetically. "But you know what?"

"Hmm?"

He turned her head to face his more directly and stared into her hazel orbs with his own blue ones, earnestly pouring all his love for them into his gaze.

"I wouldn't trade a second of it."

The End