Chapter 13: Taking care of Kate

A jolt goes through the jet as the wheels make contact with the black tarmac of the runway at Teterboro airport. Two minutes later it's come to a complete stop and Rick's dialing his wife's number as he waits impatiently to disembark the plane.

"Kate, what's happened?"

Instead of his wife though it's another familiar voice that answers his call.

"Hey Castle, Kate's resting at the moment. She's just tired from the early morning scare," Lanie assures him.

"And the baby?"

"He's fine as well, the contractions seem to have stopped for now but Dr Cranshaw is going to keep her in for observations."

"Oh thank god. My plane has just landed, if Kate wakes up tell her that I'm not too far away and I'll be there shortly."

The immediate fear has passed but he won't be able to really relax until he sees her for himself. There is a car service awaiting him at the terminal, it's a seamless transition in the chain ferrying the writer to his wife's side.

Kate is awake and talking to Lanie when he gets to the hospital, she seems a bit pale and washed out from the entire ordeal but she's otherwise well.

"Please don't ever scare me like that again," he says as he buries his face against Kate's neck in a tight hug, the familiar smell of her soothing the restless terror that had been churning through his stomach.

"I'm sorry," she says miserably.

"Hey, you don't need to apologize. It wasn't meant to be an accusation because you have nothing to be sorry about," he says as he pulls back to look at her.

"Lanie do you think you could give us a minute here?" Kate says to her best friend.

"Sure, actually I should probably go anyway but I'll catch up with you later. If there's anything you guys want me to do then just let me know," the medical examiner gives her friend a reassuring squeeze of the hand before she leaves the couple alone.

"What's going on Kate?" concern colors his face at her continuing reticence.

"I think that this might be my fault," guilt sits like a miserable burden in her gut. "Yesterday I was upstairs in the nursery unpacking that change table that the guys got for us …"

"Why were you doing that? I told you that I'd do it once I got back," he butts in.

"I'm not an invalid, I can still do things by myself," she tells him with a flash of irritation forgetting for a moment the consequences from that decision. "Besides that's not the point. My phone started to ring downstairs so I ran to get it and I tripped on the corner of the box and landed on my side. It didn't really hurt so I thought I was ok and I didn't tell anyone about it then but what if that's the reason why this is happening now? I should have been more careful, it was just such a stupid thing to do."

She can't help the way that she's mentally beating herself up for that moment of inattention. It's a game of 'what if'. What if she'd left that box for Rick to unpack? What if her phone hadn't rung? What if she'd been paying attention and avoided the box? What if she'd seen her doctor about it earlier? Could all of this have been avoided if only she'd changed one step in the chain of events?

She looks absolutely miserable, her eyes aren't even focused on him, instead she's reliving that moment again in her mind. The lump sitting in her throat is called despair, it chokes her as she contemplates the possible consequences of her actions. Rick gives her a little shake to pull her out of her introspection.

"Kate we don't know that the accident has anything to do with what's happening now and you can't beat yourself up over it. You could equally blame me for not unpacking that thing before, and it was probably my call that you were running to get, I shouldn't have called so often. It was simply bad luck, it's not like you deliberately fell. We just need to see what happens from here," Rick pulls himself up onto the bed so that he sitting next to her, Kate's head tucked into his neck as his arm wraps around her shoulders. He wishes that he could bundle her up in cotton wool or do whatever it takes to make his family safe.

He's a gift that she probably doesn't deserve, she thinks as she lets his words comfort her. Rick's told her often enough exactly how strong and courageous he thinks she is. Sure when it comes to work or putting herself in physical danger then she's confident and doesn't hesitate. It's the personal stuff like this that she's shaky on. He doesn't suspect that she's riddled with self doubts and that the only reason why she's managed to cling on to the raft of her sanity is because of him. He's the anchor that grounds her, the thing that has pulled her back from the edge time and time again.

The thought of what almost happened is enough to scare her into accepting the doctor's edict concerning strict bed rest. It's boring and frustrating but if that's what's best for the baby then she'll do exactly as she's told.

Rick hovers over her every second of the day, normally she'd have gotten irritable with all of his fussing but this time she doesn't protests. She understands that he needs to do this, he carries his own guilt for being on the other side of the country when all of this happened. His mollycoddling is his way of trying to make it up to her, it's illogical and unnecessary but she puts up with it to make him feel better. Her marriage has taught her how to compromise between her need for independence and his need to look after her.

He hasn't been home in the last forty-eight hours, instead he spends the nights in her hospital room sleeping cramped up on a La-Z-Boy chair. She's tried to talk him into going home and getting some sleep in a proper bed but he won't hear of it. Kate can normally get her way but every now and then her husband gets a stubborn look in his eye and he's unshiftable. Rick Castle may seem easy going but he can be obstinate in his own way, that's how he managed to chase her down in the end despite all the barriers she kept throwing in his way.

Dark stubble shadows his jaw and his hair is tousled from sleep, it makes him look harder than he normally does. And yes incredibly sexy as well, she might tease him about his metrosexual tastes but her husband can definitely rock the bad boy look as well.

Kate's the morning person so she routinely wakes up before him and these moments that she has before he rouses are some of her favorite. The writer is forever watching her, observing the little nuances that are the only clues to what she's really feeling, that's how he's gotten so good at reading her. This is her only time to return the favor.

There's tightness around his eyes, even in his sleep, that speak of the worries that he's careful to try to hide from her. His slumber is restless, twitches and turns reflecting the dreams that disturb him. She turns onto her side facing him, her hand stretching out to his to lend him what comfort she can.

'Let's not worry you father anymore, ok bub?' she tells her son silently. 'He needs to get some real sleep and there'll be plenty of opportunities to keep him up at night once you're born. There's no need to rush it now.'

The relative quiet is broken by the door opening as Dr Cranshaw comes in for morning rounds. The sound is enough to jerk Rick into awareness as he gives a little grunting noise at being woken.

"Sorry, I didn't realize you were still asleep," the woman apologizes.

"It's fine doc, I was up," Kate assures her, "it was just sleeping beauty over there who was still snoozing."

"How are you feeling Kate, any more pains?" the doctor enquires.

"No, none since that first day really."

"Good," Dr Cranshaw adds a notation to Kate's chart. "I think that we might be able to let you get home today, but I still want you to take it easy. Nothing too strenuous and definitely no work."

"Are you sure that it's safe?" Rick doesn't want to tell the doctor how to do her job but he'd feel a lot better if Kate was to stay in hospital for the remainder of the pregnancy.

"There aren't any guarantees unfortunately, but there haven't been any more contractions for the last two days and we aren't doing anything for you in here that you can't manage at home. Besides most patients feel a lot more comfortable at home."

"We're only ten minutes away from the hospital by car and I'd rather be at home, plus you can't spend another night trying to sleep in that chair," Kate puts in her two cents worth.

"Ok," Rick concedes.

"You have my number if you need to get hold of me and I want to see you in my office for a check up in two days. I'll just go and get your discharge paperwork ready," Dr Cranshaw says before she leaves them alone again.

"Maybe we should look into getting a private nurse for you," Rick suggests. "I'd feel better if there was someone immediately on hand who had some medical training."

"No!" Kate's appalled by the suggestion, it's one thing to have her husband hovering around the whole time, having a stranger intruding on her space would be beyond her tolerance. "They'd just end up watching me sleep and eat and read, it's creepy enough when you do it, I don't a stranger watching me as well. Please can we just go home?"

It's dirty play but Kate really can't stand the thought of having a private nurse for the next two months so she pulls out all the tricks; the bambi eyes, the touch on the back of his hand, letting her voice break on the last word. She hardly ever asks anything of him so he finds it hard to deny her on those rare occasions when she does, especially when she's really pleading like she is now.

"Ok," he sighs, "but you have to let me do everything and no pretending to be fine when you're not."

"I promise," she rewards him with a kiss on the cheek, "just get me home and then I'll let you take care of me."

Four years ago

"I think that you're trying to do too much," Rick frets as she insists on doing another lap from her room to the nurses' station and back, "maybe you should take it a break now."

"No, just this last one and then I'll get back in the bed," the detective insists even as her muscles protest against the burning pain. The tissues are still healing, edges of her wound aren't even sealed yet and the underlying muscle fibers are still in disarray from the initial trauma of the bullet and then the subsequent surgery which saved her life.

When it gets too much to bear she stops for a moment, leaning on the IV pole that goes everywhere she does at the moment. The pole sits on a tripod base of roller wheels and is festooned with medical equipment like some sort of bizarre May pole; the intravenous fluids that deliver her antibiotics, her patient-controlled analgesia pump, and the underwater sealed chest drain with the fluid in it's chamber that swings with every breath that she takes. Each item is connected to her by a length of tubing like some kind of parasitic organism.

"Beckett it's only been six days since you …" he can't bring himself to say 'since you were shot'. "Since your operation, it's going to take time to recover, you need to give yourself a break."

A month ago she ran a half marathon in an hour and thirty-two minutes and now she's out of breath from walking less than a hundred yards. The cop hates this feeling of helplessness, of having to rely on others for the simplest things.

She shakes her head, "Do you think that the man who had me shot is saying the same thing? Hmm, maybe I should give Beckett a break, after all she's just had surgery? No, I need to be fit again so I can look after myself and then I'm going after that son of a bitch."

"I know you will," he doesn't even try to talk her out of it despite the fact that the thought of the danger she is going to put herself in scares him spitless. "But just let me help you, you don't have to do this alone."

He's not just talking about the quest to find justice for Johanna Beckett and Roy Montgomery, he's offering forever and the cop knows it, she has ever since he said those words to her as she lay bleeding in his arms. They haven't talked about how he declared his love, it's one of those things that they don't speak of because that's just who they are.

She's not brave enough to say it back to him, at least not yet. But it's not always about the words between these two. It seems strange for a man who makes his living from weaving stories but sometimes they communicate more clearly in what they do compared to what they say.

Kate doesn't look at him but her arm snakes around his waist so that she can lean on him, can let him take some of her weight. That's her signal, without words she's taken him up on his offer.

"Help me back to my room Castle?"

"Always."