Sorry for the delay, real life caught up with me and demanded to be acknowledged!
Xxx
Chapter Thirteen
Castle continued to kick at the door lock, having no sense of the passing of time except for the frantic pounding of his heartbeat. His toes were now bruised and bloodied, his knees sending shooting pains up his legs and the wounds on his head reemerged from their dull ache to a screeching pain. But he didn't give up. He knew this might be his only chance, the only way he was going to survive this nightmare. So he raised his feet again and continued to kick, praying to any God that luck would finally be on his side.
When Castle heard the click give from the door, he did not believe it. He was convinced it was the sound of one of his aching joints giving out. Blinking the sweat out of his eyes, he raised his feet to kick again and this time the door swung open. Castle was immediately blasted with the sounds of New York City, with the smells of the busy streets and the shining of the moon beneath the clouds. Castle glanced over his shoulder, nearly laughing out deliriously before he caught himself. He scooted closer to the edge of the truck and looked down. The road was a passing blur of grey asphalt, the street lights creating lines in the sky where they passed so quickly. He wondered if the jump would kill him, as he paused to reflect, he realised that staying in this van would certainly kill him.
He took a deep breath, closing his eyes as he allowed his mind to fill with Kate's face. If this was his last moment, he wanted it to be filled with her. To be filled with the joy of knowing her, the warmth of her smile, the sound of her laughter, the feeling of her lips pressed against his as though it were all that sustained them. His heartbeat slowed and he felt almost at peace. Then he jumped.
There was a brief moment of free fall, where he felt weightless and free, his mind filled with Kate's beautiful face. For a split second, he believed he had jumped and landed in heaven. Then he collided with the pavement.
His left kneecap and shoulder took most of the force of his fall, the pain seared through him, like no other he had ever known. His body then began to roll, the momentum of his fall forcing him down; he rolled, rolling over and over again on his shattered kneecap. He could feel the sharp teeth of the road tearing at his skin, biting through his clothes and burning him. When he finally stilled he was on his back, staring up at the glittering night stars. It was a beautiful night. He felt as though he could feel the entire universe above him winking down.
He could have laid there forever, watching the mystery of the world passing by but he forced himself to sit up. He tried to hold in his anguished cry as he attempted standing. The pain was so much that he fell straight back onto his bottom. He tried again, this time leaving his injured knee as a dead weight beneath him. His hands were still tied behind his back as he began to hobble down the road, his left leg dragging along helplessly behind him.
He looked around frantically until he could see a car ahead, a dark Volvo cruising slowly down the street. In the same instant he heard the squeal of tyres behind him. He only allowed himself one glance back over his shoulder, what he saw terrified him. The van was turning around and heading towards him.
His hobble turned into a half run, he lumbered forwards towards the Volvo, oblivious to the amount of blood soaking through his clothes.
"Please! Please stop!" He called out to the Volvo. It was too far away to hear him, the stereo blaring as the driver sang along. Castle moved directly into its lane of traffic, so there was no way the driver could miss him.
"Stop! You need to stop!" Castle screamed now, desperation leaking out of him as the van neared him.
The Volvo driver finally saw him and slammed on the brakes, the driver rolled down his window.
"Dude, what happened?!"
"Please… Please… You have to help me. They're coming, they're coming now!"
The driver looked at the man before him, the gash on his cheek, the blood soaking through his clothes, the panic in his voice and the exhaustion in his eyes.
He kicked his door open.
"Thank you, thank you so much"
Castle turned to duck into the passenger seat, every muscle within his body protesting as he fell back into the seat. He turned to rearrange his injured leg and felt the warm liquid splash across his face before he registered the gunshot. He looked up to see the shattered windscreen, the hole in the forehead of the passerby and the blood pooling into the car.
"No…no" it was a broken whisper.
The Texan was at the window.
"Going somewhere Rick?" His eyes danced, Castle could still smell the gun shot residue on the gun he waved about.
Castle held his eyes for barely a moment before his head drop forward, his eyes closing. This mans death was on him now. A man had died for him. A man had died for nothing.
Moments later the Texan had kicked the mans body out of the car, he'd bundled Castle into the back where he now sat sandwiched between Limpy and Gun Happy Gary. Gary sat with a pistol in his lap aimed straight at Castle, his face screamed just dare me. Castle looked ahead through the shattered windscreen, hoping to see something familiar. When nothing registered, he began to count streetlights, the numbers giving him something to focus on that wasn't pain and wasn't death.
Xxx
Kate slept for around four hours. Her sleep was broken, filled with images of Castle. She gasped awake as the sun was beginning to overpower the moon, the soft morning light began to fade the nightmares in her mind of Castle dying in her mother's alley. There was a few seconds of bliss before she was properly awake, when she believed Castle's kidnapping had been another nightmare and she would just roll over to find him there, looking lazily at her with those eyes. But he wasn't there; the bed was still empty.
She sat up in the vast bed, the sheets tangled in her clothes as she picked up his pillow. She held her face to it and inhaled his scent, it filled every inch of her, touching even the darkest corners of her soul. She rested her chin on top of it as she hugged it to her chest, the scent beginning an uncontrollable cascade of memories to rush through her. The feel of his strong arms holding her, the morning cup of coffee with a careful heart, the slow smile that spread over his face when he saw her for the first time each morning, the way he ran his toes up her calf to check she was still really there and the life sustaining kiss he would give her.
Kate closed her eyes and took a steadying breath before swinging her legs out of the bed. She took a quick, hot shower, counting in her head the number of hours since she'd last seen him, since they'd last stood in this room as she teased him about his hair. It was too many.
As Kate got dressed she paused her hands over Castle's drawers, her fingers danced along the handles as she debated in her mind. In the end her need for comfort won and she pulled out one of his long sleeved purple shirts. She buttoned his shirt over her body, rolling up the sleeves as she inhaled his scent and tucked the long ends into her trousers. It was one more layer of armour to protect her from the day ahead.
She shook out her messy hair before giving up and tying it back in a loose ponytail. As soon as she moved tendrils escaped and danced around her face. Then her phone buzzed.
"Beckett"
"Detective Beckett, we have a suspected homicide on the corner of 12th and 3rd street"
"A homicide? No, I'm working the Dawnbreak case"
"We have reason to believe the cases are linked."
Her heart stopped for a moment, she took a deep breath, forgetting about his shirt until the scent flooded her nostrils and acted like a drug upon her body.
"The body?" She barely dared to ask.
"African American male, late twenties"
The guilt hit her again when relief flooded through her body.
"On my way"
She straightened her collar, taking one last hit of him from the pillow before heading towards the door. Today was the day. Today she was going to get him back, she could feel it in her bones.