Something was wrong, and Alexis knew it. Lanie would never tell her to take the day off. At least, not before it started. The morgue was always busy, and Alexis frequently worked more hours than she was supposed to. When she walked in the door and saw her dad sitting in the lobby, with Kate nowhere in sight, she panicked. "Dad? Where's Kate?"
"She's up at the precinct," Castle said. "I told her I wanted to wait here. I thought you might want to go to lunch."
Alexis shook her head. "Just tell me what's going on," she said, the panicky feeling growing in her chest.
Castle hesitated. He had that look on his face, the one that came before really bad news.
"Dad, what is it?" she asked, nearly in tears already. If it wasn't Kate, who could it— "No. No, Dad, please." She shook her head, her hands flying to her mouth. She wanted to vomit. She knew by the look on his face exactly what he was afraid to tell her.
"Alexis," Castle started, but Alexis was already heading for the exam room. "Alexis, wait!"
She flew through the hallways and flung the door of Lanie's exam room open. Her eyes went to the table, where the body was covered with a sheet. "Tell me it's not—not him."
Lanie walked over to Alexis. "Go home, honey."
Alexis tried to push past the M.E., but Lanie stood in her way. "No! I want to see him."
"Alexis, I don't think—"
"Please," Alexis said quietly.
Lanie sighed. "Alright." She lifted the sheet and folded it back, exposing the face. Ethan's face.
Alexis' vision blurred. "Who did this?" she asked her dad, turning away from the examining table.
"I don't know, pumpkin. Kate's going to find out."
"What happened?" she asked.
"He was shot," Castle said quietly. He pulled out his phone and showed Alexis a picture of a penny. "That was in his hand."
Alexis stifled a sob. "He knew," she squeaked. She collapsed against her dad, sobbing into his chest. He guided her to a chair, and after a while, she was able to shove the image aside long enough to explain, "When we first met, he said he'd turn up again like a bad penny. He left me a note a few days later." She took the note out of her pocket. "When he vanished after that concussion, he left a penny on the pillow." She let out a nervous laugh despite herself. "He drew a halo on this one." Alexis felt the tears coming back in full force. "He knew he was going to die," she said, her voice cracking and finally giving way to tears at the end. She slumped in the chair, trying to curl up into herself.
Castle gathered her up in his arms and carried her home.
At the loft, Castle took off Alexis' shoes and tucked her into his bed. She'd fallen asleep shortly after they'd gotten in the cab, and Castle had carried her up. It had been tougher than he'd expected; she wasn't very heavy, but she wasn't a little girl any more, either.
He couldn't sleep, so he dragged his desk chair into the bedroom and propped his laptop on his lap. Gina would be cracking the whip on the next Nikki book soon, but Castle knew that if he started now, the plot would look suspiciously like this double-shot serial killer. Maybe, though, that wasn't such a bad thing. He could change the killer's M.O., make him a little more findable, and get the justice and closure they clearly weren't going to get in the real world.
He put his fingers to the keyboard and started planning.
Castle woke up the next morning at the same time as Alexis. "Dad?" she said sleepily.
"Hey, pumpkin," he said.
Alexis scooted closer to her dad and he put his arms around her. Memory crossed her face, and she dissolved into tears before falling asleep again.
Castle's phone made a racket on the night table a few minutes later. It was Kate. "Hey," he answered quietly.
"Did I wake you?" Kate asked. "You sound tired."
"No, no," he said, trying to move away from Alexis. "Alexis is asleep in my bed."
"How is she? Lanie told me she didn't take it very well."
Castle glanced at his sleeping daughter. She looked like a larger version of the little girl she used to be, her face still splotchy and red. "She fell asleep in the car on the way home. I'm worried about her. Do you think she'll be okay?"
Kate sighed. "Castle. Would you be okay if it was me?"
It had been her once, almost. He still remembers it vividly. The fact that Ethan hadn't made it… "I don't know what to do," he confessed.
"Stay with her," Kate said. "I'll be over in a bit."
"Thanks," Castle said. He hung up and set the phone on the table. Alexis tossed and her face scrunched up the way it used to when she cried. Castle found one of her hands and held it in both of his own.
Castle was thankful she had only seen Ethan's face. She didn't know yet where they'd found him or how he'd died. Castle knew some of the details—Kate had called him while he was writing and given him Lanie's report—and they were horrible even for a murder. There were signs, Lanie had said, that Ethan had been standing when he'd been shot in the legs, and the fact that neither of the shots to the chest were instantly lethal pointed to a strong motive for the serial killer beyond just serial killing.
Castle was puzzled, but Kate seemed less frustrated than she usually did with anomalies like this. She'd told him it would be impossible to find the killer, which sounded very unlike Kate, and Castle began to wonder who she thought the killer was.
Half an hour after he'd gotten off the phone, he heard Kate let herself in with her spare key. She dropped a couple of things on the table and came into the bedroom. "Do you want me to make you something?" she asked quietly.
"You don't have to," Castle protested. "I can get up."
Kate shook her head. "She'll need you when she wakes up. Just stay." She gave him a little smile and left.
Alexis stirred. "Dad, was that Kate?"
"Yeah." Castle brushed his daughter's hair out of her face. "She's making some breakfast."
"I'm not hungry," Alexis mumbled. "I wanna sleep."
"That's okay. You go back to sleep."
Alexis closed her eyes and nodded. "Okay."
When Alexis woke, the clock on the table read eleven-thirty. She crawled out of her dad's big bed and shuffled through the office into the living room. She was still in her scrubs, and she desperately wanted to change out of them into something that didn't remind her so much of… things.
It was dark outside, and Alexis realised she'd slept a lot longer than she'd thought. That, or the apocalypse had come a few months early. Gram was on the couch with a glass of wine and a book; she offered Alexis a smile. "Where's Dad?" she asked.
"Kitchen," Castle called. Alexis shuffled to the counter as her dad emerged from the pantry. "Are you hungry?"
Alexis shrugged. She figured she should eat something, since she'd been asleep for over twenty-four hours. "Not really," she mumbled, resting her head on her arms. "Can I have toast or something?"
"Of course," Castle said. "Anything on it?"
Alexis shook her head and Castle put a couple of pieces of bread in the toaster. When they popped out, Castle served them on a small plate. Alexis nibbled the corner of one, but all she could think about were her scrubs and the morgue and the penny and—
Castle put a hand on her arm.
She wiped her arm with her sleeve. She needed to get something else to wear. "I'll be right back," she said. She went upstairs to her room, ignoring the open guest room door, and dug through her drawers. The first three t-shirts she pulled out were ones she'd worn when he had stayed with her, but she found one at the bottom that she hadn't worn in at least a year. She threw the offending articles in the back of her closet, changed, and went back downstairs, tossing her scrubs in the laundry hamper on the way.
She ate both pieces of toast, but she didn't feel much better. Gram finished her glass of wine and went to bed, giving Alexis a wordless hug on the way. Castle went into the office to write a bit, and told Alexis she was free to sleep in his bed if she wanted.
"I think I'll go to bed now, actually," she said, following her dad into the office.
Castle accepted a hug from his daughter. "I love you, Alexis," he said, squeezing her tightly.
"I know," she said. "I love you too, Dad."
As she walked through the living room, she stared at the empty spot in front of the window where Ethan liked to sit. She slowed for a moment, remembering, then shook her head and went upstairs. She brushed her teeth, crawled under her blankets, and tried to sleep.
Kate was sitting at the counter and Castle was making breakfast when Alexis came downstairs Monday morning. Alexis avoided looking in the direction of the living room as she passed it and sat next to Kate.
"Morning, pumpkin," Castle said. "Hungry?"
Alexis still didn't have much of an appetite, but she'd need to eat, and she needed to try to make it to class. "A little," she said, shrugging.
"How are you feeling?" Kate asked.
Alexis shrugged. "I'm okay. How's the investigation going?"
Kate and Castle both hesitated. "It's, uh, it's going," Kate said.
"Any—any leads?" Alexis asked.
"Well—"
"Kate," Castle warned.
Kate shook her head. "Alexis, we, uh, we know who did it. It was pretty obvious."
"But you're going to find him, right? You're going to find him and—and you're going to get him."
Kate bit her lip. "Do you remember the serial killer back in September?"
"You mean the—the one—he shot his victims twice in the chest?"
Kate nodded. Castle was strangely quiet.
"But you're going to find him, aren't you? I mean, you've got more—more evidence. Right, Dad?"
"Alexis, we know who did it," Castle told her. "Sometimes, that has to be enough."
Alexis shook her head furiously, tears springing to her eyes. She ran upstairs into the guest room and threw herself down on the side of the bed where Ethan always slept, sobbing into the pillow that smelled faintly of copper and men's deodorant.