After remaining at her bedside for the remainder of the night and well into the next day, Jim forces him to go home, at least for a change of clothes. Castle hates to leave her alone, so frail and unprotected in the hospital bed, but her father promises he and the security guards at her door will keep her safe while he's away.
He forces himself to leave because he knows it's what she would want and because he knows he wouldn't make a difference if another sniper shot his way into her room. He can't protect her. All he can do is hurt her. That was the last thing he had done right before she nearly died. He betrayed her trust and broke her heart. But if she can pull through this, if she can just keep living, he'll spend the rest of her life doing whatever he can to make up for his mistake.
"I could come with you," Ryan offers once he finally shuffles from her room, down the hall and back into the nauseating space of the waiting room. "You know, just in case?"
He likes Ryan, he realizes in the back of his mind, but he shakes his head at the detective.
"No thanks, but I'll call, if anything happens," Castle assures him. "Just stay here, stay with her."
Ryan nods and Esposito does too, solemn and promising, and he's thankful for them, thankful she has a circle of people in her life who would fight to protect her as viciously as he would.
He takes a cab to his place, too numbed and exhausted to attempt anything more strenuous, and focuses on the changing colors of the leaves throughout the drive. Outside of his loft, he pauses, his hand hovering over the doorknob. The last time he was here, Kate had bled out in his arms. The last time he was here, he and a group of police officers and paramedics had hustled to get her downstairs, into an ambulance.
His home has been turned into a crime scene that he doesn't know if he can stand to revisit. But he could use a shower, the sink in the hospital was enough to remove the blood from his hands, but his shirt still has splotches of crimson staining the front. He's been wearing her blood around for almost an entire day.
Castle takes a deep breath, tries not to gag on it, and pushes his front door open. The loft is empty of the crime scene analysts that Ryan had informed him about yesterday. The NYPD had gone through the entirety of his home during the night and early into the morning, as well as the empty apartment across the street, where the sniper had hunkered down and taken aim.
Will they ever feel safe here again?
He glances around, studies the surfaces of his home, the multitude of memories made with his daughter, his mother, and most recently the woman he loves. The loft has always been refuge for him, a welcoming sanctuary for the last seventeen years, but he just doesn't know if he can see it that way ever again. Not when a piece of his family was nearly killed here and his safe haven turned to a personal hell.
Rick sighs and scratches at his jaw, feeling the rough stubble abrade his fingertips as he forces himself forward. He just has to shower and then he can leave.
But he stills at the sound of movement coming from the office – the sound of wood on wood, of spritzing liquid, and… sniffling?
Rick approaches his office in quick strides before he can stop himself, pokes his head inside, and sees the floor littered with sponges and cleaning supplies, his desk pushed out of the way, and his daughter on her hands and knees, scrubbing at the floor with vigor. His daughter, whom he forgot all about in the midst of this disaster.
"Alexis?"
Her head jerks and she hastily wipes at the tears on her cheeks, sits back on her haunches.
"What - what are you doing?" he asks, taking a tentative step towards her.
He catches the shaky breath she inhales even as she turns her head to hide it from him.
"When Grams and I got here, they were still cleaning the blood from the ground, but they missed a spot and - and I didn't want Kate's blood to stain, but I can't get it out. I can't-"
Her voice cracks and falters and she quickly looks away, allowing the curtains of her hair to cover her face.
Castle drops down beside her and wraps his arms around her, cradling her to her chest and stroking her hair as she abandons the sponge and cleaning supplies to return his embrace, hiding her face in his shoulder.
"I'm so sorry, sweetie. I should have been here, I'm sorry-"
"No," she sniffles against his shirt. "We were supposed to come to you, but Grams thought we should grab some clothes for you and some of our stuff for the hotel she checked us into."
Rick sighs and presses his cheek to his daughter's head.
"I told her to check you both into a hotel so you wouldn't have to come here."
He listens for his mother on the floor above, hears the distinct sound of footsteps as she likely flutters around rooms, checking to make sure they have anything.
"Is Kate going to die?" Alexis rasps, shaking ever so slightly with the question, and the words, the possibility, makes his bones grow cold.
"No, no she just got out of surgery last night and the doctor says she has a strong chance of making it," he promises her, promises them both. "You know her, Alexis. She'll fight her way back."
"It's not fair," she whispers, the gentle tremors growing stronger, shaking them both as she starts to cry, soft and heartbreaking. "It's not fair."
"No," he sighs, staring at the gleaming wood of the floor over her head, seeing nothing marring the surface as his daughter had claimed. He hugs her tighter. "It's not."
The text from Jim comes while he, his mother, and Alexis are stepping out of the cab in front of the hospital. They stopped by the hotel he's insisting they reside in for the next few days, dropped off the bags, and then returned to the cab. Just in time.
Katie's awake.
