A/N –
1) Deepest apologies that it's taken so long to upload this chapter. I knew from the beginning (a year ago) where this story wanted to go, but there is a lot of denouement normally left out of movies and TV, and to me, the aftermath of earth-shattering events is really the most interesting part (take for example, Kate's long healing process over her mother's murder and her own shooting. We could think of either of those events as the climaxes of her life, and everything else their epilog.) Anyway I've struggled endlessly with what I want to tie up and what I want to leave loose, and how I want to get to the real end of the story. Special thanks to Aseem for beta reading (very helpful!) and to jmbatt & RS for the persistent nudges. Also to DIA for the simply epic prompt at the very beginning.
2) Where Kate's age is cast in stone because of her mother's death when she was 19, Castle's age has been portrayed inconsistently. Rick's referred to as "late thirties" in S7. Others have cited a 1969 birth year. Nathan himself was born in spring of 1971, and Stana in 1974. If we go with Alexis' birth as 1995, that works comfortably with his being 24 at her birth (he'd be just done with putting himself through college). Susan Sullivan was born in 1942, which made Martha old enough at 29 to seriously consider taking on single motherhood just as women's liberation was in full swing. So my own head-canon is that Castle was born in 71, making him about 8 years older than Kate, and exactly the age of my favorite actor. That's my story and I'm stickin' to it.
3) I was up most of the night finally posting it, and of course the next morning I found some errors, so I hope this is the one you're reading. And if it's not the one you're reading, how will you know? Are we in an AU? This is turning into a Shrodinger's Cat sort of story... ;-)
Too Soon Chapter 51 - Up In The Air
July 4, 10 a.m. EST., Shannon Airport
Matt took on the copter pilot duty from Teresa and got Castle's team into the sky without so much as a bump. The copter's passenger cabin was another story when Fabio tried to rip his way through Tiffany to get away from the Thumping Rotors of Imminent Demise. Ryan nabbed a sweatshirt out of his duffel and swaddled the kitten. Tiffany's paper clean-suit pants were shredded, so Esposito lent her a pair of his navy blue 12th Precinct sweats in men's size medium. They didn't fit quite right, but it was better than nothing. Zameer had sent along a bag of treats from the chaat house, and Tiffany wolfed down two still-slightly-warm samosas and a pint of sweet, milky chai in the helicopter on the 20-minute ride from the cemetery to Shannon airport. The kitten squalled the whole way. They landed on a side airstrip and had only a quick shuttle ride with all their gear, meeting up with an anonymous-looking white jet on the tarmac.
Rick turned to Matt. "Did you order this?"
Matt shrugged. "Nope. I thought you did."
Rick stopped, alarmed. "Dad? Did you charter the jet?"
Hunt scowled. "Nope."
Teresa sashayed past them. "Thought we'd do it in style on the way back."
Matt said, "Ooh. Please tell me I get to pilot."
"I'd be lying," she grinned. "You get to watch an in-flight movie and nap."
The flight attendant, Marisol, slightly resembled Sophia Loren, only more buff than voluptuous. She met them at the bottom of the stairs with a smile, and pre-directed Rick and Kate to the master suite near the tail. Teresa introduced them to Captain Mitford and his copilot, Robertson. Both were obviously ex-military (if not currently in some shadowy branch of it).
The hardest part would be getting the Very Groggy Doggy, Betsy, in her bulky crate, up the jet's steep and narrow stairway. Just as Esposito and Ryan were about to wrestle her up, a couple of porters arrived and did the job with no visible effort.
•
The Gulfstream G550 is a swanky aircraft, the kind used by sultans, diplomats, rock stars, and basketball teams. The jet's plain but sleek exterior belied the luxury inside. Its interior was outfitted in cream leather, polished cherry wood, and the occasional accent of juicy red-orange or subtle taupe, with marble and stainless steel utility surfaces. The cabin offered enough headroom that even Hunt (who was 6'5" in shoes) didn't have to duck once inside the cabin. Kate and Teresa had taken a smaller jet from New York with this same crew; this was larger, and a step up in quality to accommodate the team.
Although Matt was trained to fly pretty much anything, including space shuttles, he knew better than to try to horn in on the action. But he peeked his head enviously into the cockpit, and introduced himself. Captain Mitford, who looked rather like Leslie Nielsen ("I get that a lot") gave him a little tour of the controls and specs, then waved him away with a smirk, and picked up the PA mic.
"Good afternoon, everyone, and on behalf of an agency which prefers to remain anonymous and not in any way associated with this operation, we'd like to welcome you aboard flight 001 bound for a small airstrip in upstate New York. We'll be cruising at about 40,000 feet, well above most turbulence, and we'll be in the air just under seven hours. Expected arrival is 6:54 pm local time. Please take a moment to familiarize yourself with the safety instructions. Feel free to ask Marisol, your flight attendant, bartender, and fully-armed air marshall, for any assistance."
The copilot added, "I'm copilot Bob Robertson, assisting Captain Mitford today. Safety protocol requires that the pilot and I lock the cockpit, so if you feel like hijacking this plane, please simply adjust your expectations, move safely to the rear airlock, and let yourself out. Mind the gap, and have a great flight."
Beckett rolled her eyes at Aunt Teresa, who smirked, "Bob was a bit rambunctious for Southwest."
Captain Mitford continued, "Your July Fourth weather will be humid with 80% chance of thunder showers after 10 p.m. We'll be flying above most turbulence, and landing too early to get shot out of the sky by an errant bottle rocket, so with any luck, we'll all make it home alive."
Tiffany looked around wildly and Teresa patted her shoulder. "It's all right, Sweetie. I'd trust these fellows to get us to the Moon and back."
Esposito added, "They wouldn't tease if they didn't think we could handle it." He looked a little green around the edges, but he wasn't about to admit to nerves.
Matt called out, "This is one of the best jets in the business. You won't even feel any change in air pressure. I know rock stars use this model, otherwise their ears get messed up and they can't hear for performances."
Seated next to Kate, Rick smiled in relief. "Good. My ears rang for two days after we landed in Ireland."
She reached to pat his hand, and he moved subtly, placing his own over her sleeve instead. He wasn't avoiding affection, but he was avoiding skin contact, and she wondered about it, but left it alone. They'd have time to talk in privacy later.
Mirasol demonstrated the official safety instructions. They all strapped in, and were lifted almost imperceptibly into the air. When the jet leveled out, Rick closed the opaque shade against the bright sun above the clouds.
She said, "I need to debrief Tiffany after takeoff. I won't be long." She anticipated a smart-assed reply from him, but he just looked apprehensive.
He bit his lip. "I have no idea what she's gonna tell you," he said. "But she's been through a lot."
Kate nodded and kissed his cheek. "You both have. It's over now. It'll be okay."
He looked like he wanted to nod agreement, but couldn't bring himself to do so.
Once they had reached cruising altitude, Kate used the master restroom, then she and Teresa met with Tiffany in the smaller "twin" suite for debriefing. Teresa sat at the writing desk, Kate cross-legged on the bed, and Tiffany took the divan by the window.
Kate handed her a plain purple backpack. "Your mom sent along a few things in case you need them."
Tiffany peeked in. "Oh, thank God, I can't wait to get out of this stuff..." Then she sighed and set it aside. "I'm probably too fat to fit in any of it."
"I doubt that," Teresa said. "You'll be fine."
Kate's tired smile faded. "We'll need to keep what you're wearing for evidence, and you shouldn't take a shower until the doctors have done an exam." She pointed to a large zippered evidence bag, where they had already stored Tiffany's ragged hazmat suit. "Just put everything you've been wearing in there."
Tiffany hung her head. "Yeah. I get it. Are you gonna be with me? When they do the exam?"
Kate shook her head regretfully. "No, kidnapping is FBI jurisdiction. We're being met by an FBI agent named Jordan Shaw. We've been friends for years. She'll get you to the hospital safely, and we've arranged for your folks to be there as well, if you like."
Tiffany raised an eyebrow and snorted. "Like, they'll be in the same waiting room? Together?"
Teresa smiled. "Apparently they're back on speaking terms."
Tiffany paused, contemplating that: "Weird." Then her mind returned to the upcoming medical exam. "So, will the doctor take samples off me or something?"
"For sexual assault? Yes. If you consent to it, an exam can really help build the case against them."
"It might not show much."
"They'll find whatever they find. And you can say no to anything if you feel it's too invasive."
Tiffany blew out a sharp sigh. "There's two rubbers in the trash basket... back there. In the basement. If you wanna match the DNA?"
Kate pulled out her phone. "I'll make sure they look for them." She texted Gashkouri.
Tiffany hesitated, her teary eyes gaze fixed on the floor. Then her voice shook out, "Um, Patty used one of them, but I was drugged. I don't know what he did. Rick, he used the other one."
Kate's face went white. She said nothing, just shot Teresa an anxious glance. Castle had kept his distance from both Kate and Tiffany since they all left the house, and Kate wasn't even sure whether Tiffany knew they were together. Teresa said, "By Patty, do you mean Daniel Halloran? The young man? Tall?"
"Yeah." Tiffany corrected herself, "Rick didn't use it - use it. Didn't, you know. Wear it. He just slimed it up with some soap so if Murphy and Patty came in, they'd think, you know." She blinked and whispered, "He wanted them to think he was on their side. I didn't even know for sure. Things kept changing so fast."
Teresa took over, her voice motherly and cool. "Did Richard Castle touch you at all?"
"Well, yeah." Now she looked over at Kate and saw only a careful mask, and underneath it, the barest hint of horror. Tiffany added quickly, "But he didn't do anything creepy! He said we were on camera, tried to convince them he was gonna nail me. He even..." she started to cry. "They hung me upside down!, and he covered me up. For a minute I thought he..." She shook her head. "He didn't even check me out, just took out this hankie..." She made a gesture to her crotch.
Teresa handed her a tissue and confirmed, "So did he molest you in any way?"
"No!" Tiffany wiped her eyes. "He was kinda sweet. All he wanted was to get us out of there. Get back to you." She glanced at Kate, who suddenly looked like she was about to cry. "So don't freak out on him, okay? He really tried."
Kate bit her lip. "Thanks for saying that. They'll probably find his DNA all over the condom, so... that will save everyone a lot of trouble." She took a breath she hadn't realized she was holding, and arose off the bed that she really wanted to just collapse into. "So, Tiffany, there are some very nice-smelling toiletries in the bathroom. Help yourself, and if you need anything, use the call button, okay?"
Tiffany nodded. "Hey, thanks for comin' to get me. I'm sorry I've been so much trouble." She looked around at the beautiful little cabin. "This must have cost a crap-ton of money."
Kate stooped and took the girl's hands. "You were worth every moment."
"And every penny, as well," Teresa beamed.
They left Tiffany to her own devices. She took a peek into Fabio's carrier. He had finally fallen asleep... just when she needed him. So she just went ahead and cried by herself. Maybe it was better that way.
•
After Kate left the master suite, Castle remained on the reclining chair across from the bed. Even though he was sitting up straight, his eyes drifted closed in his exhaustion, and immediately his mind was swarmed with faces, dead faces: the faces in the attic, the faces in Greta's room, the faces in the freezer... He forced his eyes open and stood up, radiating a blackness he just couldn't shake, and going into the bathroom, stripped and turned the shower on. Its suction drain made a nightmarish, screaming yowl, but that was fine, because it drowned out the sound of his weeping and a string of curses. He stayed in the shower longer than he should have, scrubbing himself repeatedly with expensive soap and a brand-new scrub brush, but it just didn't seem to help. Finally he gave up and dried off. Looking at himself in the mirror, he decided not to shave, and if his hands were shaking a little, that might have been part of the reason.
He hadn't been able to wash the horror away. He didn't want it anywhere near Kate. Didn't want her to see it in him.
•
Normally Matt would have been checking out every last available detail about the jet. But he was past caring. He had been running on railroad tracks with a bloodhound for much of the morning. Because of his military history, he could sleep anywhere at the drop of a hat. So, like Mo, with his job done, he crashed out cold pretty much the minute he fastened his seat belt. He dreamed of his wife, Chloe, as he did every night away from her, in a slinky white dress, letting off fireworks.
•
Ryan spent much of the flight texting (and he did spend an inordinate amount of time in the bathroom possibly sexting) with Jenny. The rest of the time he spent going back and forth with both Jordan Shaw and Victoria Gates, giving them an outline of what had happened over the past 24 hours. It is something of a miracle that, on no sleep and completely jet-lagged, he didn't accidentally sext them as well, although he did ask Captain Gates what she was wearing.
Her answering text was "My badge. Why do you ask?"
•
Teresa Beckett stretched out in her leather recliner, snuggled in a beige Pashmina throw, popped in some noise-blocking earplugs, and put a lovely silk mask over her eyes. Nobody ever would have dared tell her that she snored. Just a little. In a dainty sort of way.
•
With Ireland an hour behind them, Tiffany should have been happy. She should have been tired, but after cleaning up, she just felt hungry and lonely. She watched an in-flight movie for a few minutes then gave up, came out of her little cabin, and plopped down in the communal area with Ryan and Esposito. "I am SO fat," she sighed. She looked down at her thighs. She poked hatefully at the soft flesh, and it jiggled apologetically, shrugging as if it didn't really want to be there.
From across the aisle, Ryan said, "Don't be so hard on yourself. You've been through a lot."
Tiffany looked miserably out the window. "When I get home, none of my clothes are gonna fit."
"When were you taken?" Esposito said.
"May 6 or so, I think." She shrugged.
"Today's July 4th."
"Really?" She looked horrified. "I was gone that long."
Ryan chuckled. "On the upside, what a great way to celebrate Independence Day."
Esposito said, "You've been gone what, about 8 weeks?"
"I guess," she sighed. "Aw, shit, I missed my cousin's graduation, and my mom's birthday..."
"So give yourself that much time to work it off. Stay out of the Twinkies and you'll be fine."
"I'm hungry again now, and I would kill for a Twinkie."
Ryan and Esposito exchanged a little nervous look, and she said, "You know, not really kill, just..." She shrugged ruefully.
Marisol appeared as if by magic, handing them all menus.
Afternoon high tea:
cucumber sandwiches, potted meat on Irish brown bread,
mushroom paté on crackers, smoked salmon crouquettes,
cookies, petite-fours, meringues, and
of course, tea, coffee, juice, mixed cocktails, or champagne.
No Twinkies.
Esposito took out his phone and punched around on the screen, then showed her a picture of a zaftig young woman with popcorn-colored hair. "Have you heard of Megan Traynor? I think this came out in June."
Tiffany shook her head, and he turned up the volume. "Come on, Ryan, help me out."
Ryan grinned at Tiffany. "What happens on Air Castle stays on Air Castle."
"Okaaayyyy," said Tiffany.
The two cops got up and were soon dancing and shaking their booties (such bootie as Ryan actually had) around the aisle, with Esposito singing in a falsetto and Ryan on backup, vogueing, Tiffany laughing so hard she cried.
"you know I'm all about that bass, bout that bass, no treble..."
They did this routine five times. On the second play she got up and joined them. On the third she had the words down and most of the moves. By the time they sat back down, she was breathless and sweaty and felt better than she had in weeks. Dancing with sexy, funny men will do that for you.
•
After debriefing Tiffany, Kate returned to the master cabin to hear the sound of the shower running. She collapsed into the bed without even undressing.
A while later, Rick stepped out wrapped in a towel, and paused, peering at Kate in the dim light. He was afraid to waken her; her face was pale with blue smudges under her eyes, a little frown between her brows. Had she really been kidnapped, been in a car accident, and saved him from serial killers, all in the space of twenty-four hours? It felt like months since he'd found her singing in the bathtub back at the Huntsman's Arms. Smiling sadly, he carefully spread a blanket over her, then made sure the belt was secured across her hips. Turbulence happens.
He dressed silently in jeans, a tee-shirt, and his spare shoes. "No creepy staring," he reminded himself. But stare he did, all the same, his eyes red from crying, seated on the divan by the window, watching her sleep. She wrinkled her nose and snuffled, then put a hand on her belly and brushed at it, as if a butterfly had landed. He wondered if the baby was large enough yet for her to feel movement.
Theoretically, no. But tell that to Small, who was using Kate's uterus as a jungle gym.
Rick thought, "Next thing you know I'll be turning into a sparkly vampire." He left behind the quiet of the suite and was assaulted by the noise of Tiffany, Esposito, and Ryan dancing around and shaking their butts to Megan Traynor. He watched a moment in astonishment, and a half-amused, half-irritated smile crept over his face. The flight attendant, Marisol, caught his eye. "May I get you anything, Sir?"
"Rick," he said. "Call me Rick. Uh, I dunno." World peace? A Valium?
She kept it light, seeing something small and scared in his eyes, addressing the lost child underneath the skin. "Milk and cookies?"
He saw her bemusement and said, "Sounds about right. What's the weirdest thing anyone's ever asked you for?"
She gave it a moment's thought. "Let's just say that it wasn't legal, moral, ethical, or sanitary."
"Ick."
"You said it." She winked, then gestured to the galley area. "I'll be right back."
Rick walked over to the dining area and sat at the table, elbows-on, hands cradling his temples, eyes unfocused on the white tablecloth, obscured from the dance party by screens behind the booth-seat backs.
Hunt slid into the booth across from him. "Hell of a week, huh."
"Yeah."
"You're not doin' too well with this," Hunt said quietly.
"No, sir, I'm not."
"Good," Hunt said. "If you were feeling normal, I'd be worried. I've been watching the dispatches between Irish law agencies. It's starting to come up on news feeds now, too. They're already calling it The House of Horrors."
"Catchier than 'Domicile of Doom'."
"Yup." Hunt arched an eyebrow at the news feed and turned it so that his son could see a knot of reporters bristling their microphones at Agent Rourke. Rourke was posed strategically with the half-ruin of Murphy's house behind him, the area cordoned off and a street full of police cars, coroner's vans, a body-processing area tented with plastic, and workmen doing cleanup. Somewhere back in the ordered chaos, they glimpsed Ameena Gashkouri talking to a coroner with a clipboard, pointing at the house, shaking her head with a scowl. But Rourke took up the majority of the screen. Comfortable with the cameras, Rourke's demeanor betrayed nothing of the fatigue he must have felt, having worked almost 24 hours straight through. He announced, "Through a joint operation of Irish Intelligence and the Gardai, acting on an anonymous tip, two suspected serial killers were arrested this morning. An additional suspect apparently ended her own life by jumping from the roof."
A reporter asked, "Is it true that a group of American tourists helped out in the operation?"
"That is a rumor, and will require further investigation, as will this entire crime scene. No further questions."
The station switched over to a balding, lanky reporter in a trench coat. "Who would have known that a den of death and dismemberment lurked in this dilapidated urban domicile..."
Hunt chuckled. "You called it."
"It's a gift," Castle grumbled.
The reporter turned to a couple of middle aged ladies; the taller one had spiky blonde hair and a leather jacket. She controlled a group leash attached to six motley dogs. The other, a small woman in a brown tweed pantsuit, held a trembling, blind terrier. He held out his microphone. "Did you ever notice anything unusual at the house?"
The tweedy woman said, "Oh, they were friendly enough. They seemed a little odd, and the dogs wouldn't go near the old man."
"I always thought it was the accordion," said her partner.
"My employer owns the whole block and asked us to be a neighborhood watch. We've seen squatters, put out a few fires..."
The taller woman finished her sentence "...but on the whole, for this area of town, it's been rather peaceful about." One of the dogs got up and sniffed at the reporter's crotch. "OFF, DAISY. SIT!"
Hunt smiled grimly. "Let's see. Rourke taking all the credit."
"We asked him to."
Hunt pointed to Ameena Gashkouri in the background, talking patiently to a coroner. "And Gashkouri's doing her best not to look royally pissed."
"She lost her mom to those fuckers," Castle gritted.
"Yes, she did. I'm not forgetting that. None of us will."
"There's a lot I won't be able to forget."
"That's true. But you'll learn to live with it."
Marisol approached them with a tray: milk, freshly baked shortbread cookies with artisan-made raspberry jam and warm fudge for dipping; black coffee for Hunt. Castle straightened up and she gave him a brief, sympathetic smile. She didn't know what her passengers had been through – Agent Soames had not revealed it – but she could tell that it had been some kind of hell, and each expressed it in a slightly different way. These two men at the table before her, possibly father and son, looked as if they had the world's weight on their shoulders.
They turned to thank her with identical expressions: kind, weary, respectful. She could always tell people who'd worked in the service industry; no matter how far they came up the ladder, even to affording a private chartered luxury jet, they didn't treat her like shite.
"I'm here if you need me," she smiled, indicating the call button. "We'll be landing at the airstrip in a little under five hours. There's turbulence from local thunderstorms, so things might get a tad bumpy."
She left them, the slight scent of warm cookies now wafting through the jet, and moved through the impromptu dance party staged amongst the younger members of the team. Esposito took the music down to a dull roar and pouted affably, working the little-boy charm. "Any chance of more cookies?"
"I'm sure you've earned them," she laughed. "I'll bake up a few more."
•
Rick didn't take a bite, just inhaled the comforting smell and took a sip of the cold milk. "So they're in custody?"
"Yeah," Hunt said. "Halloran's kid, and Murphy. But the woman's dead."
"Greta." Rick frowned. "How?"
"Jumped from the roof. I guess the fire spooked her."
Rick nodded, "Maybe. She was beyond crazy though. Probably cavorting with angels just about now..." he grimaced bitterly.
"Do I detect sarcasm?"
"She liked to mummify people and... dress them up..."
Hunt sneered. "Ugh. How many did you see?"
Rick shrugged. "I'm sure the reports will give you a more accurate count, but at least... He drew a sharp, sick breath. "At least twenty." He added in a mumble, "Some kids. Mummies. Frozen, uh, pieces." He pressed his lips together, hard.
"News report says after they put the fire out, more than fifty bodies were found, and that's just in the house. They haven't started on the back yard yet." Hunt closed the laptop. To Rick's astonishment, his father's even-larger hands clamped over his. The thick fingers, so like his own, squeezed tight, and he held his son's agonized gaze. "You've seen a lot of dead people."
"Not, not like this."
"No two are ever the same, if there's anything decent about you." Hunt let go, and took a sip of water. "I've fought in five wars, if you count the cold one."
"Well, that just makes you better than me, doesn't it." Rick's throat burned with shame.
"No. You are a product of your time and place, son. The world's been hard on you in some ways, and soft in others. But you signed on to catch killers with no reward other than research."
Rick shook his head. "That's not true, not for a long time now."
"You could have been home swilling Jameson's and writing spy novels from your safe little corner of the world, but you're here. It's because you're able to see beyond your own nose, past the "me and mine" to something bigger. I have no doubt that, if things were different, you'd have put yourself on the line, been a fine soldier, an invaluable agent. But your catalyst wasn't a war. Not politics or money or fame. It was Kate."
Rick's bloodshot eyes burned into him, but he said nothing.
Hunt added, "You know, I was about to put in for retirement when I met your mother. That was in fall of 1970. One night."
Rick stared at him as if he were insane. "Retirement? Weren't you a little young?"
Hunt picked up a cookie, dipped it quickly in his coffee, and took a bite before it could collapse. "Really, you should try one while they're still warm. I enlisted in the Army, late in World War 2. 1946."
"World War..." Rick knit his brows.
"My first job was at Auschwitz. Basically to recover and bag bodies, get them identified if possible. In the case of our own soldiers, get them back home. I barely saw any action. Then after the war I stayed on in Germany, assigned to Marshall Plan enforcement. I moved up and became an MP, did that for several years. Then I came back to DC and worked security at a military hospital. One night we detected an intruder; I came into a classified lab to find the tables laid out with severely injured soldiers, all of them unconscious and hooked up to IVs. The lab had been ransacked. The medical staff were all dead. Then someone stabbed me from behind, and I passed out. When I came to, I was sick as a dog for weeks. The medical records, and whatever medicine they had been working on, were gone. All of the patients died when they were unhooked. But whatever was in the syringe..." he shrugged. "I'm no Wolverine, but I heal damn fast when injured and I haven't been sick since 1952."
"This explains how you were able to take that guy out in the library after a gunshot wound."
Hunt nodded. "The Agency recruited me shortly thereafter, and I've been a very useful asset, to my own detriment."
"Not just your own."
"Unfortunately true. Anyway, my point is, I've seen a lot of death. More than one lifetime's worth, and it's nearly broken me, more than once. Dachau, No Gun Ri Bridge, Mei Lai..." his voice trailed off. "I've cleaned up. I've trained others to clean up. I try to make sure this stuff will never happen again. But it always does, because the powers that be expect absolute obedience to the point where it breaks men and turns them into monsters."
There was something in Hunt's sheer weariness that made Rick believe him.
Hunt continued, "It took me fifty-three years to find the people who turned me into..." he gestured to his body, "this."
"Why are you telling me this now?"
"Because I saw the look on your face this morning, son, when you beat the tar out of Daniel Halloran. I've seen it in the faces of men who turned their guns on women and children, old people and baby animals. I've seen it in the mirror."
"You don't know..."
"I do know." Hunt took a sip of his coffee, but Rick could see his left hand was balled in a fist, his knuckles white. "You're sitting on an edge, waiting to fall off, and I tell you: you gotta choose to get back up and climb in through the window and stay sane. I sat in a bamboo cage in Cambodia for over two years, and do you know what got me through the mud and the shit and the smell of death and the screams of my friends being tortured?"
Rick shook his head silently.
"The memory of one night. Your mother. And when I was finally liberated, I came back to New York, looked her up, and there you were." Hunt swallowed. "The sweetest little boy with hair flopping in his eyes..." Hunt brushed a hand over his own eyes. "But I was such a mess. The nightmares, the paranoia, the sweats, the thoughts of suicide and the feeling I was just poison." His voice shook. "I couldn't go anywhere near you, either of you. But it renewed my dedication again, to do anything I could to protect you."
"It took Alexis being kidnapped to flush you out?"
Hunt nodded. "The more I learned about all of you, the less worthy I felt." His gaze wavered. "I tortured two men to find our little girl."
Rick whispered, "I... You weren't the only one. Beckett looked the other way. I'd do it again, and I hate myself for it."
"Don't," Hunt said. "That man signed up for it. It was war. Those bastards used Alexis to get to the Agency, through me. They knew what they were up against." He took a sip of coffee, his eyes even blacker than his beverage. "More or less."
"All's fair?" Rick said bitterly.
"No. Nothing's fair. Not in love, not in war."
"So how do I live with this?"
Hunt took a deep breath. "It's a process. You have to look it in the face... sorry. But that's really it. We are not the pile of meat and bone that's left at the end of the day, and that's what makes life precious."
"And if that's not enough?"
"Look, Son," Hunt said, "You're pretty exhausted and most of today is gonna be a blur, so I'll remind you to get help if you start to go off the deep end."
Rick said, "So, after we get back to New York?"
"I'll be sticking around, if your mother will have me." Hunt hesitated. "And if it's all right with you."
Rick picked up a cookie and dipped it in the fudge sauce, then took a nibble. The cookie had cooled, but the fudge was still warm. "Wow," he murmured, then took another sip of milk. From his expression, Hunt knew that his son didn't believe him.
"It would be fine with me," Rick said. "If you actually stayed."
Hunt nodded. "I understand."
"No, you really don't," Rick breathed.
"That's fair." Jackson cleared his throat. "I want to understand. Maybe someday I will."
Rick nodded. "We'll see."
"I'm gonna catch some shut-eye before we land," Hunt said. He arose, gave Rick's shoulder a brief squeeze, and headed back to his seat.
•
After the dance party and a batch of cookies, Tiffany and Ryan both napped a little while. Esposito's phone buzzed in his pocket. The text was from Lanie:
"I hear you're all on your way back :-) Can't wait to see you, baby."
He thought for a long time, and texted just about the stupidest thing: "Be in NYC by 2nite. Need 2 talk."
She texted back: "K".
Lanie was a damn smart woman.
He went to his duffel and pulled out a pack of cards, went over to the booth where Castle sat staring wide-eyed at an unfinished plate of cookies, and sat down.
Castle's face was pallid, his nose still a bit swollen from impacting with the Rajawat boy's shoe. His eye sockets looked more like bruises than his usual dark circles. He held up his damaged right hand, the lower arm pale and relatively wobbly, compared to his left. "You should probably shuffle."
Esposito pressed the call button. "You want a beer, man?"
"Nope. Promised not to drink till Beckett's... able."
"Mind if I do?"
"Not at all." Javi offered the deck for him to cut the cards, and he shook his head. "I trust you."
Javi gave him a brief, pained glance. "Good to know." His look was plain: "I haven't always trusted you."
They played a few hands, each lost in his own thoughts, barely speaking. Esposito said, "How long before you knew? About Beckett. You and her?"
Rick gave him an assessing glance. "You're thinking about Ameena?"
"That obvious?"
"Wasn't I? I mean with Beckett."
"Well, yeah."
Rick smiled ruefully. "Seems like everyone else figured it out before we did. I denied it to myself for a long time because she could be such a..." He chuckled. "I'm not so good at masochism. So, I guess it happened in stages. Thirty seconds. Two days. Three weeks. A year."
"What sealed it?"
"When her apartment blew up." His voice hitched. "When I was shadowing Sophia, I saw what explosives can do to a body."
Javi nodded. "So you knew what you might find." He did too. Pieces. Blackened, fried, bloody, pitiful, pieces. Sometimes it was worse to find someone still alive. Marisol stopped by to drop off Esposito's beer, but stayed out of the conversation.
"I couldn't not go in, you know?" Castle discarded a card and picked up a new one. "Whatever I might find..." he stopped, staring at his new card, the Queen of Hearts. Amused, he turned it to show his friend. "She was the one. I just couldn't get her to see it."
Javi smiled gently. "You just gave away your hand, Bro."
Bro. Castle nodded and tilted his head. "So did you. Bro." He picked up a cookie and took a bite. "I think I like these better plain." A sip of milk. He was starting to feel slightly less horrible.
Espo said, "I gotta tell Lanie on my own. If she hasn't figured it out already."
"I know. She's … intuitive."
Javi chuckled. "Damn woman has eyes in the back of her head."
Castle shuddered involuntarily.
Esposito said, "Sorry."
"It's okay."
They barely kept track of the card game, not caring who was winning or losing, which must have been a first in their combined lifetimes. After cards, Marisol hooked them up to a Halo game, and they played for a couple of hours, getting sorely trounced because they were both so tired they kept screwing up and had to reset. After his fourth time getting blown to smithereens, Castle gave it up. He stood up, stretched and said, "I'm just gonna check on my girl."
Castle move to the cargo area and bend over Betsy's crate, then open the metal gate with a squeal of hinges. Esposito stared at him, puzzled, as his body disappeared into the carrier from the waist up. It wasn't exactly an easy fit.
As mentioned previously, Betsy spent almost the entirety of the trip in dreamland. But at this point, she smelled Castle (and milk and butter-shortbread cookies), and she opened one bleary eye to thump her sluggish, heavy tail when he reached in to caress her ears and jaw. He murmured, "How ya doing, Betsy?"
She couldn't answer, but she really did think it would be nice if he'd crawl into her crate for a cuddle. He seemed weary and sad, and she could smell residual fear on him, even though he'd had a shower. She dimly hoped he'd have the sense to go find Kate and get their pillow case all smelled up again. That's what she would have done. But, like all those silly short-nosed tailless monkeys, he needed to figure it out on his own while ignoring instincts for the ideas they so loosely termed as "facts". Idiots. Mostly lovable idiots, though that mean old man in the kitchen... not lovable. It was the first time Betsy had ever met someone who loved dogs, whom she absolutely could not like back. She'd just kept running, looking for Tiffany. And then the smells, all that death and fear, and the horrible slashing pain! Now her face felt sort of numb. She didn't like this at all.
She smacked her chops a couple of times and whined. Rick petted her again. "Shh. You're okay." His large, warm paw worked long, slow strokes down her side. Soothing. He hitched his upper body into her crate, hips and long legs sticking out the door, and laid his heavy head on her flank. She smelled exactly like a dog.
They closed their eyes and sighed. Rick might have fallen asleep a little, and might possibly have dreamed about squirrels.
•
To his own amazement, Esposito had the grace not to take pictures of Castle asleep halfway into a dog crate. Marisol awoke Rick about twenty minutes before they landed, and he got up, staggered into the master suite, and gently roused Kate, shaking her arm through the light blanket until she stirred and smiled up at him. She drank a pint bottle of water and used the bathroom, and they strapped into seats for landing. She sat watching Rick, wondering why he seemed so remote, but she knew better than to pry until he'd had a little time to process what had happened.
The jet landed at an obscure airport somewhere near West Point. A fleet of black limousines and conspicuously nondescript SUVs awaited them. When the stairs hooked up to the exit, Rick looked down to see Jordan Shaw and Agent Baldwin at the bottom, awaiting them, along with several other spooks in suits. He turned to Marisol and the pilots, and thanked them, then he started down the stairs first, carrying his own duffel and Beckett's light travel bag over his shoulders.
"Careful, Rick," Marisol said. "They're steep, so use both hands."
At the bottom, he dropped the bags and drew the startled Shaw into a brief hug, then gave Baldwin a manly handshake. "We did it!"
Shaw grinned at him. "So you did. Where's Tiffany?"
"Beckett's up there in the cabin with her. We figured..."
"Yes," Shaw said, her face serious. "I should speak privately with her. Esposito filled me in a little, but..."
Castle said, "She's had a tough time. And I hope the cat isn't a problem."
Baldwin pointed up to the top of the stairs. "That's a dog."
Rick turned to find Mo hesitating at the top of the stairs. Marisol looked concerned, and Mo looked queasy. Maybe a few bumps of turbulence had affected him, or maybe he was still detoxing a bit from the near-death-by-shellfish. Castle hurried back up the steps and peered into the dog crate.
"Hey, Girl." Betsy raised her head a little, sniffed his fingers through the front of the cage, and thumped her tail.
"I think it'll be harder to get her downstairs in the crate than just carry her," Rick said.
Marisol said, "It's better to wait for airport staff, we can have a porter..."
Rick said, "She's injured, and she knows me." Mo nodded and helped Rick get her out.
Betsy said, "Moof." She staggered to her feet and Rick picked her up in his strong arms. She laid her head on his shoulder (wouldn't you?) and floated happily down the stairs. He smelled like mixed feelings: happiness, worry, grief, hope, anger, spent narcotics, clean skin but traces of blood and horror still on his shoes. She noticed then that he no longer had the liver damage she'd smelled when she first met him outside the bat cave. She wondered about that. She didn't know what Hunt had dosed him with, but sometime, very long ago, Hunt had taken the same medicine, and it still lived in his marrow, extending his life far past what it might otherwise have been. She didn't really care about that, it was just another little sample in her landscape of trillions of scents. She only knew that her lovely Rick was now healthy as a horse, if dog-tired. At least he'd had the sense to nap with her a little. He was a smart boy.
Mo followed them down, keeping the slow and careful pace. Rick set Betsy down gently on the tarmac and handed Mo her leash when he came to the bottom. This smelled like goodbye, one of Betsy's very least favorite things. She gave Rick the Lean of "Can't we Just All Stay Together and Sleep in a Pile Like Civilized Dogs?" The confusion was hard for her. Rick had become Mo's alpha, and Matt's, which made him hers as well. She wondered if they were all going to go their separate ways and leave her off at the pound. Her tail didn't like that idea at all.
Shaw said, "Officer Atta, thank you so much for your service."
"Aw, Betsy did most of the work," Mo said. "And Matt."
Matt was coming down the stairs now, a bit stiffly, carrying his pack and Mo's, which he handed off at the bottom.
"Now what did I do?" Matt grinned.
Rick said, "The usual heroics. Ace Pilotry and the digging of latrines." Matt blushed red to his strawberry-blond roots, and Agent Shaw shook his hand.
She said, "I hear you really stepped up to the plate, Mr. Washington."
"Force of habit," he said gruffly. "Semper fi. All that."
Baldwin gave Matt a fist-bump. "Semper fi. Orange County limo's over on the left."
Rick said to Matt, "We'll meet you there in a bit."
Matt said, "I'll be napping in anticipation of napping." But he had his phone out, clearly talking to his wife as he walked away. "We just landed. Good. Maybe an hour. I can't wait either. No, I have a ride... Definitely Mexican food. Ireland is a tragic land. All green, no avocados. Yes, my love, ironic indeed."
One by one, Castle's team came down the stairs. Esposito and Ryan threw their luggage into Betsy's crate and hustled it all down, then made a beeline for the bottle of champagne awaiting them in the limo to Manhattan. Hunt was hot on their trail, carrying an immense pack on his shoulders. At the bottom of the stairs, he paused briefly to shake his son's hand.
"Good job."
Rick beamed. "Yeah? Couldn't have done it without you."
"You could've. But it would have been... different."
Hunt glanced at Shaw. She said, "We haven't met, have we?" None of the other agents were familiar with him. She wasn't about to let on what she knew.
He winked at her. "Now, wouldn't I remember that?" They heard laughter and the wet pop of champagne in the Manhattan limo, and he said, "Sounds like Dom Perignon." He headed to join up with Ryan and Esposito, and Teresa came down next. She smiled and hugged Rick.
"Now, you take care of our girl," she whispered.
He nodded. "You know it."
She gave a cool but pleasant wave to Shaw and Baldwin, and sauntered toward a little blue sportscar that nobody had noticed, parked in the shadow of the trees at the edge of the airfield.
She waved again as she drove away.
"Holy crap," whistled Baldwin. "That was a vintage Lotus Elan."
"Mint," said Castle, equally impressed.
Shaw went up the stairs, leaving Baldwin and Castle bereft of conversation, although they both pretended not to notice Jordan Shaw's very attractive figure as she climbed up to the jet. (Nope. Not looking. Professionals here.) A few moments later, Kate was at the top of the stairs, and Rick hurried up to her (incidentally somewhat blocking Baldwin's admiring view of her). "They're steep." He took her purse. "Hang onto the railings."
"Seriously, Castle?"
"Pregnancy can mess with your balance, you know."
She tilted her head. "Didn't I knock you over just this morning?"
"Yeah." His mood deflated, he turned from her and headed down the stairs. "If you're gonna fall on anything, let it be me."
She followed him. "You're right, they are steep." Clearly there was a lot on his mind, and this wasn't the time or place to tease. She wondered when that time would come... and then she remembered how long it had taken her to recover from some of her own traumas.
He said, "How's Tiffany?"
"Shaw wanted to get Tiffany's version of the basics before they even get to the hospital."
Rick sighed. "I can understand that. Are her folks gonna meet her there?"
Kate nodded. "Yes, and then they're moving on to a safe house until we're sure the coast is clear."
Baldwin tucked his chin, the telltale sign of a person listening on an earbud. "Coming up," he said, and headed up the stairs after Beckett and Castle left them. They waited, Kate reaching over to tangle her fingers gently in Rick's.
He said quietly, "We need to talk. In private."
Nobody likes hearing those words. Ever. Kate felt a chill down her spine. "Okay." She glanced over at the limos. "Which is ours?"
He said, "That depends on you."
She gave him the Wrinkly Little Nose of Confusion. "How so?"
"I, uh, need time alone. To think."
"How much time?" Her head spun. She'd said it before and she'd heard it before. First WNTT, then TATT. Now here she was, almost three months' pregnant, and he was having second thoughts. Maybe backing out? Her stomach did a backflip.
"A day or so. I just - I can't face the noise, can't be there for anyone else." He looked apologetic. "Need to make some changes."
"I'll be okay," she lied. "Take as long as you need."
A/N: DON'T PANIC. This isn't really a cliff-hanger, just an interesting split in an overlong chapter. Will post after I drop off a disgusting little sample at the veterinarian. Thanks for your faith in me.
:-)
