Disclaimer: I do not own Castle, ABC does
The phone rang in twelfth prescient radiating almost visible sound waves off the empty florescent-lighted hallways. Detective Javier Esposito was seated at his desk with his eyes glued to a case file that he was so close to finishing he could almost taste it. The phone went off again and he reluctantly pulled his tired brown eyes off the hazing letter before him. As he reached out and gripped the cold, black, plastic phone, he let his eyes drop to the bottom right of his computer screen. The little white numbers showed him that it was ten after three. He groaned as he brought the phone to his ear, what he would not do to be sleeping right now. "Esposito," he said as he brought the phone to his ear.
A girl was on the other end of the phone, a younger girl, and she was clearly upset. "Yes, I, um," Javier smiled to himself as she stumbled over her words, She sounds cute, he thought. "would like to report a body."
At her words, Javier sat up straighter in his chair and put all playful thought to the side. "Can you identify the victim?"
"Kinda," the girl said, "She lives in the same building as me and I've seen her before, but I don't know her name. I was on my way home from work and I walk up to the building doors and I see something hanging from a tree…." She said as her voice broke.
Javier nodded his head as if the girl was right in front of him. "Thank you, can you give me an address?"
Kate Beckett was in the shower. The hot water running over her bare shoulders releasing all the tension from the day. She let out a sigh. The case was finally over. Ben Conrad, who committed three murders all in the name of Detective Nikki Heat, because of a dead dog, killed himself this afternoon, right before the FBI was able to get to him. It was tragic, Kate thought, that it had to end this way, but at least it was over. At least, he was no longer after her. At least she was no longer in danger. At least Nikki didn't have to burn. As she reached over to wash her shoulders she heard her cell phone ring and she tensed up undoing all the good the hot water had just done on her muscles. She closed her eyes and let the water run over her again, deciding to ignore the call. As it went to voicemail she sighed in relief and continued washing. It went off again when she bent down to wash her legs. This better damn well be important, she thought as she turned the water off and peeked her head out of the shower curtain to get a towel. Once in hand she wrapped herself up and went to retrieve her cell phone. A wave of annoyance swept through her as she saw Richard Castle's name on the caller ID. Since she was already out of the shower, making a puddle on her wooden floors, she decided to answer it. "What Castle?" she asked, not trying at all to hide the annoyance in her voice. Why did he always have to interrupt her at the most inopportune times? She wondered her mind traveling to Will for a fleeting second.
Richard Castle was running, running toward something, and something in the sound of his breathing sounded panicked. "It wasn't Ben Conrad. He's not the killer. The killer's still alive! The killer's still alive!"
As Kate heard the words exit out of Castle's mouth she felt a lead drop in her stomach and her eyes grow wide. If Ben wasn't the killer than the real killer could be committing another murder right now, she could get another call any second letting Detective Heat know that she had failed once again. Another call was not what she had heard when Castle finished his sentence though. Just as the thought went through her head, three beeps sounded and then a male automated voice. "Good-bye Nikki, Good-bye Nikki." As she heard the words she looked around horrified for a second then ran as fast as she could pulling the door closed behind her and dove into the bathtub, twisting her ankle, just as the bomb went off. The last thing she heard before the call was cut off was Castle's frantic voice. "Kate!"
Kate Beckett gasped as sat up in bed drenched in a cold sweat as the light of the explosion still echoed in her memory. It had been months since her apartment had exploded but still every night she relived it. She closed her eyes and let her rapidly beating heart slow and her breathing return to normal just as her phone rang. She grabbed it on the second ring and looked at it. It was Esposito. "Beckett," she said after she hit the talk button and brought it up to her ear.
"Yo, Beckett, a body dropped on 220 West 100th Street in the city, you in? I'm on my way there now. Apparently it's a suicide."
"A suicide?" Kate said as she fell back into her pillows and pushed her brunette bangs out of her face.
"Some chick called it in maybe a half hour ago, there was no one else at the prescient that could take the call, so I did and she actually sounded kind of hot, I wanted to help her out, maybe I'd get something out of it."
Kate rolled her eyes. "Esposito, it's…" she turned the digital clock, on the bedside table toward her, "three thirty in the morning, can we focus on the victim instead of the witness please," she said and huffed. "Have you called Lanie?"
"Oh yeah, you kidding, she's already down there, God I hope she's in a silk nightgown, that'd be hot," he said enunciating the "T" knowing it would drive Beckett crazy, and there was nothing funnier than an angry Kate Beckett.
Kate rolled her eyes. It was far too early to let Esposito get under her skin like this. "Okay, fine, I'll be there in an hour tops."
Kate could hear Esposito sigh playfully on the other end of the phone. "An hour? What were you doing? Sleeping?" he said as he chuckled at his own bad joke.
"No, I was playing poker with Charles Manson and Jack the ripper," she said sarcastically. "Just make sure the vic doesn't leave before I get there, okay?"
Javier chuckled on the other end. "Oh, we're funny this morning! Seriously girl, an hour? You live ten minutes from there."
Kate rolled her eyes before closing them, dreading what she had to do. "Imnotatmyapartmenttonight," she mumbled through the phone.
Kate heard silence on the other end of the phone, she assumed Esposito was trying to figure out what she had just said. "Was that Russian? I know that wasn't English or Spanish, and I speak both."
With another deep sigh of regret and dread Kate spoke again more clearly, "I'm not at my apartment tonight," as the words came out she cringed for she knew Esposito would know exactly where she was and assume what exactly didn't happen.
Again there was silence on the other end of the line, just as Beckett had expected, before, "NO WAY! YOU'RE WITH CASTLE AREN'T YOU?" Esposito responded exuberantly.
"No!" Kate responded defensively and was silent for a moment as she looked around the dark room. Oh, there was no point in lying to him. "Well, technically he's in his own bedroom; I'm in Martha's…"
On the other end, Javier frowned in disappointment, he should have known. Beckett and Castle just weren't that way, not yet anyway. "Okay…so now, why are you in Martha's bedroom?"
Kate sighed. He was so noisy! If she had a brother, she figured he would be much like Esposito. "Castle came by my apartment last night to drop off some dinner because Martha had cooked for an army, again, and he realized the air conditioning was broken in my apartment so he insisted that I come spend the night at his place, because Martha was spending the night with her boyfriend anyway."
Javier smiled as he heard Beckett's story. She never sounded like herself when it had something to do with Castle. "Isn't it a fluke that every time you need a place to stay Martha is conveniently staying with her boyfriend?"
Kate narrowed her eyes and glared into the darkness as if Esposito was right in front of her face. "Yes, Esposito, it has worked out conveniently."
"So, um, you have to answer this for me, Castle and his mother, they're close right?" Javier said smirking as he braked his car for a red light.
Kate frowned. Why was he asking this? He knew the answer. "Yes Esposito they're close what's your point?"
Javier smirked, he knew there was a good chance that he was going to get slapped when Beckett got to the crime scene, but for some things, it was worth it. "Oh, okay, I kind of figured, I mean you have to be in order to sleep in her bed…"
Kate pulled in an angry breath through her nose. "Esposito how many times…." She began when she heard a click on the other side indicating that he had hung up the phone to avoid any comeback or argument that she would dish out.
Kate pursed her lips as she pulled the phone away from her ear and looked at the screen. It was amazing it survived the explosion as well as her. As she placed the phone in her lap, she closed her eyes and relived the scene that took place after the haunting dream she just had.
A frantic voice outside her apartment door made Kate Beckett realize she was alive, after a bomb had just exploded in her apartment. A bomb, she thought, the bastard planted an effing bomb in my apartment.
"Kate, are you in there?" A bang echoed outside her apartment but she could not bring herself to open her eyes. They burned too badly. Nor could she move. Every muscle in her body was frozen. She could not even breathe. A panic started to rise up in her as a voice she recognized, but could not place, called out. "Kate!" another bang echoed followed closely by a crash. Someone had broken down her front door. Someone was on their way! Maybe she was going to be all right. "Kate?" she heard the worried voice again and tried to open her eyes again. This time her muscles responded, this time her eyes opened. She looked around with her eyes but all she saw was her soot-covered cast iron bathtub. Why couldn't she place whom the voice belonged to? "Kate!" CASTLE! It was Castle. A wave of gratitude overtook her allowing her to take in a deep rigid breath. As the smoky air entered her lungs, it brought along with it, ashes. Many ashes. She coughed once to try to clear her lungs of ashes.
"Kate?" Castle called out again, questioningly and hoping beyond all hope that she was alive. She knew that.
She began to cough more to clear her lungs as she pulled her torso off the floor of the tub.
"Kate," Castle said still worried as he ran into the bathroom ducking under broken and fallen beams. "Kate. You're alive!" he said as he pulled the bathroom door away from the bathtub. As he laid eyes on her back, she could almost feel his eyes widen. "Whoa. And you're naked."
"Castle! Turn around," she demanded as she fought to turn herself away from Castle's eyes.
In the instant that she spoke, he spun around on his heel and looked at the burning doorway. "You know your apartment is on fire. Now might not be the best time for modesty."
As Kate finally got into a sitting position, with her back facing Castle, she took in little breaths trying to fill up her deprived lungs with oxygen. "Castle, hand me a towel," she called as she raised her arm up for him to hand it to her.
"Your towels are on fire."
A small sweep of panic washed through Kate as he said this. "Well what about the bathrobe?" she asked turning her head around to see for herself.
"The…do you have anything to wear that's nonflammable?"Castle asked not trying to be sarcastic or funny as he turned around to look at Kate.
"Castle!" she said as she turned herself around again and hunched over to hide her body.
"Sorry," he whispered as he faced the burning doorway again.
As she turned around and looked through her broken bathroom window, she realized that Castle was wearing a jacket. That would be big enough to cover her up, at least until someone else could find something more suitable. "Give me your jacket," she said as she lifted her arm up again.
Without thinking, Castle removed the jacket and held it behind him. "Okay, okay," he said as he turned his head to the side as not to intrude on her privacy again.
Even though she saw his head turned she said, "Don't look," as tried to position herself to get into a standing position.
"I'm not."
"Don't look," Kate said as she prepared to stand up in the tub to put the jacket on leaving herself totally exposed if Castle wanted to go against her wishes.
"I'm no—not looking," he said and chivalry would have it, he kept his eyes averted as he waited for her to help her with it on.
"Okay," she said as she stood up and waited for Castle to put it over her shoulders.
"All right?" he asked as she slipped her arms through the sleeves.
"Yeah," she said as he brought down his arms and she turned around and began to get out of the bathtub. "I dove into the tub just as it blew."
"Can you walk?" he asked Kate as he held her arm as she stepped out of the tub and onto the hot burning floor of her apartment.
"Ugh," she moaned in pain as she put pressure on the ankle she twisted as she jumped into the tub. "Yeah, just…a little banged up," she said as Castle guided her limping body out of the bathroom. As the two were approaching the doorway, he guided her in front of him. "Okay, come on. Nice and easy."
"Yeah," she said as she limped out of the bathroom into what used to be her living room. With each step her ankle shot shooting pains up her leg causing her to grunt.
"Are you in any pain?" Castle asked concerned hearing her grunt.
Kate let out a big breath as she fought back a smile as she heard the sirens wailing in the background. "Well, not nearly as much as you. It's killing you isn't it?"
"What?" he asked concerned.
"Having to wait this long to tell me," she paused for half a second to try and trick Castle, "how you banged down the door," she said with a satisfied smile.
"Do you want me to start from the beginning?" he said with a playful smile on his face.
When the memory ended, she sat up in bed for a second and looked around the dark room before flinging her feet out from under the warm covers to the soft carpeting below. She shook her head as she thought what Esposito had accused her of. It was silly, the thought of sleeping with Castle. She had no feelings for the man whatsoever. Unless you count annoyance, annoyance was a feeling. Sure, she flirted with him, but that is only because he started it, and because it was so blatantly obvious he was into her, but that did not mean they were sleeping together. He was only saying that because Castle was gracious enough to open up his home to her every time she was in need.
As she walked over to the light switch to turn it on the large tee-shirt she was wearing swished against the back of her thighs and she paused for a second with her hand hovering on the switch plate. What would it be like to be with Castle? As the thought echoed through her head she felt her eyes grow wide and her face heat up in embarrassment and she quickly flicked the light on and went to find her clothes. Where in the world had that thought come from?
No, her and Castle's flirtatious partnership was as far as their relationship would ever venture, she assured herself as she got dressed. Hadn't they already crossed that line though? He'd ran into a burning building to save her, not knowing if he'd even find her alive. He'd seen her exposed, of course, it was neither of their choice, how was she supposed to know a damn bomb was going to go off while she was in the shower? She'd lived with him for a short period of time while she was looking for another apartment. Now, here she was again, in his house, because her air conditioning was broken. Yes, their relationship was definitely more than a flirty partnership.
