Beckett stops on the opposite side of the street of the coffee shop. Her eyes are locked onto the needle in the bottom left of the dash. They have been the past couple times she's started and stopped the car.

Just dropped down passed a quarter of a tank.

With a bit of a shaky breath out, she unbuckles her seatbelt and climbs out of her rental car, only looking down the street to check for traffic once she's already halfway across. She jumps onto the sidewalk and pulls open the painted white door, looking through the large glass window in the middle of it to see that the L shaped counter is free of a line, but with a few lingering customers sitting at tables near the windows on the right side of the coffee shop. She's been one of those people a day or two, sitting in one of their leather wingbacks on her phone, utilizing their free wifi and free refills on coffee.

She steps inside and the two women behind the counter, looking like identical twins, both look up to Beckett with bright smiles. "Morning," the one behind the register chirps.

"Hi," Beckett breathes out and quickly steps up to the counter, pulling her wallet out of her back pocket. "Large skim latte with two pumps sugar-free vanilla,' she parrots her order to the smiling woman as she pokes in Beckett's order into the touchpad, probably already punching in her second item, "and a large cappuccino."

Beckett pulls open the fold of her wallet and flicks her thumbnail over the bills she has left, a tight knot forming in her throat. She thought she had more than this. "Six forty-seven." She's told.

Beckett swallows passed the lump in her throat and hands the women a ten, then looks back into the fold of her wallet.

No, she'll be fine. She has plenty in savings. Enough to last her a couple weeks. She folds her wallet back up and slides it into her back pocket and then digs her phone out of her side pocket while the woman hands her her change. Without much thought, Beckett takes one of the singles in one hand and putting the rest in the jar next to the register that has a cartoon drawing of a cow taped upside down onto the front with a label underneath reading 'tipping'.

With her phone in her hand, she cracks a smirk at the tip jar and looks down to her screen. "You've been coming in here for a while. You new in town?" The woman behind the register asks her.

Beckett looks up from her phone with a raised brow. She's not really used to wait staff actually acknowledging her. She's ordered coffee thousands of times at dozens of coffee shops and coffee stands in her life and never really been asked about anything so... trivial... that didn't have the intent of getting her phone number. "Uh..." She starts at first, finally remembering to smile politely only after a few seconds of awkwardly staring, "something like that."

The woman nods as the other at the other side of the counter behind the espresso machine prepares her order. "Visiting family?" She asks in a friendly tone.

She knows she's trying to be nice. She's just not all that collaborated to deal with complete strangers actually asking her things like this like they actually want to know. "No, I'm just..." she decides to mince words, shrugging her shoulders and pouting, "in town... kinda.'

The woman nods with a smile. "Where're you from?" She continues, her voice bright and almost poppy.

"New York... Manhattan, actually." Beckett nods.

The woman's brow shoots up as she drapes her arm over the tall counter next to the register. "Wow," she says largely. "Must be pretty different, huh? This small town like Crestfield."

Beckett smiles and looks out the large picture windows of the store, out onto the quiet, quaint town. "Yeah," she sighs, internally hoping to at least awkwardly end the conversation there.

"You like it here so far?" The woman chirps again.

A slight swell of guilty impatience swells in her chest as she slowly nods at the woman again. "Yeah," she smiles, "it's definitely uh..." she shrugs, looking back out the window, "quieter. Definitely a lot cleaner, less crowded, less noisy."

"Hey," the other woman chimes in from behind the espresso machine, and Beckett quickly looks over, "is it true that you have to shower brake dust out of your hair and stuff?"

Beckett guffaws at that, smiling honestly despite herself and starting to chuckle, nodding at the woman. "Yeah, you uh... you spend enough time on the streets, that stuff will get on you and..." she gives herself an obvious expression and looks back down to her phone, "being a cop I did a lot of that." She says, mostly to herself.

"Oh, you're a cop?" The woman behind the register chimes back in.

"Well," Beckett's throat closes again, "I used to be. I... quit... a while ago." She stumbles over her words. "Homicide detective."

"Oh, well you should have told us that." The woman waves at her, punching in the touchpad. "We offer police a ten percent discount."

Beckett smiles again, despite the situation, "Well, I'm not really a cop anymore, so..."

"Oh, Beth," the other woman says, "she solved murders and stuff. Just..." The woman grins and narrows her eyes at her.

Beth eyes the other woman and eventually nods, tapping her middle finger against the touchpad a few more times before looking back up to her. "What was your name?"

Beckett shakes her head for a moment. "Uh-Beckett... Kate. Kate Beckett."

"Nice to meet you, Kate." Beth says. "I'm Beth and this is my sister Barbra." Beckett looks over and gives the other woman an obligatory waves. "So, what're you in town for, Kate?" Beth sighs.

Beckett shakes her head, thinking up a neutral answer. "I'm-"

It's then that the door bursts open and a woman with short, wavy blonde hair clad in a pair of teal scrubs speed walks through the coffee shop. "Hi, hi, hi, hi, hi..." she stammers and quickly hands Barbra a travel mug.

"You're late for work again, Sierra." Barbra sighs as she takes the travel mug from her.

"Yeah, yeah, already been made not aware of that by my alarm clock so just-" The woman circles her hand as she turns toward the register. She meets Beckett's eyes for a moment with a bright, toothy, friendly smile and a rushed sigh. "Hi," she breathes and takes her phone out of her shoulder bag.

Beckett smiles neutrally at the woman and steps aside, deciding to finally check her bank account on her phone while she waits. She knows she has plenty in savings. She'll be fine. Maybe she can last just putting another thirty dollars in the tank.

"You gonna tell us yet, Sierra?" Barbra asks.

Beckett watches out of the corner of her eye as the app on her phone loads. Sierra looks up, hunched over the opening of her bag, having stopped in the middle of digging. "Bout what?"

"If you don't fess up," Beth says with a sly smile, "I'm not letting you pay."

Sierra stares at her, "But I have money," Sierra says before pinching her brow and looking back down into her bag, "somewhere, I have money somewhere."

"Sierra, you asked out the town celebrity and have been avoiding the topic for days." Beth says as she moves around the back of the counter toward her sister.

Beckett watches out of the corner of her eye, not really thinking anything of it as she pads her thumb onto the password box to pull up the keyboard. "I am also late for work." She says, reaching over the counter to try and get her travel mug back, grasping her fingers into her palms. "And that's my favorite mug, Barb. Give it."

"Sierra," Barbra says, "you work with dead people. Chill out."

"Tell us, Sierra," Beth demands, Beckett only noticing out of the corner of her eye that she's giving the woman the exact same expectant expression as her sister.

On a huff, Sierra's shoulders droop and her bag falls down onto the bend of her wrist. "Yes, I asked out Richard Castle."

"Wu-" Beckett physically stops herself, her eyes jolting up to look at the woman. Everything inside of her just crawled with the most sickening feeling she's ever felt, her entire layer of skin over all of her body feeling as if it wants to rearrange itself over her bones. Her heart is in her throat, but she can't feel herself breathe.

"And?" The twins ask in unison.

"And what? He shot me down. End... oh... story." Sierra says and pulls her bag back onto her shoulders.

"See..." Beth says and moves back around the counter to the register, where Beckett is trying her hardest to remain unnoticed. "The guy is rich, he's famous, he is gorgeous, he's charming, and he lives in a town of less than four thousand people. That's not the end of the story. You need to try again."

"Yes, and he also has a very tightly muscled back," Sierra mutters under her breath... but she catches it. She can't tell if the bile in her throat is from rage or hopelessness. She can feel her throat want to quiver, remembering what he feels when she splays her hands onto his back as he's slowly making love to her. When he used to, anyway. "He also said that he just got out of a relationship, Beth."

"Be," Barbra says from across the coffee shop, "eff... dee."

"Right," Sierra chuckles, "like I want to be the cheap rebound."

"Be Richard Castle's cheap rebound." Beth seems to point out.

"Thanks," Sierra says sarcastically as she presents a five to her and flicks it down to the counter. "I swear, I'm so sick of this hen house." Sierra mutters loudly as she quickly grabs her travel mug back from Barbra, who's still smiling slyly, then quickly darts back out the door.

Beckett swallows thickly and looks back down to her phone, not bothering to even check her bank account anymore. She couldn't focus on it if she tried.

These women, none of them see in him what she sees, do they? She always knew he was handsome and charming. He made no secret of it. What he did make a secret of is what she fell for. How great of a father he is, how selfless he can be, how caring and noble he can be. Or that child-like twinkle his baby blue eyes got when he figured something out about a hard case. That waggle in his brow and that proud smirk his lips would give her when he told her some small tidbit of information that she needed but didn't know it.

There was so much that she never realized she loves him for.

"Kate?" Barbra calls for her. Beckett looks back up to her, presenting her with two white cups with brown paper sleeves.


A short drive later, Kate stands in the same spot as she has been all week, leaning against the hood of her rental car with her hands tucked in her pocket with the coffee sitting on her hood, waiting for the man she loves.

She can't really describe this feeling.

She can't tell if she's dying to know what happened to make that woman say what she said about his back muscles being tight, or if she'd kill the first person that tried to tell her the details. Her mind feels as if it wants to violate her with images of the two of them and it's making her almost sick to her stomach. Just the thought of the two of them, the fact that at some point, that woman was talking to him and smiling at him, was interested in him and asked him out.

He said no, Kate, she tries to reassure herself. She takes in a nervous but solid breath and clenches her jaw. He said no.

After another couple of minutes of Castle's dog looking at her through the window, she spots him coming out of the woods as he has every morning, in a pair of black gym pants and a white sleeveless t-shirt. Beckett looks at him and feels everything tighten, her mind wanting again to assault her with jealous images when she sees him, and takes the cups in her hands, pushing off the hood of her car.

But just as he has the past three mornings, he simply keeps his neck craned and his eyes down to the grass as he makes for the back entrance of his house.

Her heart is already weakened by this morning. She can't take it anymore. For almost a week, he's been just brushing her off without a word. "You know, I know I pushed you away as hard as I could for four years," she hollers over to him, "but I at least talked to you!"

With hot tears stinging her eyes, she watches as the blurry vision of him stops just as he's going under the cable of his dog's lead. After a moment, he seems to sigh heavily and starts to approach her. Halfway across his yard, he finally calls out to her. "I don't know what you expect me to say, Beckett." He says to her, lifting his arms up in a shrug.

She waits for him to get closer before speaking. "Just say anything, Castle."

"Say anything?" He almost mocks. "You left me for a job. That good enough?" He says and starts to turn off again.

"Castle, can we please just fight about this?"

He stops and spins back around to her, throwing his arms out again. "I don't want to fight about this, Beckett. I want to be done with this."

"Castle," she says softly on a shaky breath, taking a few slow steps toward him, "I had... no- idea... you were planning on proposing to me." She finally manages to get out in a soiled voice.

Castle remains unphased and keeps a frustrated, lidded gazed on her. "That shouldn't have mattered, Kate."

Her first name... at a time like this. She already feels like she's about to break. She doesn't need that now, especially in the soft tone he just said it in. "But it mattered at the time, Rick."

"It wouldn't have to me." He says in a low voice.

With that, she suddenly feels lost. "What... what do you mean?"

"If I thought that you were planning on breaking up with me, do you think I would have just left?" He asks her with a tight clench in his jaw. Her throat closes again and she's suddenly at a loss for words... because she knows for a fact what the answer is. He's proven it to her. When all she can do is close her mouth and look at him sadly, he raises his brow after a long moment. "That wasn't a rhetorical question, Beckett!" He snaps.

"No." She said over him. "No, you wouldn't have left." She answers him, her eyes burning again. "You would have stayed."

Castle just shakes his head, never looking away from her eyes. "So why didn't you?"

Over his low voice, she can't think of an answer. There's no way she can answer this to make them come out of it better. "Castle..." she says in a tight voice, shaking her head and craning her head down for a moment before looking back up to him, "there's nothing I can say to that that will help anything so-"

"Well, you know," he starts over her, "the truth would be a nice change of pace." He narrows his eyes to her.

She swallows thickly passed her emotions lodged in her throat and feels her heart ready itself to crack. "You wouldn't talk about our future." She shrugs her shoulders. "So when I got the interview for the job in DC, I..." she trails off, her throat closing again. "Castle, there's no point in-"

"What..." he stops her again, "was it... Beckett?" He pushes her angrily.

She breathes out another shaky breath and nods. "I thought it was a great opportunity to do something more important in the world and I really wanted it."

Castle nods at her with a deep furrow in his brow and seems to take a pause to silently torture her for a moment before continuing. "So why didn't you tell me about it?"

Beckett feels her eyes burn and her heart tell herself that it's about to break. She has to stop her chest from shaking in a sob. "I wanted the job more than you."

She can hear him let out a hard breath through a set of flaring nostrils as he cranes his neck. It only takes him a moment to look back up out onto the yard. "Nice talk, Beckett." He says sarcastically and quickly turns back around toward his house and storms off away from her.

She watches him go, but a part of her still feels resilient. "See you tomorrow."

That makes him stop a ways away from her and turn over his shoulder at her. "Really?"

She meets his eyes and lets her misery dissipate. "Yes," she says confidently, slowly making her way over to him. "I told you, Castle. I'm not stopping until I get you back."

"Beckett," he tries, annoyed.

"I don't care how long it takes, Castle." She stops him. "I don't care how much venom and anger you spit at me. I deserve every bit of it." She tells him, shaking her head. "I don't care if you've moved on and I don't care if you how many times you just brush me off. I'll still be here, every morning, just like you were." She says pointedly, looking into his faded, angry blue eyes. "I don't care if I... if I have to live in a box in the woods behind your house, if that's what it takes, Castle."

Castle just eyes her slightly before breathing out slowly.

"I'll still see you tomorrow."


It's later that evening that Castle is sitting in his office. Alexis is at school studying and told him not to wait up. So tonight, it's just him, Sasha laying in the leather recliner against the wall next to his desk, sound asleep.

After finally deciding, he grabs his phone and makes the call, waiting for him to answer. "Hello?"

"Robert," Castle greets the other end of the line. "Hey, it's Rick." He says with a smile.

"Ricky!" He exclaims, "what you are calling me for, huh? Word has it you don't live in New York anymore."

"No, I'm just calling in a bit of a favor, that's all."

"Name it, Ricky. After you and your partner helped clear my name, you know my office is always open to you."

"Well, Rob, that's sort of what I'm calling you about." Castle says, leaning back in his chair and spinning around to face Sasha. "I heard about the budget freeze and I was hoping to make a donation."

"Budget freeze?" Robert asks.

"Yeah," Castle continues, "I was hoping to get my partner back on the force."

"Ricky, I'm not aware of any budget freeze."

Castle's brow pinches and he stops tapping his pen against the surface of his desk. "What are you talking about?" He almost chuckles.

"No, me and Winslow had a meeting about it uh... just a few days ago, in fact. We're doing fine." He says casually.

Things could change, maybe it was just a new development. "Well, I know that you might be a bit uh..." he searches for the right term, "overmanned, but Robert," he chuckles, "there has to be room for the homicide detective that cleared you, can't there?"

"Ricky," the mayor chuckles.

"Come on, it'd be a favor for me. Last one, I promise."

"Ricky, honestly, I have no clue what you're talking about."

"What..." he tries, "well, I know that you can't bring her back on unless someone retires, but-"

"Ricky," the mayor stops him on another chuckle, "who told you that? We have openings... all over the city. The Eighth... the Thirteenth."

It's then that his heart turns cold. All he can do is nod to himself. "Well, thanks for the info, Rob."

The mayor chuckles, "Hey, fly me out there sometime, huh?"

"First class, Rob." Castle forces his tone and doesn't bother in a farewell, simply deciding to end the call and let his arm fall onto the rest of the chair.

She lied to him... again. She just can't stand telling him the truth, can she?

On another hard sigh... he knows he still has a problem to solve. He didn't want it to come to this. He knows her. She'll hate it. But nonetheless, he's still calling the next person in his contact list and is begrudgingly waiting for the call to get picked up. "This is Gina." She says on a sigh.

With a sigh of his own, he begins. "Gina... it's Rick."

"Oh!" Gina starts loudly, "Rick, so good to hear from you, you're only... let's see... eight and a half months late for our meeting."

"Please... Gina..." he sighs deeply, his eyes drifting shut, "I'm really not in the mood right now. I called you for a reason."

He can hear an impatient sigh being blown into the receiver. "What is it?"

"I need you to put me in touch with the person in charge of the account I had you set up."

"The account, you mean the-"

"Yes... Gina," he interrupts her. "Just send me their contact, please?"

"Alright, I'll send it to you. Hang on," Gina says while Rick listens to the clack of her keys. "Check your email, Rick, and... I don't suppose I'm allowed to ask questions?"

Castle lets out a breath, "No," he says and hangs up the phone.