Castle puts his hands in Sasha's thick fur of her neck and pushes her back into the house with a feigned growl. "Yes, I'm back, chill out." He says to her and lets her back down to the floor, closing the door behind him.

With a quick survey, Alexis is sitting on the far end of the couch with her feet propped up on the edge of the coffee table with her phone to her ear, a textbook open in the middle cushion and her laptop open and sitting on the armrest, and a cup of coffee with a red stirring straw sticking out of the top sitting on the side table next to her. Sasha quickly spins around and presses herself up against her master's legs, looking up to rub the top of her head against his knee, her long tail with that long stringy fur sweeping across the floor.

Alexis looks over to him with a smile and quickly starts to stand up. "Oh, he's right here. I'll let you talk to him now." She says formally. Castle smirks to himself, running his nails through the fur on Sasha's chin and down her neck as she smashes herself against his legs. "Yes, thank you, Professor Collins. Here he is." She says with her bright smile and hands him her cell phone. "It's my English professor." She whispers to him.

Castle smirks and raises his brow, the incident out on his lawn just moments ago seemingly wiped from his memory as he reaches for the phone and keeps the other hand buried in Sasha's thick fur. "Richard Castle," he says into the phone, his tone charming and happy as he watches Alexis smile and cross her arms and Sasha move off his legs and back over to the window.

"Mr. Castle?" A female voice asks him, sounding older. "I'm Dorthy Collins, I'm head of the English department here at Oregon State University." She introduces herself.

"Oh, what can I do for you, professor?" He asks in his usual charming tone, watching from the entrance into the kitchen from the living room. Sasha quickly moves back to the window next to the front door and jumps up on the windowsill to look out front, her ears perking up adorably, making Castle smile and fight the need to go back over and pet her.

"Well, your daughter Alexis is a student of mine in my composition class and when she told me privately who her father was, well," the professor seems to chuckle bashfully, "needless to say, I was a tad overwhelmed."

Castle chuckles as Sasha starts to scratch at the window a bit with her paw, starting to whine in a slight squeak. "Privately?" He asks with a smile. "You kind of make it sound like we're in witness protection, professor."

"Oh, no," the woman waves him off with a chuckle while Castle watches Alexis look over to Sasha, who's still whimpering at the window, and goes over to see what she's whimpering at. "She merely caught me after class and mentioned to me that you were living nearby since I had brought up one of your books in class last week. I must say also, Mr. Castle," he listens, watching as Alexis takes Sasha's ears in her hands and asks her what's going on before looking out the window, "your daughter is a joy to have in class."

Castle chuckles again proudly at his little girl. "That seems to be the consensus of everyone that meets Alexis, actually." He says, using her name so she knows he's talking proudly of her, like he always does.

Alexis looks out the window for a second while she pets Sasha, then back over to her dad with a deep, frightened furrow in her brow. While Castle continues on the phone, his smirk suddenly feels heavy, knowing Alexis saw what Sasha was whimpering at. "Well, Mr. Castle, the reason I wanted to get in touch with you was because I wanted to see if you were interested in coming to the university as a guest lecturer."

Castle's brow pinches as he scoffs to himself. "Me? A guest lecturer?" He asks, not believing her.

"Why, yes, it would be a fabulous opportunity for the students in the English department, I assure you." The professor tells him, trying to convince him.

"Well, I'm not sure what exactly I'd lecture about, to be honest." He says to her and shrugs his shoulders, tossing one foot over the other and leaning against the wall, watching out of the corner of his eye as Alexis pulls Sasha way from the door and back over to her alcove made on the couch. Sasha jumps onto the middle cushion on top of Alexis's textbook and quickly settles down next to her.

"Oh, well, you'd be a great speaker to teach things like oh... plot development, character arcs, themes. We'd pay you, of course."

Castle smiles, shoves off the wall, and quickly makes his way over to the couch and plops down next to Sasha, who stands up to situate herself to lay her head down onto his leg. "I'd love to, but I can't charge you, professor."

"Oh, Mr. Castle, we must give you something for your trouble." She says to him as he runs his fingers backward through Sasha's fur.

"Believe me, Professor," he chuckles, "if you ask Alexis, getting me out of the house will be payment enough." He says, hoping to get a smile out of his daughter. Instead, all he gets is the same worrying furrow in her brow.

"Well, that's very generous of you, Mr. Castle. Shall we say... this Wednesday at nine AM in the auditorium?"

Castle smiles, "I'll be there."

"Fantastic, I'll be sure to let Alexis know. And really, Mr. Castle, it will be a pleasure hearing your insight." The professor says to him happily.

"The pleasure will be all mine, professor." Castle says back, and after a farewell, he ends the call and hands the phone back to Alexis. "Well," he starts in a braggadocious tone, "looks like I'm wanted for more than my good looks, after all."

Alexis purses her lips as she takes her phone back. "You know, Dad, I thought it would take you a little more convincing than that."

"Oh, come on," he says with a shrug as he uses one hand to scratch Sasha's head that lays across his leg, "the closest thing to this I ever got is being a chaperone on your school field trips."

"Just," Alexis continues and picks up her mug, "please don't embarrass me like you did back then, okay?"

"Embarrass? When did I embarrass you?" He challenges her.

"Sixth grade?" She challenges him. "Natural history museum?"

"Hey,' he lifts his finger to her, "that wasn't my fault. That tour guide was borderline incompetent."

"Dad," She almost whines.

He just smiles reassuringly and lifts his hand out of the thick fur on the back of Sasha's neck. "I won't embarrass you, pumpkin. I promise."

Alexis nods with a heavy smile as he goes back to petting his dog, and a thick silence soon falls between them. "Dad," she says with a heavy tone. He looks over to her casually, "that was Beckett out front."

He looks over to her for a moment before shrugging his shoulders. "Yeah," he says offhandedly, looking back down to Sasha as he pets her, "yeah, she said she's going to be coming by every morning."

Alexis sits up on the couch, turning toward him. Sasha lifts her head off his thigh at the movement. "Dad," she challenges him.

He looks over to her. "What?" He asks, as if he did something wrong.

"Were you not going to tell me about this?"

He shrugs his shoulders again. "I didn't think it was that important." He says and massages Sasha's ears, knowing he's getting a look from her. When he looks back over, Alexis is sending him an obvious glare. He sighs and deadpans a stare out into nowhere. "Alexis, I told you before." He smiles. "I've moved on, okay? You don't have to worry about me."

Alexis sighs and crosses her legs on the couch, turning toward him. "Dad," she starts in a small voice, "I'm a big girl now. You don't have to pretend for my sake anymore."

Castle looks over to her with a pinch in his brow. "I'm not pretending, Alexis." He defends himself. "Beckett can come over for as long as she wants, but that won't change what happened. So you don't have to worry, okay?" He asks her, honestly worried about how she's handling it. "Like I said, pumpkin, the woman I fell in love with in New York was just a figment of my wild imagination. Nothing more, okay?"

"Yeah, Dad," she says with a meager shrug of her shoulders. "But a figment of your imagination or not, you still fell in love."

Like an obstinant child or the same man that would get his words tossed back at him by his partner back in New York, Castle lids his gaze and looks away from her. It used to drive him crazy when she'd do that to him.

"And honestly..." she chuckles nervously, "I'd rather you be honest about that and just face up to it."

Castle shakes his head and puts his hand back into Sasha's fur, looking down to her with a sigh. "I'm happy out here, Alexis." He says to her. "And..." he shakes his head, "I can't really force her to stop coming by but... nothing she can say will change what happened. If anything," he says with another shrug, "the more she's told me, the more she lies to me. And whether that's to spare my feelings or not," he thinks out loud, "it still doesn't really negate the fact that she can't trust me with the truth. So..." he trails off.

Alexis nods and puts her hand into Sasha's fur on the base of her tail. "So, I take it she said something that wasn't true, then?"

Castle nods, debating telling his daughter. "She said that she couldn't go back to the NYPD because of a budget freeze. So I called the mayor to try and get them to work around it to get her back on the Force, but-"

"He..." she talks ahead of him, "said there wasn't one."

"Right," he nods. "So... I don't know why she'd lie to me about that but... if there was an opening in the NYPD and she didn't take it..." Maybe she chose him over her job after all.

After a long moment between them, Alexis speaks up. "Dad?"

He looks up to her but dismisses her with a shake of his head. "Doesn't really matter, she lied to me anyway." He says and continues to pet Sasha.

Alexis nods and looks back over to him, "Are you sure you'll be alright?" She asks, her voice small and worried.

Castle smiles, "I'm sure, pumpkin."


It's the next morning, Beckett is pulling up in her car, feeling a soft, courageous determination in her heart. His coffee is in the cupholder next to her's, but she went on ahead of him and started at her's already. Not that he's been actually taking his.

She puts the car in park and hears a dog bark from his yard. She looks out the window and sees Castle's dog on the lead that goes between a Birch and an oak tree in his yard. The dog keeps barking at her car as she grabs her coffee from the cupholder and takes a sip. She looks at the tree line and then at the entrance to his house, then back over to his dog, who's still barking. She unbuckles her seatbelt and pushes open the door, then grabs his cup from the other holder and climbs out. Once she steps out onto the curb with the two cups in her hands, the dog stops barking and its ears perk up.

Beckett chuckles when she sees the dog perks its ears up and starts wagging its long, stringy-haired tail. It's a cute dog, anyway. She closes the door to her Impala with her foot and goes over to lean against the hood to wait for him. She takes another small sip of her coffee and sets his cup down on the hood. With a sigh, she shoves her hand into her pocket, her fingers finding the engagement ring and she quickly starts to fiddle with it. She really shouldn't have this. He should be the one giving it to her.

After a minute or so of fiddling with the ring, she hears the dog let out a small, high-pitched bark in her direction. Beckett flicks her eyes over and sees the dog looking at her with its ears perked up still. When the dog sees her look at it, the dog's jowls flop with another small bark before laying down in the grass. Beckett smiles and lowers her head, telling the dog it has her attention. When she does, the dog jumps up excited and lowers its front legs to the ground, starting to bounce in place. Beckett chuckles to herself as she watches it.

If she didn't feel it would set him off, she would go over and play with it. She loves dogs, but this one is obviously Castle's. She doesn't want to set him off by invading his space and going over and annoying his dog just because she felt like it. She may be invading his place now just by showing up, but until she sees him, the curb is as far as she feels comfortable going.

With another few sips of her coffee over another few minutes, she sees the dog spin around from looking at her and around to the trees, where Castle is striding out in his usual workout clothes, his muscles glistening as they do every morning. The dog jumps up on its hind legs when Castle comes out of the trees and Beckett can hear it whimpering from here.

"Yes," Castle says, raising his hand to Sasha, "yes, I missed you too. Calm down." He says, his breath still a bit hard as he knees down to her to unhook her from the lead. "Yes, I know it's been forever," he says to her as Sasha starts licking the side of his head. "Yes, I get it." Castle finds the hook buried in her thick fur and unhooks it.

Once Sasha knows she's free, she darts across the yard as fast as she can toward her. "Sash-" Castle grabs for her but misses by a few feet and quickly stands up to call after her. "Sasha!" He hollers.

Beckett smiles as Sasha runs at full speed toward her, only slowing down a few feet away from her. "Hey, you," Beckett softly coos as Sasha reaches her snout over to her to test Beckett out for a moment. Beckett kneels down and reaches her hand out to her and it only takes a few sniffs of Beckett's fingertips for Sasha to accept her excitedly and push herself into her.

Beckett laughs as Sasha smashes her side into her, lifting her head up to try and reach Beckett, who already has her arms wrapped around her, both hands holding a cup of coffee. Sasha whimpers again and wiggles around inside of Beckett's arms excitedly.

Beckett chuckles as she Sasha sits down at her feet and laps her tongue across her cheek. "Oh!" Beckett says happily. "Hey," She says with a smile as Sasha continues to seemingly go crazy for Beckett's attention, moving around and smashing her side against Beckett's knees while she kneels down to give her attention.

Castle sighs heavily and is slowly making his way over to them. He can feel a smile putting up a fight underneath the armor he has on, watching his dog fawn all over her. "Sorry about this." He sighs a few feet away from them.

Beckett laughs when Sasha rolls onto her back. She moves her occupied hand to pet her but stops when she sees she's still holding a cup of coffee.

"Oh, here," Castle says out of instinct and takes it from her. Freeing up her hand for her, Beckett starts scratching Sasha's stomach and sets her other cup on the curb to pet her head.

"She's adorable," Beckett coos as she loves on Sasha, who's obviously loving the attention. "You adopt her?" She asks him with a smile, looking up to him.

"Sort of," he smiles. Beckett catches his smile as he looks down to his dog on the ground at her feet. His soft smirk that she loved kissing off his face makes her heart skip a beat, almost violently, when she sees it. "A couple weeks after I moved out here, it was raining one morning, and I found her under a bench on the bank of the lake while I was running."

"Aww," Beckett coos, her brow arching in sadness as she looks back down to Sasha. She pets her ears softly and Sasha mewls her head into her palm.

"She was cold and wet but she latched onto me pretty quickly. At first, I thought she was a stray, but I noticed she'd been groomed recently." He explains as Beckett looks back up to him. "So, after I dried her off, I put her in my car and drove her around to the local groomers until I found someone that recognized her. They gave me an address to a farm about..." he trails off, looking down the street the way that leads away from town, "five miles out of town. I took her down there and the guy said that he just got tired of her running away and he just... didn't want her anymore."

Feeling sad again, Beckett looks down to the dog still laying splayed out at her feet, running her hand up and down her stomach.

"So," he smiles and kneels down next to her, putting his hand roughly in Sasha's ears, "I took her in."

Beckett smiles at him as he loves on his dog, her heart fluttering wildly at the sight of the man she fell head over heels for. The softer, caring, loving, big-hearted man she loves that's in front of her now, kneeling down and loving on a dog that he rescued from an owner that didn't want her anymore. She can feel her hand telling her to reach up to his jaw and pull him into her. Once she gets the thought, she has to fight herself to keep from doing it.

"Still a big softie, huh?" She asks in a joking tone and a smile.

Castle is brought back to the reality at hand by her comment and the soft smile vanishes off his face.

But Beckett is quick to try and save it, looking back down to Sasha. "So, she uh..." she says, petting her ribcage, "she always this welcoming of strangers?"

Castle raises his brow and shakes his head. "No, it uh..." he says, shrugging his shoulders. "It usually depends on the person really."

Beckett fights her smile and looks back up to him. "She must have pretty good judgment, then."

"Well, she did choose me, so..." he smirks to himself, throwing out the first quip he could think of. After that, they fall into silence and Beckett stands up once Castle gives her the signal while Sasha stays laying down in the grass between them. "I uh..." he starts, looking at Beckett's grey Chevy Impala sedan, "I take it you cashed the check."

Beckett smiles calmly and nods, giving him a moment before giving her answer. "Thank you." She says in as honest a tone as she can give him without it sounding fake. Once he gives her his eyes, she continues. "You didn't have to do that, but... I just want you to know how much it helped and... however uncomfortable it makes me feel using your money."

He takes in a breath to fight it, but bites it back, not seeing any point in it. It's not his money. If anything, she should feel better knowing it's technically coming out of Gina's pocket and not his.

"But um..." she starts up again after a moment, "now that you're here, I should..." she hesitantly says and reaches into the pocket of her jacket, "I should probably give this back to you."

When Castle looks down to the engagement ring she pulls from her pocket, his throat closes with impatience. He waits until she offers it up to him to raise his hand. "I bought it for you, Beckett. It's yours."

"Castle," she nervously chuckles, "this is an engagement ring." She states with a purposeful tone. "I can't keep this."

"Because you would've said no?" He lets slip.

Beckett grits her teeth. "I can't keep this because we aren't engaged, Rick." She says, but he doesn't respond other than looking away from her and throwing on the same stone-faced expression he's had for the past week. "And I already told you that I would've said yes."

"Yeah, well," he starts over her, "I don't want it anymore." He looks up to her again. "So... same goes for the ring as the money, you can do whatever you want with it. It's yours." He says and looks down to Sasha, who's still laying contently by his feet. "Come on." He calls and nods his head toward the house.

Sasha stands up and follows him up the stairs and through the door. She blinks hotly, but shakes away the emotion and sets her cup down on the hood and pulls her necklace out from underneath her shirt and unhooks the clasp. She breathes out an emotion-ladden breath and puts the end of the chain through the band and carefully slides the diamond band down the chain to rest against her mother's ring.


Inside, Castle closes the door behind him and Sasha slowly walks over and claims her usual spot in the middle of the couch.

On a heavy sigh, Castle moves over to sit down next to her. When he does, it isn't until now that he has a chance to look at the cup in his hand.

Every morning, I bring you a cup of coffee just to see a smile on your face. His words ring in his head, his heart crawling with the same painful feeling it did that afternoon. When Sasha breaks him out of it by resting her head down on his thigh, Castle sighs and puts his hand in her fur. "You like her, huh?"

Sasha only responds by a big breath out as she falls asleep on his leg. Castle then looks over to the cup in his hand.

"Just try not to get too attached, okay?" He tells her, setting the cup down on the other end of the side table. "It'll just break your heart."