Castle fought to open his eyes, but somehow it was a lot harder than it normally was. He could also feel a terrible ache in the right side of his neck and did he pass out from a punch to his neck? What the hell had happened? They'd found Smith, right? What next? They'd… had they followed the man to his apartment? Oh, they had. And that guy had been waiting, but most likely only for Smith because he'd looked surprised when Kate attacked him. Then they'd moved dangerously fast. He must've been a werewolf too! That's why they had gotten all blurry as they fought, at least until the guy was holding down his partner and tried choking her. Castle had tried getting involved then, had tried kicking the guy and at just that moment Kate had done the same, resulting in the guy tumbling off. But before Castle had been able to get to his partner he'd been forced back and felt pain in his neck.
"Castle?" her voice trenched through what felt like blockage in his ears. "RICK?"
His hands quickly covered his ears as her voice was so loud and his eyes snapped open.
"Sorry," she whispered and he was surprised to still hear it even though his hands were over his ears.
He slowly let his hands fall to his side and looked at her with question in his eyes. "What happened?" He glanced around. "Where are we?"
He's suddenly aware of the tears in her eyes and the smile growing bigger on her lips. It had him wondering how long he'd been out because she's letting go of a silent chuckle of joy before she was leaning down to peck his lips in a sweet kiss. Only it didn't feel like it normally did, it was scorching hot, and his hand quickly found the back of her neck to tangle his fingers into her hair as he pulled her back to claim her lips with his again. Mmm, god, it felt like heaven, and when he parted his lips to ask permission to enter her mouth and she parted her own her taste was addicting. She moaned into his mouth and he couldn't stop the groan from agreeing with her.
"Ahem."
The sound tore them apart and when Castle looked around he was suddenly well aware of the man sitting in a chair not far away observing them. It took him another second for him to realize some of the lines in the man's face was close to identical to Kate's. It's her father.
"Sorry," Kate mumbled her apology to the grey-haired man before turning back to him. "Castle, this is my dad, Jim Beckett."
Castle cleared his throat and swallowed, damning the fact that he knew her father was able to hear the accelerating beating of his heart.
"Hi, sir," he said and the man bursted out in a chuckle.
"No need to be scared Richard," the man said. "I would never come between two soulmates if it weren't absolutely necessary."
"Dad!" Kate hissed and Castle felt confused. Two soulmates? She turned back to him with a glimpse of worry in those hazel eyes. "How do you feel?" she asked.
He furrowed his eyebrows. "Well, my neck hurts from the punch but other than that I feel fine, maybe I was kicked in my head though because I could almost swear my hearing is better than before," he told her while letting his hand rub his head.
He observed as she bit her lower lip in what looked like a nervous movement, and heard a thumping sound which he couldn't really locate. It sounded as if it came from her, but that didn't make sense. Why would a thumping sound come out of her? Or perhaps it was something behind her.
"Rick," she exhaled slowly before taking in a deep breath. "That guy at Smith's, he was a wolf…" she paused until he nodded. "...and he uh… he bit you."
Castle furrowed his brows again for a few seconds and then his facial expression turned neutral, shock entering his veins. The thumping was her heartbeat. He could hear her heartbeat!
"Does that mean…? I'm a wolf?!" he screeched and watched as her eyes turned down to look at her hands.
"Well, not yet, but yes, you're changing," she said and looked up, again with watery eyes. "I'm sorry, I should've stopped him. This wasn't how you were supposed to turn. We were supposed to be prepared, you were supposed to be ready."
Faster than he was prepared for he'd sat up and pulled her onto his lap, into his arms, and was hugging her in a comforting embrace. Kissing her forehead. Feeling her in his lap was weirdly electrifying. It felt as though everything was heightened, especially her. Everything about her was heightened. It felt as if he loved her more than was possible. She was more beautiful than ever, her scent was heavenly and her touch was more addicting than before. His love for her was deeper than anything else. The only thing that could compare was the love he had for Alexis, but even that wasn't the same. He loved them both in different ways. Alexis was his kid, but Kate… oh, Kate was his soulmate. He could feel it.
"At least I have you, when I saw him choking you I thought I'd lose you," he whispered against her temple.
The signal of a phone made the two of them look up again only to see Jim disappear with his phone close to his ear.
"Can I ask you a question?" Castle asked and she huffed.
"When do you ever ask permission?"
"Touché," he chuckled and then decided it was best not to seek her eyes in case she would feel attacked if he looked into her eyes. "Why didn't you tell me we were soulmates?"
He might not be looking in her eyes but he didn't miss the reddening of her cheeks in the sudden blush and he could see realization hit her as she understood he could feel it too. He could smell the small embarrassment in her scent, could smell the sudden rush of excitement coming off her body. Was it turning her on knowing that he knew? This was a nice surprise, being able to smell when she was turned on would definitely be helpful. But… that also meant she'd been able to smell it on him too. Oh, god.
"Because I… I didn't want it to be true," she told him truthfully and he was surprised by her honesty. "I didn't want us to end up like my mom and dad."
"Ah," he understood what she meant. She didn't want to get hurt. And he definitely didn't blame her for it. He was just glad he knew now.
"They found him Katie," Jim came back and the two of them turned their eyes to the older man. "They managed to capture him and he won't be going anywhere until you've spoken to him."
Kate took a deep breath and nodded. "We should probably head to mr Smith's apartment again, see if we can find the files and get closure to all this."
They rise from the couch and thank Jim for letting them stay there for the few hours it took for Castle to recover. Jim was telling them to call him if they needed help, and to be safe, before waving them off from the front door.
"Castle!" Kate hissed when he once again moved too fast. "You need to slow down your movements."
"I'm trying!" he groaned. "It's not as easy as you make it look."
Kate just chuckled, this was one of the things she'd have liked to be able to prepare him for before turning him. She couldn't help but laugh at the way he was totally overdoing it though. It looked so weird when he tried to move slow, she had to keep herself from bursting out in laughter several times during those first two hours of him being out of harm's way. Now she knew he wouldn't reject the change.
"How do you make it look natural? I feel so stupid," he said and she chuckled again.
"Well, you look stupid too," she teased him and grabbed his arm to hook their arms together, automatically forcing him to walk in her speed. "I've been training my whole life, just try to follow my lead, okay? And while we're in there just count seconds in your mind to keep it from moving your body too fast."
"Just count in my mind?" he gave her a confused look.
"Yeah, it's what always helps me when I'm chasing bad guys," she told him and he nodded with understanding.
They stopped right outside the building and Kate stood on the tips of her toes to peck his lips in one quick reassuring kiss.
"Let's go," she said and they walked inside.
After they'd left mr Smith's apartment police had come and started to investigate the murder. So when they arrived at the scene their friends were already gone and Lanie most likely had mr Smith on her table back at the lab. Which meant that, besides from the officer standing outside keeping watch, Kate and Castle were the only ones there, and once they closed the front door they were all alone. Which probably was a good thing considering she had to remind Castle every now and then to slow down as they went through all the cabinets they could find.
"Castle," she simply mentioned his name and he groaned.
"I know, I moved too fast again."
She looked at him and met his eyes. "No, not that. Yes, but not that. Look at this," she held up a piece of paper. "It says here he has a property downtown but if I remember correctly the building standing there is abandoned."
Castle came to her side and looked at the paper. "Maybe that's where he's hidden the files, because I can't find anything here."
"Me neither, let's check it out," Kate agreed and they were just about to get out of there when two very familiar men came through the door.
"Where the hell have you two been?!" Ryan shouted in both anger and fear while Esposito crossed his arms over his chest.
"Uh," Kate froze. She hadn't expected to bump in to them so soon.
"I didn't feel so good and so Kate took me to the doctors," her partner quickly lied and she looked at him to see him looking completely honest. If she'd been human.
She noticed the hair rising on the back of his neck as well as his heart rate picking up.
"You okay bro?" Esposito asked then, uncrossing his arms again and Kate saw Castle had to refrain from looking surprised the detective fell for his lie.
"Uh-well, yeah, turned out I was mostly dehydrated and needing to lie down," he told them.
"And you needed to babysit him for that? Without telling us?" Esposito turned his eyes on her and Kate quickly tried to come up with an excuse.
"You would too if he'd been as annoying as he was. Plus his mom and daughter are out of town for today," she lied.
Esposito huffs and she could swear she saw Ryan roll his eyes, but at least their faces indicated they believed them.
"Anyway, what are you two doing here? You haven't been answering our calls so how did you know to come here?" Ryan asked and Kate looked around them.
"Called in and found out about it," Kate easily lied. "And we found this other property so we were just about to head over there."
"Really? Where?" Esposito asked and Castle showed him the piece of paper with the address on display. "That's weird, he doesn't have anything tied to him in our databases."
"Then it's definitely worth a check," Kate stated and the others agreed.
"Let's go," Ryan said and Kate hesitated before she opened her mouth again.
"Wait, there's something you two should know," she felt Castle's gaze land on her and she could hear the skip of a beat in his heartbeat. Her two brothers in arm turned back to them and gave her curious eyes, both of them waiting to hear what she had to tell them.
A/N: Thank you all for reading, and for your patience. I love reading your reviews and I know I almost never replies to them but that's simply because I try put every time I have over for fanfics to write them instead of answering reviews. But I still read them and I'm so damn thankful for them, they keep me going and keep my insecurities in check for a bit. Anyway, thanks again and hope you enjoy! Until next time, xxxx
