Here be Dragons!
Chapter 30
Kate left Castle sitting in his chair while she went to Roy's office door and knocked. "Got a minute, sir?"
"If it stops me from doing paperwork I can give you two minutes." Roy happily gave her his undivided attention.
"Sir, about the rule that members can't date other members." Kate didn't dare say anything about her and Castle. She just wanted the ground rules.
Roy sat back and did his best not to smile. "You and Castle.'
"Sir?" How did he know she meant her and Castle?
"I may be a captain now but I was at one time a detective and I'm not blind, Beckett. Just keep the PDA to a minimum in the office." Roy leaned back over his never-ending paperwork. He wasn't just in charge of Homicide. He had the entire precinct to keep track of. His office just happened to be on this floor.
"Sir?" Kate was still taken aback at how he was handling this.
"This is still my precinct, Beckett. If anyone in the office has a problem they can talk to me about it. Just don't give them a reason to have a problem with it," Roy told her.
"Yes, sir, thank you, sir." Kate turned to leave but was stopped.
"Beckett. You're good but you weren't having any fun until Castle showed up. This job's hard enough without you making it harder for yourself." Roy was happy that she was opening up at least a little. He was sure Castle could keep her on her toes.
"Yes, sir." Kate was stunned. In a haze she made her way to her desk and sat down.
"And?" Rick knew what she'd gone in there to ask him about.
"No PDA in the building," Kate said absently.
"I can handle that. I'm not so sure about you. Pretty sure you can't –" Kate interrupted him.
"Castle!" Kate didn't have a problem not doing something in the office.
"So where should our first date be?" Rick questioned as he began to plan the best first date he'd ever had in his life. Something that would be impressive and something Kate would never forget.
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"Car was towed in a few hours ago. Started looking for the VIN and found something else," Ryan informed everyone.
"Six parking tickets and a tow sticker and nobody bothers to look inside?" Rick understood it but it didn't speak well about the city he loved.
"Tinted windows, sunshade on the window." Espo looked the car over quickly.
Rick tried again. "Still you would think someone would look inside."
"Yeah, well welcome to New York City." Kate knew like everyone else did that the public walked around with blinders on.
Espo had a little information to give Kate. "Doctor Joshua Leeds, 37. According to the business cards in his wallet, he's a plastic surgeon."
"Plastic bag and duct tape. Not a very efficient way of killing someone," Rick noted.
"From the state of decay I'd say he's been missing for about a week," Lanie said.
"Puts it in time with the first parking ticket," Espo added.
"His fingernails have been removed and his knuckles show signs of having be broken pre-mortum," Lanie mentioned.
"Pre-mortum?" Kate queried.
"If I had to guess I'd say our doctor here was tortured before he was killed," Lanie said.
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"According to the hospital the procedure lasted nine hours." Espo knew that much.
"A nine hour mystery operation he didn't want his own people to know anything about." Roy was in on this case.
Ryan showed up empty. "Get this, the hospital can't find the file. It's like it never happened."
"Who did you talk to?" Rick asked him.
"Patient Information." Who else should he talk to?
"That was your first mistake. If you want to find someone in a hospital that had a treatment there's only one division you talk to where nothing falls through the cracks – Billing," Rick suggested. "Someone had to pay for it, right?"
A smiling Kate looked at Roy and the boys. Castle had just given them a lead.
Kate got off the phone. "It looks like our bill was paid for promptly and in full."
"By whom?" Rick was dying to hear this.
"Wire transfer," Kate told him meaning for now it was a dead end. "Espo, see what you can find out about this account number." She handed him a slip of paper with the number on it.
"So had Alexis found a dress yet?" Kate was interested in everything Alexis did.
"Yeah, cute one, too. My little girl is going to the prom." Rick was proud of her and worried sick. "Now comes the long standing tradition of scaring the boy." Rick had ideas of just what to do, too.
"The what?" Kate wasn't following.
"The time-honored hazing that goes on. He and I are alone just before the daughter comes down the stairs." Rick was smiling.
"I remember what my date's dad did." Ryan recounted what happened to him. "He checked my wallet for condoms. Then he showed me his gun collection. My hands were shaking so bad I could barely put on the corsage."
"What did your dad do?" Rick asked Kate.
"I…I don't know." Kate was trying to picture it. "I was in my room."
"How was your date when you came down?" Rick tried that instead.
"You know, now that you mention it, he looked terrified," Kate admitted. "This whole time I thought he was scared of me."
"Nope!" Rick grinned.
"Yo, you're never going to believe this." Espo had found something off that account number. "The money the account was wired from belongs to the Offices of the United States Attorneys. Whatever it was, the US taxpayers paid for it."
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Hard Candy shot them down with barely a wimpy sorry.
"I know a guy. If the Feds won't tell us than he has to be big. Gang related. So what if we ask the other side?" Rick proposed.
"Go ask a criminal who this guy is?" Kate hated it.
Rick defended him. "He's actually a pretty nice guy."
"For a criminal." Kate still didn't like this idea.
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"Take him out back and kill him," Sal ordered the guy shoving Rick's face into a table.
"Sal!?" Rick was sure he was going to do just that.
"Vetto. I was just messing with him. Let him go." Sal got up from his table.
"Not funny, Sal!" Rick was not amused.
"You're right, it wasn't. It was fricking hilarious." Sal kissed his face.
"Richard Fricking Castle. What brings you down off your cloud of money?" Sal was sure this was going to be good.
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"Jimmy 'The Rat' Moran. See what you can find out on him." Kate liked him for a new lead.
"What makes you think Hard Candy's going to talk to you now?" Rick asked her.
"You have your sources and I have mine," Kate told him.
"Please tell me it's not your ex-boyfriend, is it? Mr. FBI, tall, brooding, and judgmental." Rick hated that guy.
"Why yes, it is. You got a problem with that?" They'd only kissed once and hadn't even gone out on a date yet. Besides Sorenson was a potential lead.
"Not for me. But then I'm not the one he's trying to get back together with," Rick reminded her. Kate frowned since he had a point.
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Rick watched his daughter come home and hid while Owen kissed her softly then left.
"Did you have fun?" Rick asked her.
"As a matter of fact I did." Alexis was still feeling that one little kiss. "This dating thing is kinda nice."
"How was Owen?" Rick questioned her. "Don't worry, I closed my eyes for the kissing part."
"Yeah, me too. You know you didn't have to wait up," Alexis said. She was very responsible.
"I made him," Kate announced as she came out from the kitchen with a cup of coffee.
"KATE!" Alexis looked between her and her dad.
"Your father was freaking out and someone needed to watch him," Kate grinned.
"She's exaggerating. I'm the cool dad. She wanted to know what I did to scare Owen into behaving himself." Rick defended himself and that he wasn't freaking out.
"The severed head and the white coat covered in blood," Alexis tattled. It wasn't as if she didn't already know. "I got him to stop."
"So why are you here?" Not that Alexis wasn't sorry to see her but it was late and she was in the loft.
Rick cleared it up. "Her ex-boyfriend got into a little trouble today and I wouldn't let her go home alone or spend the night in the hospital watching him sleep."
"Hospital?" Now Alexis was worried.
"He's fine. He'll be awake in the morning, held a couple of days, then released. Nothing for you to worry about." Kate, like Castle, had no intention of explaining that someone had followed them to the meeting then shot Sorenson and Moran.
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Alexis was hugged by her dad and Kate and went up to her room to get ready for bed.
"She looked amazing." Kate was smiling wide.
"My little girl is growing up." Rick smiled even wider.
"Thanks for bringing me here, Castle." Sorenson might be her ex-boyfriend but she still felt responsible for his getting shot.
"You're welcome." Rick took her coffee cup from her which he knew might be dangerous and set it down. Next he slowly wrapped his arms around her and leaned down to kiss her. Kate saw it coming and did nothing to stop him. Both could hear their Dragons screaming at them to kiss the other.
That kiss turned into another kiss that got turned into a much more passionate kiss until both were searching for more. How to make the kiss even more passionate. Kate broke from this kiss. "We haven't even gone on a date yet." It wasn't like she hadn't had a one-night stand and was betting Castle had had as well. However, she wasn't sure she wanted this to be another one.
"I can wait," Rick offered even if he didn't want to.
Kate looked up at him. "Who said anything about waiting for a first date?"
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Kate was naked and on top with Castle deep inside her and damn if he didn't feel good. Then as she ground herself on his erection she felt Castle place both hands on her breasts. She placed her hands over his and got his hands moving. She needed just one little thing so she could climax and squeeze his erection. Feeling him roll her nipples between his fingers was all she needed as she screamed out her first climax with him.
However, it wasn't just any climax. Suddenly her head was filled with visions she'd never seen before. It was Castle and she was on her hands and knees while he fucked her and she was loving it.
It was just that they were in a tent. Then again while she was on her back with Castle on top of her. Over and over again. Orgasm after orgasm. Then she saw Alexis with her orange hair. Followed by another child with orange hair while at the same time there was a boy.
She saw them fighting as Dragons side by side. She saw them getting married. She was so incredibly happy. She saw her wedding ring. She saw her dress.
It was all so overwhelming. She was still on top with him inside her. Then she saw something else. Rick was old and didn't look at all well. She heard him tell her yet again, like he had a countless number of times, that he loved her. But those words were labored and difficult to hear.
Then he died and she felt her heart break into pieces. She didn't want to live without him. "I will search for you through a thousand worlds and 10,000 lifetimes until I find you."
She knew he'd told her that earlier and yet here she was telling him.
It hurt worse than when she'd lost her mother. It hurt so much worse than that time. She even knew that she'd lain on him. She felt herself crying so heavily and her heart was so broken that she, too, died that day.
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Rick was so lost in making love to Kate that his entire bedroom simply vanished. All there was Kate and she was so gorgeous. Her beautiful body was right above him. He didn't care about her chest size, the color of her hair. He had seen her strength and she was incredible.
Not going on a date first didn't matter. He wasn't interested in a one-night stand. He wanted them to be together and stay that way.
He wasn't going to last much longer if she kept this up. Her breasts were perfectly sized and he placed his hands on them. Then he felt Kate cover his hands with hers and moved them where she wanted them. Then he rolled her nipples between his thumb and forefinger and heard her scream out her orgasm. Feeling her muscles squeeze his erection had him groaning out his climax inside her.
He saw her again and she was still the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. He was fucking her from behind. They were making love to each other constantly.
He saw himself buying a ring and asking her to marry him; he watched her cry as she said yes. They were both fighting something as Gold Dragons. He saw Alexis. However, he also saw a different little girl with orange hair and a little boy at the same time.
They lived in a large overly colorful home. He thought he saw snakes. He could also remember telling her, "He would search for her through a thousand worlds and 10,000 lifetimes until he found her."
It all hit him fast and hard; it was hard to follow and keep up with. But he knew without a doubt that he loved her more than anyone. That he would protect her no matter what it took. He couldn't lose her or it would destroy him.
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Kate felt all of it. She didn't understand how she knew what she knew, but she loved him. She loved him so hard and so very much that she had never known just how empty her heart had been until he had filled it with his love.
Kate collapsed onto him and rested for a moment as she tried to absorb what she suddenly felt and knew for a fact. She got back up just enough to place his head in her hands. Kate looked down on his face and knew that she loved him with her whole heart.
"I found you!" She didn't know how, didn't know how many worlds or lives it had taken her, but she'd done it and she wasn't losing him. "I found you." Kate kissed him with renewed passion.
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They were both still wide awake and lying in each others arms, still naked and giving the other little kisses. "I remember you. I don't know how but I do. You or we were fighting. You were bouncing and punching and kicking something like a wild woman," Rick told her in awe. "And you were bald, but there was something else."
"I had tattoos all over my body," Kate remembered as well. That had Rick getting up to look for tattoos. He found one but it was tiny and not what he recalled. "I got that one when I spent some time in Kiev. It was spur of the moment." Kate got a little defensive about her little tattoo. "I can't figure out where we were, though."
"I see a Black Dragon somewhere. It's still a little fuzzy," Rick said. "I know you are the love of my life. That I would do anything for you. Protect you with my life."
Kate knew she felt the same. Then suddenly she moved to a sitting position. "You had Alexis without me." She knew that much.
Rick sat up with her. "She's here, though. Might explain why she isn't a shifter."
"She wants to be a Dragon so badly." Kate knew that much since she had ridden her while a Dragon.
"I can try and find you the same ring." Rick had no idea how but he could try.
However, watching her shake her head had him scared, really scared.
"We're dating first, Castle. I want you to court me." Kate knew she loved him but she wanted to do it all over again. "I can't believe I actually found you." Then she chuckled. "You should hear my Dragon."
"If it's anything like mine we're going to be great all over again." Rick could hear his Dragon roaring his pleasure. "What about your ex-FBI squeeze?" Rick knew he was still in the picture.
"Will. He got shot because of me. …I don't love him. Not like I love you." Kate looked into his eyes and found herself wanting to get lost in them.
"We're going to be great all over again. Do we move you here?" Rick was ready.
Kate shook her head again. "Date me first, Castle. I want to know that you love me."
"Believe me, I love you." Rick kissed her and placed a hand on her breast.
"My dad's going to be shocked." Kate wasn't sure just what her dad was going to think. "God, what's Lanie going to say? Or the guys? And what's Captain Montgomery going to say? Why does it have to be so complicated?"
She just wanted to love him and be loved in return.
"Roy and the mayor will be on our side. As for everyone else I guess we'll see. I know what Alexis is going to say." Rick had no problem there.
"Scream at me and hate me," Kate teased him since she knew it would be the opposite.
"If you mean scream and hug you until your bones break? Yeah, that." Rick smiled at her and Kate chuckled. "We might have at least one day off after this case."
"I'll be ready. It's going to be the best first dates we've ever had," Rick vowed.
Kate kissed him again. "I'm still not sure how we got to this point. I mean I know what I know, but why or how do I know what I know?" Kate didn't get it.
"What do you mean it's you?" Kate suddenly said.
"Did your Dragon just tell you it was because of them?" Rick had heard his Dragon tell him it was because his Dragon already knew.
"Yeah, but that doesn't make sense. Any more sense than knowing what every shifter I meet is." Kate didn't get it.
"We'll work it out. Two Gold Dragons can accomplish anything. We did it last time. Even if I'm not sure just what we did." Rick knew they'd done something together.
Kate lay back on the bed and pulled him down with her. "Ready for round two, Rick?"