Thank you to everyone who is reading and reviewing. It means a lot to me that you've taken my story to heart as much as I do in writing it.


Alexis was surprised when the screen on her phone showed that the incoming call was from Kevin Ryan. "Hi, Kevin," she answered as she walked across campus. It was a crisp October Friday afternoon, and autumn had put a definite bite in the chilly air. Her classes were over for the week, and she had plans with Javier that night. "Did you get your sergeant's exam results?"

"No, not yet," Kevin said. He sounded distinctly uncomfortable, but resolutely determined. "Javi doesn't know I'm calling you, Alexis. We argued about it. He didn't want you to know yet, but I told him you'd want to know. If it were me, Jenny would want to know. If it were your dad, Beckett would want to know. I know he'll be mad at me, but I just think you would want to know as soon as possible."

Alexis stopped walking, her blood running colder than the gust of wind that was now whipping her hair around her face and slicing through her clothes and into her bones.

"Know what, Kevin?" she asked as a feeling of dread washed over her in a tidal wave.

"We've been working a case all week, and we finally cracked it today. We went to bring in the murderer, and the guy went ballistic. So we had to chase after him, and he had a knife...he stabbed Javi," Kevin said.

Alexis felt lightheaded for a moment, and her stomach began churning like she was going to throw up. She rushed to the nearest tree, dropping her messenger bag on the ground, bending at the waist, and putting her head down, taking slow, deep breaths in through her nose and out through her mouth as her therapist had taught her to do. She faintly heard Kevin calling her name over and over anxiously, and, bracing one hand against the tree to give herself something solid to hold onto, she stood upright again and addressed Kevin on the phone once more. "I'm here," she said, her voice gaining in strength with every syllable. "What hospital?"

"Mount Sinai St. Luke's ER," Kevin replied. He sounded even more nervous now. "But Alexis-"

She cut him off. "You tell Javier to hang on, Kevin. I'm on my way. Stay with him 'til I get there, all right?"

"Of course," Kevin said.

Alexis ended the call, picked up her messenger bag and threw it over her shoulder, and took off running, flagging down the first cab she spotted and breathlessly telling the driver, "Mount Sinai St. Luke's ER, and please, hurry!"

The whole way to the hospital, Alexis fought off both an encroaching panic attack, and fears of the worst, of Javier having a punctured or collapsed lung, needing multiple blood transfusions. She remembered dimly that Kate's mother had died from being stabbed, then forced that thought away, refusing to let it back in, the same way she was refusing to let herself get catapulted back to May and the morning she and Javier and Kevin and Lanie found her dad and Kate shot and bleeding on the kitchen floor of the loft.

The cab screeched to a halt at the Emergency Room Entrance of Mount Sinai St. Luke's Hospital. Alexis all but threw the money at the cabbie, telling him to keep the change, and dashed into the hospital. She skidded to a stop at the desk, took a few seconds to catch her breath, and frantically said, "My boyfriend was brought in here a while ago. He's a homicide detective with the NYPD and he was stabbed. Javier Esposito. I need to know where he is, right now!"

Before the woman at the desk finished typing his name into her computer, Javier Esposito emerged from an ER cubicle, Kevin Ryan at his heels, and Javier frowned when he saw Alexis standing there. "Alexis?" he asked.

Alexis spun around at the sound of Javier calling her name, and her knees buckled with relief to see him standing there in his A-line t-shirt, carrying the shredded remnants of his button-down shirt slung over his right arm. His left bicep was covered with thick gauze bandages, but otherwise, he looked normal. "Javier," Alexis breathed. Again her messenger bag hit the floor, and then she was running to him, throwing herself into his arms. He grunted a bit from the impact of her weight. "I'm sorry!" she exclaimed. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry! But thank God, thank God you're okay!" She released him to frame his face in her hands.

"Alexis, what are you doing here?" Javier asked.

"What do you mean, what am I doing here?" Alexis asked. "Kevin called me-"

Javier scowled at Kevin over his shoulder. "Bro, I specifically told you, do not call Alexis!" he scolded his partner and best friend.

Before Kevin could respond to that, Alexis took her hands away from Javier's face and backed up a step. "Why didn't you want me to know that you'd been stabbed?" she wanted to know.

"For exactly that reason!" Javier exclaimed. "I was not 'stabbed.' Ryan told you I was stabbed, didn't he? I wasn't stabbed, I was knifed! There's a big difference! The punk made a couple of cuts in my arm-"

"Javi, you needed 18 stitches and a tetanus shot," Kevin interjected.

"I know! I was there!" Javier snapped, glowering at Ryan again. Then he returned his attention to Alexis. "I see it in your eyes, Alexis: the fear, the panic, the worry...I was trying to spare you all of that."

"So were you going to tell me at all?" Alexis wanted to know, feeling angry and defensive now. "What, you think I'm too fragile to be able to handle it? You think I don't know what your job entails, the risks you take every time you go to work? I know them all too well, Javier! I watched my dad take those risks for years, and Kate too! You think you're sparing me anything? News flash: you're not!"

"But I'm trying to!" Javier exclaimed, getting angry and defensive himself now.

A nurse approached them then. "I'm going to have to ask you to leave," she told them. "You're causing a disturbance to our patients."

Alexis spun and stormed outside, Javier storming after her, and Kevin, knowing he was going to catch more hell from Javi but standing by his decision to let Alexis know about Javi's injury sooner rather than later, trailing after them.

"Javier, I'm with you! I'm with you because I want to be with you, for all of it, no matter what it is!" Alexis said when they were on the sidewalk in front of the hospital. "You can't shut me out when something like this happens because you're trying to protect me!"

"But protecting you is what I'm supposed to do!" Javier argued. "I'd be the world's worst boyfriend if I didn't try to protect you, Alexis!"

"From reality? From the truth?" Alexis said. "You didn't answer me before: were you going to tell me you got hurt in the line of duty if Kevin hadn't?"

Javier shifted his weight and paused before answering. This did not help his case with Alexis.

"You wouldn't have told me!" she exclaimed, feeling angry and hurt at the same time.

"I didn't say that," Javier said.

"You didn't have to," Alexis said. "You not saying anything said it all." She paused, realizing how that sounded. "You know what I mean!"

"Alexis," Javier said urgently, "I saw what you went through after your dad and Beckett were shot. I don't ever want to be the one that makes you react like that."

If she didn't get away from him, she would start crying on the spot, and Alexis wasn't going to do that. "I'm here!" Alexis exclaimed. "Yeah, I was scared when Kevin called me, I was worried about you...but I'm here, Javier! I don't want you keeping things like this from me like I'm some...some child, or some fragile flower who can't handle this! I'm here, and there's nowhere else I would be, and if it would have been more serious than this, I'd be in there, waiting for you, just like I waited for Dad and Kate, because that's how important you are to me!" She got choked up, but managed to get out the last thing she wanted to say. "I'm not saying I wouldn't fall apart, but I'm here because of how much I care about you!" Then, unable to keep the tears at bay any longer, Alexis turned and rushed away.

"Alexis, wait!" Javier called. He started after her, but Kevin grabbed him by his good arm and kept him in place.

"She needs some time," Kevin said.

"Do you see what you did?" Javier said angrily, shaking off Kevin's hand.

Kevin drew himself up to his full height. "Javi, you're my best friend, and I love you like a brother, but I'm not the one who screwed up here. You should have told Alexis so I didn't have to. And I'm not the one you need to convince that you were going to tell her. She is, because did you really think she wouldn't have noticed the bandages? They'll have to be changed."

Javier's face faltered. "Dammit, I screwed this up," he said.

Only in that moment did Kevin see the fear in Javier's eyes. "What if I ruined everything?" he asked. "What if she cuts me out of her life after this? What if I lose the best thing that ever happened to me because of this?"

"You give her some time to calm down, and then you go to her and do whatever it takes to make it right," Kevin said.

"What if I can't make it right?" Javier asked quietly.

"I didn't say it would be easy," Kevin replied, "but you can do it. Give Alexis some credit. Have some faith in her, and in your relationship."

Meanwhile, Alexis sought refuge with Martha, and tearfully poured out the whole story. After ascertaining that Javier would be all right, Martha handed Alexis a box of tissues, then went and made her a cup of hot tea. "I'm not saying Javier was right," Martha said carefully as she set the tea in front of her granddaughter, "but I understand why he didn't tell you right away."

"Gram, I'm not sure he was going to tell me at all!" Alexis exclaimed. "What, did he think I wouldn't notice the bandages, or notice that he was favoring his left arm?"

"His instinct was to protect you," Martha pointed out. "Didn't he say that?"

"He didn't say it was his instinct, but yes, he said he was protecting me," Alexis admitted. "That kind of protection, I don't need. God, we're turning into Dad and Kate at their worst—Kate just walking out and leaving Dad, leaving all of us, trying to keep us safe from LokSat."

"Your father and Katherine worked that all out," Martha reminded Alexis. When Alexis opened her mouth to speak, Martha held up her hand to forestall whatever objection Alexis was about to make.

"I'm not saying Katherine was right to do what she did. She never felt safer than when your father had her back, so for her to cut him out like that, she had to be running on blind terror that completely obliterated her objectivity and everything she knew to be true. Thankfully, it was only temporary. But it does raise a larger question for you, kiddo. I watched your father go through this with Kate for years. But I never had to ask him what I'm about to ask you, because I only had to look at him to know his answer was and would always be yes.

"You know the realities of Javier's job. You saw what your father went through the first time Kate was shot, and what all of us went through when they were both shot earlier this year," Martha said. "If ever there was an acid test for a relationship, Alexis, this is it. Today it was a few minor knife wounds. But someday, it might be more serious than that. Someday it might be a knife wound that collapses his lung...or a bullet. Can you handle that, Alexis? Can you really handle that? Are you willing to take that risk, being involved with a man whose life is in danger literally every time he goes to work?"

The tears had been exhausted, but Martha's questions required very little conscious thought on Alexis's part, because, she realized, she had been thinking about this for months. She hadn't spent all those years watching her dad and Kate, worrying about her dad, then worrying about Kate, for nothing, and what they had all been through earlier in the year when both of them had been shot had been Alexis's crucible, her reckoning, even before she and Javier became a couple.

"Yes," Alexis said firmly, definitely, in a tone that brooked no arguments. "I won't live my life waiting for the sky to fall, Gram, but I won't live my life without Javier, either. At least, I don't want to live my life without him." She bit her lip then, looking more like Kate than she knew. "But if he can't trust me, if he can't let me in and be honest with me when something like this happens, that, I can't live with." Her phone binged then, signaling an incoming text message.

It was Javier. "Can we talk? In person, I mean."

Alexis texted him back. "Yes. Where and when?"

Javier replied instantly: "Where are you?"

Alexis: "At Gram's."

Javier: "On my way. Be there in 15 min."

Alexis: "Okay."

Alexis looked up from her phone and addressed her grandmother. "That was Javier. He wants to talk, and he said he'll be here in fifteen minutes. Is it okay if we talk here, Gram?"

"Yes," Martha replied. "Do you want me to stay?"

"I wouldn't feel right asking you to leave your own apartment," Alexis hedged.

"I think in this case, it would be better if the two of you talked alone," Martha replied. "Fortunately, I have a class to prepare for, and I can do that at my studio." She hugged Alexis and kissed her cheek. "Good luck, sweetheart." Then she gathered up her things and left.

Javier arrived ten minutes after Martha departed, still in his A-line tank top and black slacks. His shredded button-down shirt was nowhere in sight, but he was carrying a manila folder. Alexis let him in and asked, "Does it hurt much?"

"It's not too bad," he replied. "They gave me a prescription for some painkillers, but I don't think I really need them."

Alexis sat down on one end of Martha's couch, and Javier sat down on the other end of the couch. "I would have told you," he said. "I was just trying to figure out how best to break it to you. You went through so much after Castle and Beckett were shot earlier this year. I didn't want to trigger a panic attack or any flashbacks for you. Are you all right?" He looked at her anxiously, worriedly, fearful that despite his intentions, he had hurt her anyway, which he would have hated.

"When Kevin said you'd been stabbed, I thought I would throw up right then and there," Alexis said bluntly, meeting his gaze. "And I had to fight it off, fight off the panic attack, fight off the reminder that Kate's mom died when she was stabbed, and not let myself get thrown back to Dad and Kate's shooting last spring...but I did it. I did my deep breathing exercises, and I just concentrated on getting to you as fast as I could. I didn't have time to fall apart, because you needed me. At least, I believed you needed me."

"I did. I do," Javier said fervently.

"But the fact is, you're in danger every time you go to work, Javier," Alexis said matter-of-factly. Off his surprised look, she said, "I've been down this road with Dad and Kate. In the end, I had to trust that Kate would keep my dad safe so he could come home to me and Gram every night...and then when Kate became part of our family, I had to trust that she and Dad would keep each other safe and they'd both come home every night. And they did, with help from you and Kevin. And I trust Kevin to keep you safe. I'm sure Jenny trusts you to keep Kevin safe. Just because we haven't talked about this before doesn't mean I haven't thought about it."

"You've thought about it more than I have," Javier mused. "You've thought about it more than I gave you credit for, and that was wrong of me. One of the things I admire most about you is how intelligent you are. I should have known that you had given this some thought."

"A lot of thought," Alexis gently corrected him.

"A lot of thought. My instinct is always going to be to protect you, Alexis," Javier said earnestly. "I've never really dealt with this before. Not like Kevin and Jenny, or your dad and Beckett. When I realized that dirtbag had knifed me, after I cuffed him and read him his rights, and Ryan pointed out that my arm was all bloody, even before the pain and my injury registered with me, my first thought was you, and how you were going to take it, how you'd react...if this would be when you decided that you couldn't go through this again. Beckett's retired. She and Castle aren't at the 12th anymore. They're not putting their lives in danger every time they go to work anymore. And you put up with that for eight years, Alexis."

"It was good practice," Alexis replied. "I didn't know it then, but I know it now."

"Do I have any right to ask you to put up with it from me?" Javier asked, metaphorically holding his breath while he waited for her answer.

"Are you breaking up with me?" Alexis asked, unable to hide the upset on her face or in her voice.

"No!" Javier exclaimed firmly. "No! That's the last thing I want! No, that's not right—I don't want to break up with you at all." He moved closer to her on the couch, until they were sitting side by side. He set the manila folder on the coffee table and took Alexis's hands in his, his eyes boring intensely into hers. "I don't want to lose you over this, Lex. But it's my job. I like it, and I'm good at it, and I just can't walk away from the force."

"And I would never ask you to walk away from the force," Alexis replied earnestly. "I understand you wanting to protect me, but life is risk. Do you remember when I was kidnapped a few years ago?" At his nod, she continued, "I was grabbed and drugged and taken to Paris because an enemy of the grandfather I never knew, of the father my dad never knew, targeted me to get revenge on my dad's father. We never even knew the man's real name. I never even met him. I know how frantic Dad and Gram were then. Kate too, for that matter, and she and I weren't nearly as close then as we are now. But you can't live your life on 'maybe's and 'what if's. When trouble comes, when bad things happen, what matters is the people who are there to help you get through them.

"I've been very blessed, because even though Meredith is a complete flake, I've always had my dad and Gram to help me get through whatever life threw at me. And for the past eight years and counting, I've had Kate, and because of her, I met you...and Kevin and Jenny and Lanie and Alan and even Deputy Chief Gates. I'm not saying I won't worry, and I'm not saying I won't be scared if something happens to you, but I am saying that I'll be angry and hurt if you shut me out, if you're not honest with me, if you don't have enough faith in me and in our relationship to tell me when something like this happens." She gestured to his bandaged arm.

Javier smiled, part relief, part happiness. "You're a strong woman, Alexis Castle. I'm sorry I let myself forget that for even one moment. And I'm sorry I hurt you by not being the one to tell you myself that I'd gotten hurt on the job." He reached for the manila folder and handed it to her. "But I can promise you that's not a mistake I'll ever make again." Alexis looked questioningly at the manila folder. "Take a look," Javier said.

Alexis opened the folder and scanned the sheet of paper in it, her eyes going wide. "You designated me your primary emergency contact," she said, surprised, as she looked from the paper to Javier and back again.

"Ryan's been bumped down to second, but he swears he's okay with it, as long as you're okay with being the first person that gets called in case of an emergency involving me," Javier said.

Alexis looked up from the paper to Javier. "I'm more than okay with it," Alexis replied. "I mean..."

"I know what you mean," Javier replied.

She looked at him intently now. "Just...be careful. More than you already are, I mean."

"I will be," Javier pledged. Taking the folder out of Alexis's hands and replacing it on the coffee table, he said, "I have the most amazing, incredible reason in the world to be the most careful cop in the whole NYPD: you."

They kissed until they were interrupted by Martha saying, "Oh, good, everything's all right now. You're making out on my couch."

Alexis and Javier hastily pulled apart. "Gram," Alexis said, her voice an octave higher than normal. "You're back."

"Oh, don't mind me," Martha said as she breezed into the living room, headed toward the kitchen. "By the way, Javier, that's a lovely shade of lip gloss you're wearing."

Javier tried to surreptitiously wipe at his mouth with his hand, but gave up when Alexis handed him a tissue. "I'm glad to see you two worked this out," Martha said, returning with a glass of wine, which she held up to them in salute. "Nothing good comes of brooding for weeks or, worse, months. Always talk things out as soon as possible. It can only help."

"Speaking from personal experience, Martha?" Javier asked.

"Secondhand personal experience," Martha replied. "Lack of communication is one reason it took Richard and Katherine four years to get together."

"Oh yeah," Javier agreed. He looked at Alexis now. "I want to keep the lines of communication open between us all the time."

"Well, except for today's lapse, I think we're doing pretty well so far," Alexis said, threading her arm through his.

He smiled at her. "Yeah," he agreed, "I guess we are."


"You weren't this nervous when we filled out the paperwork to get our marriage license," Rick said.

"Because I didn't have any doubts at all that I wanted to marry you and spend the rest of my life as your wife," Kate said. "But I've been asking myself if this is really fair to the baby."

"Having a New York City Councilwoman for a mother would be unfair to Sweetpea?" Rick asked. "How?"

"How?" Kate echoed, laying the pen down and pushing away the paperwork in front of her at the dining room table.

"How," Rick repeated, sitting down next to her.

"When I'm at work, I won't be with the baby," Kate said.

"Which would be true of any job," Rick said, determined to play devil's advocate. "You don't have to do this, Kate."

"I'm really excited about being a mom, and I want to be the best mom I can," Kate said, "but I don't think I can be just a mom, Castle."

"You could never be just a mom, Kate," Rick replied.

"I'm serious, Rick."

"So am I. If you want to not work for a while, we can afford that. You'll rock Mommy and Me, and the playground, and Gymboree, and I already feel sorry for any toddler that dares to tell you no when you're in charge of the play group."

Kate bit her lip. "I want both," she said after a long moment. "I've worked since I was sixteen. I needed the time off after the shooting, obviously, and it was time for me to leave the police department. This feels like the logical next step. I need to learn about government firsthand instead of walking into a Senate seat right off the bat."

Rick leaned closer, putting an arm around Kate's shoulders. "How did you feel after you graduated from the academy and before you went out on your first patrol?" he asked.

"Head to toe adrenaline," Kate replied. "I was headstrong and overeager, determined to be the best officer in the whole NYPD. I still had a lot to learn, though. The academy was great, but out on the streets, for real...it was totally different. I'd had the procedures and protocols drilled into me at the academy, but putting them into practice, being able to think on my feet, fly by the seat of my pants when necessary when everything was going wrong because it almost never happened exactly the way it did at the academy...But I found my way. I had great mentors. Montgomery...Mike Royce… I learned so much from both of them. And in the end, when they gave me the ball, I ran with it. I like to think I became one of the best officers, one of the best detectives, on the force."

"You did," Rick assured her.

"You're incredibly biased," she pointed out.

"Even being biased, you did, Kate. You are, without question, one of the best detectives in the history of the NYPD," Rick insisted.

"So you think this is just jitters?" Kate asked.

"Do you?" Rick tossed the question back at her.

Kate sighed, scrubbing at her face with both hands. "I really wish my mom was here," she said softly. "She worked the whole time I was growing up. Maternity leave was a new thing when I was born, but I know she took it, and then went back to work after...I don't know, three months, four months? I wish I could ask her how she did it. And she did it so well, Rick. She didn't miss a school play or a softball game or anything really important."

"She must have had her jitters about leaving you in daycare, or with a baby-sitter, or your grandmother, whoever it was that watched you, while she was at work, before you started to school," Rick said.

"Dad would know," Kate said, "but I'm not ready to ask him yet. It's still so hard for him to talk about her. For the past several years, whenever we have talked about her, it's always been about her death and her case, and then in May, it was about seeing her again someday. I'm letting the good memories of her come back to me, but I don't know if he's there yet, and I don't want to hurt him by bringing it up to him." She rested a hand on her abdomen. "Maybe by the time we tell everybody about the baby, I'll be ready to ask him. Or at least before she, or he, is born." She shuffled the papers before picking up the pen again, then looked at Rick. "I want this, Rick. I want to run for City Council."

"You know I'll back your play, no matter what it is, Kate," Rick said earnestly.

"I might not even win," Kate said.

"You'll win," Rick said confidently. "When you take your case to the people of Manhattan during the campaign, you'll win in a landslide."

"And if I do win..." Kate said.

"Unless it's a closed meeting, Sweetpea and I can always sit in the gallery," Rick offered. "Do they have a gallery at City Council meetings?"

"I guess we're gonna find out," Kate replied. She finished filling out the page she'd been working on, then laid the pen down after signing her name at the bottom. "So, I file these to register with the Campaign Finance Board, and then I have to get a minimum of 450 signatures from the district I'd be representing in order to get on the ballot."

"We can definitely do that," Rick said. "If you want my help, that is."

"Babe, I wouldn't dream of doing this without you backing me up. You're my partner, in everything and every way," Kate said seriously.

Rick smiled then, the smile that never failed to make Kate's insides melt. "Oh!" he exclaimed. "Speaking of Sweetpea, I finally got the origin story on Popeye's Sweetpea. Actually, they didn't pronounce the 't,' so he was Swee'Pea. He was left on Popeye's doorstep in a box, and Popeye raised him as his son and officially adopted him in 2004."

"Maybe that will come up in Trivial Pursuit sometime," Kate mused.

"Well, for now, we're going to concentrate on our greatest joint project to date," he gently splayed his hand over her abdomen now, "and on getting you elected to the City Council."

Kate ran a hand through his hair, cupping the back of his head in her palm. "Sounds like a plan," she said before leaning in to meet his lips with hers and seal it with a kiss.


I looked it up, and that really is the backstory of Swee'Pea from Popeye.