To everyone affected by Hurricane Harvey, Hurricane Irma, and the wildfires, stay safe!
Thank you to all who are reading, and those of you kind enough to take the time to leave reviews, and the guests who leave reviews. Knowing that you like my interpretation of the Castle family's story means a lot to me. Your enthusiasm for this story is truly a gift to me.
The rest of August sped by. Kate dove into campaigning head first, with Rick and the rest of their family right beside her. Lily even made appearances at a few of Kate's campaign events, the smaller ones, since Kate didn't want to either overwhelm Lily or expose her to a bunch of strangers.
Everyone spent the Labor Day weekend at the Hamptons house. Rick, Kate, and Lily had the luxury of getting away a day earlier than everyone else, and Lily, almost four months old and increasingly curious about the world around her, was staying awake for longer periods of time during the day and sleeping longer during the night.
After arriving early Friday afternoon, Lily got her first real exposure to the pool. Kate and Rick took turns with her in the water. Lily, already a big fan of bathtime, screeched, squealed, and babbled happily as she splashed her hands and kicked her feet in the water, all while held in the secure arms of either her mommy or her daddy. "Looks like we have a water baby," Rick said after Lily let loose with a long, excited string of baby babble, punctuated by her splashing him in the face.
Kate beamed. "I think you're right," she said. "Lily, do you want to swim with Mommy for a while?" They were in the shallow end of the pool, of course, and Lily watched Kate move through the water towards Lily and Rick, fascinated. Kate took Lily from Rick, and Lily happily resumed her splashing and kicking.
Lily was not as big a fan of the sand, however, when they went out on the beach. The tiny grains of sand irritated her, making her fuss as she shook her hands and kicked her feet, trying to remove the offensive grains of sand, and when her brow knit in frustration and anger the same way Kate's brow knit when she was frustrated and angry, Rick said, "Uh oh. Lily's about to go mini-Detective Beckett in the box with an uncooperative suspect here. She's already got the look."
Kate picked Lily up and did her best to brush off as much of the sand that was stuck to the soles of her tiny feet and in between her toes as possible. "Okay, sweetie, okay, we'll get that awful sand off of you." She looked at Rick, then back at Lily. "I looked like this?"
"Way more intimidating," Rick said as he hurriedly gathered up the beach blankets and the few toys he had brought out. "But she absolutely looked like you." His arms full of beach supplies, he said brightly, as they headed for the house, "Maybe this means you won't wear bikinis when you get older. What do you say, Sweetpea?"
Kate rolled her eyes as they entered the house. "'She loves the pool. Of course she's going to wear bikinis when she gets older."
Rick groaned as he dropped the beach gear in a corner of the foyer. "At least I'll have your Uncle Kevin and Uncle Javi to back me up, because I'm not about to have a pack of rabid teenage boys sniffing around you in a bikini someday, Lily."
Kate laughed. "That's a long way off, babe," she said. They climbed the stairs and headed to the master suite, where Rick hurried ahead to the en suite bathroom to run a bath for Lily while Kate pulled a turquoise blue onesie printed with smiling gray-and-pink elephants that had been a gift from her father and a fresh diaper from Lily's diaper bag, laying them out on the bed before carrying Lily into the bathroom, undressing her, and settling her in the tub. Kate and Rick both knelt at the tub, working together to bathe Lily, who resumed her splashing once she was clean of all the sand, and the sticky sunscreen residue, that had been bothering her so much. Kate quickly washed Lily's hair, and then Rick had a towel at the ready, which he wrapped Lily in after Kate lifted the clean baby from the tub and handed her off to her daddy.
After Lily was dressed, and Kate had combed her hair, she was much more content. They knew, then, that Lily loved the pool, but was not yet ready for the beach.
Jim, Martha, Alexis, and Javier made it up on Friday night, while the Ryans, Lanie and Alan, and the Gateses arrived late Saturday morning. Lanie and Alan, just recently back from their honeymoon in Bora Bora, still had that newlywed glow about them. They grilled lunch on Saturday, went out to dinner as a big group on Saturday night, spent Sunday splitting the time between the pool and the beach (except for Rick, Kate, and Lily, who stuck to the pool), and Jim and Martha baby-sat Lily, Nick, and Sarah Grace on Sunday night while all the couples had a Date Night.
Everyone was in agreement, though, that the epic Super Soaker battle of Labor Day 2017 was the highlight of the weekend, the game beginning with people splitting off into teams—Jim and Martha wisely deciding to stay inside with the napping Lily and Nick Ryan as Kate, Rick, Alexis, Javier, Kevin, Jenny, Sarah Grace, Lanie, Alan, Victoria, and Gerald ran all over the deck and the yard spraying each other, having split off into pairs, except for the Ryans, who were a trio. Sarah Grace squealed delightedly when she got her Uncle Javi right in the face with her Super Soaker, and Kevin paid for doubling over with laughter and dropping his own Super Soaker when Javi spluttered and spat out water, then shook himself like a dog coming in from the rain, and Alexis and Javi both opened up on Kevin, which led to Jenny, with able assistance from Sarah Grace, opening up on Alexis and Javi.
After the Ryans, Javi and Alexis had emptied their Super Soakers, everyone filled up again for another round, this one a free-for-all that left everyone soaked and laughing. Victoria took both pride and pleasure in getting the jump on Ryan and Esposito and blasting them but good with her Super Soaker.
Having learned their lesson regarding Lily, Rick and Kate had a CD of city sounds made before coming up to the Hamptons again for the Labor Day weekend, and it worked very well in helping Lily sleep.
Upon returning to the city after the Labor Day weekend, Kate's campaign kicked into high gear, as she faced a debate with the other candidates for City Council, and also reconnected with Madison, who started coming around to Kate's campaign office, showing up at as many of Kate's campaign events as she could, and starting to spend time at the Castle family loft.
Alexis started law school at Columbia and was soon up to her eyebrows in the stresses and the neverending reams of paper generated by a first-year law student, but she carved out time for her parents, grandmother and sister, and time for Javier.
Javier saw or spoke on the phone with Matias once a week every week. Alexis went with him one Sunday afternoon to have a late lunch with Matias.
Lanie and Alan happily settled into married life.
Lily turned four months old and started to babble more, trying to have conversations when people talked to her, even though she could only make a few sort-of-intelligible sounds. She was also fascinated with textures, and most of her books and toys went into her mouth at some point, kicking the vigilance factor among her family up quite a few notches.
Life moved forward for everyone. And with Kate's place on the November ballot secured, things were about to get a lot busier, as her campaign headed into its home stretch.
The ballroom of the Soho Grand Hotel, located in Manhattan's City Council District 1, was decked out with red, white, and blue balloons, bunting, and streamers, and a giant KATE BECKETT: FOR A GREATER, SAFER NEW YORK CITY banner hanging at the front of the room. A major campaign event was about to take place.
Madison Queller, decked out in a white t-shirt that said KATE BECKETT FOR NEW YORK CITY COUNCIL in red and blue letters over her skinny jeans and strappy sandals, had assigned herself as the unofficial greeter at the doors, as people arrived in a fairly steady stream. Kate had honed her stump speech over the past several months, never sounding canned or rehearsed, although Madison knew that Kate rehearsed as much as she could. She had her talking points down, and couldn't have kept the passion out of her voice if she had tried. People responded to Kate because she wasn't just another politician, but more importantly, because she connected to them on their level, and her background as a decorated NYPD homicide detective and precinct captain was unparalleled. She was committed to serving District 1 in the same manner that she had served the city when she was with the NYPD, still focused on justice, but in a broader way, with crime prevention being one of the platforms on which she was running. She had been doing her research, and, if elected, she would have to serve on three of the City Council's committees. Fire and Criminal Justice Services was a given, but it was more difficult for her to narrow the remaining field of committees to only two. Standards and Ethics...Women's Issues...Juvenile Justice...Public Safety...Civil Rights...State and Federal Legislation… It was a real dilemma for Kate, but one that she was putting off, for the time being, until she was certain she won the District 1 seat in early November.
Rick and Kate were talking on the stage, away from the podium and microphone, of course. Kate's dad was there as well, wearing a t-shirt that matched Madison's as well as one of the straw boater hats and a campaign button. Castle's mom was at their place with Lily. Alexis and her boyfriend Javier, a detective who used to work with Kate and Castle, was there, as were his partner Kevin and Kevin's wife Jenny, and Lanie the medical examiner and her new husband Alan, and all of them were also wearing KATE BECKETT FOR NEW YORK CITY COUNCIL t-shirts. The only other person wearing a boater besides Madison and Jim Beckett was Kevin.
Volunteers milled around, handing out buttons and boaters and offering t-shirts and miniature pennants on sticks that proclaimed Kate's candidacy.
Madison had been talking to an elderly couple, the Goldbergs, spry and active in their mid-70s who had supported Kate's run for City Council since her first campaign event, when she noticed a brooding man, probably in his late forties, wearing a navy blue suit and a tie of alternating navy blue and sky blue stripes, standing against the wall just inside the entrance to the ballroom with his hands on his hips, surveying the scene while trying to look like he wasn't surveying the scene. Even if his body language hadn't been screaming, "Stay away from me," he still would have been the most attractive-looking man Madison had ever seen, with his dark hair beginning to gray at the temples, brown eyes, and chiseled jaw.
But Madison hadn't gotten where she was in her life without being persistent. So she confidently strode over to the man after the Goldbergs had gone on their way and said, "Can I interest you in a t-shirt, pennant, hat, or button?"
The man looked surprised that she had come up to him and spoken to him. "No, thank you," he said briskly, all business. Madison stood there regarding him, and it was only years of practice that kept him from squirming under her intensive gaze. "Okay, a button," he relented a moment later. She noticed the American flag pin he wore on the lapel of his suit.
"I don't think I've seen you at any of Kate's campaign events before now," Madison continued.
"This is the first one I've made it to," the man admitted. "Been busy. Work."
"What do you do?" Madison asked.
"I'm with Homeland Security," the man replied. "I worked a case with Beckett and Castle years ago. I've been keeping up with them in the news ever since. Finally got a free night, and knew there'd be a campaign event here, so I thought I'd come down."
Madison smiled, but the man's face remained an inscrutable mask. "I go back a long time with Kate. We were best friends in high school, and I was involved in a case she and Castle worked years ago too, though not the same one as you, because I would remember you if we had met before now. I recently reconnected with her and Castle. I'm Madison Queller." She held out her hand for the man to shake.
His grip was firm but not crushing. He shook her hand as he replied, "Agent Mark Fallon, Department of Homeland Security."
"Well, Agent Fallon," Madison said, "why don't you come with me? I'll get you that button, and you can say hello to Kate and Castle."
Agent Fallon regarded Madison thoughtfully, tilting his head for a few seconds before saying, "If you insist."
"Oh, I insist," Madison said seriously. "Just follow me."
Mark followed Madison through the growing throng of people. He recognized the two detectives who had been part of Beckett's team years ago, although he couldn't recall their names. "Hey, Kate, Castle, I found a blast from your past!" Madison announced when they were within earshot of the duo.
"Should we be worried?" Rick cracked.
"He says he's with Homeland Security, so I don't think so," Madison replied.
Kate and Rick looked and were surprised to see the man standing behind Madison. "Agent Fallon!" Kate exclaimed. "This is an unexpected surprise."
Mark smiled, one of his rare, genuine smiles, the briefest flash of even white teeth before resuming his stern, forbidding demeanor. "At least it's not for the same reason as last time," he said, proffering his hand to first Kate and then Castle. "Congratulations on your marriage, your baby, and the City Council run. Government can use people like you, Captain Beckett, although you're not a Captain anymore," he said. Off their twin looks of shock as they shook hands all around, he said, "I read the papers. I've kept up with you guys down through the years." He gave just the barest hint of a sly smile. "I knew after we pulled you two out of that deep freeze, it would only be a matter of time before you figured it out. I'm glad you did."
Kate and Rick looked at each other. "So are we," Kate said.
"Most definitely," Rick agreed.
Madison watched Agent Fallon's...Mark's, she corrected herself...interaction with Kate and Castle with great interest. He was obviously a complex man; so stern and forbidding on the surface, clearly someone that you crossed at your own peril, not entirely comfortable in his own skin, but his smiles and congratulations for Kate and Castle were sincere, and carried an unmistakable underlying current of warmth.
And though his smiles were brief, probably only measurable in microseconds, that inscrutable mask of his slipped, for those microseconds, and Madison got a glimpse of the man behind the mask. Her eagle eyes noticed he wore no wedding ring. Of course, that didn't mean there wasn't a girlfriend, or even a boyfriend, but her gut instinct was that Agent Mark Fallon was single and unattached. And if that gut instinct was right, Madison thought, maybe she could get the buttoned-up Homeland Security Agent to loosen up a bit on his downtime.
Kate recognized the look in Madison's eyes, but a cursory glance at Agent Fallon's left hand answered Kate's question: clearly, there wasn't anyone in his life. She was certain of it, and not only because of the lack of a wedding ring. She had been in his shoes once. She knew that kind of lonely solitude all too well, and was grateful every day that she had finally been able to leave it behind her for good. Sixteen years later, Mark Fallon clearly wasn't there yet. And Kate understood that. If not for Rick, she'd still be treading the same path Mark Fallon was on. On principle, Kate didn't object to the possibility of Madison coaxing Mark Fallon into a date (realistically, Kate knew that Madison would be the one doing the asking, and the pursuing). Stopping Madison from going into Pepe Le Pew mode was the key here. Not that Madison wouldn't take "no" for an answer, if that was the answer Mark chose to give, but Madison needed some crucial background information here. Was it butting in? Well, yes. But Kate didn't want Madison to get hurt, especially if Mark Fallon was doing what Kate did during her own solitary years, and having brief relationships that couldn't even really be called relationships because they went nowhere. She lusted after or sometimes even liked, the men, but she went in each time knowing that nothing would ultimately come of those liaisons.
Madison excused herself then, returning a moment later with a campaign button. "Here you go," she said, handing the button to Agent Fallon with her brightest, most flirtatious smile.
He nodded once, shortly, curtly. "Thank you," he said, affixing the button to the lapel of his suit jacket, directly under his American flag pin.
Madison's smile lost its flirtatious quality and dimmed just enough for Kate to notice, and thankfully, Alexis, Javi, Kevin, and Jenny chose that moment to approach. She recovered admirably by asking, "So, what's that you were saying about pulling Kate and Castle out of a deep freeze? I've never heard that story."
Javi and Kevin also remembered Agent Fallon, and after re-introducing themselves, and introducing Alexis and Jenny to Fallon, Javi and Kevin told the story of how they and Fallon had found Beckett and Castle mildly hypothermic, unconscious and wrapped in each other's arms, on that case years ago. "They weren't just wrapped up together like that to keep warm, we all knew that," Kevin said. Lanie and Alan, Victoria and Gerald, and Jim Beckett had all drifted over to join the group by the time Kevin got to that part.
"Yeah, it just took them a while longer to admit it to each other," Javi added.
Kate pulled Madison aside while Rick recounted his disarming of the dirty bomb by yanking out all the wires at the same time when time had run out, thereby saving the city, to the others, and said, "Maddie, about Agent Fallon-"
"Do you know his deal?" Madison asked interestedly, excitedly.
"Madison, he's a 9/11 widower," Kate said quietly, seriously, so only Madison could hear her. "His wife was in one of the Twin Towers that day. They were on the phone together when it collapsed."
Madison's heart twisted painfully in her chest as she looked over at Mark Fallon. Well, that certainly explained things. "Oh my god," Madison whispered.
"I'm not telling you not to have coffee with the man," Kate continued, "and I can't say for certain that there isn't anyone else, but I just don't want you to get hurt. And don't chase after him like you're Pepe Le Pew and he's a black cat that got a white stripe of shoe polish or paint down his back."
"Hey, I have matured somewhat since high school," Madison said defensively. "But I get your point." She looked at Agent Mark Fallon speculatively. Yes, he was the most attractive-looking man she had ever seen. Complex, too. Madison Queller did not date the equivalent of male bimbos...anymore. He had been forever scarred by an unthinkable tragedy. Some people chose not to move on completely after losing someone they loved. Madison and Kate had lost touch originally after Kate's mother's funeral, but Madison, while not knowing the nitty gritty details, knew that Kate had hunkered down and not completely committed herself to moving forward with her own life until Castle came into it many years later.
She wasn't looking to be Mark Fallon's Castle.
But a cup of coffee didn't mean she was looking for a lifetime commitment from the man.
The event began then, and Kate addressed the crowd to thunderous ovations and roars of approval, vowing to work as hard for the residents of New York City as a Councilwoman as she had as a cop if they elected her. Madison had one ear on Kate's speech, and the rest of her attention was focused on Mark Fallon. He was not a loud, enthusiastic participant among the crowd, instead listening intently to every word Kate said, and saving his applause for the end of her speech.
Before the event broke up, Madison found Mark Fallon again in the crowd. He had noticed her as soon as he had walked into the ballroom; he wasn't completely dead inside, and only a dead man would have failed to notice Madison Queller.
She was attractive, and he knew she was flirting with him. He hadn't flirted in so long, he had forgotten how flirting even went, and women usually took one look at the stoic, brusque, all-business, hands-off demeanor he projected as a Homeland Security Agent and didn't bother trying to make any kind of personal connection with him. Many flirted, as Madison had, but some of them were much more obvious about it, and all of them shut down completely and quickly after very few preliminaries. Madison hadn't entirely shut down. She didn't seem put off by the emotional suit of armor he wore. She reminded him of a flashing yellow traffic light: proceed with caution.
He hadn't really been out there, emotionally speaking, since the early '90s. And he honestly had no idea if he even wanted to take that kind of risk again with anyone, ever.
But what had come unexpectedly to him was the flutter of feeling, there and gone in the time it takes to blink once, or snap your fingers, he got when Madison had smiled at him with her eyes bright as she handed him a KATE BECKETT FOR CITY COUNCIL campaign button.
It was the first time he had felt anything like that since August 4, 1992, the first time he and Kim met.
So with the event breaking up around them, the crush of people heading for the exits, in the middle of the crowd, when Madison found him again, holding a t-shirt that matched the one she was wearing in one hand, and what looked like a business card in the other, he planted his feet so as not to be swept away by the crush of people all around. "I guessed at the size," she said, holding out the t-shirt. "Extra large?"
"That'll work," he replied, taking the shirt from her and draping it over one shoulder. "Thank you."
Then she extended her other hand, the one that held her business card. "If you'd like to get a cup of coffee sometime, or you're looking for a restaurant reservation, I own Q3..." she began.
And he saw it then, just the slightest hint of uncertainty, as if she wasn't sure this was the best idea in the world, but she saw more reasons to do it than reasons not to do it.
Kim was gone, and she was never coming back. He knew that all too painfully well. It had been sixteen years since he had lost her, an anniversary that loomed large for him every year. It had taken ten years for him to stop getting blackout drunk on September 11. It had been five years since he had taken to drinking a toast to Kim and their life together with a single glass of the finest single malt Scotch he could find, and marking the anniversary that way, along with a visit to Kim's grave with a bouquet of peonies, her favorite flower; his in-laws had always been grateful that she had been found, that they had been able to give her a proper burial, which is something so many September 11 survivors did not get with their loved ones. He had never been able to look at it quite that way. With or without her body, with or without an actual grave, she was gone, and she was never coming back, and that wouldn't change.
Before he could analyze it too closely, or overthink it, he accepted her business card, tucked it into his shirt pocket, and removed his wallet from his hip pocket, flipping it open and pulling out a business card of his own. Then he removed a pen from the breast pocket of his suit jacket, and scribbled his personal cell number on the blank back of his own business card before extending it to her. "My personal number's on the back," he said. "Direct office extension is on the front. My schedule can be crazy, but I do drink coffee."
"Same here," Madison replied. "I mean, I also have a crazy schedule, and I also drink coffee." She paused a beat, looking at his personal number. "Is that a-" she started to say.
"It's an eight," he said. "Sorry. My handwriting's not the best."
"An eight. Got it," Madison said. "So, I'll call you in a few days?"
"Sure, if you want to," Mark said.
"I want to," Madison replied.
Kate and Rick watched the exchange between Madison and Mark Fallon, Kate admiring Madison's obvious restraint. "Madison's trying to pick up Mark Fallon?" Rick said.
"I don't know if she's so much picking him up as just reaching out to him," Kate mused. "And just reaching out can make all the difference in the life of someone who's been shattered by grief for a long time." After Madison and Mark Fallon left, separately, and they had said their good nights to everyone else, Kate put her arm through Rick's. "Let's go home, babe. Lily might still be awake when we get there, and I want to read Pat the Bunny to her if she is. That's her favorite lately."
"Sweetpea does love to give the bunny a rub," Rick reflected as they left the ballroom, and when they got home, after Martha said her good nights, they read Lily Pat the Bunny, and she listened as Mommy read to her about Paul and Judy, giving the bunny a good rub. By the time they got to the part where Lily was supposed to feel Daddy's scratchy face in the book, she was too tired to do what she usually did, which was feel Rick's scratchy face before feeling the scratchy face of the daddy in the book. She reached up to Rick's jaw for one sleepy pat before snuggling down against his chest and falling fast asleep. Kate finished the book quietly, and Lily was sound asleep by then.
After he and Kate settled Lily in her crib with "good night"s and "I love you"s, and her night light on, when they returned to their own bedroom and got ready for bed, as they settled themselves beneath the covers, Kate turned out the lights and then snuggled down against Rick's chest in the same spot Lily had occupied just a short time ago. She felt Rick's grin and lifted her head to look at him, finding him grinning like a jack-o-lantern into the darkness.
"I've been waiting to say it," he said eagerly.
"To say what?" Kate asked, although she had a pretty good idea what Rick was about to say.
Rick gestured to his chest, to the area right over his heart, grinned at Kate, and said, "Like mother, like daughter."
She and Lily did both love to snuggle up with Rick and lay their cheeks against his chest, right over his beating heart. So the only response Kate could make to this was to lean in and kiss her husband before settling herself in his arms, her cheek against his chest, right over his heart once more, to sleep.
