Heartlines

a story by Sandiane Carter and chezchuckles

Timeline Note: This is the third story in the Beth Beckett Universe, which began with Ghost on the Canvas and continued with Stop Haunting Me. This story falls four months after Kate Beckett gets shot in the cemetery, and eight months after Alex Conrad shows up in season three. The idea is that the seasons' episodes progress pretty much the same, just with the added twist of a sister for Kate (which helped to result in a relationship with Castle). We hope this clears up any confusion.

Castle stares at the murder board as if he's hoping to get it to move by the sole power of his mind.

That's actually not so far from the truth.

He wants to solve this, or at least find a lead, something to make up for his lateness this morning. But it's not just that. He also wants the case over so that Kate's mind is free, unburdened, if – when – he decides to...

Propose.

His knees give a little at the thought; he leans against Beckett's desk, makes it look as natural as he can. Solve the case first, Rick, and then you can start picturing her in a white dress.

Well, actually, she must be surrounded by white gowns right now. Looking for Beth's perfect dress, of course – but maybe she's using this as an excuse, maybe she's also letting her fingers linger on the white silk or satin, letting herself imagine...

Oh, wow. A few words from her dad and now look at him. Daydreaming about their wedding day.

He might want to ask her opinion first.

With a ruthless smile at himself, Rick focuses back on the board, his eyes darting from the timeline to the suspects, trying to find that Kate-like state of calm concentration. Kate-zen. Which is stupid, of course, because it doesn't really work for him.

The murderboard doesn't speak to him; the story does. Spinning theory with Kate.

He sighs, shifts, starts going over the things they know about their victim. He's recapping the woman's family history when the loud ding of the elevator breaks his focus. He involuntarily looks up; surprise freezes him for a second before he moves forward.

"Alex," he greets jovially. "What are you doing here?"

The groom-to-be smiles back at him, a little nervous, looking like he doesn't know what to do with his hands. He buries them in his pockets, jerks them out, twists them together.

O...kay.

"Can I – show you something?" Alex asks, glancing around secretively like he's carrying a bomb or an indecent amount of money. Knowing him, Castle highly doubts that either is true.

"Sure," he says, waving him towards the break room. He's in need of some coffee, anyway.

As he handles the cups, starts the machine, he can see Alex fidgeting from the corner of his eye. What is the man so anxious about? Is he getting cold feet?

If he is, Castle is probably not the best person to come to for advice.

Okay, not true. His previous marriages may have left him somewhat wary, but he knows Kate has nothing, nothing to do with Meredith or Gina. It's almost like they don't come from the same planet.

He trusts Kate. Trusts her like he's never trusted another human being in his life.

Apart maybe from his mother.

He won't get cold feet. And he doesn't think Alex would either; the man looks at Beth like she is some goddess who has condescended to share his unworthy mortal life. (It would make Castle laugh, if he could be completely sure he never looks at Kate the same way).

"There," Alex says brusquely, holding a white, rectangular box to him.

It looks like a jewellery case, but larger than you would expect for a ring. Rick takes it, flicks it open: two wedding bands are sagely tucked in a dark blue velvet cushion, exquisite in their simplicity. Diamond and white gold.

He remains silent for a second, powerless against the way the sight tugs violently at his heart, at how much he wants this for himself; apparently, a second is more than Conrad can handle.

"Do you think they're nice? I think they're nice – I think she'll probably love them – but I wasn't sure, wasn't sure if she'd want to come with me, and so I didn't mean to buy them, I wanted to wait, but really I couldn't resist when I saw them, because I could just, see Beth with this on her finger, and so, do you think – do you think she'll be mad?"

He stops suddenly to gulp down some air, then *finally* seems to notice the wide grin that has spread over Castle's face. His shoulders slump and he runs a hand over his face, laughs reluctantly.

"I'm ridiculous, aren't I?"

Rick pats his upper arm, merciful.

"We've all been there. They're gorgeous," he says, nodding at the rings. "I'm sure she'll love them. Besides, Beth likes surprises, doesn't she?"

Unlike Kate. Yeah. He's not making the mistake of buying Kate a ring that she hasn't seen.

"She does," Alex sighs in relief. "Yes. Yeah. Right."

The younger man moves to the coffee machine, probably in need of some liquid comfort, and Castle is left staring at the wedding bands. Really, really nice. He's vaguely jealous.

He should probably close the box, but something stronger grabs ahold of him, opens in his chest; he reaches for the woman's band, unearths it gently. He can imagine sliding something like this onto Kate's finger, imagine the look she will level on him –

As if warned by a sixth sense, alerted to her presence, he suddenly looks up. Kate is standing in the door frame of the break room and it takes him a second to realize that it's really her, that she's really here. Not just a vision straight from his imagination.

She's not looking at him. Her eyes are on the ring he's holding, riveted, transfixed, and oh – oh. He cannot breathe; he's awed, amazed, and this can't even compare to the shock of her father's words this morning.

It's there, all over her face, for everyone to see. For him. The dancing flame of joy, of tremulous hope.

She wants it.

He doesn't know what to say. And yet he has to say something – can't let her believe –

"Alex dropped by to show me the wedding bands he bought," he quickly explains, his throat so tight it's a wonder he can speak at all.

She looks into his eyes then; he can see the effort she makes to tuck it all back in.

"Oh," she says softly, and he would never have thought a single syllable could hold so much disappointment.

He hears Alex move behind his back, and then the young man comes forward eagerly.

"Kate, hey! Oh, this is wonderful. I didn't think you'd be back already. You can give me your opinion – not that I don't value yours, Rick..."

"Yeah, yeah," Castle grumbles, pretending to be upset.

"Actually," Alex says, as if struck by a luminous idea, and turns to Kate. "Maybe you could try it on? I know Beth's size, but the woman at the store said this particular brand was sometimes a little different –"

Horror rises in Rick. She thought, if for a split second, that the ring was for her, and he's had to let her down, and now Alex...

"No," he says firmly, exactly when she says, "Sure."

She and Alex give him a surprised look; he feels a little ridiculous. But surely... Kate holds out her hand, palm open, her face the very picture of calm and collected. Maybe he's wrong. Maybe she doesn't mind.

He drops the wedding band in her hand, his heart missing a few beats as he watches her slip it on her slender finger. He wants to be the one doing that.

Wants it so badly that it hurts.

"It should be perfect," she tells Alex with a smile, "it's slightly too large for me, but I think all of Beth's rings are. Her fingers are just a touch bigger than mine."

The young writer beams at her like a man who has just been rescued from a terrible death; Castle's fondness for Conrad resurfaces suddenly. Alex takes the box back from him, offers it to Kate so that she can put the ring back.

She glances at Rick as she slowly takes it off, and he can't mistake that look, encouragement and impatience rolled into one. Everything in him soars to see it, tries to tear through his chest and make its way to her.

Just you wait, Kate Beckett.

Just you wait.

She spends too long staring at the murder board that night, but Castle is with her, and something just clicks, like it always does when they're together. She puts a call in to Judge Markaway for a warrant; she gets everything set up for tomorrow morning.

The takedown occurs at five a.m. and Castle is right at her back, not even complaining about how he didn't get to finish his coffee. Problem is, her hands are shaking as she draws her weapon and chases their suspect.

In a back room of the warehouse (it's always a warehouse, isn't it?), the guy turns and pulls his gun, screaming at her to get back, get back, and all she can hear is the ringing in her ears of the sniper shot, the screaming; her hands won't cooperate.

Castle is at her back, sliding forward. "Stay back, Castle," she warns, but she can hear the crack in her voice.

Their suspect steps towards them, cocking his gun with deadly accuracy, and her own weapon falters.

Behind her, Castle creeps closer. "Take it easy, Kate."

Castle. No. She can't-

It takes a supreme force of will to raise her weapon, to aim, even as the flashback rolls around her.

"Take it easy. You've got this."

Just like every therapy session he dropped her off at, every time he helped ease her out of bed in those first few weeks, every small and excruciating recovery step forward - that mantra: You've got this.

That, more than anything, acts as an anchor. She brings up her stabilizing hand, narrows her eyes to focus past the too-bright sky in a cloudless cemetery.

"No one dies today," she growls. "You hear me? Put it down or I swear, I will drop you."

The flash of steel in her eyes, the grit in her voice must convince him, because he drops his weapon; it clatters across concrete. Esposito and Ryan are swarming in and collaring their suspect, and then Castle is at her back, not touching her, warmth and support and confidence radiating off of him and all she wants to do is crawl back into his bed and bury her face in shame.

But at least no one died today.

Kate's not sure how it happens, but she's the one who ends up with the baby.

Alex Conrad picked up his old college room mate and best man from the airport; James Robert Cash and his wife Shelby brought their 8 month old son with them. Then Beth had a 'quick' bridesmaid shopping trip since Kate was free after the arrest; they found and bought the dresses for Alexis, Kate, and Beth's room mate from France, Lucie. Then Beth picked up Lucie from the airport and everyone ended up back at the Castles' place - a central location Beth laughingly called it.

Rick ordered pasta and pizza from Celeste's, Alexis helped arrange the dining room table with extra chairs and a card table (Castle banned the use of his poker table), and then everyone was sitting around talking and laughing and passing the baby around.

Maybe it's because Kate is sitting next to the kid's mother, who seems thrilled to let someone else handle him, or maybe it's because the little one keeps trying to eat Alexis's hair (she sits to Kate's right), but Kate is the one holding him again.

His mother, Shelby, is a native of Mississippi and named for Shelby Foote. Even though she looks exhausted behind the careful makeup, she talks animatedly with Alex and her husband, James, each of them telling college stories. She hands Kate the bottle that James warmed in the microwave and now it looks like Kate is now feeding the baby too.

Baby J.R., as they're calling him (for James Robert Cash, Jr. which Kate finds atrocious), takes the formula eagerly and arches his back in Kate's arms, smacking his gums around the bottle, thumping it with his fists before grabbing it.

Alexis leans in and brushes her fingers over J.R.'s forehead, darting back when the baby releases the bottle and reaches for her hair. Kate laughs and adjusts the eight month old to her other arm, farther away from Alexis.

"He's cute. Look at that smile," Alexis coos.

He is cute. And his belly bowls out in his grey-striped footie pajamas; he keeps giving Kate these adorable, whole-face smiles which make his blue eyes squint up. "Hey there, Jamie. Yeah, you like that name better, don't you?"

Alexis snorts and leans closer to Kate. "J.R. is cowboy-cool. Jamie? That's a girl's name."

"Look who's talking, oh, it's Ashley's girlfriend," Kate teases back, nudging the girl with a shoulder.

Alexis flushes but rolls her eyes.

"Oh no, not-uh, Alexis Castle. Can't roll your eyes at me. I invented that."

This time it gets a laugh out of the girl, and her bright eyes flash to Kate with something that she thinks might be relief and adoration both. "Jamie is also Rook's nickname, Kate. So that's kinda. . .weird."

"There is that." Kate sighs down at the baby, wondering again what she's supposed to do to help Alexis with her neediness, with the way she can't let go. Nothing seems to settle her anxiety.

As if to prove it, Alexis leans in and rests her cheek against Kate's shoulder, one hand coming up to stroke the baby's cheek as he sucks on his bottle. Kate glances over at her, but her face is hidden.

Kate's not a mother; she has no clue how she's supposed to make this right for Alexis.

At some point, everyone gets up for seconds or to refill their glasses, some cluster together to hear Lucie and Beth chatter in French, pulling Kate into their stories at random. Their positions all shift, moving around the table, moving into the living room, back to the kitchen. After awhile, Kate feels a warm hand at her neck and looks up to see Castle sitting down beside her.

Alexis has disappeared to join in a halting conversation in French, while Shelby and James and Alex try to make up crazy translations. Castle moves his chair into position so that he's blocking Kate's view, but the soft blue of his eyes is the only thing she needs to see.

"Hey," he whispers.

She glances down and J.R. is drifting to sleep, his little lashes brushing his cheeks, one tiny finger flicking back and forth slowly over the bottle.

"Kate-"

She looks up at him and her breath catches. Kate untangles an arm from around the baby and wraps her fingers around Castle's elbow. He draws in closer and brushes his lips across her mouth, a hot breath of need and desire.

"What are you thinking?" she whispers against his cheek.

"You are so beautiful."

Her throat closes up.

Lucie is hilarious; she slips into French whenever she gets excited and then Beth does the same, talking back to her, and then everyone will laugh at them. Except Kate, of course, who knows what they're saying. Castle glances over at her and she's free again; Shelby has taken the baby somewhere to change him.

While he's got the chance, he takes Kate by the hand and drags her towards his study, even as she shouts back to Beth in French, something that he swears is dirty. Alexis is giggling so hard it can't possibly be anything clean.

She stumbles after him into his office and catches herself by holding on to his arm, her face still turned back to the crowd in the living room. He waits until she's standing on her own, looking at him with a little bit of confusion and curiosity, running a hand through her hair.

Kate had a moment today, but she pulled out of it; she *is* healing. But he still has trouble getting that image out of his mind, her body dark on the green grass, the stain of blood against her white gloves, the light dimming in her eyes, the life leaving her body.

He's tried not to panic and freak out and cling to her these past few months. When she said she needed the solitude of her father's cabin for those first six weeks, he gave it to her. He showed up almost every day, of course, and often slept in the twin bed next to hers, but she spent a lot of time in the sun room, warmed by the light heating up the room and letting him rattle on about nothing beside her.

He couldn't write.

When he finally convinved her to recouperate at his place in the Hamptons, there was a lot of therapy sessions and behind closed doors crying, a lot of 'don't, Castle' and 'let me do this, Castle.'

He managed to finish the book and it's many edits in that short space of time. The book is due to hit the stores soon, but he's not sure how much he even likes it. As depressing a place as it was to be in his head those summer months, he's pretty certain that leaked out all over the page. Separation from Kate physically and emotionally equaled separation for Nikki and Rook.

But he's not sure he can keep his distance any more.

Watching her with the baby. . .

He still gets visions of their child, the one that never happened; it's hard to shake.

"Rick?" she says gently, and it pulls him back to the present.

"I have something I need to give you," he says, moving back around his desk and opening the bottom drawer.

Kate walks towards the desk, leans a hip against it. "Yeah?"

He pulls out the plastic bag, unfurls it. He can't look at her while he does this. He just. . .it's all he can do to reach inside and pull out the box.

He hears her ragged breath in and her fingers reach out to take it from him. The unopened pregnancy test she gave him almost a year ago.

"I'm cashing in, Kate." He has to pause to steady his hands against the desktop. "I want it now. With you. I want to see you holding our kids, our babies. Before it's too late. Before we don't have any time left and-"

"Castle," she murmurs.

"You said I'd know. You trusted me to know. And I know. I know we're ready. Kate-"

She traps his words with her mouth, her body leaning across the desk to meet his where it can, points of hot contact that knock him senseless. He feels her rise above him suddenly, realizes she's craweled up on his desktop on her knes, her hands cradling his face.

He breaks with a gasp, blinking hard, certain he was being rejected and dismissed only to now find her eyes brilliant and intense on his.

"I thought you were going to marry me first," she breathes.