Kate stared out the window of the limousine, trying not to fidget as the crazy world of midtown passed them by.
Rick couldn't help but notice the bouncing of his girlfriend's left knee, and rested his right hand on that knee in an attempt to keep the appendage still. "Hey!" he exclaimed quietly, "It's starting to feel like there's an earthquake going on in here...and not the good kind."
The physical contact shook Kate out of her reverie with a jolt. "Oh!" she exclaimed, blushing. "Sorry..."
"Why are you so nervous?" asked Rick. "You couldn't possibly look any more beautiful than you do right now..."
Kate leaned back in her seat, sighing as the limo moved all of six inches in the dense traffic. "When we watched the broadcast of the interview today, all I could think of was how much I talked, and how much I said..."
"I know!" Rick exclaimed in mock annoyance. "I mean, after you told Oprah that every theory I have starts out as a CIA conspiracy then *all* I could think of was how I'm going to walk into the precinct to find my chair covered in tinfoil and buried in Oliver Stone movies..."
Kate glared at him in response...but the annoyance couldn't quite consume her, and it was only a moment before they were chuckling together at his expense. Kate cupped Rick's face in her hands and leaned in to kiss her. Rick allowed their lips to meet for only the briefest of moments before taking her hands down to be held in his own. "Kate...I know I've made a lot of jokes over the years about why I created Nikki Heat, but do you know why Nikki became so incredibly popular?"
"This ought to be good..." Kate replied with a wry smirk.
Rick matched her smirk to show that her teasing wasn't getting to him. "Nikki Heat is *you*, Kate. When people read Nikki's story, they start to love you almost as much as I do. And now that they've seen a bit of the *real* you, Kate...they're only going to love you more."
Kate leaned in, kissing Rick gently, hoping the love and gratefulness for his words poured through their contact. When she opened her eyes to find her boyfriend gracing her with one of his overwhelming smiles, she knew the message was received. "Thank you," she whispered.
"You're welcome," Rick whispered back. He pulled back, never letting go of her hands...figuring that that moment was probably as good a time as any to bring up what had been on *his* mind. "Kate...uh, about the interview..."
"What about it?" asked Kate.
"Did you mean what you said to Oprah after the interview...about..."
Kate was still confused. "About what?"
"About letting Oprah interview us about your mother's case?"
"Oh," Kate mouthed without sound coming out.
Rick studied his girlfriend as silence filled the back seat of the limousine. The car moved a few more feet, and his face fell with every inch he thought she was stalling. "You were just saying that to get her off your back, weren't you?"
"I think I was at the time," Kate finally admitted. "The more I think about it, though..."
"The more you realize how powerful an ally someone like Oprah can be?"
Kate nodded. "The one thing people like Bracken fear is not people like me. It's people like *her* exposing what they've done."
Rick was sure he knew where she was going with this. "There *has* to be proof of Bracken's involvement out there somewhere. If there really was no proof, then they wouldn't be so desperately worried about you investigating the case."
Kate was in full agreement. "So, when we're ready to take these guys on full force, we find that evidence and we take it to Oprah."
Rick felt like he couldn't be prouder of his girlfriend than he was in that moment. "When *we're* ready?"
"When *we're* ready."
Rick pulled Kate into a fierce hug, pulling his head back only enough to pour all of his love into a passionate kiss as the car turned the corner toward beginning of the red carpet. Kate, though, started pulling away seconds after Rick's lips met hers. "Castle..." she warned, clearly growing in her annoyance, "I still have to look good on that red carpet, remember?"
Rick's smile was completely unapologetic. "Fine. But just know that the minute we get home..."
The roar of the crowd cut Kate off from any comment she was going to make in response. The door swung open, and a hand reached in to help Kate keep her balance as she stepped out of the car to a fresh round of cheering. An announcer's voice cut through the cacophony of noise that surrounded her. "Ladies and gentlemen, the creator of Nikki Heat, Richard Castle and her real-life inspiration, Kate Beckett!"
A fresh round of cheering rang through the air as Rick emerged from the limousine. The car drove away as Kate linked arms with her boyfriend and faced what was to come.
The entrance to a movie theater never looked so far away. Rick could feel his girlfriend tensing up around his arm, and he patted that arm with his other hand to show his support. "Ready?"
Kate drew in a deep breath, then let it out slowly, hoping the move would untangle the knot of nerves in her stomach. She tried to remind herself that she was there as Castle's arm candy; that the press were all looking for his sound bites and the crowd was only there looking for his autograph. After all, he was the famous one, right? Who'd want to talk to a homicide detective when Richard Castle was right there next to her?
It was then that she started to pick out individual voices in the crowd. They weren't calling out for Castle...
They were cheering for her.
"Kate!" "Kate you're so pretty!" "Kate who are you wearing?!" "Kate that dress is amazing!" "Kate, can I get your autograph?!" The more she listened, the more voices she heard calling her name. She looked to Rick in amazement, wanting to see if he could confirm that what she was hearing was actually *real*.
Rick's smile was a mixture of love, wonder and pride. He tilted his head toward the crowd. "You should go over and say hi," he suggested.
Kate turned fully toward the crowd, taking a couple of tentative steps in their direction. She was answered with a fresh wall of joyous sound giving her encouragement. As she approached, a dark-haired girl who couldn't have been older than fifteen thrust an autograph book and pen in her direction, her hope-filled look begging Kate to sign. It was a look Kate knew she couldn't refuse. As she took the pen and steadied the book, Kate commented, "you know, this is the first time anyone's asked me for my autograph..."
The teen's happiness overflowed in a typical teenage expression of joy, "Ohmigod, really?! No freakin' way! You are totally my *idol*! I'm applying to the academy as soon as I graduate! I want to be just like you..."
Kate was dumbfounded, as much by the girl's enthusiasm as her actual words. She handed the pen back...and was confronted by the girl's iPhone. "Can we take a picture together?" the girl asked. "Please?!" Kate nodded, turning so the girl could lean in toward her, putting them cheek-to-cheek in front of the camera. The screen clicked, and the girl gave her as enthusiastic a hug as she could without ruining Kate's hair or makeup. "Thank you so much!"
Kate nodded, giving the girl a warm smile as she faded back into the crowd. The cycle repeated itself in some variation over and over again as Kate grew in confidence, eventually signing autographs and posing for pictures with the crowd like she'd been doing it for years. Rick finally came over to 'rescue' his girlfriend with a teasing announcement to the crowd, "Sorry, folks...we don't want Kate to be too late for her movie, now do we?"
The cheers started to mix with a few boos as Rick escorted his girlfriend through the many reporters looking for sound bytes to air on the evening entertainment news shows. By the time the couple made it through the theater's revolving doors and into the pre-screening lobby reception, Kate was overwhelmed and energized at the same time. "Rick," she turned to her boyfriend, smiling, "I know I make fun of the whole celebrity part of your life, but how in the world did you do that every time you went out? Doing it once was *exhausting*..."
Rick smiled. "You get used to it after a while, just like anything else. And *you* were amazing out there, by the way..."
Kate's mind flashed back to the effusive praise she had gotten from the first girl she had signed an autograph for. She blushed at the memory. "I had always heard about how the books have been such good PR for the department, and how we needed people to see cops in a positive light for once, but until tonight...I never, ever thought that Nikki Heat might actually inspire someone to become a cop themselves."
"It makes a difference to know you're making a difference, doesn't it?" asked Rick, his smile growing even brighter.
It was a smile Kate finally felt comfortable sharing. "Yeah...it really does."
"Well, if it isn't my girl of the hour and her writer-boy arm candy..."
Kate broke away from her boyfriend to embrace her best friend. "Lanie," she exclaimed, looking her friend over from top to toe, "you look amazing..."
"Thank you," Lanie said with a smile. "It's so very nice to get out of my scrubs every once in a while."
Rick's curiosity quickly got the better of him. "Did you see the interview?"
Lanie glared at Rick like he had just made the world's dumbest comment. "Did I see the interview? What do you think could have possibly been important enough for me to miss it?" She then turned and gave her best friend a huge, supportive hug. "You were amazing, you know."
"Thanks, Lanie," said Kate as she accepted the hug. Out of the corner of her eye, Kate noticed Esposito coming up to them with Ryan and Jenny. "Whoa, Espo," Kate teased, pulling away from her friend's embrace, "you mean to tell me you couldn't snag a date for a major red carpet movie premiere..."
Esposito responded simply by snaking an arm around the waist of Kate's best friend. "Who said I couldn't get a date..." he countered with a cat-that-ate-the-canary grin while Lanie leaned teasingly into her ex-boyfriend's embrace.
Kate's heart leapt as she watched the interactions of the couple that she was *hoping* was re-emerging in front of her. "Have fun, tonight, you two...don't do anything we wouldn't do."
"That goes double for you two, then..." Lanie countered, smiling.
Natalie Rhodes entered the room, bringing the group's playful banter to a halt. She went straight to Kate, greeting her with a European set of air-kisses. "Detective Beckett! It's so good to see you again!"
"Nice to see you too, Natalie," Beckett responded in kind. It was only then that she noticed slight air of tension surrounding the actress. "Everything ok?"
"Oh, fine, fine..." Natalie replied, blowing off Kate's question with a smile. "I just hate watching myself onscreen, that's all. I hope I've done you justice..."
"I'm sure you're performance will be spectacular," Kate reassured her.
Natalie's attention was distracted by the approach of a few of her fellow actors, and she waved over not just the actors, but a photographer as well. "Oh, hey, guys!" she greeted the actors, "Get over here..." Natalie turned and addressed the group of cops. "While we were filming, the guys here went on and on about how much fun they had when they got a chance to help you with a case when you were in LA. After I told them that I had met the cops their characters were modeled after, we all agreed that when we came here for the New York premiere we each wanted to get pictures taken with our real cop counterparts. You guys up for it?"
The group readily agreed, and the photographer jumped in right away, first taking a giant group shot, then breaking up the group into each individual pairing and snapping away. Finally only one man was left...a tall, older black gentleman with a tough, yet seductively deep bass voice. He kissed Kate's hand chivalrously before introducing himself. "Detective Beckett? My name is Julian Jameson. I had the honor of playing Captain Montrose in the movie."
The cops' faces fell as they remembered the reason why Julian was the odd man out. The change in the group's energy wasn't lost on the man. "Detective," he began, not quite letting go of Kate's hand, "I understand the man that my character was modeled after was something of a mentor to you?"
Kate's voice choked up slightly as she nodded. "Yes...yes he was."
"It is also my understanding that Captain...Montgomery was killed in the line of duty?" When Kate nodded, Julian continued, "then, Detective, I would be honored to take a picture with you and your on-screen counterpart."
Kate started to nod...then, out of the corner of her eye, she noticed an older woman and two teenage girls watching the group's interactions from a distance. "I'll do you one better, Mr. Jameson," Kate added with a sly smile. "Evelyn!"
The woman came over at Kate's call, and embraced Kate as soon as they were in a close enough physical distance to each other. When they broke their embrace, Kate made the introductions. "Julian Jameson, I'd like to introduce you to Evelyn Montgomery, Captain Roy Montgomery's widow."
Julian's eyes widened just slightly at the recognition of his real-life counterpart's name, and he smiled, bowing deeply before kissing Evelyn's hand. "It is truly an honor to meet you, Mrs. Montgomery. My real-life counterpart obviously had *exquisite* taste in women."
Evelyn blushed at the compliment. "It...it's very nice to meet you," she responded nervously.
Kate swore she could just make out the sound of Evelyn's daughters giggling loudly behind her as Julian took pictures with Evelyn. Julian then stunned just about everyone in the group of cops and actors as he offered his arm to the captain's widow. "Would you do me the honor of joining me for the rest of the evening, Evelyn?"
Evelyn face lit up at the idea of having such a handsome escort for the evening, and she looped her arm around his, accepting the offer. This set off another round of loud giggling from the girls as the group watched Julian leave with his date. "I gotta admit, honey," Ryan commented to his wife, "I did *not* see that coming..."
The few people who could comment all had the same thought running through their heads: "Me neither..."
The flashing of the lights in the lobby forced everyone's attentions back to the present. Rick offered his arm to his girlfriend, imitating Julian's earlier gesture. "Would you do me the honor of joining me for the screening, Detective Beckett?"
Kate smiled warmly as she looped her arm through her boyfriend's. "Always."
Well, that's it, folks! Thank you so much for overwhelming love and support you guys have given me throughout this story. It literally would not be the story it became without the favorites, follows, and *especially* comments encouraging me to come back to it. So don't forget to leave one last note! :-)
