Close Encounters 27

This was not turning out well. Damn it. They could not get into a gunfight in the middle of New York City.

With his son in the car. His wife.

Well, his wife was immensely capable and could hold her own - there was no one else he wanted standing next to him in a complicated dance like a shoot-out - but she was still not yet up to speed.

They might need speed.

Reese was driving. James was between them in the middle seat, exact center of them and the vehicle, incongruous amidst the battle-ready bodies all around him. Sasha was at James's feet in the only space available to her, and James kept kicking his feet to try to reach her.

"Not even a year old," he muttered, rubbing a hand down his face, darting his eyes to the window as they sped the short, short hundred yards to Jim's apartment. They could walk it; they had. Jim would be fine.

"Shut up, Castle," Kate growled at him. "I do not have the energy to combat guilt on top of the very real death threat hanging over us. So-"

"Guilt's on hold," he promised, reaching across the baby to grip her knee. "No guilt. We keep him safe, and there will be no guilt."

She nodded tightly, her eyes returning to the road, sentinel.

The SUV yanked around the corner, pulling up at the back of the building. Castle had his door open before they stopped, everything wordless, working with efficient supremacy. Reese manned the wheel, AK-47 strapped across his chest, James alone in the middle seat with Sasha staying put.

Beckett came up at his right side, strong side, her weapon drawn but at her thigh, their team of four spreading loosely out over the sidewalk.

His phone vibrated in the pocket of his army jacket. "Signal," he confirmed to her.

"All clear," she said, as if she had to echo it for it to be true.

He rapped his knuckles on the glass door of the back entrance, tapped out the pattern of code. After half a heartbeat, the team he'd sent on ahead - three guys - came out of the darkness (they'd shot out the bulb) and popped open the door.

"Jim," Castle called. Her father was shuffled forward and Kate gave him a fast hug, pushed him towards the back seat of the vehicle.

Reese was on their comm; he said something sharp to Beckett and Kate turned to Castle, three security personnel between them - too much, too much for that look in her eyes.

"They're pulling up out front," she croaked, nodding ahead of them.

And then he heard tires on pavement and snapped his head around. Fuck. "Back here too. Let's go, let's go. Now!"

Jim half-turned on the running board. "They said I'm supposed to take James, the dog, and get in the other car!"

"No time, we have no time-"

"Get in, Dad, right now." She came in on Castle's side, pushing her father into the back.

The advance team retreated to the building, melting away just like that; he fucking hoped it was to take up sniper positions, strategic places to provide cover for their getaway.

Castle thumped the back of Reese's seat when the doors shut. "All in, go, go, go."

The Land Rover was already churning pavement; it jumped forward in a burst of speed that had Beckett crashing into him.

Castle gripped her thigh, angling her in his lap; they were squeezed in tight. He glanced forward out the windshield and saw the SUV bearing down on them and his guts clenched.

"Oh, God," Kate husked.

He looked at her but she wasn't staring out the window. She was looking at their son.

James was laughing, absolutely delighted.

"Figures, Richard Castle," she growled. "He's your son."

"We cannot be in hot pursuit with him in here," Castle yelled.

"What other choice do we have?" she said, shoving him backwards with her elbow. Hunt was shotgun, which was a seriously stupid move now that they needed him hanging out a window and shooting back. The whole damn purpose for shotgun. "Hunt - somebody grab his belt."

Reese's arm shot out and gripped Hunt, but fuck, he was driving. The SUVs were making chase, but the Land Rover was much more maneuverable in the city.

"Castle-"

"I got it," he snapped back. He was leaning forward now and gripping Hunt as the man leaned out too far. Hunt fired twice at the vehicle closest as they rounded a corner. He was a fucking lousy shot. "Switch with me, Hunt. Right now. Switch."

"I can't make it back there," Hunt panted, slithering back inside the car, the heat pouring inside with him.

"Kate!"

She crawled forward, shaking with exhaustion herself already, but a surge of adrenaline had her gripping Hunt by the shirt and untangling him from the seatbelt even as Castle climbed over into the front seat.

Everyone got kicked. Sasha growled in her throat and jumped over the seat and into the back with Jim while James was giggling like this was just the best ride ever. Hunt finally slumped unconscious, half over the center console. The two security agents in back with Jim were trying to help her, and instead she crawled to the very back seat and let them move forward and the whole fucking car was playing musical chairs.

She ended up directly behind James's seat, Castle now a whole two rows ahead of her, and she slid her arm down the inside of the baby's car seat, reassuring herself of him. He leaned his head against her arm; she could feel him giggling, that desperate kind of laughter he had when they tickled him too much.

Yeah, they all were feeling it.

"Beckett!"

"Back here," she called out, lifting her head to meet Castle's eyes. He was up front and loading the fucking enormous over-the-shoulder rifle.

"No," yelled. "Up here where I can get to you."

"Let them get Hunt-"

"I said no." He went half out of the window.

She ignored him, gestured to the two security agents to finish getting Hunt situated in the seat. One did crawl back, leaving his partner to deal, and she sighed and gave in, slithered over the middle seat again.

"Mama!"

"Yeah, wolf, this is all so hilarious."

"Reese, fucking hell, hold still."

"Dada!"

"He's not angry, not really," Kate said, leaning in close and brushing her lips over her son's forehead. So damn surreal. The car hurtling through the streets. She needed her fucking seat belt. Oh, God. It just - Castle needed his seat belt on. They needed to be safe, safe; this couldn't be happening.

He was right. No high speed chases with their son in the car. It made everything seem infinitely more house-of-cards precious.

The gun burst to life with a boom that made her jump, but James clapped his hands, utterly delighted with the show. She hunched close to him, her own weapon in the holster at her thigh, her eyes on the back windshield.

She had an idea.

Kate leaned forward, grabbed for Castle's belt - oops, his crotch. Got his attention. He ducked back inside the car, eyebrow raised, hair raked by the wind, his scruff of a beard like a dark shadow at his jaw. "You rang?"

She pressed her lips together, glanced to Reese. "Drive for the cabin. The woods."

"No, we're not leading them-"

"It's in my mom's family's name," she interrupted, cutting her eyes to Castle. "The Houghtons."

"The fucking Houghtons - are you fucking kidding me?" Reese spluttered, shooting them both a horrified look.

Yeah, sometimes she was too. Her Aunt Theresa, fuck-

"Beckett. The cabin isn't tenable."

"But the road is," she said quickly. "The switchback."

"Oh, hell," he husked. She saw that he knew exactly what she was thinking. But he turned to Reese, already pulling up the cabin on the internal GPS. "Reese. New destination."

They were going to make their stand.

The switchback was a hairpin turn that he and Beckett liked to fuck with on their drive to and from the cabin.

Well, without James in the car. It was a nice, sedate thrill. A roller coaster of precision timing.

Jim Beckett looked grim in the backseat, though Kate kept telling him to put his head down, keep his head down. The dog had crept forward to be close to James again. Castle tried to look confident, but the switchback driven by someone who didn't know that road in the dark could be seriously problematic.

He got off another burst of gunfire as they raced for the tunnel, aiming a little high (evening in New York, fuck, don't hit anyone), Reese expertly maneuvering their Land Rover. The second security team had fallen back and finally gotten to their own car - it had been right outside Jim's building - and they were going to catch up with them on the road to the cabin.

"Kate," he called back, checking his gun's ammo load.

"Yeah."

He looked over his shoulder. She was pressed up against the carseat, the dog half in her lap; James was playing with the ends of her hair, smiling. That oral gel had to be leaking drugs into his bloodstream, had to. Why the fuck was James so happy?

Well, Kate looked good, flushed and awake and electrified. He felt it too, the way his blood sang in his veins. James had the same blood, whether it was modified or not; he was their son. And yeah, something about it - felt good.

"Are you up to driving?" he said. "You and Reese switch out?"

"Sir," Reese clipped.

He put his hand on Reese's shoulder. "You're going to be driving the other car with my son and his grandfather. You hear me?"

"I can do it," Kate spoke up. "I'll drive it. You and me in here, Castle. That's it."

"And me."

Castle glanced over to Colin Hunt with a raised eyebrow, assessing the man's condition. Slumped back, blood spotting the shirt over the bandage. "Hell, no."

"Okay," she said.

"Kate," he gritted out, glaring at her. She cut her eyes to James.

Fuck. Okay, no, he did not trust Hunt in any kind of position of custody over his son. Shit.

"I'm going with you, Castle," Hunt said, sitting up a little straighter. But he had eyes for Beckett.

Well, fucking hell. "Fine," Castle said. "This is going down fast. You don't hustle, you get left in the road."

"Rick-"

"It will go like this," he said louder, including Jim and the two security agents now. "The boy, Jim, you three, Reese driving the second team's car. Everyone in that car will already be out, holding their positions. You take that car, you take my son, you head to the original location."

"Yes, sir," chorused from the team. Jim Beckett looked stone-faced, but he wasn't talking against it.

"Hunt, with me and Beckett. We draw them off. The whole group. If they don't all follow this car, this car alone, then we will end it."

The car was silent. No shots were being fired at them, no shots had been fired at them. They were the ones doing the shooting. They were the ones desperate enough.

Diane Jolin could not get her hands on Kate.

"Beckett drives," he said then, sinking back in the seat. "Beckett has the wheel on this; we follow her lead."

If it came down to it; Beckett would continue the chase as quarry while he and Hunt were dropped off to make ambush.

Jolin would not reach his wife.

They met up with the second car two miles before the switchback. The transfer was fast. Castle unloaded James himself, the entire carseat pulled out of the back, and hustled the boy across to the SUV.

Sasha had refused to get out of the car; he couldn't waste time insisting. They didn't even have her leash.

Kate stayed with the Land Rover, crawling into the driver's seat, the dog going with her.

The back door to the other team's SUV was open and waiting; Castle refused to say good-bye. This was not good-bye. This was a delay, an obstacle to be overcome. He buckled James into the SUV, good and tight, and he brushed his hand over the boy's face.

"Be good, James Beckett," he said roughly.

Jim was belted in already; he reached out and snagged Castle by the arm. "Don't let Kate do something stupid."

"No," Castle said, shaking his head. "There is nothing stupid to be done. We will be at the rendezvous to meet you."

Jim sat back; Castle jumped out of the SUV. The Land Rover was already pulling out, causing him to take it up to a run. He caught the doorframe of the passenger side, hauled himself in even as Kate stomped on the gas. Sasha was in the floorboards at his feet, her eyes glowing red in the night.

Neither of them watched the SUV disappear down the access road. Their eyes stayed front and center as Castle wrestled the door closed even while Beckett barreled down the highway in the dark.

She flipped the headlights back on and the double yellow lines flared to life before them, a ribbon out into space.

"Hunt okay?" she said.

He turned his head to look. Hunt flashed him a thumbs up, his face pale in the darkness. "He's telling me a-ok, but I'm not believing it."

"Fuck you, big brother."

A cracked silence, broken and strange, alternate reality, and then Kate gasped on a laugh, helplessly.

Castle's jaw worked but there was something in it, yeah. "Blood will out," he said instead.

"That's the first time you've acknowledged my existence," Hunt muttered.

"It's just the first in your hearing," he shot back. "And if you don't bleed out inside my car, you little bastard, there might be more coming."

"Gasp."

Kate giggled. Fuck, she was not doing good if she was that punchy. Castle reached out and squeezed the back of her neck and she stiffened up, clutched the wheel tighter.

"Just get through this for me, babe. Just do this for me and we are home free."

"I know," she said.

"I am not writing you out, you understand?"

Her eyes flashed fast to his. "I'm not either."

Good.

Suddenly the road was filled with the echoing sounds of an engine - a powerful one, at least another hemi. The trees reverberated it back to them. Castle turned to look and in that instant, the entire back windshield blew out spectacularly.

Beckett cursed as the explosion rocked the Land Rover sideways and fishtailed it along the highway. Castle was caught in a rain of broken glass, but he got up on his knees with Reese's left-behind AK-47, aimed past Hunt's head.

His brother. His wife. His dog.

Fucking hell.

"I thought you said it was bulletproof glass," Kate was yelling at him. "You said-"

"It is. It was," he shouted back. The high speed wind whipping through the back window, the roaring of the engine in pursuit, sounds bouncing around inside the vehicle. "It was. I have no idea what the fuck that was. Hunt? You're on Kate."

"I got her back," Hunt said, already wrapping the loose seat belt around and around his wrist to steady him.

He rose on his knees as well, facing backwards just like Castle, putting his body between the car behind them and Beckett's seat. The driver had to be protected.

Castle nodded grimly and put his elbow on the windowsill of the passenger door, brought the AK-47 up and out.

Another percussive round went off somewhere over his head, shattering his senses; his own gun fired with his reflexive pull of the trigger. Beckett was struggling to keep the vehicle straight on the road and he could barely hang on.

The switchback would come at any moment. He laid down ground fire, aiming low and purposefully, the rear car swerving and veering and dropping back.

"We're coming up on it now!" she shouted.

Fuck, they needed more space between them. It would have to do. He ducked back inside. "Hunt, cover me."

The man began firing, indiscriminately, just shooting out the back of Castle's fucking car, but he couldn't care right now. He dug the over-the-shoulder out of the duffle in the floorboard and fitted it up against his neck, snug, tight, sighting down the range-finder.

"Steady as you can, sweetheart."

"Do my best."

He leaned out, precarious like this, nothing at all to hold on to, but he had to get far enough out the window for his right shoulder to sight the car behind them. Another percussive went off, but it was flashbang this time; and it dazed his vision something fierce, he shook his head, trying to clear his ears, his eyes.

"Fuck, fuck," Beckett was chanting. The car swerved. He cursed and felt himself sliding right out the window.

Only to be caught at the last second by Colin Hunt.

"Don't go running off now, big brother," the man husked, his body flung over half the front seat just to get to Castle. The two of them dropped back inside; Castle felt blood pressing against him where Colin was.

"Shit, Castle, Castle-"

"I'm okay. I'm okay."

"You're bleeding."

"Eyes on the road, Beckett."

"We have thirty seconds," she choked out. "I made the first curve. Coming up on the second."

Another percussive, this time the car rocked wildly and they all were thrown apart.

"Get in the back, Colin," he said tightly. "It's time to do this." He got up on his knees in the seat, braced his feet as best he could in the floorboards and then he turned to his wife. "Gun it, Kate. As much power as you can. I'm gonna blow shit up."

The back tires skidded as she hugged the line, centrifugal force taking them. She went with it, used the forces she had, made the dangerous descent through the second tight curve of the switchback.

"It's gonna roll," Hunt gasped.

"Not with Kate," her husband said grimly.

It didn't roll.

They made it onto third leg of the road at insane speed and they approached the bare place in the trees where, if you looked, you could see the road you had just left behind, the second car approaching that final curve, and slowing, hopefully.

Jolin had to slow or they couldn't do this.

"Castle!" she warned.

"Ready."

She stomped on the brakes and the car skidded wildly but the Rover was fucking excellent and they halted with a bone clattering jerk.

She turned her head and saw Castle sliding out the passenger window, not even bothering with the door as he set up his sights for the rocket launcher. She jerked on her seat belt, yanking open the driver's door, her heart racing, her hands fumbling.

She snagged the dog under the collar and yanked to make Sasha follow her.

"Go, go, go," she yelled to Hunt.

They couldn't - could not - be in that car when Castle shot the rocket launcher.

That was the whole point. They had to be clear.

Hunt still hadn't exited when Kate and the dog got clear, Sasha running off into the woods, no leash, and Kate had to run back to the car to yank open the back door. Hunt fell to the pavement, a tumble of limbs, and she bent over him, hooked her arm under his shoulder.

"You have to fucking move. You have to move. The Land Rover is gonna get the blowback."

"Fuck," Colin croaked. He couldn't seem to stand.

Castle couldn't choose when; he had to fire when the vehicle appeared on the switchback just above them. Because of the incline, if they didn't get the shot then, on the road above, the SUV would be upon them before they could get off a shot at Jolin oncoming.

"Get clear!" Castle shouted. "Fire!"

Fuck.

She dragged Colin away; she had to fucking torque his arm getting him moving. And then she felt the fierce expulsion of exhaust and flame from the bazooka as they staggered across the road.

They had nearly made it. They had nearly made it when the force of the rocket's exhaust picked up the Land Rover, and it exploded.

Castle waited the half a breath to be sure, but the fiery cloud on the road above them was confirmation.

Target destroyed.

He dumped the modified RPG tube, faintly horrified at how his hands were shaking, and he turned to look for his team. His wife.

As he had known, the blast effect to the rear had been sizable.

The Land Rover was burning, and not where it had been.

"Beckett!" His heart was a hard thing in his throat. She would never hear him through the angry rage of the flames eating the engine block, but he shouted her name again, running in a wide loop around the hulking Rover.

"Beckett, answer me!"

He crossed the road, the pavement sticky with the heat of the fire, felt the itch at his back where the RPG had gotten him as well. Singed at the very least. Always the fucking problem with those black market over-the-shoulders; sometimes they were shoddily made. Sometimes the missile had degraded.

"Beckett!"

He pulled up short when he got to the trees, tried to think. If they'd been in the road, force of the blast would have thrown them clear.

Into the woods.

Fuck. Fuck, Kate-

"Castle."

His head whipped around, but the smoke from the burning car was roiling here, thickening even as he dashed through the trees. "Beckett. Talk to me."

"Here." She sounded faint. Her voice was bouncing against the tree trunks. The heat was intense. A stand of trees had caught fire, caught ablaze by gasoline in the Rover's explosion.

"Beckett!" he shouted, panic trying to get a foothold in his guts.

Suddenly she appeared in the smoke like a fucking vision, running crookedly away from him, a ghost with a dog at her side.

"Kate!" he screamed.

She jerked and turned, searching, saw him, and he was already jumping a fallen trunk and crashing into her, picking her up off her feet in sheer, dizzying relief.

"Kate, God, you okay, are you hurt-"

"It's Colin. It's Colin-" she croaked, her body twisting away from him, untangling.

He followed her jagged run back through the enveloping smoke, watched in alarm as the trees grew closer, their tops touched with flame. Sasha had disappeared somewhere ahead of them. "Kate, we need to move."

"He's unconscious. He's bleeding badly. I can't get him up."

"Faster, Kate."

He was crowding her back to get her moving, but she jerked to a stop and he crashed into her. Castle reached for her to keep her from falling and managed to land with his ribs against a tree, Kate cocooned in his arms. Her back felt slick with something.

"Here, he's here," she gasped, already slithering out of his grip and dropping to her knees.

Castle followed her down and finally saw him. Colin Hunt had a gash across his forehead that was muddied with grass and detritus, but that was a good thing - slow the bleeding. The stitches in his side had no doubt opened up, bleeding weakly, but he was breathing.

"I'll carry him," Castle told her, elbowing Kate aside. "Check yourself. I thought-"

"It's his blood," she husked.

"Check," he growled, slinging Hunt's deadweight over his shoulder. Fuck, this guy was heavy.

He glanced at her and saw Kate had finally paused to take inventory of her own condition; her hands peeled up her shirt and fucking hell-

"Oh."

"Shit, Kate-"

"It's okay. I'm okay. It's a scratch."

It wasn't a fucking scratch, but she'd said that in Mayak, Russia too. She'd survive, but the faster he got them to the rendezvous, the better.

He rose to his feet on a grunt, Colin Hunt like a fucking sack of golden potatoes, and tested his first step to be sure.

Solid.

"Beckett, hand."

She reached out for him, her eyes traveling fast over Colin Hunt, checking his condition, and she caught her finger in Castle's belt.

"You stay there," he said. "The explosion must have thrown you both-"

"I hit my head," she said quietly. "I know. It's not bad, but I'm dazed."

Well, fuck, direct assessment from Beckett in the field. She could be taught. "Thank you," he rasped. "Hang on to me unless the terrain gets rough. If you let go, you gotta keep talking so I know you're back there."

"I won't let go," she said.

"Then we have something of a hike."

"You don't want to check Jolin-"

"No," he said grimly. "I want us clear."

"Then lead on. I'll be right at your back."

The bypass access road where they had left the other security team's SUV connected to the switchback further down. When she had been planning this in her head and filling in Reese on the idea, she'd been thinking about the bypass in terms of driving time.

But it was a fucking long walk, even cutting straight through the trees. Sasha appeared at the limit of their vision every now and then, but the wolf was in her, and the fire in the trees made it impossible for the dog to come back to them.

Sasha would be fine so long as she kept coming back to keep them in sight. And the further they got from the explosion, the better she'd be.

Kate's head was throbbing now, her side burned. Castle had to be straining even though super, a load like Colin Hunt across his back couldn't be easy no matter how many damn shots he'd had.

"You okay?" she asked him.

"Fine."

"The RPG get you?"

"Little bit."

Shit. That's what it was. Why he was holding himself so awkwardly. Hunt's body was no doubt rubbing him raw where the rocket had burned his skin.

"Castle, we can stop for a second and reposition."

"Do you need to stop?"

No, but he did. "I need to pick bark out of my side."

Castle halted immediately, head swiveling back to her. She saw the slice of discomfort behind his eyes and knew she'd chosen correctly.

"You take your shirt off and use it to pad your shoulder," she told him. Plus it would mean pulling the material off the burned places, letting her get a chance to see the damage, clean cotton out of his wounds.

"Maybe. Your side-"

"I'll let you look at it, but I'm just gonna pick out the biggest chunks. It's irritated."

Castle squatted down and carefully eased Colin to the forest floor by his arm. Since her husband was already kneeling, she put her hand to the top of his head and made him stay, gently tucked her fingers under his collar.

"Shit," she breathed. "Castle."

"It hurts but it will heal."

"If it gets infected-"

"My wounds don't get infected," he sighed. "Now let me take my shirt off."

She kept her fingers under his collar to help, keep the material from snapping back against the angry, raw skin. His back flexed, the shirt yanked off in one smooth movement.

"Fold it, maybe," she directed. He gave her a pointed look, already wadding up his shirt before she could finish her sentence.

She huffed and plucked at the hem of her own shirt, glanced down at the place where the force of her landing had broken a branch off in her side. Sort of. That sounded worse than it looked. Crumbled bark and shredded wood fiber, but she just had to keep her hands steady enough to get at it.

"How's Colin?" she asked.

"He's living still."

They couldn't do much in the way of help with those stitches. The security vehicle had a first aid kit that would work, but Castle had explained that the island was limited facilities - theirs alone, deserted, once a former CIA training ground.

Good for isolation, bad for medical care. He'd been planning on installing a lab and sickbay for the team - for James, his unspoken promise - but he hadn't gotten that far.

"Let me do that," he sighed at her. She dropped her hands and turned her side to him. His warm fingers came to her hip, thumb against her bare skin like a caress. She closed her eyes, let her shoulders slump, let herself be marooned by the exhaustion.

He touched her carefully, teased debris from the wound with such a gentle touch that she didn't even feel it.

A squeeze of her thigh let her know he was done. She opened her eyes and tilted her head down, sweat-damp and dirty and soot-singed, and he was grinning up at her.

"We made it," he husked.

"So far. We didn't check to be sure Jolin was taken out."

"She was taken out. I don't know how she could have survived that-"

"If she wasn't in the car-"

"Then we'll hear of it," he said easily. "Espo and Ry are monitoring everything. They'll be up there with the first responders. We'll get confirmation one way or another. Right now, we need to make the rendezvous."

She believed him. She did. "It was my idea," she said finally. "I'm the one."

"But I pulled the trigger," Castle said solemnly. "As everything with us, Kate. Teamwork. Partners. Ride or die."

His eyes were smoke-colored, the same silver-blue as their son. He leaned forward and pressed his lips to the exposed skin of her abdomen, a hand at her spine, the other at her hip, reverent.

She sucked in a breath and dragged her fingers through his hair. Her husband, her partner in everything, life and death, all their stories. "Ride or die," she choked out.

They were crew. They were in this.

He touched another kiss to her hip. "Now let me scoop up my annoying little brother and we'll get going."