A/N: I dislike long author's notes...here we go.
Disclaimer: Not mine.
He called her Kate now.
That was different. At first, she didn't even really think about it. He had called her Kate before, sometimes, but it was usually in moments that mattered. He called her Kate when he needed her to listen or he needed to pull her back in from the edge. When she heard him say Kate, she knew to close her eyes, shake her head and focus because something wasn't right. Now, he called her Kate all the time and it made things confusing.
It was oddly intimate, hearing her name from his lips. It made her want to shiver, but of course she didn't. They didn't do things like that. There was a line that wasn't be crossed. But now, he called her Kate and the line felt blurry. She wanted to take two steps back, look into his eyes and ask why he was doing this.
How she felt about him…it was confusing. She cared for him, of course, and, maybe sometimes, she wondered if they could had more. But…with his track record, it was hard for her to believe the things that he said to her. She'd heard the pretty words he's said to other women, met both of his ex-wives. She couldn't let herself be just another conquest for the infamous Rick Castle. He'd changed since they'd met, but sometimes she still saw him, the playboy she'd met in the interrogation room who tried to get his way by charming her.
And he kept on charming her. Even now, after bullets and years and ex-wives and Doctor-Motorcycle-Boys, he could still make her blush like no one else. It was a secret that she held close and would never tell him, but she knew, sometimes, that he had to know. He had to know what he did to her, try as she might to hide it.
She wasn't like the other women that he dated. She wasn't a glittery piece of plastic with bleached-out hair. She was visceral and raw and real. She was made of flesh, blood and bone. She meant the words that she said. She held her emotions in. Managed to pull her heart back into her chest when any other woman would have left it hanging from her sleeve.
Her bullet wound still hurt sometimes. She'd run her fingers over it absently, a line of puckered and white flesh. The skin didn't hurt so much as the inside did. For weeks after she left the hospital, she'd wake up clawing at her chest, sweating and screaming. When her father asked her what was wrong, she'd just shake her head and keep her tears inside. The truth was, she could still feel it, the hot metal ripping through her body. Her body, falling, falling, falling…
She didn't want to talk about it. So she lied, told them all that she didn't remember. She wished that she didn't remember. Lying on the grass, feeling blood running from her body and hearing distant screams. She could still see Castle's eyes when she closed hers. Hear his words, terrified and desperate in her ears. "Stay with me Kate…I love your, Kate. I love you."
God.
It was too much to think about sometimes. He loved her. Since the summer before last, since he'd left her with her heart in her hands to go to the Hamptons with Gina, she'd always dismissed his flirting as just that. It was just his personality…sometimes, she didn't think he could help it. Since that day, when he'd hurt her heart, she'd armored herself against the likes of Richard Castle. He could smile at her and make her laugh and tell her pretty, perfect words, but that was it. He didn't mean it and she knew that now. There was no point in looking deeper because there was no deeper. There was just him, the playboy writer, and her, the steel-hearted cop. She took it at face value this time and kept a wall between them.
Of course, it slipped. It was always going to slip. And he was there to find it way through the cracks in her icy facade. When the triple killer made an unwelcome reappearance and she thought she'd lost him…she'd had terrible flashbacks to the time she'd come home to find a detective waiting and her mother dead. She couldn't lose anyone that she cared about like that ever again. She almost cried tears of joy when she found him okay.
Then, there was the time that her mother's killer peered above the surface once again and she grabbed his hand tighter as they circled the rabbit hole. And…there was that kiss. Sometimes, she'd dream about it. Feel his lips, soft and demanding, pressed up against hers. Hear the tiny moan that had slipped unbidden from between her lips. He had saved her life that night.
A few weeks later, they'd been trapped in a freezer together and close to death. He'd held her as she slipped further and further away. And, in that moment, she almost told him everything. She almost said that she loved him, maybe. But, the world closed in too fast and they were back in their pre-cast roles before she could say the words that mattered. He'd saved her life again, defusing a bomb with a guess.
Then, they were a thousand miles gone from the city and from everyone. He looked into her eyes and she could swear that he knew everything about her in that moment. He inched closer to her and she closer to him, but the enormity of the situation started to press on her and she left him there. But, maybe, it could work. So she peered out from her room and saw his door closing and she cursed the fact that she was just a few seconds too late.
But, then there was her mother's case. And him holding her against the side of a car, begging her not to leave. And the Captain dying. And that bullet ravaging her already fragile heart.
And he loved her. He loved her, he loved her, he loved her.
He had been ready to own up to his confession, she had seen it in his eyes. Instead, she'd shut him down with a lie and a refusal to let him in. Her wall was still intact. Despite all the things the bullet had shattered, the wall still stood strong. She had seen the disappointment in his eyes. He wanted her to remember, to tell him that she loved him too.
She couldn't. She wasn't that brave.
The truth was important. It had been her mother's favorite line. All that mattered was the truth. And as she had traced the web of lies that surrounded her murder, she found a tragic sense of irony. Truth had gotten her mother killed and it had given Kate a run for her money.
After almost two months, and the bullet wound had still hurt. She had continued to lie, to tell everyone who asked that she didn't remember it, couldn't feel the metal tear through her fragile body. Though it wasn't the original reason for her lie, not having to talk about the feeling of hot metal ripping through her body was an unforeseen bonus. The real reason that she wasn't telling the truth, however, all came down to Rick Castle.
He had pleaded with her to stay, said her name, told her that he loved her. No matter how much time passed, the words set her on edge. They made her feel impossibly light and heavy at the same time. He loved her. Richard Castle loved her.
She hadn't seen him since waking up in the hospital, hadn't seen him since breaking up with Josh, hadn't seen him since Heat Rises came out. It was wrong. All of it was so wrong, but she couldn't handle it anymore. She couldn't face him. She couldn't tell him that she wasn't strong enough to tell him she loved him back.
But she did. She knew she did and that's why all of this was so, so hard. If she didn't, maybe she could tell him to walk away. Maybe she could have stayed with Josh and been ordinary. But, he was too much to her. She had never felt what she felt for him about anyone. Not ever.
So she had sat in her father's cabin day after day, hugging pillows and eating only when made to. She had cried when she thought of her mother, she had cried when she thought of Montgomery, she had cried when she thought of Castle and she had cried her wounds hurt. She thought of the truth sometimes and found herself wondering when everything had gotten so complicated. It had never seemed so hard before, finding the truth. She lived on it, lived on bringing voices to those who had been robbed of them.
But, when it came down to it, she never could tell the truth when it counted. Not anymore. Not since he started calling her Kate.
For now, there was nothing else to do but to pretend that she didn't know why. Pretend that she didn't hear the difference in his voice when he called her by her first name. But, she heard it. She knew why. He loved her. He loved her and, some days, she loved him too. But, she couldn't tell him.
Her heart was battered and bruised.
"I remember everything."
And she wasn't brave enough to risk hurting it again.
A/N: So...there you have it. Review and all that.