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Prologue: This is a sequel to my earlier Season Four story, "Enlightenment," which picks up 6 months after that one left off. Search FFN for my name or the title and give it a read if you haven't yet, with or without the M-rated "Enlightenment Extra" chapters. This will make much more sense that way. This is not a post-finale fic, in case you might be looking for something different.

And hey, I love feedback. Any feedback. It makes me write faster. I'm in this for the summer, if you'll come along for the ride. Next chapter includes Halloween Caskettness. : )

"Castle! Get down!"

Three bullets ricocheted off an I-beam a few feet to Kate's left.

She had dived behind some sort of forklift when the first shot had rung out. She twisted around to check on her team's positions when she landed. Castle had been too far behind her to make it to her hiding spot, but he didn't seem to realize that as he tried to dash after her.

Thankfully, the rest of her team was right behind him. Esposito's hand shot forward and grabbed the back of his vest, and Castle disappeared behind a crate. She could just hear their whispered argument from her cover.

"Hey! She's up there by herself!"

"Yeah, and unlike you, Castle, she's a cop who knows better than to turn herself into target practice for a trigger-happy shooter in a chemical warehouse."

Kate scanned the room, trying to spot their guy. This was not the best locale for a shootout. The warehouse was full of nasty combustibles—chemicals, fertilizer, drums of industrial grade ethanol. She chanced revealing her position to try to bait the gunman.

"Come on, Mason, you don't want to light this place up. You'd go up with it!"

She was hoping he'd answer so she could track his voice, but no such luck. He might be psychotic, but he was smarter than your average Manhattan murder suspect. He knew exactly what was in this building, being one of the chemists from the company that stocked it.

She just hoped he didn't have his own death wish.

"Eleven-o'clock." Espo's whisper carried just far enough for her to pick up on it.

She shifted to sneak a peek over the chasis of the forklift.

A shot sparked off the metal cage behind the seat, dangerously close to the fuel tank and her forehead.

But the angle of the shot helped her spot him, with just the edge of his jacket peeking out from behind a large drum. No chance she was shooting at him with the unmistakable red stamp "DANGER - FLAMMABLE" looking back at her. She heard the unmistakable click of a magazine snapping into place as Mason reloaded.

In that instant, she realized she also had to move. For all she knew, his next shot would be at the gas tank on the lift, trying to get rid of one pursuer in hopes of escaping in the confusion of the blast.

She had a clear space behind her and to the right-about 15 feet to the nearest stack of crates. She steeled herself and sprang out from her cover, just as all hell broke loose.

She concentrated on her dive and roll as Mason's next shot went off. The bullet must have hit home, because by the time she hit the ground, the blast from the exploding tank had deafened her ears. She felt a wave of heat wash over her, but her momentum had carried her far enough behind the wooden crates that she missed the brunt of the fireball.

Her ears still weren't working properly, but she crouched and peered out to try to spot Mason.

She saw Esposito sprinting in pursuit, with Ryan right behind, and decided to circle around to head him off at the back door. She didn't see Castle, but maybe for once he had listened and stayed down.

Ears ringing, lungs burning from the haze of smoke now wafting through the warehouse, she dodged containers and made her way to the back wall. She turned from behind a row of cylinders and faced off with Mason, who had just rounded the far end of the same row and was now running straight at her. His goal was the exit, along the wall roughly halfway between them. Espo and then Ryan came into view only a half-second behind their suspect. None of them could take a shot considering their break-neck speed.

She stood her ground and pointed her weapon at Mason, who hadn't slowed in the least.

"Stop right there or I will shoot."

She hoped he wouldn't call her bluff. She couldn't take a shot directly at him with her boys directly behind. But when he didn't even hesitate in his race for the door, didn't slow his speed, she had to make a call. He was only a few yard from the door now.

She shifted her aim and shot the doorknob.

The noise and the spark of metal threw Mason off just enough that Esposito could get an arm around his waist and tackle him. As his torso hit the concrete, his gun discharged. Sounds were registering better now, and she heard the bullet whiz by her before lodging in the wall behind. Her eyes flicked along its path and found Castle, standing just behind the closest drum, watching her with hollow eyes and a blank expression. She locked eyes with him, not able to shake the haunted look he was giving her.

She heard Esposito cuffing their gunman, and Ryan reading him his rights, but her eyes couldn't let go of the pale, smoke-smudged face of the man she loved.

"Castle, are you okay? We need to get out of here."

He seemed to snap out of his daze at her words, blinking hard and pressing his lips tight together.

Sirens were nearing—Ryan had called for backup as soon as they figured out Mason was armed.

Rick still hadn't moved, so she stepped close and grabbed him by the hand, pulling him along toward the door that Espo and Ryan had just dragged their suspect out.

When they hit the cool, fresh air, Kate sucked in a few breaths, still jogging away from the warehouse, not entirely sure what would constitute a safe distance considering its contents.

She hadn't relinquished her hold on Castle's hand, and as they reached the edge of the parking lot and rounded the concrete wall at the perimeter, he tugged her back and grabbed her in a bear hug. His grip was fierce, and he didn't seem to care that Ryan and Esposito were a few feet away, handing their suspect off to the first uniforms to arrive on the scene.

He tucked his lips in against her hair.

"God, Kate, why didn't you answer me? I thought you were... I couldn't find you after the explosion..."

He loosened his grip ever so slightly and found her eyes. His still had that look of abject fear, now tempered slightly by something like anger.

"I didn't hear you. The explosion was loud-my ears are still ringing. I'm sorry, Rick, I didn't mean to scare you. I got away from the forklift just before it went up."

He ran his hands over her shoulders, down her arms, then gripped her hands and pulled them up to his chest. His voice still sounded desperate, spooked.

"So you're not hurt? You're okay?"

"I might have a bruise tomorrow from diving onto concrete, but I'm good, Rick, really."

Since they'd been together, they always took a moment, even at crime scenes, when one of them had a scare, but he hadn't been this worked up since she'd been living with him.

Finally, his eyes began to clear, as though finding her whole and breathing was beginning to sink in past the panic. He pulled her in for another tight hug, though, mumbling something she couldn't quite make out against her neck. She thought she caught the words "why" and "waiting," but he followed it up with a very clear: "I love you," directly against her ear, so she figured whatever he said first must not have been meant for her to hear.

Despite all of her prior fears and reservations, she had come to understand over the past six months that sometimes he needed words from her. And frankly, she had begun to appreciate the power of those words, both from his lips and from hers. She granted the most powerful of them now, as she squeezed him tight against her.

"I love you, too. Now let me go do my job." She disengaged and took a step back. "You want to go home and change out of those smoky clothes?"

"Not unless you're coming with me." Though the frozen fear had melted slightly, he still wasn't himself. Not finding her in that debacle of a take-down had obviously affected him. She wished she had just heard his voice calling her so she could have answered.

"I have stuff at the precinct..."

As she spoke those few words, she saw the panic start to flare again and thought better of splitting up right at this moment.

"Let me go tell the boys we're going to change and then be right back. Mason can twitch in lock-up for a while." She patted his "Writer" vest.

Rick's small smile seemed genuine, then.

The fact that he wouldn't move his hand from its firm but gentle grip on her knee in the car on the way home should have set off warning bells. Despite that, she truthfully hadn't been expecting him to practically rip her clothes off as soon as they crossed the threshold of their bathroom door.

Oddly enough, it wasn't sexual. As he meticulously unfastened buttons, undid clasps, unzipped zippers, he was inspecting, assessing, making sure that she was, in fact, her whole self. And he did so with serious, searching eyes and probing fingers. He didn't seem to mind her utilitarian choice in lingerie from this morning. Some days she slipped back into her old habits from the days before Dora and her unending supply of lingerie had made her top drawer so much more fun.

She inhaled when he found the spot on her shoulder where she had landed on the warehouse floor. He had circled around behind her to find it, and he placed his lips against the point of her shoulder blade, brushing them feather-light to erase the hurt. It took him only a moment to find the matching spot on her hip, which he gave the same treatment, gripping her waist with warm fingers just above.

His assessment apparently complete, he turned her around and pulled her to him. The contrast of her naked skin against his clothes was stark, even the soft fabric of his shirt seeming coarse against her breasts, but she snuggled close, breathing in as her nose found the curve of his neck.

She hadn't required as much convincing as she once might have to clean up together in the giant shower, soaping each other up and washing away all the traces of their morning. It was much more efficient to do this together, after all, since they were in a hurry to get back and interrogate their suspect. But as skin met skin in the steam-filled, granite-walled cube, suddenly a brief detour seemed in order.

Something had Rick more worked up than he should have been. He hadn't had her out of his sight or his touch since they'd left the warehouse. She knew he had thought scary thoughts, but that couldn't have lasted more than a couple of minutes at the longest. Something had him clinging. But she wasn't about to deny him his coping mechanisms, especially when at the moment they involved worshiping her naked body in their shower.

He was alternating between slippery caresses with firm hands and lazy kisses with soft lips, all the while finding her eyes, looking for affirmation. When they were thoroughly clean, he wrapped his arms around her and pressed her against the smooth granite wall, obviously with intent to continue worshiping in a more directed manner.

The spray had warmed the wall behind her and was now pouring over his back as he kissed along her collarbone, pulling a sigh from her lips and all thoughts of the case from her brain. She ran her palms over the taut muscles of his shoulders and decided to let him love her.

She had pulled out her blow dryer and was plugging it in as he re-entered the bathroom in boxers and an undershirt.

"Think the boys can handle questioning Mason?"

He reached for his toothbrush and opened the drawer for toothpaste.

"I'm guessing they already are."

She switched on the stream of hot air and finger-combed her hair. They hadn't been home for that long, considering all they had "accomplished," but by the time they made it back to the 12th, Ryan and Esposito would have gotten antsy and taken matters into their own hands.

He reached over and palmed her rear through her robe. Just one of the lovely side benefits of living with Richard Castle—being groped in the bathroom at random moments while primping. Something about her morning, or in this case mid-day, routine turned him on. And apparently that was true even when they had just had a steamy bout in the shower.

She raised her voice to be heard over the dryer, and smiled at his lustful reflection in the mirror. Only Rick could convey lust while brushing his teeth.

"Down, boy. We have to go back to work now."

He finished brushing and rinsed, then kissed her shoulder.

"I know. I'm leaving you alone and getting dressed now."

But he lingered, giving her a sweet, sort of awestruck-puppy-dog-besotted smile.

She shut off the dryer and set it on the counter, knowing he had something to say.

"Thank you for humoring me."

He stepped around behind her and peered over her shoulder.

"I'm sorry I scared you in the first place."

She leaned back against his chest, twined the fingers of one hand with his. He leaned in to rest his chin against her temple and she couldn't help tilting her head into his warmth. He spoke again, voice low and deep.

"Don't be sorry. Sometimes I just forget how quick… It's a dangerous job…"

He closed his eyes for a beat, took a breath in.

"Having you with me all the time makes me assume things that I shouldn't. I don't want to get complacent with us."

She turned to find his lips with her own and kissed them softly, then looked into his eyes, seeking out that fear and insecurity he was trying hard to hide.

"It is a dangerous job. But we're careful, and we have a great team, and we're going to come home together every night, just like we have been."

He wrapped an arm around her waist and tugged her against him. She could feel his urge to protect, defend, possess, in the strength of his arms and hands as they covered her.

She knew that the words she'd said were platitudes, at least to an extent. There was no way to know when one or both of them might not come home. But she had made her peace with the fact that coming home to him now was worth the fear that one of them might lose the other one day. She thought he had, as well.

"I love you."

He breathed the words into her hair, as though trying to infuse them into her.

She hugged him back, tightly.

"I love you, too."

"Let's go back to work, Detective."

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