may flowers
I am so sorry about how long this took. University takes up more of my time than I thought it would. Most of this has been written while I'm sick (what nice way to spend Christmas Eve) so I apologise for any mistakes. Thank you for being patient with me, and happy holidays.
Chapter Seven
He becomes an almost integral part to her life after that.
Every week, she regales him with stories from the precinct, case after case. And - he's different, he's new. He's interested. He claims it all as a part of research, of course, when he calls her mid-case to ask her what her strategies are, what her next move will be. And, as much as she pretends to begrudge him for it, she can't help but fall for him.
They don't discuss when she'll meet his daughter, but the invitation remains open. It's a warm, hearty feeling that has her smiling into her pillow at night before the nightmares encroach her mind. She's - excited, she thinks. And it should bother her. It does bother her, sometimes, when he's not around to assuage her questions. After all, what does she know about children? The only thing she knows is darkness. What if she messes things up with Alexis, and by default, ruins things with him too?
He's the best thing to have happened to her in years.
She doesn't want to lose him.
Kate is lounging around on the couch when the banging on her door starts. Sighing, and glancing at the clock, she drops the Derrick Storm novel she was reading on the floor beside her and lifts herself up and over to the door.
It's him, on the other side; a smile raises briefly at the sight of him. But then she notices the anger in his eyes, the way his hair looks as though he's been running his hands through it. Her smile drops, and she steps back a little.
"Castle?"
"Can I come in?" He asks, but she gets the feeling it's more of a request than a question.
"Of course."
Stepping aside, Kate allows him in to her apartment. He acts differently. Normally, he would be inspecting the place. He loves doing that. Studying the tiny knick-knacks she has in her apartment, the way she blends her style together through her furniture and her decoration. It's part of his learning process about her, about the character he's going to base on her, along with his own curious, childlike nature - normally, too, he would wiggle his eyebrows at the fact that she was reading Derrick Storm. Would make a joke about her being his biggest fan; a joke about reading sex scenes in the bath.
This time, he's not five paces into her apartment before he turns to her.
"What's wrong?" She asks softly, closing the door behind her. Please, let it be something she can fix.
She misses the way he normally looks at her: like she's everything.
"Really? What's wrong?" He repeats, mocking her and she feels anger flare inside her chest. Okay, she does not deserve this.
"If you have something to say, say it."
"Oh, you're damn right I have something to say," he spits, scowling at her.
The anger that had flared inside her chest rages now, bubbling through her but she fights it. She will not overreact. She will not take his bait and act like the bad guy here. Jeez, all she's been doing tonight is try to rest and take her mind off of the case.
"Stop being childish and spit it out, Castle."
The writer huffs, scrubbing a hand over his face. "You're investigating the mayor, Kate."
Huh. So he reads the news about her cases? Well, she doesn't actually see the connection - why he'd be so angry over a case that she can't control. But at least he's actually speaking about it now.
"I am, yes," she replies, stepping cautiously towards him. "Why has that upset you so much?"
His eyes widen.
"Why?" He repeats incredulously. "He's my friend, Kate. You're going to ruin his career!"
His friend?
"Woah - look, Castle, I'm not trying to ruin his career. I'm just going where the evidence leads me. You can't tell me not to do my job."
"I'm not telling you not to do your job, I'm just telling you to leave him out of it."
At his words, she raises her eyebrows, shock coursing through her. How is she supposed to react to that? He wouldn't understand - he's never been a detective, never worked on a case that leads him down winding, political roads. Real police work, it's not like his books, not all the time. She doesn't get to decide on the ending because it's not hers to create, to flesh out; she merely doesn't give up until she's lead to the ending. That's how it works. None of this is her doing. She doesn't even want to investigate the mayor. But it's her job.
"You can't tell me what to do, Castle, no more than I can tell the rest of my team investigating this case to leave the mayor out of it," she argues. "Don't you see? We're not investigating him for fun."
"But the minute - the second you arrest him - he will never stand a chance in politics again," Castle claims. "He's a good guy, Kate. He didn't do it. Leave him alone."
"Leave him alone?"
Castle nods, stuffing his hands in his pockets and raising his chin a little, almost daring her to argue with him. And oh, she's gonna argue alright; there's no way she's letting him get away with this.
"So, what, Castle? I just give up on the case? Because he is the number one suspect, and I know he's your friend - but you're clouded by bias. Out there is a family, a family of the victim who need closure. And the victim… she deserves justice. Isn't that what all of your books are about? Justice for the dead?"
He shakes his head. "Don't use my books like that."
"What am I supposed to do, Castle?" She cries, exasperated. "I'm just doing my job! Or do you not trust me?"
Thunder flickers behind his eyes, fast and dark. The last time she'd seen him like this, she had fought her corner valiantly when she had no true argument to justify herself with. But this time? This time things are simply out of her control, and he's aiming his anger over the situation at her unnecessarily.
"You don't trust me," she surmises, quiet and soft.
And it hurts, she thinks. Somewhere in the pit of her stomach, like a dropping stone that leaves consequences in the water.
"Kate - "
"Please go, Castle," she instructs quietly, looking down at the ground.
"It's not - "
"Leave," she grits out through clenched teeth.
He stays, standing still, completely mute for moments. But she keeps her eyes trained on the ground, refuses to look up at him and forgive him when it feels like her insides are shredding each other apart. So finally - finally - he moves, hesitating beside her and reading out to kiss the side of her head. She turns away and he sighs.
"Call me when the case is over," he requests softly, and she nods.
A few seconds later, she hears the snick of the door behind her, and she knows that he's gone. Once again she is left alone in her apartment and when she lifts her eyes she can't believe that just seconds ago he was stood before her accusing her of being untrustworthy; she pinches herself just to make sure she hadn't fallen asleep on the couch earlier and was simply experiencing a nightmare.
No such luck.
Taking a deep breath, she wipes away the few silent tears that had dared to escape. Then she moves away, rifling through her cupboards for the new set of sleeping pills she had bought. She hadn't been using them - Castle had been staying around frequently, the reassuring warmth of his body always there when she startled awake. And even if he hadn't been, if he had been sleeping soundly in his apartment while she stayed in hers; he was always just a phone call away, ready to assure her that the shadows in her nightmares weren't real.
She doesn't think she'll have that support for a while.
Swallowing the pills dry, Kate undresses as she heads towards the bed. She feels wrong; hot and sticky, suffocated. Her insides are battling one another and she is just so drained. She shouldn't have relied on him. She knows better than to rely on people.
Still, she rests a hand over the side of the bed that he has become his, pulling his pillow towards her and hoping that just the smell of him will be enough.
It takes her days to call him.
The case ends and she respects that Castle doesn't call her, that he gives her space. She needs it. It's not so easy for her to get over what had happened, not after things had been going so well between them. She had trusted him with the darker parts of her, had let him see her scars, and now it's almost as if she didn't really know him at all. Never had she thought he would be as irrational as he had been.
But her world is cold and empty without him. She misses the way he would text her jokes and ridiculous case theories throughout the day just to make her smile while she was at work. The way he would always pick up if she called and needed someone to talk to. The way he was gentle and understanding and touched her carefully; not as though she was fragile, because he would never underestimate her, but as though he understood that she was soft and flawed and was looking for somewhere to settle safely.
She's fallen hard for him - she knows. Just months ago he was a stranger on the cover of a book jacket, a sentimental part of her heart reserved for him because of the way his books had carried her through her mother's death when all she had wanted to do was lay down and never move again.
That's what makes this so hard. He means so much to her already. And all she wants to do is mean as much to him - but if he doesn't trust her -
Shaking her head for the dozenth time that evening, Kate finally presses call.
"Kate," he answers, breathing a sigh of relief. "You called."
Her thumb strokes softly over the image of him on her phone. "Yeah."
"Look, I - I have so much to say. But can I come round? It would just be better to do this face to face."
Do this face to face. The phrase tumbles inside her, making her feel all wrong - it's ominous and vague and makes her breath catch.
"Sure," she replies, clearing her throat.
"I'll be there as soon as I can."
He ends the call before she has a chance to reply and she's left staring down at her phone, biting her lips. He wouldn't - would he leave her? Break up with her? Were they even together for him to break up with her? She's not quite sure what it is they've been doing, what dance it is they're following; the boys and Lanie tease her about him being her boyfriend, but is that what Castle is to her?
She doesn't know. She just hopes he doesn't take away the chance for him to be.
The knock on her door comes fifteen minutes after he'd hung up the phone and she almost feels sick, dragging herself towards it. Do this face to face. Do what? What did that mean?
"Hey," he says breathlessly, as soon as she opens the door.
"Hey, Castle."
This time he doesn't ask to come in, she simply stands aside and lets him in immediately. This - it's what she missed, his energetic presence in her life. It had barely been four days and his absence had hit her hard.
Like the last time, he doesn't venture too far into her apartment. It makes her heart sink slightly but she disguises it with a smile, closing the door behind her. He doesn't plan on staying.
"Kate, I'm so sorry," he murmurs, reaching out to take her hand. His skin is warm and soft and she sighs. "I shouldn't have said what I did."
"It's okay," she replies, smoothing a thumb over the back of his hand. "I could've tried being more understanding."
He shakes his head. "No, you were right. I was blinded by personal bias. I do trust you, Kate. I know you're good at your job, that you had no choice. I just didn't realise it at the time."
Tears form rapidly in her eyes at the words I do trust you. She blinks quickly, hoping to ebb them away but he notices as soon as they arrive. One of his hands lifts up to gently curve around her cheek and she leans into him, calming her breathing. He's here. He's apologising. He trusts her. She repeats the words in her head until they make sense, until the jumbled sense of fear dissipates from the pit of her stomach and she can breathe a little easier.
"You must know that I trust you, Kate," he says quietly, frowning a little when she hesitates to respond.
Finally, she laughs slightly, wiping away her tears with the back of her hand.
"My job - it's gotten in the way of relationships before," she tells him as he nods in understanding. "And so I - I thought you were gonna break up with me."
His jaw drops. "What?"
She shrugs lightly, clenching his hand.
Castle wraps a hand around the nape of her neck, tugging her towards him almost harshly. She has no room to complain, though, when his lips crash against his. Fisting one of her hands in his shirt, she can't restrain the whimper that she lets out at the back of her throat, pushing up on her toes to drag her body against his. It makes him groan and hold her tighter, teeth tugging at her bottom lip before he pulls away.
"I am not going to break up with you, Kate," he whispers, lacing her jaw with gentle kisses. "I'd be mad to, you're way out of my league."
She huffs, rolling her eyes but it doesn't quell the serious look in his eyes that makes her heart pound. That look. It's the look she'd missed.
"So is that what we're doing?" He asks, hands resting on the small of her back. "We're in a relationship?"
She flushes slightly. A relationship with Richard Castle.
"If that's… what you want too," she replies, watching the emotions that play across his face.
He visibly brightens, grinning. "Of course that's what I want."
He's still grinning when he kisses her again. This time it's light and soft - not hesitant, but teasing, making her lose her breath and her head spins as she tries to deepen the kiss. He avoids her attempts, moves away from her mouth to dust soft kisses across her cheeks, even teasingly dropping one to the tip of her nose and making her wrinkle it. He laughs.
"I missed you," she admits quietly.
Castle goes silent, almost speechless for the first time since she met him in that bank so long ago. His eyes are wide, bright blue and making him look young. She presses her lips together and then slowly her pulls her close, winding his arms all the way around her as she drapes hers around his shoulders. And then he buries his face in her shoulder, breathing her in deeply.
"I missed you too," he replies.
TBC