Chapter 7


With a sigh, Kate drops her pen out of her cramped hand after filing the last piece of paperwork on her latest case. It was a gruelling one and she's glad that it's over. She can't wait to get home, order some Thai and read a book surrounded by bubbles, accompanied by some wine.

"All right, boys!" she calls across the bullpen. "I'm done, I'm going home."

Ryan and Esposito look up from their respective paperwork, which they're actually doing for once. "Need me to give you a ride, Beckett?" Ryan asks. He's dropped her off at home more and more often since it happened.

"No, I'm okay," she says. "Thanks for the offer, though. But do me a favour and go home. We've all had a tough week."

They look at her as if she's gone crazy, but after a second, they nod and start packing up. They exit the building together and part ways when they reach the parking garage. Beckett slides into her own unmarked car with a heavy sigh. She loves everyone for being so concerned for her, but sometimes she just needs to be left alone. Like right now.

On the drive home, she tries to take her mind off of the case. She turns on the radio in the hopes of anything interesting, but it's just bad music, so she turns it off again. Finally, she stops trying to distract herself from the case and just focuses on the traffic, which isn't doing a very good job at distracting her.

When she walks through her front door, she drops her keys and bag on the table next to the door and slips out of her coat. She shudders. Her apartment feels chilly after the nice warmth of her car and she quickly turns on the heater. After that, she shuffles into the bathroom to get the bath ready. While she waits for it to fill, she pours a glass of wine and calls the Thai restaurant to order some food. They tell her that it could take about half an hour before it's ready. Perfect. That way she can enjoy her bath before dinner.

On her way back to the bathroom, she grabs a book from her nightstand. She strips out of her clothes and lets herself slide into the hot water.

A knock on her door half an hour later announces her food. When she opens the door, the bags of Thai are held by someone she knows.

"Mr. Castle?" she asks incredulously.

"I ran into the delivery guy just a minute ago, thought I'd take it from there."

"I'm not going to pay you," she tells him.

"Oh, don't worry. I paid the guy, tipped him generously too," he winks. "By the way, you spent a night with me and my daughter watching Harry Potter, so you don't have to call me Mr. Castle. Rick's fine. Can I come in?"

She's shocked for a second by the maelstrom of words that just came out of his mouth. Then, she takes a step back to let him in. As he passes her, he brushes his lips along her cheek in a greeting.

"Where can I put these?" he asks as he walks further into the apartment.

"Just put them on the counter," she tells him. After a moment of internal debate whether she should invite him to join her for dinner, she realizes she's actually not in the mood to socialize. Instead she opts for asking the reason he came. "So what's up?"

"What's up? I haven't heard from you in a while, so I was wondering how you're doing," he says.

"I'm fine," she mumbles. She knows that he knows that she's not. She can feel his scrutinizing gaze on her, but refuses to look him in the eye. Instead, she focuses on unpacking the bags of takeout.

"You look tired," he says. She clenches her teeth. Who's he to talk? He doesn't even know her. He's seen her all of three times. Four now.

"I said I'm fine," she snaps. She doesn't want to tell him about the nightmares that are keeping her up at night. She doesn't want to tell him that all she wants is to curl up under his sinfully soft bedsheets and use his warmth as a shield against her dreams. There's no way that he should be this important to her already and it irks her. It feels wrong. And yet – with the way he's looking at her right now… No, she's not even going there. She's irritated with him; she's not going to let him charm her with those cute puppy dog eyes.

She turns around to face him when she has unpacked all the Styrofoam boxes and has lost her reason to hide her face from him. She realizes that he hasn't said anything after she snapped at him. "Mr. Castle – " she starts, but he interrupts her.

"I told you, you can call me Rick."

"Mr. Castle," she starts again as she shoots him a look that warns him not to interrupt her again, "I've had a very long week and I just wanted a quiet night in."

"That's okay," he says, pretending he hasn't caught her silent plea for him to leave. "I can be quiet." At that, she raises her eyebrow. "Somewhat quiet," he adapts.

"I'm not going to get rid of you, am I?" she asks after she assesses him for a minute.

"No. You're not," he says. "I asked you not to be a stranger. Apparently, you don't know how to do that, so I'm going to teach you."

"By showing up unannounced and uninvited and annoying the crap out of me?" she says.

"Well, that's one way," he says. "Would've been easier if you would've just answered your phone."

"So you thought you'd just stop by? You didn't stop to think that maybe I didn't answer the phone because I don't want to talk?" She winces. She didn't mean to say that. She does want to talk to him. But she knows that he'll ask her how she's doing and he can see through her lies. So she figured that avoiding him was easier.

His face drops in disappointment. "You don't want to talk to me?" he says, deflated.

"No, that's not…" she tries to amend. She sighs. Why is it so hard to just say what she means? "I do want to talk to you. I just don't want to talk."

He looks confused. She doesn't blame him; her contradicting feelings confuse her too. She likes having him around. At least, she did last time. He cheers her up and makes her forget about her nightmares.

"I'm sorry," she says. "I'm not making sense."

She struggles to come up with an explanation that doesn't involve telling him how she's been. He just waits her out, seems to realize she needs to work through this.

After a couple of minutes of silence, he says, "You should eat. It's getting cold."

She nods and gestures for him to join her. She needs some more time to figure out how to deal with this situation, but she doesn't want dinner to be awkwardly silent, so she asks, "How's Alexis?"

He shoots her a look that says she's not getting out of it so easily. She answers it with slight nod of her head, indicating she knows that. "She's been good. Excited for the holidays," he says with a fond smile.

"But those are still a month away," she says.

"Yeah, I know," he grins. She notices that Alexis isn't the only one who's excited for the holidays.

"What are your plans for the holidays?" she asks, hoping to keep him talking.

"Well, I promised Alexis that we'll stay in the city this year. We spend the holidays either here in the city or in the Hamptons. She says she likes it better here."

"The Hamptons?" Kate asks.

"Oh, yeah. We have a little place by the beach," he waves her off. It reminds her that he is a bestselling author and probably has a lot of money. She wonders how little that house by the beach really is.

"What do you like better? The beach or the city?" she asks.

"Well, the beach is always beautiful and peaceful during winter. Though it can get a little depressing, so I get why Alexis likes the city better. And I kind of have to agree with her. Nothing can beat the festive buzz the city gets during Christmas."

"If you like the city better, why did you go to the Hamptons?" she asks.

He looks pensive for a moment, as if he's trying to decide if he should tell her. He seems to come to a decision, though, because he says, "Last year, I got divorced near the end of November so I was in a bit of a depressing mood. The beach seemed to fit that mood."

"I'm sorry," she murmurs. She appreciates his honesty though. Especially since she can't seem to find it in herself to tell him the truth.

"That's okay. I'm over it now. I realize now that I never really loved her. It was a marriage of convenience."

They finish eating in silence. After clearing the table, she offers him a cup of coffee. When she starts making a cup of tea for herself, he says, "I never pegged you for a tea drinker."

"I'm not. Not really anyway. I like coffee better, but – " She stops. She wants to tell him. She wants to be honest with him. The words just seem to fail her.

"You're still having nightmares," he says quietly. Nightmares? How does he know about that? Oh right, she told him last time they saw each other.

She nods. It's easier to nod, it doesn't require words. Sentences. "I've been having trouble sleeping," she finds herself saying. "So I switched to tea at night."

"You want to talk about it?" he asks carefully.

He's being sweet for not pushing her too much, but she shakes her head. "Not right now."

"Can I tell you a story?" he asks.

"Sure," she says. She doesn't really care, to be honest. She just doesn't want there to be a silence so she can think about her nightmares some more. Because she's been doing that enough already.

Before she realizes that he's actually not talking but moving, he walks to her refrigerator. He takes out a carton of milk and grabs two mugs from the same cupboard she had just taken the two cups for their coffee and tea. He pours the milk and puts the mugs into the microwave.

"When I was younger," he starts, "my mother always used to make me warm milk when I'd had a nightmare. I never really wanted to talk about them. Apparently, I have a very vivid imagination." He pauses to take out the milk. "She knew that I would tell her when the fear had settled down a little. So she would make me warm milk and sat by me as I calmed down."

Kate smiles as he slides onto the stool next to her. He slides over one of the mugs to her. She foregoes her cup of tea for the mug of warm milk to wrap her hands around. "So that's what you're going to do for me?" she asks.

He nods, "If you're willing." She looks down at her mug. "If you're not, I'm perfectly happy just drinking my milk... or coffee. Sorry about that."

She smiles at that. "It's fine. Thanks," she says, then after a beat she asks, "What were your nightmares generally about?" She's deflecting his request of her sharing her own nightmares. She knows she is. She knows he knows it, too. But his story about him needing to calm down first as a kid sticks with her. Maybe his story – his voice – will calm her down.

"There was one…" he ponders, a frown appearing between his eyebrows. "I was about eight and I don't remember how it started, but I remember being in Central Park with my mother and some friends. It was the middle of the night and there was a full moon shining through the trees. There were pillars on the grass – four pillars – and we were hiding behind them. Something flew by the moon and made the light flicker. It was one of those creepy witches who cackle when they laugh and have warts on their incredibly long noses.

"The witch didn't scare me at first, but then something happened. I don't remember very clearly what exactly, maybe something with the witch throwing fire or stars, but it's possible I've made it up over the years. I do know that the witch kept flying from one end to the other and that we shouted things at each other. I couldn't understand the words, but we sounded scared. My friends and I were hiding behind one pillar and we were trying to get my mother to join us. On her way to us, the witch grabbed my mother and kidnapped her on her broomstick."

The frown disappears and he shrugs. "The next night it had a sequel. It was terrible. The witch had taken my mother to another planet where she kept her in a spikey cage. As soon as my friends and I landed on the planet, we were caught and thrown into the cage with her. I don't remember how it happened, but we escaped and flew back home on the witch's broomstick.

"They seem stupid now, sound like a bad children's film, but the full moon made my hairs stand on end for years."

"Why was the second dream not as scary as the first one?" Kate asks.

"I don't know." He's quiet for a minute, seeming to think it through. "I think," he says thoughtfully, "part of it has to do with the fact that it was my mother who was in danger in the first one. When I'm the one who's in danger in dreams, I always seem to wave it off with humour. It just doesn't scare me as much as someone I love being in danger."

"In my dreams, people I love are being tortured the way I was," she finds herself saying. She looks down at her now empty mug. She can feel that the question of what happened to her is on the tip of his tongue. She's happy he stays quiet, though. If he'd ask her that question now, she'd just retreat back into her shell. She knows herself well enough to realize that and she hates herself for it. Why can't she just talk about things?

Baby steps. She takes a deep breath and forces herself to tell him about her nightmares. "I relive parts of it. The torture. But I'm never the one being physically tortured. It's always someone else and I have to watch. There's nothing I can do about it." Images flash through her mind and she only realizes that she's crying when she feels his arms slip around her.

He smells like he did that night – minus the alcohol – and she feels herself relax into his embrace. She hasn't realized how much she's needed a hug. Hasn't realized how much she's yearned for a hug. The warmth of another human being embracing her. It doesn't hurt that the human being in question smells so amazing.

When she has control over her actions again, she pulls back. One look at his face tells her that he needed the hug, too. She doesn't know why, but her disappearance has unnerved him more than one would expect.

"I should go," he suddenly says. "You said you just wanted a quiet night in anyway." He gets up and already has his coat halfway on when she finds her voice.

"You know, quiet nights in are overrated. You could stay if you want." It's a thank you and an apology in one.


I'm going to France for two months this Wednesday and I have three chapters left... Only solution is to post a chapter a day. Hope you won't mind. ;) Xx