SheLearnedtheTruthat17 by Oldest Man

Chapter 7

It was the 'snick' of the door closing softly that brought her out of her fugue.

He said he loved her. She hadn't answered. He told her exactly why he loved her and exactly why she wouldn't believe him.

He was wrong. She believed him. Now she had to get him to believe her.

Kate grabbed her jacket, purse and cell phone, thought about it and then left the phone behind. No distractions. She was off for the next three days and she intended to spend every minute of it with the man who loved her.

She hailed a cab, amazed that she could get one. Most would be downtown searching for foot-weary Christmas shoppers who would pay fares and render big tips because, after all, it was Christmas time.

She planned to confront him with her truth and beg him to forgive her for her emotional paralysis.

Him. She realized that was part of her problem. She liked Rick Castle. What was there not to like? He was funny and witty and charming and always had a kind word for everyone and…she could go on for ages.

But she loved Rick Rogers, the man who lost one woman and then married another to save yet another woman, well, woman-to-be, his daughter, Alexis.

She loved the man who'd cried in her arms on the way back to New York because he couldn't save his friend.

She loved the man who tried to save her from herself and show her glimpses of the man he really was at heart, not the playboy player who took anything and everything he saw straight to his bed.

She loved Richard Alexander Rogers no matter what name he used. No matter what mask he chose to wear, he was still the man she loved.

Loft

"Richard, what are you doing home, darling? I thought you and Kate were…uh oh. What happened, kiddo?"

She took one look at him and dropped her plans for the weekend. Chet would just have to understand and accept that although her son was pushing 40, he was still her son and he came first, although it would be a tie if Alexis were involved.

"I'm not exactly sure. One minute she's open and carefree and the next she's hugging her ribs like she's in agony. I guess telling her that I loved her was painful for her. I thought you had plans?" He desperately wanted to be alone to lick his wounds in private.

"They're on hold. Keep talking. There has to be more to the story than 'I told her I loved her and it made her sick'."

"She had her hair up in a ponytail, not the usual hairdo. She looked happy and beautiful and then she asked me the killer question – 'where are we going with this' and then she said she was afraid that she was just some project to me and that one day I'd wake up and realize what she was and leave."

"Oh, Richard, she's just unsure of herself. This is all new to her and she's uncomfortable with her feelings. Hearing that you love her must have been quite a shock…"

She didn't imagine that Kate had ever heard the words from someone she didn't share DNA with.

"I told her about the rings and what they meant and told her that she was afraid to love because she didn't believe anyone could love her in return. She put her walls back up and I left. I shouldn't have let it go that far. I should never have…"

"Richard, I don't know what to tell you. There's nothing I could possibly say that will make it all better. You just need to step back and let her come to you. If she doesn't then she's not ready and you can't force her to be someone she isn't ready to be."

"That's probably best. I think I'm going to write a while. Leave, Mother. I'll be okay." He would be okay, eventually.

"I can tell from your posture and what you don't say that I've done all you'll allow me to. Then I'm going. My work here is done. Be good to yourself, Richard. You're worth more than you know and it's her loss as well as yours. Remember that."

She gave him a hug and then grabbed her coat and bag. She hated leaving him but he needed time to think and he couldn't do that unless he was alone. She knew her son.

He would become the 'bear' he'd been when he rotated back to the States and drank himself to sleep most nights until he realized what he was doing and enrolled in college. He wrote some stuff that got published and then the whole cycle repeated itself when the Blaine girl left him.

Then there was 'Meredith the Slut', another 'bear' period but not as damaging since he had a daughter to take care of. For a few years he was as normal as any other person until he felt overwhelmed with being both mother and father to a young girl and so he married Gina. The less said about those turbulent months, the better.

And now when he's really ready for commitment, Kate Beckett probably panicked and froze and he took her panic for rejection.

She walked out into the hallway and pressed the button to summon the elevator. She glanced at her watch and smiled wanly. 'Fashionably late.'

Loft Lobby

Kate walked quickly into the lobby and was greeted by the doorman who reached for the phone to call up to announce her.

"Not necessary. I have a key." She held up the key she'd been given before at the time of Castle's 'arrest' and never returned. Now she was glad she hadn't returned it and if things worked out, she'd add to her key ring.

"Ah, Ms. Beckett, you do know it's December, don't you?" He leaned over the counter he sat behind and pointed to her bare feet.

Kate realized that in her hurry to catch up to Castle, she'd forgotten to put on her moccasins. "Oh, yeah, Merry Christmas, George!" She grinned and walked to the elevator and pushed the button for the penthouse loft.

She leaned back against the rear wall of the elevator car and remembered once when they were in a crowded elevator in an office building going up to interview a potential witness in another case. Castle had pushed his way to the front of the car and turned and asked his fellow passengers why they stood facing forward and looking at the floor indicator.

"Is it because you don't want to look at your fellow passengers? I think that's very anti-social of you all."

He went on to introduce himself to the passengers and then insisted that they introduce themselves to each other. By the time they'd reached the 52nd floor, half the people had missed their floor because they were talking to other passengers. Kate hadn't known whether to die of embarrassment or just laugh and watch the show.

His only comment to her had been "Future elevator trips in this building will certainly be different from now on."

The elevator door opened and Martha stepped in, not expecting to see anyone else.

"Kate! How nice to see you again. Richard's in one of his moods but I'm sure you'll be able to entice him out of his funk. Ah, Kate dear, you do know it's December, don't you? You're going to catch pneumonia going barefoot."

Kate leaned over and kissed Martha on the cheek and whispered "Merry Christmas".

"I'll be gone until late Sunday and Alexis is over-nighting with friends at a pajama party and then going shopping in the morning. Kate, be gentle with him. My son is not the pillar of strength he'd like us to think he is."

Kate pulled her into a quick hug and got off the elevator leaving a surprised but pleased Martha Rogers humming to the Muzak in the elevator as it traveled down to the lobby.

Loft

Kate let herself in, quietly closing the door and engaging the deadbolt. The loft felt empty and cool with only a few lamps in the living room and dining room providing a soft light.

The door to his study was open and she could see him sitting in his chair, legs up on his desk, staring out the floor-to-ceiling window and the lights of the city. She couldn't see the reflection of his face in the window but she could imagine it – pensive, disappointed, regretful. A man like Castle would take rejection in stride, working his way through it just like he did with any problem but this man was not just Richard Castle.

She padded across the living room and stopped just inside the door. The thick carpet had muffled even the soft treading of her bare feet. He put his legs down, grunted at the moment of discomfort and then sat up in his chair.

Reflections of Kate and Castle merged for one brief moment before he twisted around in his chair, almost spilling the glass of Scotch he'd been nursing.

"Don't say anything, Rick. Let me talk this time. I was at a loss for words and there were so many things I wanted to say but couldn't find my voice."

Kate felt emboldened by his silence and he turned back around in his chair and watched her reflection. She walked over and leaned down behind him and wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed her ruined cheek and ear against his smooth cheek, all the while watching his reflection close its eyes and she heard his sigh of resignation.

"I like you, Rick, I really, really like you and some day it might even have turned into the kind of love 'Rick Castle' feels for me but I – I've met someone, Rick, someone who is just as scarred as I am, only his are inside, in his heart where they aren't visible."

She felt him try and stand, to escape her hold but she tightened her arms around him and whispered, 'No. You're not walking away from me now. You had your say and now it's my turn."

"You could have called me on your cell phone and told me you met someone else. You didn't have to come all the way over here to do it. I wished you would have called, Kate."

The look on his face tore at her heart and she thought about just blurting it all out but she'd rehearsed what she planned to say when she explained why she didn't love him.

"I had to do this face to face, Rick. It's not a conversation for a cell phone so just sit there and listen. I'm not done yet."

His reflection closed its eyes and she knew exactly how he felt but she had to explain it to him as she planned.

"I met someone right after you were arrested and I think I fell instantly and hopelessly in love with him at the very second I first saw him. It felt like I'd been struck by lightning and I couldn't talk or move or do much of anything."

"Kate, cut to the chase. You're being cruel and I don't think I deserve to be treated this way just because I admitted that I loved you. Just finish it and be gone."

"The thing is, Rick, I need both of you in my life to feel completely loved. I need you, Rick, for yout support and love and caring and all the things you've brought into my life."

"Well, at least you're stating your infidelity intentions up front, Beckett. That's a change from the norm. I – "

"Shh, I'm not done, Castle. I need the other guy just as much if not more. I love you, Castle, as a best friend, a confidant, as my partner at the precinct."

His frown and the look in his eyes she saw reflected in the window prompted her to hurry before she lost her one chance to do this right.

"I doubt I'll be a fixture at the 12th any longer, Kate. I've done the research and the novel's written and will hit the stores Monday. There's a copy for you in the living room on the coffee table. There were some 'editorial' differences that delayed printing but they've been resolved now. Apparently Gina felt that no one would buy a book written by a serial killer about serial killers and so she put in a print-stop order that was only pulled after the charges were dropped."

"I can't wait to read it in bed snuggled up against my boyfriend, Castle. Can you picture us in a big bed with silken sheets and big fluffy pillows and – "

"That's not an image I want to carry around with me, Beckett. You have 30-seconds to close out this torture session before I throw you out."

"I like Richard Castle very much, but I love – " and here she hesitated, not for dramatic effect but because she suddenly couldn't speak his name. She took an enormous breath and then whispered the name of the man she loved into his ear.

"Richard Alexander Rogers. I love Richard Alexander Rogers."

She knew she'd done the right thing in approaching her declaration in the way she did. She wanted to assure Castle that she loved 'both' of him. She loved the man she'd first met and grown to know and love and she loved the man behind the façade, Richard Rogers.

"Well, say something, Castle! Jesus, it's not everyday I tell a guy I love him, y'know? In fact, it's never happened before."

"I'm hungry. I didn't get to eat dinner. How about I order us in some Chinese and then…"

"No. I like my plan better. Yes, we order in food and then we go into your living room and put on some slow music and you dance with me. I never went to my prom and I want to dance with the man I love. Then, I want us to go up to that indecently comfortable bed and make love. Martha said that Alexis will be out until at least noon and she's not coming back until Sunday. Oh, yeah, and then I want us to go eat Sunday dinner with my dad and - "

"Okay. I'll order some Chinese and then we'll dance and then we'll see what happens next. Sunday dinner with your dad? Sure. But first things first, Kate."

He spun around and captured her around the waist and pulled her into the chair and kissed her just like he had outside the motel after the grenade blast.

"Wow, I felt my toes curl on that one, Rick. Again, I want to do it again and again and again…"

Her toes-curling comment made him look at her toes to see if they really had curled. "Where are your shoes, Beckett? It's December, y'know?"

"I've been told that a lot tonight. Merry Christmas, Rick. Forget the plan. Let's skip ahead to the part where you unwrap your early Christmas present."

Loft
3am

She woke up because she was hungry. They had been too busy discovering each other to think much about food but now her stomach was growling loudly and she was sure the neighbors could hear it.

Hunger warred with the warm comfort of the 'bubble' and won easily. Kate eased herself out from the circle of his arms and slipped from the bed and cringed when her feet hit the cold wooden floor. She almost dove back into the 'bubble' of warmth and comfort but the nagging pangs won out and she pulled on her panties and Castle's shirt and went down to the kitchen.

Nothing had changed from when she'd stayed with Alexis and she quickly had coffee brewing and checked out the refrigerator. There was a fruit plate covered in plastic wrap and she put selected pieces in a bowl, grabbed her coffee and sat down at the breakfast island.

She remembered something that Rick had said – a copy of his new book was on the coffee table – and she picked up her coffee and breakfast and went in to get it. The couch was closer than the breakfast island and far more comfortable on her butt than the wooden stools so she put everything on the coffee table and sat down, curling her legs beneath her, and started reading HeatWave.

She finished the novel and sat back and thought about the parts that had touched her most.

Nikki Heat had a boyfriend she spent most nights with. His name was Jameson Rook, an investigative reporter who was blind. Was he telling her that he was 'blind' to her scarring or was he telling her that love was blind? Either way, it worked in the novel and in real life.

There were other sections that read like their real lives. Apart at the beginning but drawing closer and closer until by the end of the novel Nikki and Rook were a committed couple.

Kate closed the book and put it back on the coffee table and walked up the short flight of stairs to his bedroom. She needed to be close to him and she wanted to see his face when he woke up.

Castle jerked awake, the dream falling away and leaving him feeling empty and alone. He reached over and found nothing but cold sheets and he sighed. She must have gone home but how would she ever get a cab at this time of the morning?

He fumbled with the lamp and smiled a slow smile that gradually reached from ear to ear. Her pale blue sweater and a white lace bra were on the chair, her jeans on the floor in a pile with his.

'Not a dream!'

He found his boxers and stumbled into the bathroom and emerged a few minutes later and pulled on his jeans. His shirt was missing and he had an image of Kate in his shirt sitting at the breakfast island impatiently awaiting coffee.

"Oh, you're getting dressed?" His head jerked up at the sound of her voice and he saw her standing just inside the bedroom wearing his shirt. There was disappointment in her voice.

"I was coming to find you. When I first woke up I thought last night had been just a beautiful dream but I found your clothes and figured you'd gotten hungry. I – I missed you, Kate. Last night was – "

She crossed the room quickly and hugged him, kissing his neck and finally nipping at his earlobe. "I'm glad you missed me but I'm sorrier that I wasn't here, lying beside you so I could watch you wake up and see your face."

"I like your new look, Kate. Freshly ravished, your hair all tousled and wearing my shirt. It's a good look for you. I want to see it every morning for the rest of my life."

"That sounds like a plan I could support. There's fresh coffee and I nibbled at a leftover fruit plate since the growling of my stomach woke me. Castle, about last night – "

"Regrets?" One word could bring down his world and it seemed like it took her forever to answer.