AN: This chapter was a major pain in the butt! I knew I wanted to have a scene with Castle in here, and I knew exactly how it should go. Yet, when I tried to write it it would not cooperate. Finally I managed to get some inspiration for it and force it into submission so that you guys can (hopefully) enjoy a new chapter.

Once again, many many many thanks to my personal mind reader, ChristyLoisGilmore17, who pretty much talked me through this whole chapter even though I kind of ended up forgetting what we had decided on for this chapter and had to go search through our emails to find what we had planned...

I do NOT own Castle!

Richard Castle was sitting at his desk in the Hamptons, dutifully working on the latest chapter of 'Naked Heat'. He'd gotten a considerable amount of progress done, only because Gina had taken away all his contact with the outside world and he had nothing else to do. Of course, he could go down to the beach or something, but that got old after a few days of doing nothing but that while putting off writing.

So, after only a few days, he figured he better start writing, if only to be able to get in touch with the outside world again. She was seriously starting to piss him off though, since she wouldn't let him talk to Alexis, but since she said that she had talked to her for him, and said that Alexis was having a great time, he tried not to let it bother him too much.

I mean, it's not like she would lie to me about Alexis just so I wouldn't worry... Right? He shook his head to clear those thoughts from his mind. If something was really wrong she would tell him, she wasn't that heartless.

Castle looked wistfully over at the large flat screen tv that was on one wall, wishing that he could play some kind of game or do something that didn't involve Nikki Heat. As much as he didn't want to, everything he did made him think about a certain homicide detective. Last night he had even gone so far as typing Rick and Kate instead of Rook and Nikki while writing a couple paragraphs. Thankfully he had realized what he had done, and fixed it, before he had let Gina look over that chapter though.

He had just planned to quit cold turkey, leave for the summer and not think about or talk to anyone in the precinct but after only a few days, he already wanted to get in contact with Ryan or Esposito, just to see what was going on without him. But, seeing as he didn't have his phone, and Gina had cut off the internet, because he made the mistake of telling her he already had all his research done, he couldn't even get in contact with them. Which was probably just as well, since he didn't really want to hear about how great Beckett and Demming were getting along.

An almost inhuman shriek came from the doorway of his study and Castle realized that he had been staring off into space, thinking about things that he should not have been, for the better part of an hour. With a heavy sigh, he sat back up in his chair and started writing, really wishing that Alexis was there to cheer him up. As he looked at Gina who was still standing in the doorway, he vowed to get his phone back one way or another.

Kate didn't know why, but she was afraid. Fear was griping her heart as she frantically placed brick after brick into this large wall in front of her. She didn't really understand why she was doing this, only that on the other side of this wall was something that terrified her, and she was desperately trying to keep it out.

She jumped when there was a loud roaring sound that reminded her of waves in the ocean crashing against the shoreline. Quickly, she put the last brick in place and then stepped back to admire her handy work.

Suddenly, she was leaning down next to Castle, looking at a file he was reading. "You smell like cherries." He tells her and she turns her head to look at him, realizing they are only a few inches apart.

A hissing sound startles her and now she is looking at the wall again where a brick just fell out, a dark stream of water flowing out of the place where the brick should have been. She rushed to put the brick back but suddenly found herself huddled in her bathtub, naked and bruised, while everything is in ashes around her. Someone is shouting her name and then suddenly Castle is standing in the doorway.

"Castle! Turn around!" He gives her some sort of remark, but she doesn't really pay attention, then she finds herself wrapped in his jacket and they are stumbling out of her burning apartment.

Two more bricks fall at her feet and she scrambles to put them back in as more start to fall out. She pushes the bricks back into place and feels the dark water running over her hands but when she looks down at them; her hands are covered in blood. She's kneeling next to Dick Coonan, desperately trying to get his heart to start again. She's getting blood all over her but she doesn't care. Then, there is a warm hand on her shoulder and she knows that it's Castle trying to comfort her.

Kate can hear the almost deafening sound of the bricks falling one after another but she's standing in front of the murder board and Esposito is telling her something that she understands loud and clear.

"Whatever his reasons are, they don't include watching you be with another guy."

The brick wall she had worked so hard to build came crashing down, letting loose the waves of dark water that the wall was holding back. They crashed over her and the breath was knocked out of her with the force of it.

It was dark all around her and she was underwater, unable to breathe. Desperately, she called out but no one could hear her as she sunk to the bottom.

"…Kate…Kate!...KATE! Wake up!" Her shoulders where being shaken roughly and Kate groaned before moving her hands up to rub the sleep from her eyes, only to find that her whole face was wet.

"Wha?" She opened her eyes and realized that she had been crying in her sleep.

"Kate? Are you okay? You were crying and yelling in your sleep." Kate looked up to see Alexis looking at her with a worried expression on her face.

"Uh, yeah. I'm fine. Sorry, did I wake you?"

"It's okay, the alarm was just about to go off anyway."

Kate looked over at the clock on the bedside table and saw that it was nearly time to get up. She reached over and turned off the alarm before it could even start, then they both made their way into the kitchen where they decided on having French toast for breakfast.

Two hours later found Kate Beckett walking through the doors of the precinct, ready for another day of murder and mayhem. She was just a few minutes later than normal since she had dropped Alexis off at a friend's house before heading to work. Alexis was going to spend most of the day with a few of her friends then come by the station later in the afternoon to fill out the necessary paperwork to be able to help out. She wouldn't actually start until tomorrow though.

She walked into the bull pen and immediately noticed something was off. Glancing over to Ryan and Esposito's desk, she found them working diligently at their computers with slightly terrified expressions on their faces. When she got to her desk, she quickly opened the drawer where she normally put her purse, quickly putting her purse in its place before shutting the door a little too roughly causing both Ryan and Esposito to jump.

"What's got you two all jumpy?"

Esposito turned towards her and looked around carefully before mouthing one word.

"Lanie."

That was all the warning Kate got before there was a rush of air and she was suddenly being hauled off to the girl's bathroom by one very determined woman.

"Spill it. I know something is going on. You are happy again and…and… Is that French toast I smell? You actually ate breakfast before coming into work? You never do that unless it's a bear claw or something else you picked up on your way here."

Kate stood silently as Lanie went on for a few more minutes, knowing that Lanie needed to get all her questions out in the open before she even tried to answer them. Once Lanie finally calmed down enough so that Kate could talk, she told her everything that had happened in the last few days because she knew that Lanie was just worried about her. Even though she didn't need to be.

"And that's why you were suddenly curious about what I did in my teen years? So you could figure out what to do with Alexis?"

"Yeah, I figured she would get bored just being around the apartment so I suggested she volunteer here at the precinct, for a little while at least."

"I don't know, are you sure this is all a good idea?"

A knock was heard on the bathroom door and suddenly they could hear Ryan telling Kate that she had a new case.

"It will be fine, Lanie. Now, if you are through interrogating me, I have a job to do."

AN: Okay, before you ask, Yes the dream is important. You might be able to figure out why she is having those dreams if you think about it but if not, it will be explained in the next chapter.

Poor Castle being held hostage by Gina... She took away his phone and his internet! At least he is actually writing though, right? Somehow I don't think he sees it that way.

Reviews are like yummy little shot glasses filled with pure caffeine, they help me focus! (and make me one very happy writer.)