You get another chapter and it hasn't even been a month! It's a miracle! Okay, actually no it's not. I am definitely going to try harder to update this story faster than I have been.

I do NOT own Castle!

His fingers were flying across the keys of his laptop, typing up word after word of the newest Nikki Heat novel. He woke up early this morning and immediately started working until finally, in the afternoon, he was putting the finishing touches on chapters one through six of 'Naked Heat'.

"Yes!" Castle took the time to fist pump the air a couple times before running out of the study in search of the person who was holding his precious phone hostage. After going through the whole house, he finally found her outside on the beach.

"Gina! I completely finished a fourth of the book, now give me my phone!"

She calmly looked over at the grown man who was practically hoping from foot to foot while waiting for his phone. "Completely? You aren't going to suddenly decide to start over again are you, Richard?"

He shook his head so fast it was a wonder he didn't get whiplash. "Good." She picked up his phone from its place on her towel and threw it at him. "You can have it back. But! If I see even a small decrease in production from you I will take it away again."

The only answer she got was a half hearted assurance that he wouldn't slack off since as soon as the phone was in his hands, he had taken off back to the house, quickly dialing his daughter's phone number.

When they had first set out for Kate's dad's house, Alexis was a little nervous about meeting him but once they actually got there, he turned out to be a very nice and laid back man. After the introductions were over, Alexis was given a grand tour of the decent sized country home that Kate grew up in. It wasn't exactly in the country but it was far enough out of the city to give more privacy and had a country feel to it. They had just settled into the living room, and Kate was explaining in more detail why Alexis was staying with her, when Alexis's phone went off. Looking down at the screen of her phone her eyes lit up seeing that finally after weeks of not hearing from him, Castle was calling. She quickly stood up, excusing herself, before walking outside to give Kate and her father some time to talk while she did the same with her own father.

"Dad?"

"Hey, Pumpkin!"

"Happy Father's day! I didn't think I was going to get to talk to you today since Gina's been answering the phone every time I call and won't let me talk to you. Why did you even take her up there in the first place?"

"I'm sorry. I didn't think she would actually take my phone away but because she did, I've managed to get lots of progress done on 'Naked Heat' and because I made enough progress, she let me have the phone back. I brought her with me because I knew she would actually make me get some writing done."

Alexis made her way over to the porch swing, curling up in it.

"Well, that's good I guess. It was still a shock when she answered your phone the first time because I was under the impression that you were going to take Ka- Detective Beckett with you, at least for the weekend."

He gave a little humorless chuckle before replying. "I was, but those plans didn't exactly work out and when Gina called to haggle me about the book, we ended up talking and I asked her to come with me."

"Didn't work out? Why not?" Alexis honestly didn't know why not and until now she just assumed that he chickened out and didn't ask her but maybe that wasn't the case.

"It's… Complicated. You don't want to hear about boring adult stuff, tell me about some things that you have been doing? Has the program been fun?"

Does he not know? Gina was supposed to tell him! "You mean, Gina didn't tell you?"

"Tell me what?"

"That…" If I tell him he'll come home immediately and while yes I do miss him, he needs to work on the book and apparently he can't do that unless Gina is making him. Taking a deep breath, Alexis did something that she hated doing. She lied to her father.

"That I'm having a great time here! I told her to tell you but I guess she didn't." Both Castle's let out a sigh of relief, one because he was thinking horrific thoughts of his daughter having a hard time there and the other because she managed to lie to him without it sounding like a total lie. After a second of silence, Castle prompted her to tell him about the things she has been doing.

"Well, I've learned lots of new stuff, plus I've made a new friend out of a teacher there and she's been showing me lots of cool things. Of course, it hasn't been all work, no play. I've spent lots of time with my new friends. We've gone to the movies, out to eat, and we even went ice skating once… That didn't end too well on my part though. Apparently the ice and I don't get along. But, I do want to hear about 'boring adult stuff' especially when it concerns you, dad. Did you even ask her to go with you?" He didn't need to know that the 'teacher' was Lanie and that all of those things were things that she had done with Kate over the weeks since her 'daring escape' from the summer program.

"It sounds like you are having a wonderful time then. Hopefully not too good of a time though, right?" Alexis raised an eyebrow at him even though he couldn't see it. He was completely ignoring her question. Did he really not want to answer it? Too bad that she was her father's daughter and that made her want to know the answer ever more.

"Dad… Did you ask her?"

There was a sigh and some mumbling before he spoke up. "Yes, I asked her but she turned me down."

"And what? That's it? You just let it go? Geez dad, that's not like you. Normally you would go after whatever you wanted and not stop until you get it."

"I backed down."

There was silence as Alexis tried to understand what he meant. "Backed down? Backed down from what?"

"Schlemming." For a normally very talkative writer he was being very withholding today.

"What does a fictional character in your book have to do with anything?"

There was no mistaking the depressed sigh that came from the other end of the line. "Because he's not fictional, he's a real person named Demming. Also, he's not in my book anymore. I rewrote the whole thing and took him out of the picture."

A real person? But, in the book he was a guy that Nikki was starting to like… Oh, poor dad! But, if that's true where is Demming? I've been around Kate this whole time and I haven't seen him around her at the precinct and she hasn't been seeing him after work because she always comes home. Wait, rewrote the whole thing? Geez, no wonder Gina's been after him.

"Okay so let me get this straight. Schlemming is a real person so you backed down? You gave up? On Detective Beckett just because someone else showed interest in her?" That probably came out a little harsher than she wanted it to but she just didn't understand why he would do that.

"I told you, it's complicated pumpkin." He sounded so down from talking about it that she almost didn't push it further but she had a feeling that this had something to do with the dreams that Kate has been having along with the fact that everyone at the precinct tiptoes around the subject of her father when Kate was near.

"Dad, please. I want to know what happened. You used to hate leaving her side for a week yet, now you are spending the whole summer away from her."

"Alright, hold on a minute." She waited patiently as she heard him moving through the house and judging by the sounds it sounded like he was making his way upstairs. After another minute or so he made it to where ever it was he was going and started explaining what had happened. He told her about Demming showing up to help on the case involving Ike Thorton and about how he kept showing up after that. He continued talking until he had told her everything that had happened from the time Demming showed up until he walked out of the precinct with Gina.

Alexis hung on his every word, but there was something that was bothering her.

"Dad?"

"Yes, pumpkin?"

A shrill beeping in her ear caused her to pull her phone away from her head and look at it, noticing that it was showing low battery.

"Uh, well I forgot to charge up my phone so I have to go. I'm really glad that you called me, it's been weird not actually getting to see you on Father's day but, I'm having a great time."

"It's odd for me too. I miss you so much but we will see each other after the summer, alright? Call me whenever you have the chance, I'll be looking forward to it. Good bye, Alexis."

"I'll call as often as I can. As long as you promise Gina won't answer it anymore. There is something I am curious about though… "

She just knew that he had one eyebrow raised as he replied. "Oh? What is it?"

"Well, I was thinking why would Detective Beckett pull you out into the hallway and start off by saying she isn't the easiest to get to know if she was just going to tell you to have a great summer? Doesn't really make sense to me but then again, you know her better than I do so you should know why she did that but my phone is really about to cut off any minute now so, bye dad. I'll try to call tomorrow!" And with that she disconnected the call, unfolded herself from her position on the porch swing, and headed inside to help Kate with the Father's day dinner knowing that her father would spend the rest of the day, and maybe longer, thinking about her question.

While her father was trying to figure it out on his own, Alexis was going to find out what Kate was really going to say from the source herself.

And if Kate wouldn't tell her, well then it was a good thing that Alexis had been spending a lot of time with a certain ME lately.

This chapter isn't exactly my favorite, probably because it was all Castle and Alexis talking but it's necessary for what I have planned. *Insert evil laugh here*

Um... Dang it, I had a few things I wanted to mention about this chapter but now I can't remember what they were!

I think one of them was that I have no idea how many chapters "Naked Heat" actually has, I just guessed that six chapters would be a fourth of the way.

Sooooooooo, now we got Castle's wheels turning, thinking about why Beckett would say that then just say have a great summer.

I wasn't originally going to skip to Father's day already but if I had waited and spent chapters going through all the things that Kate and Alexis did we would all be in our 80's before this story is finished. But don't worry we still have the rest of the summer for Kate and Alexis to spend time together.