For starters, I do not own Castle or any of the characters from Castle. I'm just writing for fun, clean and simple.

First off, Thanks so much to everyone who's favorite-d/reviewed/read on purpose/accidentally clicked on this and read anyway/whatever. It's really cool to know people are reading and liking this okay So, thanks!

Next: this chapter was yet again, deceptively difficult to in the beginning write, but all in all I really like how it turned out! Johanna gave me some trouble, just because we have almost no information about who she was, how she acted, etc. But after that it pretty much flowed. Also. Don't hate on the dream. I like writing dreams and this one's really important to the whole whole-ness of things. Also dreams and how they affect us fascinate me :) (WHO WATCHED CASTLE MONDAY? I'M GOING INSANE *ahem*)

Anyway, you know the drill. Review, tell me what you like, what you don't like, if anything's OOC (I feel like I made Beckett a tiny (well not really tiny)bit more vulnerable in the chapter, but I dunno), ideas (I should say speculation. Ideas implies … something else I guess), whatever. I love reviews :) Hope you enjoy!

Thank :)

M

Part 12

"Katie Bug, wake up." The words floated in to me through a haze of darkness that lightened steadily until it was like I was sitting in the bright summer sunlight. I blinked in the resplendence, trying to discern the figure before me.

"Who's there?" I muttered, trying to shield my eyes from the light.

"Sweetie, it's me. Why are you on the floor?" I blinked again and there she stood. Long, dark hair framing her face, self-assured and yet compassionate posture, kind, gray eyes, thin fingers reaching out to help me up. Everything about her was utterly perfect. There were no blemishes, no wounds. It was like she was frozen in time the day before she was killed.

"Mom," I choked, grabbing her hands to pull myself up and letting my momentum swing us into each other's arms. I clutched her as close as I could, never wanting to let go.

"Hi, honey," I felt her lips against the side of my head and I took everything in. She was the same height, the same girth, she even smelled the same. Cherries with a \ hint of lilac.

"What…?" I couldn't continue, just reveled in the contact that I'd craved for 12 years, clenching my arms around her and deciding that I'd never let her go.

"I'm just here to talk," she rocked back and forth, combing her fingers through my hair. It was as if no time had passed, like nothing had chanced in twelve years. But oh… so much had.

"I've missed you so much, Mom," I murmured into her shoulder as she continued to rock.

"I know, bug, I've missed you too." I laughed at the childhood nickname that I only rarely heard from my father anymore and pulled away enough to kiss her cheek.

"You are so beautiful. You grew up into a fine woman, Katie," she laid her soft hand against the side of my cheek.

I leaned into the contact, smiling a little and swallowing the lump in my throat, "Good genes, I guess." She laughed and kissed my forehead again.

"How's your father?" she sighed, pushing me away slightly so she could examine me further.

"He's okay," I murmured, "He misses you so much, Mom."

"Oh I miss him too," she whispered and her eyes gleamed a little brighter. She and Dad had always been so in love. He was always waiting with open arms and a kiss when she got home from work, sometimes carrying her to the couch , other times lifting me into her arms for contact I'd been craving all day. They way their eyes lit up when they saw each other… It was like nothing I'd ever seen or had seen since. It was complete, pure, unadulterated love. I could probably count on my hands the number of times they'd actually fought and when they did, they always made up within the day. Mom and Dad had adored each other. That's why it had destroyed him so much when she died. A huge part of him died with her. It was the kind of love I wanted. Safe. Unwavering. Passionate. Endless.

"So have you found him?" my mother took my hand and we walked around the white expanse that surrounded us.

"Found who?"

"Thomas Darling," My mother whispered the name with such venom that I stopped. I had never heard her utter a word so harshly, much less a name.

"Mom… I… I got shot. I was looking into the case and my Captain, he was part of it. He was killed and I was speaking at his funeral… and I was shot. My partners think it was Darling who did it."

"Why did you even let him get that close? You had twelve years to find him, how'd he get so close to you?" she sounded furious. Her fingers were digging into mine. She didn't sound like my mother.

"He hides. He hides so well and he's got people under his thumb. He's basically got his own personal army. We didn't even know he was part of it until out Captain was killed."

"I thought you were a better detective than that, Kate. Twelve years is a long time to wait for justice." Her voice was shifting to a calm cold that I was all together unfamiliar with. Ice slid through my chest.

"I'm sorry, Mom, I've been trying but… I got shot!"

"No you didn't," She pulled us to a halt again, dropping my hand and fixing me with a glare that took my breath away.

"Yeah… Mom, I did, look," I tugged the collar of my shirt aside to show her… nothing. No raised, red line, no black line of stitches. The skin of my chest was flawlessly.

"I… It was there."

"You don't care, Kate. You're hiding, playing house with that writer of yours instead of trying to avenge me. What happened to getting justice for those we can't? To speaking for the dead?"

"Mom. I'm sorry. I…"

"Kate! How could you!" She was screaming now, her face contorted in rage. Spots of red were appearing along the front her pale purple shirt and growing and there was a trail of it down the side of her face.

"No. Mom, no!" My stomach plummeted and I wrapped myself around her, trying to staunch the flood of blood. She fought me, thrashing against my arms, raking my back with her nails. It was a side of my mom I'd never even imagined.

"You don't care, Katherine! Where did you go? Where did my daughter go? Because you aren't her." Her blood was pouring by then, flowing in rivers down her porcelain skin, over her face, from her body to mine, soaking the front of my shirt. I was drowning in blood again.

"No, Mom, please." I begged. I was choking on my tears and her blood was still gushing from her and I squeezed my eyes shut, clutching her closer in a futile effort to stem the bleeding, "I'm sorry. Mom, I love you!"

My eyes flew open again. I was staring at the dark ceiling of Castle's bedroom. Everything was quiet save Castle's steady breathing from beside me. My mother was nowhere to be found. A dream… It had all been a dream. I raised one hand slowly and brushed it over the front of my hoodie. It was completely dry. No blood. My hammering heart slowed, no longer pounding in my ears, but still pulsing painfully through my stitches. The pain helped me focus somehow, magnified my thinking.

It was only when I raised the hand to my face that I noticed it. The trembling. My hands my legs, every part of me was shaking uncontrollably.

"Breathe," I mumbled into the blackness. And I tried. I really did. I opened my mouth and took in… nothing. I gasped again but nothing again.

Suddenly, everything was hot and repressive. The blanket around my chin was torrid and confining. Castle's hand resting over mine was scorching my skin and the bandage over my chest was pressing too heavily, baking my heart. I was suffocating and burning. The room was shrinking, pressing in from all sides.

Still trying to choke down a breath, I threw off the covers and stumbled out of bed. The door wasn't far, maybe 15 feet away. I could make it there, at least crawl. All I knew was that I had to get out of this room. I took a step and glanced up at the door. It looked further away. I took a second step. The door had jumped back even farther. For every foot I moved forward, it jumped back two.

In all, I got maybe 6 feet from the bed before my knees gave out and I started crawling. It was painstaking and slow but concentrating on putting one hand, one knee in front of the other, was easier than thinking or even trying to breathe. My head hit something hard and I had to stop. I had run into the wall. The door was 5 feet to my right but all the energy was gone from my limbs.

I collapsed against the wall, bringing my knees to my chest and sucking in a breath. My nails dove under the neck of my sweatshirt. They scrabbled along my skin until they found purchase under the tape. I tore it away and flung it across the room, sucking in my first real breath since I'd awoken, wincing at the pull in my chest. I glanced down at my still quivering hands and found four little red crescents under my nails.

All the while, since I'd first opened my eyes, until I was here, sitting on the floor, knees to my chest, pressing against the stitches to keep everything in focus, I hadn't stopped thinking about the dream.

The way she's shifted from the mother I'd known all my life to the woman I didn't even recognize. The hatred in her words, the ice in her glare, the way she looked at me like I was scum on the sidewalk. I couldn't forget it. It was like someone had taken all my perfect memories, doused them in gasoline and set them to burn.

Her words bounced through my head, "You don't care, Kate. You're hiding." But I did care. I cared so much it was like a constant stomachache. Everything in the case was constantly churning through me, looking for patterns, for 'odd socks.' Everything in my life was on hold for the case. I couldn't move past anything in my life because I cared so damn much. It… her whole case had swallowed me whole and I was still teetering on the edge of the rabbit hole again, trying to will myself to jump.

"I thought you were a better detective than that, Kate. Twelve years is a long time to wait for justice." I was a better detective than this. I could go for days on end without sleeping or eating just so I could bring justice, find something important that others had missed, but on her case I just kept coming up blank. Nothing made sense. There were so many questions yet to be answered.

"Playing house with that writer of yours instead of trying to avenge me. What happened to getting justice for those who can't? To speaking for the dead?" She was right. I was playing house with Castle instead of being out on the street, looking for clues. He was warm and safe and he cared. It was so easy to let myself get lost, forget things when I was with him. As for getting justice for those who couldn't and speaking for the dead, we'd done that. Done it a hundred fold, but it wasn't enough. It would never be enough until Darling was caught and my mom's murder was put to rest.

A rustling from the bed broke me from my reverie. Castle rolled over, his arm sliding between the empty sheets where I'd been laying. Still sleeping he reached further, his hand finally clenching on the unoccupied linens.

"Kate?" his eyes fluttered open and he stared at the empty bed. Panic seemed to fill him and he shot up straight in bed, "Kate!" he stared around wildly until, after a few moments, his eyes lighted on me and relief softened his features.

"Oh God, Kate, you scared me. How'd you end up all the way over there?" he scooted over to the side of the bed where I'd been sleeping (I refused to think of it as my side now. It was too domestic, a phrase used for hiding) and swung his legs over the side of the bed, "How'd you get over there?"

"Crawled," came my strangled reply. Air still wasn't making a steady path through my system and one word was all I could manage through my swimming head.

"What. Kate… Are you crying?" I reached up a hand and touched my face. It was wet. I hadn't noticed. Castle's voice was thick with worry as he tried again, "What's wrong?" he slid into a standing positing and hurriedly came to kneel at my side. His fingers attempted to curl around mine, but I flinched away, refusing to look at him.

"Don't."

"Kate, you're scaring me. Are you hurt?"

I shook my head.

"Is someone else hurt? Lanie, the boys?"

I shook my head.

He went ashen as he voiced his next question, "Alexis… My mother, are they…?"

I shook my head.

"Then what is it, Katie, tell me. I'm right here." Hearing him say 'Katie,' drove me to speech.

"I'm failing her, Castle." I sounded like some cracked out addict. My voice broke and quaked as I tried to speak, "I've had twelve years to solve her murder and I've failed. She deserved justice years and years ago and I couldn't give her that… I'm her daughter I should have… I'm just failing her, Castle."

"Kate, this is not your fault. You've done your best; you let it take you over. Darling's just over our heads." He tried to cradle my face in his hands but I pulled back again, shaking my head.

"No. I'm a better cop than this. I should be out, looking for… something, anything, Darling. He's still at large and it's because I couldn't catch him."

"You got shot because of this. Your mom would say that even in the name of justice sometimes we have to back down for ourselves, just for a little while."

"No," I snapped, "No She's say I should be working harder. That I should have found him already, that he shouldn't have ever gotten close enough to shoot me and that I'm just hiding, holed up here with you. She'd be so disappointed."

"Kate, you don't believe that." I didn't look at him and this time he grabbed my face in his hands and refused to let me pull away, "No, look at me. You are an extraordinary cop and woman. You're committed, you work yourself to the ground, through the ground and out the other side, you care about the job more than yourself. It's time to think about yourself for once in your life."

"I can't, Castle," I could feel the tears welling up, "I need to fix this before I can move on. There's so much… I can't sleep when I think about it. Nothing else seems to matter as much. I'm lying to you because of it." The last part flew out without my permission and I froze.

Castle stared at me, "What do you mean you're lying to me, Kate?"

I shook my head, another tear carving its way down my cheek. No. We could not talk about this now. It would be so easy to just forget I'd said it.

"No, come on," the pad of his thumb traced over my face, catching the tear, "I won't be angry, just, please, tell me."

His eyes were so full of hurt and fear but at the same time love and I … I just shut down my brain and let the words flow. I was tired of pretending.

"I heard you. At the cemetery. I remember everything you said to me."

"Everything?" I felt his hand tense on my cheek just slightly.

"Everything," I confirmed.

He stared into my eyes for a fraction of a second longer before pulling himself away, sighing deeply, and running his fingers through his hair, "Why didn't you tell me?"

"I…" I grappled for the words, "I couldn't. I can't give you what you want and I don't want you to have false hope that I'll somehow be able to just forget everything and be your… be the perfect … person for that kind of thing that you want because I can't be. You want… you deserve someone who can love you as strongly as you love them without letting anything get in the way and I don't know how to do that. The wall's too big. You've stripped parts of it away, but the damn thing's still there. And God, Castle, I love you. I love you so much it hurts me to think about not being able to be the person you want me to be. Because I want to be her, but I just… I can't. Not until this whole mess is fixed." There was a ringing silence after I was finished. Had I just said I loved Castle? Oh. Shit.

"You love me?" he whispered, awestruck, turning to look at me, hope and fear still present in his eyes.

"God, yes," I half-blubbered (this was getting pathetic, really), "Yes, I love you…" The words felt foreign, new, warm in my mouth, but they flowed so easily like they absolutely belonged to the man before me. I started to say more but stopped at the huge, child like and yet mature.

"You love me." He murmured, reaching out to cup my face in his hands.

"But, Rick, you deserve someone better. Someone who can be the person you need them to be. I can't be that."

"You're the person I want, Kate. Not someone else. You. Walls and all."

"You're insane," I choked out, relieved to have it off my chest.

"I'm in love." He responded.

"Which makes you a fool. I'm no good."

"No, you're better. We'll get through this, Kate, together. I swear. We will find Darling and get justice for your mother. As soon as you're well enough, we'll go and help the boys and do what needs to be done. And then, maybe, when you're ready, you'll be the person that you want to be, for me." He leaned in and rested his forehead on mine. The anxiety from before was melting away and I reached up to wrap my hand around his where it rested on my cheek. Somehow he almost always knew the exact right thing to say.

"God. I hope so." I leaned against him more and suddenly realized how close we really were.

"Kate," he whispered after a pregnant pause, his breath washing over my face, "I love you too."

My lips twitched at hearing it for the second time, "Yeah?"

He was inching closer, giving me time to opt out, "Yeah." His lips were about to brush mine when I turned my head.

"I'm sorry," I whispered, as he lips found a home on my cheek, "I… I can't."

"Okay," he pulled back slightly, but I could see the hurt in his eyes.

"I want to kiss you, don't get me wrong," God did I want to kiss him. Kiss him until he couldn't think and there was no air between us. Kiss him and so much more but… I couldn't, "But if I kiss you… everything will get confusing and I won't want to move from this spot. Because it'll be warm and safe here with you and knowing I could stay here forever if you wanted to would just give me more incentive not to go back out into the real world. And it'll already be hard enough to tear myself away now." I ran my fingers through his hair.

"It's okay. I'll wait as long as you want me to wait now that I know." His voice was husky and his fingers tightened on mine.

"Thank you," I murmured, leaning in and placing a light kiss dangerously close to the corner of his mouth.

He sighed, "Always," and pressed a kiss to my forehead, "We'll figure this out."

We stayed there, caught up in one another for several more minutes before I glanced at the clock 4:51. It felt like years since Lanie and Esposito had come to see us.

"You think you can sleep now?" he murmured into my hair, rocking us lightly back and forth.

"Yeah," I responded, breaking the trance I'd fallen into, thinking about Castle and my mom and praying that I'd made the right decision. Because it felt so damn right.

"Okay, here we go." Before I could object, I was hoisted back into the air, Castle's arms holding me snuggly to his chest.

"Castle I could have made it back to the bed, walking."

"But now I get to do this without wondering if you're going to shoot me when I put you down."

"Who says I won't?" I muttered as he placed me gently on the bed and crawled over to his side.

"You won't," he responded, confidently, "You love me."

"God, you're gonna hold that against me aren't you?"

"Damn straight," he smiled laying back down.

I snuggled under the covers and turned over to look at him.

"Thank you again,"

"For what?" he reached over and traced a hand almost hesitantly over my cheek.

"For everything,"

He laughed scooted closer, moving his hand downto my waist, "Anytime." I tensed up as he wrapped his arm around my back but then relaxed against him, snuggling my head against his chest.

There were several moments of silence, I swore Castle was asleep, and I moved my hand to rest over his heart, feeling the steady beat again. His legs had entwined with mine and my shakes had calmed to light tremors. Everything felt good for the moment we were frozen in time. I just wanted to freeze that moment and never let it go.

"I love you," the proclamation came quietly and caught me by surprise. I had been positive he was asleep, but the rumble of his words echoed under my hand and I repressed another smile.

"I love you too."