Wow, I'm rendered speechless by all of the wonderful reviews and all of you that added this story to story alerts and favorites. And that's as rare for me as it is for Castle. :)
Disclaimer: The way that you know I don't own Castle-I would NEVER have Kate tell Rick that they were over. EVER. The fact that there is going to be a 4th season is the only reason I'm not totally freaking out over that particular comment.
"Oh, so many layers to the Beckett onion; however will you peel them all?"
Ugh, yet another one I can't remember the reference to. Help!
I don't know if I could do this without Castle.
Kate's thoughts for the last several minutes had been focused on preparing for what they'd find at the crime scene. There was nothing in her thoughts that Rick wouldn't have already known, even without his new mysteriously acquired ability. It wasn't until they were in her car, pulling out of the precinct parking lot, that her thoughts starting surprising him again.
He glanced over at her from where he sat in the passenger seat but still her eyes gave away nothing other than determination to find justice. It was the same expression she always had on her face when they were headed to a crime scene.
Roy was right. I was torn up. I didn't handle Royce's case like a cop. Instead, I panicked. Everything I did, everything was because I was feeling rather than thinking.
Rick had seen that. It had been the main reason he had followed her to LA. He had known that the Captain wouldn't be able to keep her from going after Royce's killer. Kate had said that she was committed to catching the murderer, but it had gone deeper than that. She had been desperate, like the thought of letting the culprit slip through her fingers would have made her fall apart.
It had been an odd situation for Rick, being the voice of reason. He shuddered to think of what would have happened if he hadn't been there. It had been quite a trick to act in subtle ways to reign in her impulses as best he could, while still doing it in an outrageously Castle-type fashion so that she wouldn't get suspicious. He had a feeling that if she had been more her objective Detective Beckett self about the whole thing she would have caught on to him in a matter of minutes. And she would NOT have been happy.
Ugh, I'm such a girl sometimes.
Rick couldn't keep himself from smiling at that. Kate threw him a questioning glance and he forced himself to wipe the smile off his lips. With a small smile and shake of her head, she let it go.
Huh, I wonder what Castle was thinking. Oh, well. I'm just glad he's here.
There was a moment's pause and then, No Kate, you can't hold his hand. Not right now. You're too emotional. It might give away too much.
Rick wanted to growl with frustration. Even when he could read her thoughts, he still didn't know everything she was thinking.
Although he really didn't want to know anything she wouldn't willingly tell him herself. Every little detail she shared drew them closer together. He didn't want to sacrifice that because he was too impatient to wait.
He couldn't tell her about his ability to read her mind now, though. Not on the way to a crime scene. Something like that would throw off her focus. He knew that she would be worrying about every single thought in her head, wondering how he was interpreting it and what he would say about it later.
He's always been there when I needed him. Even when he didn't know it...
An image filled Rick's mind, this time of a young woman sitting in bed, clutching a book to her chest while tears streamed down her face. It only took him a moment for him to realize the woman was Kate, although from the looks of it, a Kate that was around a dozen years younger than she was now.
Image after image then rapidly filled his mind. Kate sitting in a chair engrossed in a hardback book. Kate walking on a sidewalk on a sunny day, another book under her arm. Kate running up stairs, tears welling in her eyes, clutching yet another book in her hands. And then...Rick couldn't believe what he was seeing. Because there was Kate, in the middle of a long line at a bookstore, a book in her hands, looking directly at him.
Kate had come to one of his book signings, one of his relatively early book signings.
Rick had known from the very first day that she was a fan. Anyone who would remember his book "Hell Hath No Fury" as she had was an obviously devoted fan. But he realized that it went deeper than that. He was sure that in each image he had seen, the book that she had with her had been one of his. With the way that she had clutched the book in that first memory, like it was a lifeline, he just knew.
His books had helped Kate deal with her mother's death.
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