Close Encounters 3.5
She could barely sense anything other than the pulsing heat of agony, but Castle-
Castle was there, and he held her up.
Beckett walked each of the thirty steps back to their room and collapsed onto the bed, let him arrange the covers over her, then snagged his fingers when he made to leave.
"In with me," she murmured, her heart catching on her ribs.
He nodded but only hovered over her on his hands and knees, a soft kiss to her cheek that made the tears spill over once more, but she swiped at them with her fingers and he sighed.
"I don't want to hurt your back-"
"I don't care." She needed him to stay and she was weak enough to admit it.
"I should shower first."
"This first. Please."
He wordlessly gave in, curled up at her back with his arms around her and his forehead pressed into her neck, his breathing fast and quick. She twined her arm with his and brought it up against her chest, kissing his fingertips, tasting blood. She felt the way her back flared at the initial press of his body, but after a moment, it seemed to be the only thing actually holding her together.
He smelled. He was right; he needed a shower. But she needed this too, having him here. Not dead.
He killed Maddox.
His words were a murmur in her hair. "Do you really. . ."
She took in a shallow breath and let it out again, knew he could feel it against his palm. Her nose was beginning to warm up.
"You don't really want to die, Beckett. Do you?"
She shivered and hunched her shoulders, drew him closer. "It just. . .hurt. A lot."
"Understatement of the year," he muttered, but he sounded lighter, like he could take a deep breath again. "Shit, Beckett. What the hell were you doing out there?"
"Trying to get better," she growled, but it pulled at her chest in a way that made her hurt and she had to shut up and breathe through it, her fingers tightening in his. "To find you," she admitted at last.
He shifted forward a little more, almost draped around her now, and the pressure of him at her back both hurt and comforted. Pleasure and pain. Metaphor for their relationship.
"Find me," he sighed, like he had no idea what that meant. "There's a program for getting better, Beckett; stick to the program."
"Programs don't work for me. And the physical therapist leaves me - fucking weak and broken. And I'm so tired of it, so tired of being tired and not able to move and needing help."
"That's just how it is for now," he murmured at her shoulder, so close to the stitches that she felt the stirring of her skin orienting towards pain. "Kate, love, that's just how this goes. You got shot. You've been shot before."
"But I never-" She choked off and closed her eyes, sucked in a shallow breath that did nothing to keep back tears.
"You never what?" he said quietly.
And if it weren't for the way he was holding her together, keeping her sane, she'd never have answered.
"I never had someone need me before," she finished. "Someone I needed too. Partners."
His arms clenched tighter and she felt his teeth press into her spine, mouth open on a word he couldn't say or a cry she couldn't hear.
"Castle."
"I'm glad. . .glad you weren't there."
"What happened?" she said back. She shivered at his silence, tried to tug him closer even though it hurt. "Castle. Tell me."
She already knew but-
"Eastman is dead. I killed Maddox."
She turned in his arms and he closed his eyes to keep her from seeing it, felt her fingers at his cheeks.
"Castle. Oh, God."
He swallowed hard and fought to suppress it, but her fingers were too gentle, her voice too soft, her body so good and warm and alive against his. She nudged in closer, her mouth at his chin, his lips, the corner of his eye.
"Were you crying?" she breathed out.
Fuck.
She touched her tongue to his skin and he shivered.
"I can taste it. The salt. Castle, oh, I am so sorry. I am so sorry." She was curling her arms around his neck and shoulders, tugging him into her, and he went if only to hide his face.
"Hurting you," he muttered, his fingers at her hips, the flare of her bones under skin.
"Not enough to stop," she said back. "This is all my fault. I never-"
"It wasn't you. Maddox - he - I shot him. It's his - I need a shower." But he couldn't move to save his life, not when her body was so warm and pliant under his, her hands caressing his cheeks, her knee curled up as if to cradle him. He had to be hurting her.
"Eastman. Was that - do you know his real name?"
"That is - was - it is Eastman. Mark. I don't know. Shit," he growled, saw again the man on his back, blood pooling, the helpless way his hand had flopped against the roof like a fish out of water. Castle had taken cover behind the air conditioning unit but Eastman hadn't made it.
"He was your family," she whispered, her mouth at his temple. God, he'd missed her. He ached for her.
"Yeah," he gruffed against her chest, tried to get himself under control. "He was like - a brother, an uncle. I don't know."
"Tell me what happened."
"Maddox had a hotel room, was looking for Smith, I think. Me, Eastman, and some guys were in the room, searching through it when he came back. Got the drop on us."
He felt her shiver and tried to pull away but she came with him, settled over his chest. He tilted his head back and tried not to see it, tried to just quote his report.
"Eastman and I chased him up to the roof where he was waiting. Ambushed us behind a maintenance shed; I lost my weapon. Eastman covered as I went running for my gun, turned to fire but Maddox had already drawn down on us. Eastman was shot, I took cover, returned fire."
End of story.
He took in a ragged breath and kept his eyes closed, felt her fingers running through his grimy hair, down his neck, stroking his sides. She was warm on top of him, a liquid heat that filled him up, and she didn't stop touching, everywhere, just touching.
She was gentling him; he knew it, could feel it, and for the first time in weeks, he wanted her. He wanted her so badly, but-
"You've got blood under your nails," she murmured. "In your hair. Rick. I am so sorry."
"Maddox won't be back," he rasped, clearing his throat when the words scraped. "But Bracken. He's still out there. I'll get him next."
"I never wanted you to do this. Not like this. It's not worth your life, not worth Eastman's or the other two agents who were killed-"
He stiffened. Two. She'd said two other- "What do you mean?"
"Castle," she murmured, her lips at his jaw, his mouth, light brushes that made his skin shiver. "Castle, I'm fucked up. And you know it. Don't cater to me just because I can't control myself. There shouldn't be - this is too high a price. Even for-"
"Kate-"
"You could've been killed," she whispered, and he heard the agony in her voice. But not for the pain in her back, for him. "It's not worth it. It's not worth it. I need you more."
"I will kill him," he said quietly. "I'll kill him, Beckett, and it will be over."
She squeezed his biceps and lifted her head, her eyes so dark, swirling with grief. "No. That's not justice."
He kept his mouth shut but-
It was justice enough.
He should shower; she saw it now, tasted it, felt it all over herself as well. They both needed to shower, strip the bedsheets off, be clean.
She drew her leg slowly off of him, felt that instinctive and clutching grip of his hand and kissed his jaw where she could reach. It tasted - wrong. She didn't want to know what it was she tasted.
"We should get cleaned up," she murmured. And because he was still not letting her go- "Castle, only if you can. I think I could - maybe in the sink-"
"No," he shuddered, as if coming awake after a long, cold sleep. His voice was raw. "No, I can help you bathe."
Her skin rippled at the words, but they weren't sexual, they didn't mean he wanted her. Still, there was intimacy in them now where there wasn't before. He wasn't just performing a necessary function; he wanted to bathe her.
"Okay," she whispered at his jaw. "That'd be good."
He roused, his head lifting as if he was looking at her for the first time, and she eased off of his chest to lie on her side, watching him study her. He must've sensed it too, the shift between them. She curled her fingers at his chest and brushed her thumb over his stiff shirt.
Blood. Stiffened with blood. Enough that he must've gone to Eastman, tried to stop the bleeding, tried to save his friend and partner and fellow agent. Brother.
She closed her eyes. This was her fault, her mother's case she'd dragged him down into, and she'd gotten his only real family killed. His father wasn't-
"Kate," he murmured. She felt him capture her hand and draw it to his lips. "I should probably - I need a shower first."
She nodded and opened her eyes to look at him. "You do."
"And then I'll clean out the tub and run water for you. Help you wash off all. . .this."
But would she ever be clean?
She swallowed and stared at him, the blue of his eyes like flint that had morphed into crumbling sandstone. A rock that couldn't hold together, that kept getting chipped away, dissolved by wind and water.
Eroded into nothing.
He kept the lights off in the bathroom, didn't want to see his own face in the mirror. He could sense Beckett's eyes on him as he stripped out of his clothes; he'd left the door open because it had made his chest tighten when he'd gone to close it.
He felt battered, and it wasn't in his body. He felt old.
Castle stepped into the shower without checking it, hissed as the cold crawled over his skin. He needed to save the hot water for her bath, though, so he scraped his hands through his hair and tilted his head back, let it souse over him.
He opened his eyes in the darkness and still saw the chest wound, the gasping, sucking breath as it came and then as it didn't come. And then, instead of Eastman, it was Beckett. Her body, her blood, the life loosening from her limbs and melting away.
Castle growled and grabbed for the shampoo, lathered it in his hair roughly, hoping to scour the images out of his head. He went quickly, made sure he got some soap on his chest, his neck, to wash out the blood. The-
Eastman.
Fuck, fuck, he couldn't do this right now. Not right now.
Kate.
He took in a breath and blinked through water, wishing he'd turned on the light. The darkness and the wet were spinning his mind back through time, to Ireland and skinny dipping with Colleen only to wrap his arm around her neck, the knife, and drag her down and under and down-
Enough. Foley was awaiting sentencing and Colleen, Sophia, all of them-
They were never Kate.
Kate who was waiting for him.
He shut off the water and stepped out, scrubbed the towel down his face before leaning over to push the stopper into the drain.
A hot bath, the best he could do for her right now.
He'd drawn the bath, and the water came up high, she saw, would be nearly to her fresh stitches, but she knew he'd make sure to keep them dry. She trusted him; they'd done this often enough already.
She shivered in the chill air as he drew her leggings down, fingers skimming her skin and making her knees weak. Or maybe it was just standing up for so long; she had to put her hands to his shoulders and cling to stay upright.
Castle was delicate with her ankles, thumbs brushing around the bone as he untangled the material from her feet. And then he rose up and brought her loose tshirt with him - his shirt, actually, that the doctor had given her after stitching her up again. Castle must've provided it.
He tossed her clothes back towards the bedroom but she stepped into him, needing his body to hold hers up. Normally, she hated it, despised the weakness trembling through her bones, eating away at her muscles. But he needed her too, he needed her after what had happened, the price he'd paid, and she could do this for him. She could let him hold her up if that's what banished the darkness in his eyes.
He smelled sharply clean, cold water clean, and she leaned in to press her mouth to his collarbone, that dip where it hollowed out and formed a natural place for her lips. His hand came to tangle in her hair, but she stayed anyway.
She wasn't sure what was going on in his head, what had him so tense and angry against her, the lights off and the room cool and dark and ghostly in the moonlight. She'd have thought he'd want some light, the door shut to warm the room up, but it was the opposite tonight.
"Rick," she murmured at his skin, lifted her head to him.
He let her go, stepped back, and surely she was imagining the flex of his fingers around her neck.
He was still naked, his skin cool to the touch, but he stepped into the clawfoot tub first, held her by the elbows as she shakily climbed in after him. He drew her down against him, her chest to his, and she sucked in a breath at the touch, wished she had the energy or the range of motion to do anything at all about the flicker of awareness that suddenly flamed between them.
Bright, burning.
"I got you," he murmured, and he drew an arm around her neck to keep her up against him. His other hand trailed down her left side, fingers wet and warm, well away from her bandaged back but delicious and soothing. Her body melted into his, her knees coming up to bracket his hips, letting her arms fall around his ribs and her hands drift in the eddies of water.
Her head tilted to his shoulder, keeping her upper back out of the water and giving him the chance to let go of her neck. He used both hands to slide down her ribs, soft and wide, and then to her hips with a squeeze and back up at her thighs, fingers hooking at her knees.
He hadn't even reached for the soap yet, and she didn't care. Oh, she didn't care at all. Let him touch, let his hands map her body and ease them both. Still the flame burned, a small point of light between them, caught somewhere belly to belly, and she curled her arms up at his sides in the tight space, fingers pressing against the porcelain of the old tub, thumbs at his ribs.
"I love you," she said quietly into the darkness at his ear. "I love you, Rick, and I never meant for you get hurt. For Eastman and those two men to die. Never."
It took a supreme effort of self-control not to wrap his arms tightly around her the moment she said I love you in that breathy, soft voice at his ear.
And then it was a different kind of stillness that fell over him when she said the rest. Echoes of years ago, echoes of Colleen in the dark water, their skin warm and close, and the words in his ear that testified against her.
But this was Kate.
Not Colleen. Not Sophia. Not a woman out to betray him.
"How did you know they died?" he said quietly, heard his own voice echoing the question of fifteen years ago in a lake in Ireland. "How did you know that two other men had died, Kate."
She stiffened against him, and he struggled to choke out memories of another woman, another time, another place.
This was Kate.
"Who told you," he said quietly, his fingers wrapping around her thighs and squeezing tight. Too tight. He was hurting her. He had to stop.
"Your father came," she whispered finally, a choked note in her voice that made his hands gentle but his chest tighten.
"Black? When? What did he say to you?"
She was silent for a long time and he growled into the darkness, hooked his arm low at her waist and pressed her deeper into him, wanting her and needing her and afraid for her.
"Beckett. Tell me what he said."
"He said you'd killed Maddox but had lost three men in the process."
The silence between her words said more though. The rasp in her voice was nearly as dark and terrible as it had been when he'd found her in the woods, broken. His damn father was the cause of this.
"I'm going to fucking kill him," he growled.
She flinched and he remembered to ease up, made sure his hands hadn't gotten the bandage wet, but she was trying to lift off of his body, trying to push away.
"Castle. Don't. He's your father. He was - he obviously cares about you-"
"The hell he does. He's not my father."
"Castle-"
"He was never a father to me, Beckett. All he did was pick me up and tell me what to do, where to go, how hard to train. That's not a father, that's a dictator."
"I won't defend him. I don't like him. But he's only ever told me the truth."
"Truth?" he said heatedly, sitting up so they were face to face, so he could look her in the eyes and have her know. "It's not the truth, Kate. Whatever he said to you - it's not the truth. It's damage control for his precious experiment."
Her body was practically vibrating in his arms, her hands gripping his biceps. "His - experiment?"
"Me."
"What?"
"You think he took me in out of the goodness of his heart?" He laughed and heard for himself how fucking pathetic he sounded. Shit. She was cracking through everything he'd ever built up to protect himself. "Kate, love, as Black himself has told me many times - the best operatives are orphans."
"Oh God," she gasped and she bowed her body over his until their foreheads touched. "Castle."
"I'm fine, Beckett. Don't pity me," he growled, his hands suddenly at her shoulders as if he'd push her away. And yet she heard her own self in his voice, her own stupid pride, familiar and just as debilitating, wasn't it? and so she cradled his face, laid her head back down at his chest so that she was tucked up into him and he had to hold her up again.
"I don't pity you," she murmured at his collarbone. "I love you."
He still felt tense under her, like he'd get out of the bathtub at any moment and leave her there.
"Whatever else he's done," she started. "He's trying to keep you safe. He has your best interests-"
"No."
She sighed. "Your well-being then-"
"Hardly."
"Physical safety," she compromised. "He doesn't want you to die. And neither do I. So in that - we're united."
"Don't you dare align yourself with him. You are - Beckett. Kate. You are so much more. You're everything. You are my family and all-"
She silenced his brokenness with her mouth, her kiss sensitive and light because she couldn't hold herself up any longer. Exhaustion licked at her body, eroding her strength, and she still felt sweaty and grimy and only halfway clean, but she touched her tongue to the hot-cool of his mouth, wrapped her legs around him.
He groaned into her kiss and clutched her thighs, trembling under her.
She could do nothing about it, but she held herself against him until it passed.
He spoke the truth to her while he ran soap over her skin, murmured into her ear all that was right and good, and all that was wrong as well.
"Never mind what he says about us," he said softly, his hands lathered and skimming her lower back, her thighs. He'd had to drain half the water so he could get her clean, and even though the room was chilled, she was warm over him. "Don't listen to anything he says, Kate. I had to learn that trick years ago."
She sighed at his neck and he lifted a wet hand to her hair, combed through it slowly, working the tangles out as he carefully kept from dripping water to her wound.
"He plays headgames to get what he wants. Arranges things. Master chess player. When East-" He had to stop and clear his throat, still his hands before he continued. "When Eastman took me under his wing, taught me the ropes out in the field, Black had Eastman reassigned, then gave him a desk job here in the city office."
She didn't say anything, but he didn't need her to. She was quiet but he knew she was listening. Castle stroked his thumb over her neck and was reminded - this was Kate, this was Kate. This wasn't Ireland fifteen years ago.
"He keeps me alienated and without ties. He needs me emotionless and able to do my job, be a machine. I've let him because it was easiest. There's a program, and when I stick to the the program, everything goes smoothly. I get the assignments I want, I don't hear from him that much, and I do my job well."
Her thumb skated his ribs and he drew his hand down her arm to capture it, bring it to his mouth to kiss her fingertips.
"But you."
He opened her palm and put his lips to the warm curl of her hand, haunted her wrist until she stirred. He'd missed this, the connection they had when their bodies touched. He'd been denying himself her because she was just too broken and in pain. But he'd been wrong. She needed this too; she felt more in control when their bodies came together, even if it was just so she could feel what she did to him and nothing more.
"You, Kate Beckett." He brought her arm slowly up until he could touch his mouth to the inside of her elbow, then to her bicep, licking at her soapy skin before moving to her neck.
"Me?" she breathed out, her voice moist and hot and sleepy at his ear.
"You make me want things."
She groaned over him, the sound traveling into him and making his blood sing.
"You make me need you, want you, love you. And he can't have that. It ruins all his work. So he's out to break us, Kate."
"He can't," she sighed into him. "He won't."
"Then don't listen to him. If he comes to you again, you tell me. It works better for him if you're keeping it from me."
Her knees bumped his elbows and he twisted her hair in his hand, angled her head so that he could dip her hair into the water on her good side. She let out a little breath, almost a moan, when the heated water touched her scalp, and Castle stroked his fingers through her hair to get it wet.
He cradled her at his side, the long strands like silk in the water and touching him everywhere. Her eyes were closed when she finally spoke.
"He said those men had died because I couldn't keep you here. The one thing he'd asked of me - to keep you safe - and I'd let you go. I couldn't keep you."
"Kate," he murmured, leaning over her to press his mouth to her forehead, slowly drawing her up again. He squeezed her hair, twisted it in a loop around his hand to keep it off her back. "Kate, love, you don't keep me. And I don't keep you. That's not how this works."
Her eyes flickered open; her mouth parted. She took in a long breath as he maneuvered her higher on his chest to keep her out of the water.
And then she touched her palm to his forearm, his fingers still wrapped in her hair, and she curled her hand there.
"Partners," she said, her eyes as dark as the night and filled with so much more.