Author's note: Had to work today, so I had to wait until I got home to write this. Hope you like it. And thank you all for the reviews!

OOOOOOOOOOO

"Thank you, Detective, please keep me informed."

Alexis Castle walked in as her grandmother was hanging up the phone, and smiled.

"Was that Beckett?"

Martha shook her head, and sat down. Alexis was immediately concerned because she rarely saw her grandmother as serious as she looked just then.

"It was Detective Esposito. You remember him?"

"He works with Detective Beckett, right?"

"Right."

"What did he want? Is everything okay?"

"Your father and Detective Beckett haven't shown up to the convention yet."

"What?"

"Now don't panic," Martha said, holding up her hand. "Just because they aren't there doesn't mean that something happened to them."

She didn't look convinced.

"You know your father, dear. It's completely possible that he decided to go to Chicago or even Detroit."

"With Detective Beckett?"

"I'm just saying… don't panic until there's a reason to. The detectives are going to go to the airport and find out where he went."

"What if something did happen?"

Martha opened her arms and Alexis took the invitation gratefully, more than willing to be comforted.

"Darling, your father can walk through raindrops and come out dry on the other side. He's fine. I know it."

OOOOOOOOOOO

Montgomery looked up at the knock on the door to his office and found Ryan standing there.

"What did you find out?"

"They never arrived at the airport in Buffalo."

"Do we know where they ended up?"

Ryan shook his head.

"The plane's emergency beacon hasn't been activated, though, so that means that they didn't crash. They might just have taken a side trip somewhere…"

Montgomery frowned.

"It's not like Beckett to pull something like this. Castle, yes, but not Beckett."

Esposito walked over to join them, looking worried, too.

"They just finished calling around. The plane hasn't landed in any of the airports within its range. That means something happened to it."

"What's the next step?" Montgomery asked.

"The FAA is going to launch a search for them along the flight plan Castle filed," Esposito told him. "There aren't any reports of planes going down in the last couple of days in the populated areas which means they'll focus on the rest of it. If they crashed, they'll find them."

"You talked to his mom and daughter?"

The detective nodded.

"They're worried, but that's understandable."

"Keep them posted on anything we find out," Montgomery said.

Ryan nodded; they already planned on that, of course.

OOOOOOOOOOO

It wasn't a very good day. Beckett was used to being active, and hanging out in the woods wasn't the ideal way to take care of that need. She watched Castle sitting on a log fishing, but didn't join in. Part of the reason for that was that she was afraid she might actually catch something. Castle wasn't the only one who didn't have a clue how to cook a fish by a fire – and she had no desire to clean them, either. Another reason was that she didn't want to sit around doing nothing – and fishing was boring. She couldn't believe he was able to sit still long enough to do it, really.

She took a hike, instead, looking for the same road that he'd been looking for earlier that morning. She had been careful, though; the last thing she wanted was to get lost in the woods without any way of finding the camp again. She didn't have any more luck than he had, unfortunately. Not only did she not find a road or any campsites, she didn't find hunters, other hikers or any other kind of outdoorsmen. She wondered if he'd imagined the road or had mistaken something else for a road. They'd crashed pretty fast, after all. It wouldn't have been that hard. It could very well be that they were in a place that was a lot more isolated than they'd initially guessed.

And that was a little scary.

She'd made lunch for herself when she'd returned from the hike. A quick check in the box told her that a pack of crackers was missing but that he hadn't made himself anything for lunch. Of course, he could have been too focused on his fishing – she knew he tended to get that way sometimes. Beckett thought about taking him some spaghetti when she made her own lunch, but decided that he was a grown up and if he wasn't hungry she wasn't going to nag him about it. It wasn't like they were using all that much energy sitting around, after all, and he knew where to find it when he did get hungry.

The rest of the afternoon she spent gathering up firewood, just in case. Not that she liked it, but she wanted to do her share, and he'd already done more than his share of wood-gathering and fire minding. She'd make sure he didn't need to do it that evening at least. But it was boring, too, and she needed some kind of conversation, so she dropped a final load on the pile and ambled over to the lake to see what he was doing.

He didn't even seem to notice her coming over, she saw. It was confirmed when he jumped, startled, when she spoke up.

"How's it going?"

He looked up at her, and she frowned when she realized he was as flushed as he'd been that morning when she'd woken up.

"They're not biting," he told her, looking back over the water.

"Are you okay?"

He smiled.

"They're fish. I'll get over it."

"That's not what I meant, Castle."

He shrugged, and the smile faded into a sad grimace.

"I'm worried."

"About what?"

"Who," he corrected. "Alexis. They have to know we didn't show up at the convention by now. She must be frantic."

Rather than try to convince him otherwise – which would have been a waste of time – she sat down beside him.

"I'm sorry."

He looked over at her.

"You don't have anything to be sorry for. This is all my fault."

"You meant to crash us?"

"No. But it was my idea to fly you. If I'd left you alone, you'd be at the convention having a fun time and doing whatever it is that you guys do at those things. Instead you're stuck here eating crap and waiting to be rescued by people who probably don't have a clue where to look."

She sighed, and leaned against his arm.

"It could be worse."

"Yeah? How?"

"We could have died."

"Still might."

She shook her head.

"Knock that off, Castle."

"Sorry."

"You can feel guilty when they find us, okay? Right now we need to keep positive."

He looked out over the water, avoiding her gaze.

"The water's pretty clear," he finally said. "I've been looking at it all day. If someone flies over they might spot the plane."

"Think so?"

He shrugged.

"Maybe."

"That's good."

"Yeah."

"You're pretty hot, Castle."

He looked over at her, surprised.

"Yeah?"

She reached over and rested her hand gently against his cheek, brushing against the stubble that was growing there.

"Yeah. We'd better get some aspirin in you and see if we can break your fever."

He rolled his eyes, a self-mocking smile breaking into his moodiness as he realized that she'd purposely phrased it to make him think she was hitting on him. It was perfect, and he'd fallen for it – which amused him as much as if he'd done it to her.

"That was cold, Detective."

She grinned and got up, pulling him up as well.

"Yeah, I'm like that some times. Let's go dose you."