A/N: Holy cow, this fic is going to be the death of me! Seriously, I've never had characters be so uncooperative with me before. I totally didn't mean for this confrontation to happen now, but they refused to wait. Oy vey. In any case, I think this chapter might get some varied opinions. I will further explain why I chose to do what I did in the author's note at the bottom.
Thank you so much for your patience and support!
Chapter Four
Kate isn't supposed to have to deal with this right now.
A vice constricts her lungs, and she knows that if her hands weren't strangled in her dad's shirt, they'd be shaking uncontrollably.
She can't face Castle right now, not like this. Not without an inch of armor to protect her from this onslaught of emotions. Not when she's this raw and exposed. Not when she'd fallen asleep to echoing refrains of fun and uncomplicated and woken up to the scathing memory of what do you know about Detective Slaughter?
He's not supposed to be here.
(Her heart is not supposed to leap with hope and joy at just the sight of him.
Foolish heart. He's the one who crushed you.)
Why is he here when in the past weeks he's given her every indication that he's only sticking around for the cases?
She wants to yell at him, to scream and rail at him for showing up now of all times. She doesn't need his pity, and she can't survive this false hope that wells up in her from his mere presence. She can't stand him being here but not.
She sees resolve in his eyes—fathomless, blue eyes that have haunted and taunted her in every one of her dreams and nightmares for the past two months—and the need to break suffocates her.
Not now. Not. Now.
She forces herself to breathe deep, steadying breaths.
In, out. In, out. Just like that. Good girl, Katie.
The panic passes. She is in control again.
She remembers that her father is by her side, that she doesn't have to face the bitter-sweetness of Castle's concern on her own. She is not alone.
Her mind clears enough that she can drape herself in a mantle of insouciance. She's so proud of herself that her voice comes out steady. "Fine, whatever. We're heading up to Dad's cabin, so if you want to hang around an empty apartment, go for it."
A pause, then to her surprise it's Jim who speaks. "Actually, Katie, I don't think we should head up to the cabin right now."
"What?" She snaps her head around to stare incredulously at her dad.
She hates that she keeps thinking about what Castle would say—especially since he's standing right there—but she can't help feeling like this is an exemplary et tu, Brute moment.
Jim shrugs lightly, a move that makes her wince when it jars her head and her vision blacks out for a couple of seconds. He apologizes, and then explains, "I just don't think it's a good idea for you to be traveling right now."
"But I—what—Dad," she exclaims, but it comes out sounding more like a whine than anything that's passed through her lips in over a decade.
"Katie," Jim replies in that universally acknowledged parental tone of warning.
She hasn't heard him use it in so long that she stares at him in stunned surprise, not knowing how to respond to it. He cocks an eyebrow at her, and she feels a respondent desire to complain like she's sixteen again. She suppresses it, barely, and sighs.
"Fine. Whatever. Can I go sit down and get a cup of coffee? My head is killing me."
She should be irritated when she sees her dad and Castle share a commiserating glance, but instead she's…amused. It's strange. She wouldn't have imagined that she would feel light this morning, but she kind of does.
Maybe she's still a bit intoxicated.
…
"Castle, you've been here for half the day. Don't you better things to be doing?"
Like taking blond flight attendants out to fancy restaurants or following freakin' insane detectives for inspiration?
Kate valiantly bites back the recriminations. Not her place, she reminds herself.
No," he responds.
She waits for some smartass remark to shoot through his lips, but he doesn't add anything. It throws her off, like everything else has for the past day and a half.
…
"Castle, why are you here?" she eventually asks when she's finally fed up with the fact that he's just taken up residence on her sofa like it's no big deal.
It is a big deal when they haven't even really been friends for the last several weeks.
He looks up at her from the book he'd stolen off her shelves. "Because that's what partners do."
Anger wells up hot and frighteningly quick. The filter between her mouth and her brain is out of commission and the words spit themselves out before she even has a chance to think them. "Bullshit, Castle. We both know we haven't been partners in more than a month."
He stiffens, and the open, friendly (false, she thinks, so very false) expression wipes away until there's nothing but a carefully blanked slate. "I still care about you, Kate."
She shakes her head, not in denial, but disbelief that he could even say that after all the cold shoulders and pointed words he's fed her.
"Sure you do," she mutters, not sure if she means for him to hear it or not.
Her heart still aches every time she thinks of those two weeks filled with underhanded snipes and deliberate brush-offs followed by another week of him breaking up their partnership to shadow another detective. He came back, sure, but not until Slaughter got suspended by the board of review for excessive violence. Apparently Castle had even testified on Slaughter's behalf, but the overwhelming evidence spoke for itself.
She doesn't even know him anymore.
That was the moment she stopped hoping that he would snap out of his funk. If he wanted to get away from her so badly that he was willing to testify on behalf of a guy who was more than halfway insane, then so be it.
She doesn't need Richard Castle in her life, no matter that her ever-present wall had begun disintegrating for his sake. After all, he'd helped her build a better fortified one in its stead.
And her dad. Jeez, her dad.
She knows he means well, but it really doesn't help when he leaves them alone for these extended periods of time thinking that—what? They want to spend time with each other? This awkward tension between them will go away? That Castle would somehow magically make her better?
Memories from last summer when the strength of her nightmares were dulled only by the soothing pages of one of Castle's books are deeply entrenched in both Kate's and Jim's minds, so it makes some kind of sense for her dad to think that the good Castle's books did for her can only be magnified by the man himself. It's faulty logic, but not something for which Kate can blame her dad.
Of course, the fact that Jim doesn't know how badly it hurts her to see Castle is actually Kate's fault since she never told her dad about their recent breakup. Of their partnership, she adds.
Then she scoffs a little at herself. What's the point in pretending that their partnership was the only thing rent asunder? Even if she never acknowledges aloud the depth of her feelings for him, the fact is that the pain of losing him is no less crushing. She may never tell him how totally and completely he's broken her, but she shouldn't lie to herself anymore.
She settles back into the large armchair she's been confined to and leans her head against the back of it. The effects of her hangover still plague her in the form of a persistently throbbing headache and an unsettled stomach.
…
"What happened last night?" Castle asks out of the blue twenty minutes later.
He's sitting on the end of the couch that's furthest away from Kate with a notebook on his lap and a pen in his hand. He hasn't written anything, not that either of them had expected him to when he made his request for the tools of his trade. They both know it's a prop to establish a façade that he's not just sitting there, watching her as if she might free fall into mental instability at any moment.
The worst part is that she really might.
Kate screws her eyes shut to block out memories of wild panic converging with rampant paranoia. "Leave it alone, Castle. It's none of your business."
Castle ignores her and persists. (Of course he does. He never backs down, except when she doesn't want him to.)
"Do you have episodes like this often?"
She snaps. "God damn it, Castle! What the hell makes you think you have the right to ask me anything? I don't know what my dad told you about last night, or why he thought it would be a good idea for him to call you but I—"
"He didn't tell me anything," Castle says quietly. "I was here."
Her breathing stutters as her pent up anger drains so suddenly, she's left dizzy and unbalanced and flooded with a whole new set of emotions. Joy that he'd actually been there last night, that his presence hadn't been a figment of her unreliable imagination. Embarrassment that he'd seen her at her lowest. Resentment that she'd been so exposed and hadn't even had a chance to fend for herself. Hurt that he hadn't stayed with her through the night.
Then, when everything else runs its course, she's mostly just weary. Weary from spending so long hiding the damaged pieces of her (sometimes it feels like that's all she is). Weary from trying to mend something that breaks every time she sews it back up.
And now that he's seen the ugly underbelly of her psyche despite everything she'd done to avoid that, she realizes that it's all such a waste of time and effort.
"So what, Castle? You think that gives you a free pass to dig out all my sordid secrets just because you've seen firsthand how fucked up I am? Or did you want some more material so that you can add a psychotic break to Nikki Heat's sparkling personality?"
"Damn you, Kate," he growls, his blue eyes darkening to a stormy gray. "Damn you to hell if you think that the only reason I'm here is because I want to exploit you."
"That's just it, Castle! I don't know why the hell you're here. I don't know why you suddenly care when you didn't give a rat's ass about me just two days ago. I don't know why you're pretending like I matter when all you want right now is fun and uncomplicated and the goddamn 'Widow-maker.' I don't know why you're here!"
…
Castle clenches his hands into fists so tight, his knuckles turn white and he can feel crescents forming in his palm where his blunt nails dig hard into the flesh.
He tries to ride the tide of anger that wash over him, tries to remember that Kate's emotions are still unsettled, but it doesn't work because he knows that she's never been this honest before.
And it tears him apart because it's taken this—the demolition of their partnership and the instability of her emotional state—for her to say actual words, but this honesty is scathing and almost too much because she isn't hiding behind her wall anymore. She lets him see every ounce of her vexation, her pain, her anger, and—this confuses him the most—her utter heartbreak.
He forces himself to breathe deeply through his nose, to calm himself before he says something scathing. If she wants honesty, then he'll give her honesty.
"I'm here," he says in a low voice, "because I love you."
She stares at him blankly, incredulity painted in thick, broad strokes across the elegant features of her face. "What?"
He shakes his head. "Is that really so surprising, Kate? You already know it. You've known for about a year, in fact."
He watches in fascination as gears turn and scattered information fall into place. Comprehension sparks in her eyes followed by disbelief and a riot of emotions that flash through faster than it should be possible for the human mind to compute.
Everything runs so quickly that he doesn't have a chance to dissect her emotions before she's already speaking. "So that's it then? That's the reason behind all the drama these past months?"
"Drama?" he repeats in disbelief. "What, you think I was throwing some kind of childish fit?"
"No, but I do think you were trying to punish me. And damn you, Castle, because it worked. When you stomped on our friendship and spat on our partnership? Yeah, congratulations. That hurt."
He looks away sharply, pained by the knowledge that his barbs had indeed sunk into tender flesh, but the bubbling anger he thought he'd suppressed wells up once again.
She doesn't get to do that. She doesn't get to make this his fault.
He stands, the notebook and pen clattering to the floor, and paces in front the coffee table. He wants to get up into her face, but his emotions are far too volatile right now, and he just can't be near her. She stirs up too much in him.
"You seem to be forgetting that you're the one who lied. You're the one who strung me along like a clueless idiot with empty promises of some day."
Kate jumps out of her seat and has to steady herself from the dizzy spell by extending a hand behind her to brace against the armrest. "String you along? Damn it, Castle, is that what you thought I've been doing? God, I don't even know how to dignify that with a response."
"What the hell am I supposed to think? I tell you I love you, and you lie to me for a year about not remembering. You couldn't tell me the truth, but you could throw it out in the interrogation room as ammunition to get your confession? Tell me, what am I supposed to think?"
"You weren't supposed to think the worst of me!" She rakes a hand through her tangled locks, and she tugs her hair in frustration. "Call me a selfish bitch, Rick, but I'm not sorry for lying to you. I'm sorry that I hurt you, but I can't be sorry for taking the time I needed to out myself back together. I can't be sorry for thinking about myself first because if I hadn't, I wouldn't even be standing here today. Not as I am, anyway."
He freezes and a chill pierces his veins. "What are you talking about?"
She shakes her head, not in denial, but self-deprecation. "Just look at me, Castle. Most of the time you see Detective Kate Beckett, unbending and unbreakable. Supercop. Sometimes you see Kate Beckett the woman, sexy and confident and fun. Most of the time, though?" She gestured at herself. "This is what I am. This broken, screwed up person who can barely walk outside most days. I needed to stand up on my own two feet before I started leaning on you. Because if I leaned on you from the start, I wouldn't know how to walk by myself. I needed to know that if you weren't here, I could make it on my own."
Castle rubs a weary hand down his face, wondering how this conversation spiraled so far out of control. His thoughts are a kaleidoscope of broken images and fractured sentences, and for all her revelations, he can't get past this one fact. "You don't trust me to stay. You don't trust that when I say always, I mean it. You just don't trust me."
Hazel eyes flame red, and she shoves him. Hard. He stumbles back several steps, almost tripping over the coffee table behind him.
"Goddamn it, Rick. You keep saying these things like you're surprised, but why the hell should it shock you? You're right. I don't trust you. Why should I trust you? Why should I show you every vulnerable, screwed up part of me? Why should I let you see me at my lowest? Why, Castle? Because you love me? So much that at the first mistake I make, you punish me for it? Why should I have to let you in? So that you can tear me apart, piece by piece until there's nothing left? Why, Castle? Tell me. Why should I trust you?"
"Why should you—" He cuts himself off with a hard bite of his tongue. He can't believe that she's actually using his love for her against him, can't believe that she can say these things and mean it. Indignation boils up hot and heavy within him and he can't take it anymore. He explodes. "Because of everything we've been through together! Four years I've been right here! Does that mean nothing to you?"
"Does it mean nothing to you?" she returns. Her jaw tightens, but rather than coming off angry, she looks contemplative. "I'm not the only one with trust issues here, Castle. Despite everything that we've been through together," she repeats his words emphatically, "you don't seem to have any trouble thinking the worst of me either."
The air squeezes out of him in a great whoosh, and just like that, his rage deflates and he's left feeling…defeated. She doesn't trust him to stay, and he doesn't trust her to love him. Why is it that two people can trust each other with their lives, yet be so reticent with their hearts?
Kate bites her lip and glances away, noting something in his posture that she can't stand to see. She takes a deep breath and continues, "Look, you're entitled to your anger, I know. You have a right to be furious at me for lying for so long. I'm not denying you that, nor am I saying that I'm faultless. I just…sometimes I feel like you know me better than anyone, but sometimes I feel like you don't know me at all."
Silence wraps them up in its mantle, its curling tendrils filling the chasms torn between them. It settles there, a neutral presence that neither rips apart nor draws closer, and it's strange that perhaps for the first time, Kate and Castle are on the same page. Hurts have been exposed, fears revealed, hopes barely touched on, and the only question now is where do they go from here?
Castle thinks back to just hours earlier this morning when he'd deliberately chosen to love, regardless of whatever backlash may occur. He hadn't expected the trial of thorns to appear so quickly, but here stands before him the first obstacle. It hurts, rakes him from the inside until he feels like he's just a standing, bloody mess. There is so much distrust between them, so much buried pain and lingering wounds. Can he really fix this? Does he even have the ability to?
He'd chosen to hold fast and make his stand, but he realizes that he can't do it alone. He needs her to do her part in this as well. She has to be willing to put in as much as he is, maybe not all at once, but he needs her to commit something.
He licks his suddenly parched lips and swallows hard. "You say that I don't know real you. Okay, maybe that's true, but how am I supposed to get to know the real you if you never let me see her? Give me a chance—give us a chance—to really get to know each other, weaknesses and insecurities all. I can promise you that in the end, I'll only love you more."
A/N: First of all, yes, I jacked some lines from "Always." Consider it my tribute to the best finale ever. :)
The big issue I think a lot of people might have is how I had Kate deal with Castle revealing that he heard her say she remembered everything. I chose to do it this way for a couple of reasons. One, this is essentially a spin-off from "The Limey" on, so neither of them have gone through the growth we saw in "Headhunters," "Undead Again," and "Always." Instead, that poison has dragged on for a month and a half without any resolution. Two, even in "Always," I noticed that Kate never exactly apologized for lying about remembering. Her apology at the end of the episode seemed to be more about the fact that she'd heedlessly pursued her shooter than it was for this. That's really the basis for my spin that Kate isn't necessarily sorry about the lie itself. Three, they, especially Kate, are extremely emotionally volatile at this moment and just like in real life, not everything they say is necessarily really what they mean. Four, these aren't their final thoughts on the matter because this will definitely crop up again.
Okay, I'm done with my rambling now. Even though this is a different approach than usual and way different from how it panned out in the canon, I hope you all still find it believable and enjoyable. Thanks for reading, and I still crossing my fingers that the next chapter will come out without so much wrestling with the characters.