Disclaimer: The only part of Castle that I own is the TV on which I watch the show.
A/N Oops. Not a two-shot after all.
It's a good thing he'd put the razor down before picking up his phone or he'd have given himself one hell of a nick. He'd wanted to check his Twitter feed, as he does when he needs to give his spirits a boost. It probably would have, too, but for the fan who was going into Smacksy's Bar last night just as he and Slaughter were leaving. RookRocks had taken a photo of the two of them propping each other up, looking like the back end of a garbage truck. He'd posted it with the caption, "Hey, Nikki Heat, your guy is totally wasted. Who's his date?" Castle's 3.25 million followers are rushing to comment, not that he's going to look. He wishes that he had only 3.25 followers, though how would that work? Maybe three followers, one of whom is ten weeks pregnant?
He's still standing at the sink. His phone is off, but that appalling image is seared into his brain. If the mirror is to be believed, and it almost certainly is, he doesn't look much better now than he did last night, but at least he's standing upright and doesn't reek. If he had the nerve, he'd consider using the razor to slit his throat. Instead, he gets dressed, makes himself some coffee, and turns his phone back on. Slaughter will be getting in touch, and he'll have to answer, God help him.
Beckett is still in the break room. She's going to have to tell Castle, but when? And where? Ordinarily she's a good bullet-biter, but there's nothing ordinary about this. She hasn't a clue how to approach him, and she's a wreck. Maybe if she put herself in his shoes? Or put herself in his mouth? No. No, no, no, that's not what she means. What she means is that she'll eat something that he likes to eat when he's with her. Oh, God, if he could read her mind right now. She often suspects—used to suspect—that he does. Did.
To steady her nerves, she gets up to make some coffee with the luxury beans that he supplies for the luxury machine that he also supplied. While it's brewing, she shoves a handful of change in the battered vending machine and buys his favorite workplace snack, a Milky Way Marshmallow bar* and a bag of Cheetos. "Sweet and salty, gooey and crunchy," he likes to say. "Can't beat that combination, Beckett." Back at the break room table, she takes a tiny bite of the candy bar, and chews on a Cheeto at the same time. It's vile. Absolutely vile. But he loves it, so she'll try to love it, too, for whatever that's worth—even though she's afraid that everything is worthless now between them.
It turns out that if she chases the Milky Way-Cheeto mouthful with a good slug of coffee, it's almost tolerable. Still, after four bites of candy and cheesy puff things of a bilious orange hue, she's ready to gag, so she stops and stares at her phone. Text? Call? Go to the loft? No, no, and no. No, wait. Yes to the first, with a suggestion of a meeting place. It takes her several minutes and a chewed nail to compose an eighteen-word request.
"Could you meet me privately for coffee in half an hour, please? Just us. The place on MacDougal."
When her phone chirps, she drops it on the floor where it lands screen down. She retrieves it, flips it over, and warily checks the response with one squinting eye.
"OK"
That's it? "OK"? It's the shortest text in history from Castle, and probably not a good sign. She pushes herself wearily from the table, throws the rest of the vending-machine delicacies into the wastebasket, and returns to the Captain's office.
"Excuse me, sir."
"Yes, Detective," Gates says, looking over the tops of her glasses.
"I wanted to let you know that I'm going out to meet Castle. Just to talk to him briefly, see if we can make any progress on the case. I thought it best to do it away from the precinct."
"Good idea. You've already gone over the material I gave you?"
"Yes, sir."
"You're a remarkably fast reader."
"I try to be. Find it useful on the job, you know?"
"Yes, I do know." She takes her glasses off, laces her fingers together, and bumps them against her chin. "And you will impress upon Mister Castle that he is not to let Detective Slaughter know that you are in any way involved."
"I will. First order of business."
"All right then. Good luck." When she puts her glasses on again and looks down at the file on her desk, Beckett takes it as her unvoiced dismissal and leaves. On the way to the elevator she tells Ryan and Espo that she'll be gone for a bit to do something that Gates has requested. She's uncomfortable saying it, though it's not untrue. It's just not the whole truth and nothing but. She feels the same way about what she'd said to Gates. She is a fast reader, but she's barely looked at the file from the Captain. She doesn't need to because she's been reading, on the sly, everything there is on Michael Reilly's murder, as well as every detail about every charge that has ever been brought against Slaughter.
Deliberately arriving ahead of her meeting time with Castle, who is always prompt, she parks her car down the block from the cafe on MacDougal. She chose the place because it has sensational coffee and, more important, because at this time of day, in the pre-lunch lull, it's usually all but empty. There's also a high-back, two-person booth in the rear that's almost impossible to see from inside or out, and she grabs it. When the waitress approaches, she places their order and keeps her eye on the door.
She's two sips into her latte when he comes through the door. He looks fantastic, and he looks like hell. He's wearing a new sky-blue shirt—new to her, anyway, which probably makes it new since she mentally catalogues his wardrobe. For professional reasons. In case he's, say, taken captive and she needs to provide details on what he had on when last seen. It could be vital information. It's warm for mid-April and he's not wearing a jacket, which means that his biceps, triceps, and deltoids are visible. Not exactly visible—she can't actually see them, she doesn't have X-ray vision for crying out loud—but the play of them under the (presumably) soft cotton of his shirt is evident. Very evident. But he does look like hell. His eyes are bloodshot and there are dark circles underneath. He's moving like someone very old who's trying to walk through ankle-deep mud. What the hell, Castle?
He's sure that she'll be in that booth in the rear, and she is. She looks even more beautiful than usual, and she looks like hell. There's an overhead light that catches her cheekbones just so, and brings out some honeyed shades in her hair. But the most remarkable thing is her make-up: she's not wearing any. He's never seen her without it, except in the hospital the morning after she was shot, which doesn't count. Without it she looks freshly scrubbed and incredibly young. Open and vulnerable. He's not used to that, either. But she looks gaunt and exhausted, too, as if something's bearing down on her and crushing her, physically and emotionally. What the hell, Beckett?
"Hey, Castle." She summons a smile.
He slides in opposite her. "Hi."
"I took the liberty," she says, gesturing to two mugs of coffee and an enormous glazed doughnut, trying not to mind that he hadn't said "hey" to her. "Hi" was for everybody else.
"Thanks." He lifts his mug, takes a sip, and winces.
"Is there something wrong? Too hot? Oh, wait, too cold? Did they give you decaf by mistake? I'll get another—"
He puts his hand out, and unintentionally brushes her wrist. It feels like a jolt from a downed high-power line. "It's fine, Beckett. It's me."
"What do you mean, it's you?"
His entire body slumps. Even his face sags. "I had too much to drink last night." He slumps a little more. "And this morning."
"This morning?" Her fingers leap to her lips. "Sorry. Sorry. I didn't mean to be so loud."
"It's okay. I already yelled louder at myself."
"You never drink in the morning, Castle. You okay?" She's the one who winces this time. "Sorry, none of my business."
"I'm sure you'll hear about it, anyway."
No judgment, no judgment, no judgment. No jealousy, no jealousy, no jealousy. Keep it light, keep it light, keep it light. "You land in the drunk tank, Castle? Am I gonna have to get your record wiped clean?"
"Only if you can wipe Twitter clean."
If she could surreptitiously check it right now, she would, and as soon as they're out of here, she will. For now, she'll brush it off and maybe also get to the point of the conversation they're not yet having. "I'm not sure even Gates could do that, and she can do almost anything. You probably have a zillion followers."
"Three point two five million."
"Wow." And one, she doesn't add. 3.25 million and one. Her. Under an assumed name, of course. "So, um, Castle, speaking of Gates."
"Yeah?"
"She's the reason I wanted to see you."
His ego has taken a lot of blows lately, but this is the worst. "Oh."
He looks so hurt that ironically he's given her faint hope. Faint hope is better than none at all. Belatedly she wonders what he'd thought when she'd texted him. He must have found it odd, but he'd showed up. That's something. She extends the tiny tip of the tiniest leaf on an olive branch. "Not that I didn't want to see you."
"You did?" He sounds surprised. And then his tone turns bitter. "Is that true?"
That's a metaphorical slap. "Of course it's true. Why would I lie?"
He just manages not to throw the question back in her face, but he takes a few moments to reply. "Anyway, Beckett. Gates. What about her?"
So much for the hope. Could this meeting get any worse? "She's put me—well not she, but One PP. One PP instructed her to." Oh, shit. "She put me on the Reilly case."
"What? So I'm off?" Anger and relief are dueling at twenty paces in his gut, pistols drawn, but he can't let her think that he's grateful. "Dammit."
"No, you're not off the case. I'm on it with you. As of this morning."
"So Slaughter's off?" And he and Beckett are a team again?
"No."
"Look, I have the hangover of the decade, and maybe I'm a little slow on the uptake, but does this mean that the three of us are working this homicide? Because I can't see that—. It won't work."
"It's the three of us, but not exactly. Let me explain." This isn't easy, not least because she's not allowed to reveal that Finn Rourke is working clandestinely with the mayor. "I don't have to tell you that Slaughter doesn't always play by the book."
"You hate him, Beckett."
"I don't. I dislike some of his methods and a lot of his attitudes, including the way he treats women, but that's not the point. The higher-ups are concerned about serious escalation of gang-on-gang violence, which is one of your friend the mayor's hot topics, and they want this case closed cleanly and quickly. The cleanly part is something Slaughter isn't interested in."
"So, what, you're supposed to sweet talk him into playing nicely?"
"No, Castle, I'm not going to talk to him at all. He can't know—and you can't tell him—that I'm working the case, even behind the scenes. You'll still be riding with him, and as far as he's concerned, it's just you two cowboys. What I'll be is your shadow. That's something, right? Me shadowing you?"
That should have gotten at least a little smile from him, but it hadn't. He's expressionless. "Shadowing me. As in following? Tailing?"
"Yes. But look, maybe it won't even come to that."
"How's that?"
"Because Gates is hoping that you and I can break this case on our own, just the way we have dozens of other times, only without Ryan and Espo. Whenever you can get time away from Slaughter."
"I dunno, Beckett." He runs his hands down his face and looks blankly at the wall behind her.
She doesn't know either, not really. But she's desperate for it to work and this might be her last shot. She's shredding the edge of her paper napkin. "Aren't you going to eat your doughnut?" she asks, pushing the plate towards him. "It's your favorite. Remember that time last year when you asked the manager if she had a secret, magic machine in the basement that injected warm air into the doughnuts? Because there was no explanation that you could think of, scientific or otherwise, for them being so light?"
"Weird that you remember that," he says, turning his eyes back to her. "It wasn't important."
"Sure it was. Doughnuts are very important to you."
"What about other important things, Beckett? You remember all of them?"
His question, questions, are laced with acid and shot through with everything from anger to disappointment. Something starts bubbling in the back of her brain. He's talking about something specific, isn't he? Before she can say anything, his phone rings. The music is familiar, but she can't place it. Castle reads her face well.
"It's 'Cowboys From Hell'," he says. "Slaughter's ringtone. He programmed it into my phone yesterday." He accepts the call. "Castle."
TBC
A/N Thanks so much, everyone who's reading this, and I hope you don't mind sticking around a little longer. I'm terrible at estimating how long my stories are going to be. I outgrew chapter two, which is where I'd intended to end, so this will be a bit longer than I intended.
*The Milky Way marshmallow bar was not yet on the market in 2012, but I thought that it would appeal to Castle, so I'm exercising artistic candy license.