Chapter 13

Tried to go more into the minds of the characters in this chapter. Hope it worked. And a big thank you to my friend SkySmoke for helping me with editing and inspiration for this chapter

Rick couldn't even begin to imagine what his face looked like as he watched Kate walk away. He stood there, in physical pain. Every fiber of his being was screaming at him not to let her go as she disappeared around the corner. His body and mind were telling him to run after her. His heart knew better. Seconds turned into minutes and he lost track of how long he had been standing there. When he finally convinced his feet to carry him to the elevator he was almost alone at the precinct. Just about everyone else had gone off to do work or gone to lunch.

He didn't remember getting in a taxi but all of a sudden he was back at the loft and Martha was asking him what was wrong. He vaguely remembered telling her that now wasn't a good time before he locked himself in his office. She knew enough to leave him alone, at least for a little while, when he was in there. He sat and stared at his bookshelf, then got up and paced, then sat back down. He needed to find something to get his body to settle down and stop trying to convince him it would be a good idea to call her.

After what must have been a couple of hours he heard a knock at the door. "Dad?" he heard a young voice call before he heard the knob turning.

"It's locked" he called out from where he was currently standing over by the window.

"Well unlock it and let me in before I find a way to break it down. Gram says you came home all funny and have been in there for almost three hours."

"Now isn't a good time."

"Gram said you said that too, now let me in."

Castle looked at the door, debating. He didn't want his daughter seeing him like this. He was sure he looked like a mess. "Don't you have homework or something you should be doing?"

"You're more important dad. And you have to come out sometime."

"No I don't."

"So you're just going to stay in those clothes for the rest of your life and never eat again?" When Alexis didn't get a response she continued. "Stop being so dramatic and open the door dad. Please?"

He took a deep breath and walked over to the door. The second he turned the lock the redhead opened the door, came in and shut it again behind her. "Dad what's going on?"

He sat back down in his swivel chair before saying anything. "Kate…left" was all he could get out before getting up to pace around some more.

"What do you mean she left? Her stuff is still here…" she walked up to her dad and touched him on the arm.

"The case we are working on, she got a hate letter from one of my fans, and then a letter with a picture of her moving her stuff in here. The lady had been following her." He stopped for a minute as his emotions threatened to get the better of him. He was upset at the situation and angry at himself that he hadn't been able to keep Kate from the publicity. "We were closing in on the stalker and then she put the picture she sent us in the newspaper, and they ran a whole article about Kate moving in here. She saw it and freaked out. We got in an argument at the precinct and…she told me to go home, that she needed time and would call me soon. Then she just…walked away." He turned away from his daughter and faced out the window again, bracing himself with both hands on the window frame.

Alexis was silent for a minute, just looking at her dad in shock. She knew what Kate meant to him, she had known for a while. They had only been officially dating for a few months but Alexis knew the feelings had been there a long time before that. "Dad…" she finally said in a quiet voice. "Kate cares about you, a lot. Even I can see that. She just needs her space. You know her well enough to know that she won't just disappear." He turned to her and she was amazed at the amount of pain she saw on his face. "She'll come back dad, you guys have waiting for this for too long for her to just walk away for good."

He nodded and she tried her best to give him a convincing smile. She left the room and closed the door behind her again. Castle almost walked over and locked it behind her but thought better of it. Instead he just walked to the door and listened to see if Alexis would tell his mother what was going on. He heard her rummaging around in the kitchen and then Martha asked her if he was ok. He smiled at his daughters' response.

"Something happened at work and he's a little shaken up but he'll be alright. He just needs some time to mope around in his office, you know him." A minute later Alexis came back into the room, this time without knocking. She set a glass of wine on his desk along with a turkey sandwich. "Don't stay locked in here for too long ok?"

She turned to go but he stopped her "Alexis wait," she turned back to him with a question in her eyes. "Want to play a game of scrabble?" he asked with a forced smile.

Kate fought to keep the tears at the back of her eyes as she walked away, leaving Castle standing in the door of the interrogation room. She could feel his eyes boring holes in the back of her head. What had she just done? Her steps slowed as her heart willed her to turn around and run back towards him and apologize for everything she had said. It hadn't been his fault that the picture had ended up in the paper, but she had taken it out on him. He should have warned her about that kind of publicity though right? Or should she be willing to accept it if she really wanted to be with him? She shook her head and took a deep breath. She couldn't worry about that now, she had a case to deal with, and they were closing in. Focus she told herself, you don't have time to think about that now.

She paused at the door to holding and gathered her thoughts. She had to be in charge going in there or she wouldn't get anything. She opened the door and walked down the row of holding cells until she got to Brians'. "Mr. Adams, do you know why Ms. Lincoln would be at your house?"

He looked up at her in shock. "What? No. why?"

"We found your car parked outside of your house, and you told us that she took your car, which means she went to your house." Her phone rang and she excused herself and walked a few steps away to answer it. All she did was listen for a minute then say ok and hang up. Walking back to Brian she started talking again. "It rained out last night Mr. Adams, you know what rain does to the ground right?"

"Um…turns it to mud?"

"That's right, and there is plenty of mud around the perimeter of your house. My people found shoe prints leading from the car to your back door, but no prints coming back out, which means she's still in your house."

Brian stammered but couldn't seem to say anything coherent.

Becketts' voice rose as she talked. "Brian if you're thinking of hiding something from me I would think again. I have not had a good morning and I am fully prepared to make yours just as miserable if you don't tell me what Kaylee Lincoln is doing at your house."

"I don't know! I don't have anything really valuable, I don't have anything related to you or that author. I don't know what she would want there unless…"

"Unless what Brian?" Beckett asked raising her voice even more.

"Unless she's just hiding there, waiting for everything to blow over or something."

Beckett took a step closer to the suspect. "What do you mean hiding?"

"I…have a panic room. I got it installed a few years back after I got broken into. Kaylee knew about it. I don't remember telling her the password to get into it but I don't know, I might have told her at some point. I showed it to her once. But that's the only reason I can think of she would be back there I swear."

"Brian I'm going to need the password to get into that room."

A minute later Esposito felt is phone go off and picked it up. "Yo Beckett, we still can't find her anywhere."

"That's because the house has a panic room. I'm on my way with the combo to get into it. I'll be there in five minutes."

She pulled up in front of the house and walked in to find Ryan and Esposito waiting for her at the foot of the stairs with half a dozen other officers. "Panic room is this way" she said pointing to the living room. Everyone followed her as she walked up to a small painting that hung next to the couch and took it off the wall. Behind it was a small electronic keyboard panel.

"Dude this so cool. Castle is going to be so mad he missed this." Ryan said.

Beckett's breath caught in her lungs and she felt a tug on her heartstrings. She bit her lip to keep from saying anything and pulled a piece of paper out of her pocket. The code for the room was written on it and she punched the six number code into the keypad and heard a soft click. A panel in the side of the wall opened up to reveal a steel door. Beckett unholstered her weapon and leveled it at the door. Everyone else followed suit as she reached out and turned the handle in the door.

It opened smoothly and revealed Kaylee Lincoln sitting calmly in the corner of the room reading a book. "How'd you find me detective?" she asked.

Beckett nodded at two of the officers and they stepped forward to put the handcuffs on her. "Your friend Brian sold you out."

That got her attention. She looked at Beckett in shock as the cops led her out of the apartment and into one of the waiting squad cars. "No, he wouldn't do that."

"Well he did Ms. Lincoln. You can write him an angry letter from jail. You're good at those."

Kaylee stayed silent as she was put into the back of the car and simply stared at the three detectives and the car drove away.

Beckett turned to her partners. "Thanks for your help on this one guys."

"No problem Beckett." Esposito said. Ryan nodded in affirmation.

"I need to go home I think. It's been a really rough few days."

"Thought you were staying at Castle's place for a while?" Ryan asked

Beckett froze and tried to think of something to say. "Um, sort of, but I'm…going to my house tonight."

Ryan raised one eyebrow and Esposito simply asked "are you ok?"

She half smiled and nodded. "Yeah, I'm fine. I just need a warm shower and a good night sleep."

Her two partners nodded and she headed back to her car. She drove around a bit before heading home, needing to clear her mind. Now that the case was finished she knew she needed to have another talk with Captain Montgomery about the offer he had made her. Right now though, that warm shower was sounding really good.

She opened the door to her apartment and dropped everything on the couch. She stripped off her clothes on the way to the shower, not caring that the curtains on her window were still open. She turned on the shower and just stood there letting the hot water calm her down. She closed her eyes and thought back to the look on Castle's face when she told him to go home. She thought about how hard it had been to walk away from him. She allowed a few tears to fall before pushing them back.

What was she thinking? Rick Castle had done nothing but been there for her, she saw that now. The past three months had been the happiest she had had in a long time, was she really about to give that up over this case? Was she really going to fault him for something that was out of his control? She wondered, no, not wondered, knew she had made a mistake in telling him she needed space. She didn't need space, what she needed was his arms around her telling her it was going to be ok. What she needed was him.

Ok, case solved. And no I haven't forgotten about the offer Beckett got from Montgomery, next chapter will deal with that I promise