Chapter 9 – The Ambush
Castle is waiting for her the very next day when she shows up at the Twelfth to start her shift. He's casually loitering in the vestibule between the inner and outer sets of swing doors, looking as if he owns the place. A picture of studied nonchalance, he has his shoulder pressed against the tiled wall where he's leaning, institutional green paint propping him up, a copy of the New York Times expertly folded to reveal only the article he's currently reading.
He reacts to her presence instantly, standing up straight, his height impressive against her flat, black, work boots. "You're late," he informs Kate, glancing at his watch.
Surprise, followed closely by indignation, color her response.
"Mr. Castle, what are you doing here?" she retorts, stunned by his reappearance at her place of work. It's as if her brain contains some magical genie, a genie that has the power to summon a person before her by the mere act of thinking about them.
Because she was…thinking about him.
"So, here's the thing," he begins, completely ignoring the startled look she mostly fails to hide as he falls in step with her, walking by her side into the lower half of the precinct, so close that they bump shoulders and elbows as they clear the inner set of doors.
"The thing?" murmurs Kate for something to say, feeling her cheeks flush with the rush of so many emotions at once.
She surprised, annoyed, actually make that completely taken aback to the point of violence…and then he starts talking in a way that reveals a little of his own nerves, just a slight excitable tremor in his voice, and she feels relieved. She feels a little bit relieved because he's the one shouldering the responsibility for this. He's the one continuing to do the hard work so that she doesn't have to. His actions are absolving her of responsibility, and still she finds herself railing against it.
She's a mess.
She hardly slept the night before. At one she woke with her hardback copy of Gathering Storm still lying on her chest. After banishing the book to her nightstand - its weight one metaphor she certainly didn't want to contemplate the meaning of at that ungodly hour - she tossed and turned through a series of tormented, dream-filled naps, haunted by images of a faceless little girl being chased through a dark, twisty wood by a large, equally faceless man. The man gave off vibes of evil despite saying not a word, his presence disturbing for its silent menace as much as anything. She awoke with a start, feeling hot and exhausted, irritable and confused, at around 6am, the city still dark and fairly silent beneath her window.
Her day got off on an extra bad footing when she realized she was out of coffee at home, and had to make a special trip to the coffee shop around the corner on her way into work to pick up her favorite order - a grande skim latte with two pumps sugar-free vanilla. This essential detour almost made her late. And now this man is here again, waiting for her after she told him last night that he should leave her alone, forget her, don't call again…ever.
Does he listen to anyone or take no for an answer at all, she wonders to herself, as she hears him start talking again.
"Yeah, so here's the thing," he repeats, when Kate halts at the bottom of the half-flight of stairs that lead up to the precinct's main reception area.
It's a public space where anyone could see or hear them, and she's not about to risk that again. The Twelfth suddenly seems riddled with aging desk sergeants who run the precinct by day with an iron fist, and then act as touts for Match-dot-com by night. She wonders if they're on commission or if they just meddle because their own lives are so sad and empty that they need to live through the lens of other people just to keep from ending it all.
When she looks at the writer, he scares her. She finds his face too full of hope; so full of the effort he's putting in to get past her barriers in order that she'll even talk to him again. It's too much and it's...right there, just sitting on the surface, swimming in his eyes for her to see so plainly. The optimism in his persistent blue gaze merely adds to the guilt she already feels and uncertainty she's secretly harboring over the decision she made last night: to nip this in the bud before it gets anymore out of hand and he finagles his way even further into her life.
She looks away and then turns back to face him, intent on cutting him dead. But he gets in before her, as he seems able to do almost every time she goes about setting him straight.
"I know you said you didn't want to see me again. But I don't believe that's actually true."
Her mouth falls open at his jaw dropping audacity, but no sound comes out, and Castle takes full advantage of her stunned silence to keep on talking.
"Truth is, I can't stop thinking about you. Okay? And I…I mean all night. And I figure I'm not the only one who was there in that bar or on that phone call last night. Kate, we made a connection. And whether you're ready to acknowledge that fact or not…" he shrugs. "I'm prepared to wait until you are. Ready that is."
Fact!? Her brain screams the word at her until her mouth is able to catch up and form whole sentences again.
"Did you just say fact?" she spits out, one hand falling to land on her hip, the other clutching her coffee cup so hard it looks like she might pop the lid right off.
Castle nods in response, holding his tongue for once, sensing that she isn't about to leave it at that.
He's not wrong.
"That we "made a connection"," she repeats, making air quotes around the words with her fingers and her mocking tone, "is a fact to you? How can you know that? How can you presume to speak for me?" She's getting into her stride now, anger taking over from any fleeting capitulation towards guilt.
"How can I—? Because I look in your eyes and I see this flicker of…of something. And maybe it's just a flicker right now, but I know it's there."
"You see a flicker?" repeats Kate, deadpan, voice flattened by sarcasm. "A flicker of…of something. What are you a clairvoyant now?"
Castle purses his lips, waiting out her acerbic tirade. But when it's over, it's as if it never happened, at least for him. He seems unphased, as polite and upbeat and jovial as ever. "Look, I have no idea what your deal is, okay? I can see that there's some…issue you're figuring out. And whether that's because some dumb jerk hurt you and you've sworn off men, or if it's something else entirely…I just want you to know that I can wait. I'm a patient guy, Kate, believe it or not, and so I can wait until you're ready. However long it takes."
She's opening and closing her mouth like a guppy, trying to find the next best words to respond to this outrage, when the double doors swing open behind her and a gush of fresh air whooshes in.
"Well, well, well, if it isn't our two love birds. Should I rush out and buy a hat or are we taking it slow?"
Kate doesn't have to turn around to guess where this pithy little remark has come from. Hardass Halliday is chuckling to herself and Castle is giving the woman a grin and a little wiggle of his fingers over her shoulder.
"It's her, isn't it?" she half mouths and half whispers to the writer, their only point of collusion this morning so far.
"Yep," he replies through gritted teeth. "Just grin and nod along."
"Date went well I take it, if you're in here doing the walk of shame, Beckett."
Kate's mouth falls open once more, and she looks close to infuriated, but Castle steps in to prevent her from making career suicide by saying something she'll later regret.
"Actually, I dropped my phone in the back of a cab and Officer Beckett kindly brought it to the precinct for me to pick up," he explains truthfully.
Halliday frowns. "So…does this mean you didn't spend the night together?" presses the blunt cop, looking from one face to the other for answers.
"Sarge!" exclaims Kate, opening her mouth to add more when Castle slips his arm around her shoulders and tugs her into his side. He gives her a tight squeeze that's supposed to indicate "leave this to me".
"I'm actually kind of an old fashioned guy, Sergeant Halliday. You probably couldn't tell that about me straight off just by looking, but…I am," he smiles, radiating charm like it's going out of style.
The sergeant appears disappointed to hear this. "So…that mean no sex on the first date?" she clarifies, in the bluntest manner possible, shocking both Kate and Rick this time.
"No!" exclaims Kate, who has had quite enough of her private life being poked around and raked over the last couple of days. "No, we did not sleep together, and—"
"But we're hoping to real soon," interrupts Castle, watching a light go on in Halliday's eyes, just as he expected it might. Give her what she wants to hear and maybe she'll go away, is his reasoning. He just doesn't have any opportunity to explain this tactic to Kate just yet. He hopes she doesn't take his head off before he gets the chance to.
"Alrighty," grins the, clearly sex-starved woman, who seems intent on living vicariously through the young cop and the millionaire writer's budding romance. "Well, you two love birds have a good day," she rounds off, giving them a sweet smile and a parting wink.
Kate's about to turn her ire on Castle, his arm still looped around her shoulder holding her in place beside him, when Halliday turns back to have one final go.
"And, Beckett, kiss the guy already and then get moving! You're gonna be late for roll call. That's twice this week," she barks, as she runs up the stairs to reception, displaying the Mr. Hyde side to her nature.
They're still standing staring after Halliday a couple of seconds on from this parting remark, bemused and a little shell-shocked. Kate can smell Castle's cologne and it's making her woozy. She eases herself out from under his arm and finally marshals her thoughts enough to look at him square on.
"What the hell just happened?" he gets in first, seeming at a loss for the only time since she met him.
"You lied to my Sergeant, is what happened."
"I did? I didn't notice."
"You didn't notice? All that stuff about you being a gentleman and us hoping to sleep together soon? You didn't hear any of that as it sailed right out of your mouth? Does lying come so easily to you?" she wonders, narrowing her eyes.
"Which part of that is a lie exactly?" he asks calmly.
Kate fumes, too tongue-tied by his nerve and her own fury to even reply. "Everyone around her is crazy today," she mutters to herself. "Crazy," she repeats, leaving Castle standing as she turns and heads for the stairs.
"Hey, Beckett?" he calls after her, hoping she'll turn around.
"What?" she demands, her hands on her hips.
"My cell phone?"
"Shit!" she curses, jogging back down until she's level with him. "Here," she huffs, stuffing the offending piece of tech into his outstretched hand.
He catches her by the wrist as she turns to go. "Kate," he says quietly, locking eyes with her. "I meant everything I said just now."
His thumb strokes the soft, vulnerable skin that covers the veins on the underside of her wrist, somehow managing to slip beneath the cuffs of her navy blue nylon duty jacket and uniform shirt. Goose bumps retexture the skin of her arm, rushing all the way up to her elbow.
"Thought most of that was for Halliday's benefit?" she says, suspicious and curious both, suddenly fighting the tug of excitement churning low down in her belly.
"I meant everything I said, Kate," he repeats, leaving her in no doubt as to his intentions or sincerity.
He scares her, this one. He sees too much and he won't be put off, and he just...he scares her.
"Good for you," snaps Kate, attempting to turn away from him. But he holds onto her wrist so that she's forced to turn back again.
"What?" she snarls, angrily searching his face. "What is it with you? I'm about to be late for the second time in two days. Do you want me to lose my job? Is that it? My humiliation isn't enough for you?"
"No, of course I don't want you to lose your job. You're an excellent cop. And you'll make a fantastic detective one day."
"What would you know about what it takes to become a detective?" There's bite to the question, but also a touch of curiosity because she wants that job so badly, and much sooner than "one day".
"You'd be surprised. I've known a few good ones in my time…as a writer," he shrugs, offering her this little nugget of how he works when he's researching a novel.
"One of these "method actor" types," she states, looking him up and down with a critical eye. "Might have known."
"What does that mean?" asks Castle, holding onto her for as long as he possibly can before she disappears again, as he knows she must.
"Just…you said it yourself. You're the kind of guy who makes connections wherever he goes. Figures you'd have a cop or two in your back pocket."
"I meant for research," Castle clarifies.
"If you say so," murmurs Kate, cutting her eyes to her wrist, which his large hand is still encircling.
"Beckett! Roll call!" yells Halliday, leaning so far over the front counter that Kate can see her large white-shirt encased bust from here.
"I really have to go," she tells Castle, the fight and anger and indignation all drained out of her by the time he lets her wrist slip free of his fingers.
He clears his throat and takes a step back. "Thank you again for this," he says, holding up his cell phone.
"I didn't crack your pin code in case you were wondering. Your secrets are safe," Kate promises, trying to end things on a more harmonious note.
Castle chuckles at her remark.
"Well…have a safe tour. Go catch the bad guy," he adds, scuffing the ground with his shoe, displaying his reluctance to leave her.
"Thanks, and good luck with the writing. If you're ever looking for extra authenticity—" She pauses, and Castle's head shoots up, the light of hope back in his eyes when he stares at her. "You can always give Halliday a call," Kate adds, grinning so widely at her own joke, she's so pleased with herself. "No way she'd turn you down," she adds, almost doubling over with a fit of the giggles at Castle's stricken expression.
"Oh, yeah, great. Laugh at the guy who saved your ass with your boss this morning, why don't you."
Kate almost chokes on her words. "Saved my ass? You all but invited the woman to come watch us have sex for the first time," she says, drawing a loud whistle from a couple of beat cops who happen to be passing by.
"Maybe you should lower your voice."
"And maybe you should kiss my ass."
"Isn't that what I've been trying to do all along? Amongst other things," he whispers, arching one eyebrow oh so suggestively.
He's too calm about everything, and smug and amused for her liking. He makes her blood boil.
"Argh!" Kate roars in frustration, because he worked her into a corner, not to mention got her to talk about them actually sleeping with one another. "I'll see you around," she says, as off-handedly as possible, taking the stairs two at a time before he can come up with another ploy to detain her even longer.
"I'll be waiting," Castle yells, loud enough that she can't miss this promise as his words echo after her down the hall.
TBC...