After Martha registered that the pounding she heard wasn't coming from inside her head, she emerged from her room to see what the problem was. "What's going on?" asked Alexis from the top of the stairs.
Martha paused in her rush to the door when she noticed the mess in the kitchen. "Richard?" When he offered no response to her question or the knocking, she waved her hands in the air and called back to Alexis. "Everything's fine, dear. Go back to bed."
The girl tiptoed downstairs anyways, her curiosity peeked by the smell of macaroni and the mysterious guest at the door. In the kitchen she took in the wake of what she recognized to be her father's cure for insomnia—the trick was to eat food that tasted good but ultimately made you feel nauseas so that you could pop a few painkillers and pass out. His particular poison was a box of Kraft and a tall glass of chocolate milk. Her gaze searched the kitchen and living area for the culprit as Martha fumbled with the deadbolt.
The muted cursing from the opposite side of the door did little to bolster Kate's courage, but she steeled herself nonetheless. It slipped, however, once the door was opened and Martha realized just who had woken them all up. The older woman's eyes narrowed in accusation. "Why, Kate…Whatever can I do for you?"
"Detective Beckett?" Alexis peeked around her grandmother. "Is something wrong?"
Kate balked, momentarily unsettled by the striking difference between the wide-eyed innocent expression on Alexis's young face and Martha, who seemed to be trying to figure out if looks really could kill. "I…I'm sorry, I realize it's late but I…" Again she faltered. How much did they know? Martha looked ready to slam the door in her face, but Alexis didn't seem angry. That was a good sign, right?
"Are you here for Dad?" Alexis looked around again, but there was still no sight of her father.
The detective's heart skipped a beat at the girl's words. It had always done that whenever she saw Castle with his daughter, or when he talked about her, or…she shook her head again, trying to remain on task. Martha cut her off, though, and yanked her inside by the elbow before closing the door a little more firmly than necessary. "She had better be."
"He told you?" she asked warily.
"Told who what?"
Martha nodded, both women ignoring Alexis.
"How much?"
"Enough to know that you've got your work cut out for you, and that this," she said, gesturing towards the mess in the kitchen, "is likely to go on for some time unless the two of you work things out."
"Wait, what's going on? Where's Dad?"
Martha turned Alexis towards the stairs. "Nothing to worry about, sweetheart. Go on back to sleep while Detective Beckett and I have a little chat."
"But I—"
"No buts. Bed." They waited for the grumbling teen to disappear upstairs. When she was out of sight, Martha rounded on Kate. "You sure have a lot of nerve showing up here in the middle of the night, after everything you've put my son through. He hasn't gone on a midnight binge like this since just after you were shot. We can't get him to eat more than a bite or two, and then he's up in the middle of the night because he can't sleep and he eats until he's sick. He won't even listen to Alexis when he gets like this; he just sits and stares at that screen, and you," she said, dropping onto the sofa as her ranting came to an end. "You…I can't even think straight. Well?"
Thoroughly chastised, Kate followed Martha's example and plopped down into the chair by the couch. "I'm sorry," she said from behind her hands, slumped forward with her elbows on her knees.
"'I'm sorry' isn't gonna cut it, kiddo. Not this time."
A single teardrop fell to the carpet. Kate watched it drop. "I had my reasons."
"I'm sure you did, but that's not what I'm concerned with at the moment. I want to know if you're going to tell that man the truth and put him out of his misery. The way you've both gone on the past few years…that's not how relationships are supposed to work. You either act, or you accept the fact that nothing is ever going to happen. So if you're here to offer up excuses or push this mess aside, I can tell you right now that we aren't going to let him go back. Not this time."
Kate's gaze was drawn to the door of his office. A dim light, barely noticeable, leaked out from the crack beneath it. "Is he in there?"
"Most likely, but I'm not sure what shape he's in."
"Should I come back in the morning?"
She watched Martha consult the nearest clock and the two women's eyes met. "It's probably best to get it over with now. But so help me—cop or not—if you put Richard through anything like this again I swear I'll include an entire act about you in my play, and it won't be pretty." With that, Martha took her leave and left Kate—only slightly shaken up—to face the proverbial music.
He didn't answer when she knocked on his office door, so she slipped in as quietly as she could and found him fast asleep in his desk chair, the light from his smart board casting harsh shadows across his face. It took a moment for her to realize what he'd fallen asleep to. The all-too familiar photographs and notes on the screen were from her mother's case. He'd organized them differently than she had on her own board, a detail that drew her attention. She tentatively touched Rick's image on the board and a number of lines sprouted out of the circle surrounding his picture. One line connected to her own image, two more to Martha and Alexis, and a fourth that led to a silhouette labeled 'Erik, OG'. She tapped the man's image and the board rearranged itself again, this time centering around a triangle drawn between herself, Rick, and the mystery man. Behind her, Rick stirred in his sleep, making an odd snorting sound as his head lolled from one side to the other. There was no mistaking that he'd continued digging after advising her to set her mother's case on the back burner, but if he'd found a lead, why hadn't he shared that information with her. Unsure how to process that information, Kate pushed it aside for later and moved closer to study his face.
She'd only seen Rick's sleep face a few times, and then she'd been too afraid to be caught staring at him to really pay attention to what she saw. What she saw strengthened her resolve and she perched beside him on his desk. "Castle, wake up," she said, using her no-nonsense detective voice.
He shot up at her command, though he was facing the screen behind his desk and he had to turn around before he fully registered what had woken him. Kate watched his eyes light up as he realized that she was really there in his office before his brow furrowed, wondering why she was there. Her heart sank as she saw the sign of remembrance dawn on his face—he was supposed to be angry with her. The dark circles beneath his bleary eyes did little to encourage her.
Rick looked back at the screen, sparing Kate a momentary glance. She pretended to slide into work mode for the time being. "Find anything new?"
He grabbed a remote from the desk and spun around to turn the screen off. "No."
"Care to tell me who 'Erik' is?"
"Leroux."
"Who?"
"Nevermind." Apparently he wasn't ready to provide her with anymore information.
"I didn't…I didn't know you were still looking into the case."
"'Cause I didn't tell you." He leaned forward and scrubbed his face with his hands. "What're you doing here? It's like…"
"…a little after 4, yeah. Gates kicked us out so…"
He checked his watch, glared at the floor, determined to look anywhere but at here. "So…?"
"You didn't show up today."
"Nope," he said, his lips popping at the end.
"You didn't call, either."
"Nope."
"Or text."
"Well, I figured that if anything interesting happened—you know, anything that I should know about—you'd fill me in. Right? Because you're pretty good at filling me in when I miss stuff."
Kate grabbed a pen and flipped it over in her hands, her eyes avoiding him as well. "Speaking of which, a few days ago you said something about missed opportunities, but you never explained what you meant."
"And you decided that now was a good time to come ask me about it? I thought I already told you that it wasn't important."
"I know, but…tell me anyways."
Something in her voice, a vulnerability that rarely manifested itself, caught Rick's attention and forced him to look up. Their eyes met, and he wasn't sure how, but he knew what was she wasn't saying. "Why?"
Her eyes darted away from his for a moment before boring down on him, glistening with determination. "Because right now no one is shooting at us or planning on interrupting us and I want a chance to respond this time." She watched his mouth slide sideways as his eyes crunched and his brow furrowed; it was the look he adopted when he was weighing his options. While she was a little frustrated that he was silent for so long, she was also thankful that he was for once being a mature adult. The last thing they needed was another fight over thoughts and feelings that were never actually confirmed. "I promise I'll tell you whatever you want to know, but I want to know what you were going to say the other day."
Rick's brows scrunched even more. If she already knew what he was going to say, why was she dragging it out of him like that? "I think I've already said everything that needs saying."
"Rick…"
"No, you don't have the right to just come in here and—" Here his words failed him. He was angry with her, and she was asking him to say he loved her. He was supposed to shout and flail and break some glass and punch a wall or something. Wasn't that how people were supposed to react when they felt mad enough to…Rick palmed his face and slumped forward as the tears threatened to fall again. There was no way he was going to let her see him cry. Aware that his elbow was touching her thigh he jerked away, upsetting a mug of pens. As the pens clattered on the floor around him and the mug barely missed toppling off of the desk, he managed to regained control of himself. "I really believed it, you know." He couldn't peek out from his hands, but he could breathe again. Breathing was important.
Papers rustled as she shifted on the desk, but she refrained from touching him. "Believed what?"
Inhale. "That you didn't remember. That we had a chance." Exhale. "That one day you'd wake up and suddenly realize what was going on, and that after everything that's happened we'd…and…and then you…and I don't know, but somehow it still wasn't enough," he rambled. "None of it. I don't know if anything ever will be. I can't change how I feel, and I'm not sure you can do anything to change that."
That's what she'd been afraid of. She forced herself to continue breathing, repeating the exercises she'd perfected while managing her anxiety attacks. The last thing she needed was to pull one in his office right then. Unable to fully master her emotions, Kate sniffed as she edged herself off of his desk. Taking a final glance at his shaking form, she turned once more to the screen on the wall. It wasn't the right time to talk about the new lead, but she wondered if she would ever have a chance to talk to him again. 'And that after everything we'd…' What had he been about to say?
She managed two steps before his hand shot out and clenched the edge of her sweater. His face was still to the desk, an eye peeking out from his beneath his arm. The small hold he had on her appeared to comfort him. Kate allowed him to pull her closer, pull her until he was able to wrap his arms around her waist and bury his face in her stomach. Startled, she hesitated before tentatively stroking his hair. A long held breath burst from her lungs and a tightness in her chest she hadn't been aware of slowly dissipated. Rick tightened his hold but risked looking up. Her hands fell to his shoulders and remained there as he pulled her into his lap. His left arm clutched her like his life depended on it while his right hand snaked between them and cupped her cheek. Turning into his touch, Kate felt her eyes watering. If only he would look away and giver her time to get a hold of herself.
Maybe she could put some space between them, anything to break their intimate position. How had she gotten there? No. Intense blue eyes locked with brown and she couldn't escape if she wanted to. "I want you to listen to me, Kate." She shivered as he said her name and his grip tightened. She couldn't break eye contact, and she felt light-headed, as though she was being drawn out of her own body by his hypnotic gaze. "I don't care if you're scared and want to run away, or if you don't feel the same way, or if you're going to shoot me or kick me off your team or whatever else you're thinking about—I need you to listen. I. Love. You. Got that? No matter how many times you tell me to go away. No matter how many times you lie to me about what's really going on with you. No matter how many times you tell me that you aren't sure you'll ever be ready for the future that I want with you. I love you. I love you so much I feel like I'm freezing when I can't see your smile. And while I respect your choices, I don't want you to pretend like my words can be tossed aside like that ever again." Blinking and taking a deep breath, Rick loosened his hold and leaned back into his chair. "Now you can shoot me."
"I don't have my gun." And with that Kate buried her face into Rick's chest and allowed all of the pain and love and the joy and sorrow she'd been suppressing for the past two years to surface as she stained his grey t-shirt with her tears. Despite the fact that she'd known for months that he felt this way, his words struck a chord and she couldn't ignore how right it felt for her to acknowledge them. Apart from the guilt she felt over the pain she'd caused them both, a great weight had begun to lift from her chest, and her arms tightened around his neck as she struggled to breathe. "I love you too," she sobbed into his neck, his skin dampened by her tears. "I thought—you said I messed it all up, that you wouldn't change your mind, I—"
Rick silenced her with a kiss. "Shh. What I meant was that I don't think there's anything you can do to make me not love you. After everything we've put each other through, I'm not sure we can mess up any more than we already have."
She nodded against his neck. "I'm ready to be happy. Can we move past all of this and be happy now?"
"I…I think we can move past it eventually, but we've got some stuff to figure out first. Once I know that you don't doubt me anymore, then I will be happy."
"…I guess I won't doubt you anymore if you tell me how you really feel."
He quirked a brow. "Seriously?"
"Seriously. You said you love me, but…"
"But…"
"Well, I want to hear all of it. Even if you think it'll scare me, I need to know what you want. In the future. I need to know what I'm getting myself into."
The look in her eyes said she was dead set on having the conversation, but Rick tried once more to deter her. "Kate…this is a lot, really fast. Do you really want to get all of this out in the open now?"
She wiped her cheeks with the back of her hand and squirmed into a more comfortable position on his lap. "Yeah, I do," she sniffed, trying to prepare herself for what she was sure would send her over the edge. "You hide stuff from me and expect me to figure it out on my own, and I do the exact same thing. If we're going to see this through to wherever it ends, I want to get everything out in the open first."
"Alright, but after I say my piece I want you to remember that I warned you, and that I'm not letting you run out of here screaming."
Trying to lighten the mood, Kate mimicked him by raising an eyebrow. "Is it really that bad?"
"It could be. You want to see it through to the end but…well, I don't think it has to. End, that is."
She took another deep breath, strengthened by his words. "OK, well, consider the band-aid ripped off. I'm sick of going home to an empty apartment every night, and I'm sick of playing through scenarios of us doing dishes and folding laundry together. I want to know what that's like, but I'm also afraid that if we move too fast I'll do something that you can't forgive me for. No, I know what you said, but I'm still concerned. And I don't want to take you away from your family while we work this out because I know Martha and Alexis already hate me for –"
"They don't hate you," he said strongly.
"You don't know that."
"I think I do, but what else?" He needed her to keep going, because if she froze up he'd know she was still hiding from him.
She paused to collect her thoughts, worried that he would misunderstand her because the next issue was what worried her the most. "Rick, I don't…I'm not sure how to say it…"
Kate at a loss for words wasn't typically a good thing, but he braced himself and rubbed her back anyways. "Just say it. I won't interrupt you."
She caught his eye and made sure that he meant what he said. When would she learn to trust him? "Well, I…I don't know how to be anything other than a detective. I work late hours, eat too much take-out, and I drag you along with me because you're the only dose of fun in my life. I don't know how to turn off the part of my brain that makes me work like I do, and I thought that—that if I caught my mother's killer, then maybe I could let it go. That's why I didn't say anything after the shooting. You know me," she said, watching him nod in agreement. She pushed on, her gaze dropping to her lap as her hands twisted in her shirt. "You know that I tend to obsess, and that part of me isn't healthy for me or for you or—or for anyone else. I…I never thought about having a family, but with you there is a definite possibility and, and I don't want to fall apart and screw it all up. I want to say that I'm ready to have a life with you outside of the precinct, but I don't know how to do that. I don't know that I can." She wanted to make sure that he fully understood where she was coming from before he made his own confession.
When he finally nodded in understanding, she allowed herself to relax against him. "Then it sounds like there's a simple—albeit sour—solution."
"And that would be…?"
"Well, I stop working every case with you. The gruesome fun ones, sure, but if you don't see me as much at work, then presumably you'd be more interested in coming home to see me than working late, right? You can obsess over me instead."
"Sounds like a lot of sacrifice on your part."
"Not really. I'll still see you as much, and there will obviously be more perks this way."
"And you see us living together? I would get to come home to you every day?" For a fraction of a second, Kate was worried that she'd sounded a little too excited about that, but the look on Rick's face told her that he'd been thinking along the same lines. "Paint me a picture, then. What is it you want?"
Rick buried his hand in her hair and massaged the base of her scalp with his thumb. "I see us agreeing to take it slow, but it's obvious after our first official date that we've taken enough time as it is. Gradually you spend more and more time here with me and the fam that it doesn't make sense for you to have your own place anymore, so you move in. Alexis is delighted that she won't need to hire someone to babysit me while she's away at school, and Mother is pleased to have another sensible lady to shop with." He paused, taking stock of her reaction. She chuckled in the appropriate places, but he was still having trouble figuring out if he was revealing too much too quickly. She noticed his hesitance and urged him to continue, though her hand tightened around his. "Not that I have a timeline for any of this, but I do know that I'd be an absolute moron not to eventually propose to you and give you that family you were talking about."
"But that's not what you want," she stated, though it came out more like a question.
"Huh?"
"The family is what I want, but what do you want? I mean, you already have a family, and…wait, that's not what I—"
"If you're asking me if I want to have kids, then yeah, I do. But only with you, and only if it's what you really want." Kate nodded. "But before you say anything, we don't need to decide any of that now. I just want you to know that I'm planning on you keeping me around for a while. And if I see you hiding in your work again, I'll call you out on it, just like you'll call me out if you feel like we're moving ahead too quickly. OK?" She nodded again. "Good. Now, if you're anywhere near as exhausted as I am, I say we move this upstairs and sleep through tomorrow."
Dressed in an oversized t-shirt and a pair of Rick's boxers and spooned against her partner, Kate drifted off to sleep in what she imagined had to be the most comfortable bed in the city.
"Love you, Kate."
"Mmm, love you too, Rick."
I'm planning on at least two more chapters...and it's likely that the rating will be bumped up...
