Heart of Stone

by

A.K. Hunter

Chapter Seventeen

"I'm breaking down . . . Tell me there is hope for me." —Sia, "I'm In Here"

"You have to let him recover."

Kevin twitched at the familiar voice. He fought to open his heavy eyelids.

"He can recover after he gives us some answers!" another voice hissed.

He knew that voice, too. Slowly, excruciatingly, he forced his eyes open, and almost immediately shut them against the bright, disorienting light. A quiet, relentless pain smothered the left side of his chest, and he shifted uncomfortably. His wrists banged against unforgiving metal, and the sound seemed to echo around him.

"Ryan? Are you awake?"

That was Beckett.

"Wake up!" Something hard gripped at his shoulders, shaking him with enough force to rattle his bones. Kevin let out a weak yelp as the embers in his chest blazed to life. His eyes shot open again, and he watched as Beckett physically pulled Castle off of him. Kevin sank back into the bed with a pained breath.

"Do I need to have you removed?" she snapped at her husband. "You told me you could handle this."

"I can," he insisted, sullenly turning his eyes back on the man in the hospital bed. A sense of dread pressed in on Kevin at the look in Castle's eyes.

Beckett returned to her seat on the other side of the hospital bed. "Hi, Ryan. I'd say it's good to see you, but..."

"I get it," he croaked. "It's good to see you, too."

"Where is she?" Castle interrupted. "Where's my daughter?"

"Castle! Enough!"

"It's okay," Kevin said. He took a deep, ragged breath that sent a jolt down his side. "How long have I been out?"

"Two days."

He nodded, his heart sinking. He'd been out of commission for too long. Even with the protections on the apartment, the chances of Alexis still being there were slim-to-none. "She's either back at my apartment, or she's with a man named Devin Sloane." Just saying the words made him sick. He shuddered. "I tried to protect her—"

"Your apartment? She's been with you this whole time?" Castle asked, fury marring his features.

Kevin nodded.

"Where's your apartment?" Beckett asked.

He gave them his address. "That's the building the call was traced to," Castle said to Beckett.

"What call?"

The police captain bit her lip, clearly unsure how much to tell him.

"Please, Beckett. I care about her, too."

He heard the writer mutter something under his breath, and Beckett shot him a look.

"Two days ago, shortly before you were picked up, Alexis made contact with Castle. The line went dead before she could say much."

"And since you picked me up? There's been no other contact? No sign of her?"

Their silence was enough.

"Jesus," he muttered, shaking his head. This was a nightmare.

"Ryan, I don't think I need to tell you that this doesn't look good. The FBI's involved, and they're going to want to question you."

"That's fine. I'll do anything they want. We need to find Alexis."

"We?" Castle scoffed. "You're kidding me, right?"

"Castle—"

"There is no 'we.' At least not where you're involved. My daughter has been through enough because of you."

"You don't think I know that?" Kevin snapped. "I know I'm the bad guy here, okay? And I want to find her just as much as you do! I care about her, too! I love her, too!"

Castle made a move toward him, and Beckett was there in a heartbeat. "We're done here," she said to Castle, directing him to the door. She turned back to Kevin. "The doctor is going to come in and speak with you, and then the FBI will want to take their turn. In the mean time, I'd like to start searching your apartment."

Kevin knew that she wasn't making a request. She was simply informing him of her next move for old time's sake. "You know the address. The code to the elevator is 1008. If there's anything I can do to help..." He trailed off, swallowing thickly. He was living his worst nightmare. The love of his life and his unborn child were gone, taken by a madman, and Kevin was cuffed to a hospital bed, barely able to breathe around the pain in his body.

Beckett nodded tightly.

"There's something else you should know," Kevin said as Castle and Beckett made their way out of the room. They stopped, looking back at him. "It's um... about Alexis."

"What is it?" Castle demanded.

Kevin took a deep breath. "She's thirty-two weeks pregnant."

The words floated featherlight through the air, and Kevin saw the exact moment they made impact on the writer's overburdened shoulders.

"Son of bitch!"

Kevin didn't try to stop the first fist that flew at his face, nor the second one. When a screaming Beckett and two nurses managed to pull Castle off of Kevin's battered form, he welcomed not only the pain, but the darkness that followed.

In the cold half-darkness, time ceased to have much meaning. Alexis rocked herself back and forth in her small prison, begging the baby to move. It felt like years that she was huddled there, cold, hunger, dehydration, fear, and that overwhelming grief smothering her. Her eyes were half closed, her limbs were frozen in place, and over and over those same words spilled from her cracked, purple-blue lips.

"Wake up, Rosie. Please wake up."

Then, so soft and tentative that Alexis thought she'd imagined it, the baby moved. Alexis' tearless sobs sputtered in her chest. She was alive. Her baby was still alive. Rosie's movements were sluggish, but she was moving. Sloane hadn't killed her, too.

"Hi," Alexis whispered, her voice cracking. "Hi, sweetheart." She pressed her fingertips against Rosie's foot, relief and joy spreading through her when she pushed back. "I'm so happy you're awake." Protectiveness washed over Alexis—stronger than the fear, stronger than the grief. No matter what happened, she couldn't let anything happen to her child. She had to get out. She had to survive whatever horrors Sloane had in store—if not for her own sake, then for her daughter's.

After a while, those familiar cramping pains pushed across her abdomen. Alexis tensed, worried that she'd been forced into labor. But they never got worse; they just kept her awake with discomfort. Braxton Hicks were often triggered by dehydration, trauma, and just about everything she'd been experiencing. They weren't harmful in themselves, but they could put her into preterm labor if they went on long enough.

Alexis had to be smart. She couldn't focus on everything she'd lost, everything she stood to lose. She had to survive. Sooner or later, she'd have a chance to escape. Sooner or later, an opportunity would present itself. But if she never got herself out of that dingy basement, she'd probably die down there along with her unborn baby.

When Sloane returned an eternity later, Alexis was frozen to the bone, sick with hunger, the dull pain of her contractions keeping her from finding an escape in sleep. He looked unimpressed with the woman curled on the floor in front of him, especially when she shakily forced herself to her knees, her eyes locked on his shoes. He wanted submission, didn't he? It was time to swallow her pride.

"Th-thank you, Devin," she rasped, her throat like sandpaper from disuse and dehydration. Chills rendered her speech almost unintelligible. "M-may I p-please have my gift?" She kept her eyes on the floor, more out of exhaustion than anything else.

It seemed like forever that Sloane stood over her, but finally he crouched down and pulled her upright. The cement bit into her knees, and she really didn't have the strength to kneel with the baby's weight pulling her down, but he held her there, taking in her exhausted, malnourished features. A small smile tugged at his lips.

"I didn't think you'd break so quickly."

She didn't respond. He could think she was broken. That just helped her plan along.

"Please?" she whispered. He probably liked to hear her beg.

"Alright then." He yanked her to her feet, and she almost crumpled to the ground again. There was not an ounce of strength left in her entire body. Sloane scooped her up, carrying her bridal style out of her prison.

Fear bit at her hazy mind. "Where are w-we going? I thought—"

"You've been a good girl. Good girls deserve a reward."

Sloane brought her up to the main part of the house, a heated part of the house, and proceeded to treat her like spun glass. He helped her bathe, gently washing her skin and hair, and dressed her fresh pajamas that were soft against her bruised skin. Alexis didn't have the energy to fight him when he'd begun undressing her, and she was shocked when his eyes didn't linger on her bruised, naked form.

After that, he led her to a luxurious queen-sized bed and arranged the pillows until she was comfortable on the thousand-count sheets. He offered her a bowl of soup and a large glass of orange juice. Alexis had inhaled both. Once she was done, Sloane pulled the covers up around her and brushed a kiss over her forehead. "Good night, baby." He left her alone in her significantly upgraded accommodations, and Alexis tried to find some logic to the way he'd treated her. The state of her body and the click of the lock in the door were the only indications that she wasn't a treasure guest.

She'd expected brutality, and she'd gotten it in those first hours in his custody. What she hadn't expected was the gentleness. What was he doing? Trying to make her like him? That was impossible. He'd ruined her life in more ways than she could count, and yet there she was: freshly bathed, wearing warm, comfortable pajamas in one of the softest beds she'd ever slept in, her belly full for the first time in days.

If Alexis possessed the capacity to feel anything but hatred for her captor—hell, if her grief-stricken, shattered mind and depleted body had the capacity to feel anything, she might have been grateful to Sloane. But Alexis knew better. He was trying to manipulate her, trying to positively reinforce the submissiveness she'd shown him down in the basement.

Sloane wasn't being nice. He didn't have a change of heart, and he didn't give a shit about her health. He was training her—like a dog.

And if she wanted to survive, if she wanted her baby to survive, she had to make him believe it was working.

In the days and weeks and months that Rick had spent praying for a break on his daughter's case, he could never have imagined a more unbelievable sequence of events. After Kevin had re-stabilized following Rick's attack, the FBI had been ruthlessly questioning him, not only about the last three and a half years, but about his entire life. To keep the NYPD involved in the investigation, the interviews were recorded, and occasionally Kate was invited to sit in. Rick was completely blown away by what they'd discovered about the man they'd called Kevin Ryan. In a different set of circumstances, Rick would have wanted to write his former friend's life story, perhaps in a new book series. As it was, Rick could barely contain the frustration and grief and anger that churned inside him.

Kevin had lied to them about who he was. He'd disappeared for three years and had gotten Alexis pregnant. He'd been keeping her in his apartment for the last seven months in a misguided attempt to protect her, and his foolish choices had allowed a sociopath to kidnap her.

Rick rubbed his face, exhaling as he listened to the latest tape, which detailed Kevin's connection to Devin Sloane and possible places that he might have taken Alexis. It was looking grim. Kevin had identified Sloane as his shooter and the new leader of the crime syndicate that had been slowly taking over New York in the last few years. It was more than likely that Sloane had resources and safe houses that Kevin knew nothing about.

"If you let me out of here, I can help find her." Kevin's voice sounded desperate. "I know a lot of these guys in the syndicate. I can find Sloane, and I can bring Alexis home."

Ever since the first interrogation, Kevin had begged to help. Rick had to begrudgingly give Kevin credit in that regard. He'd been nothing but compliant. He'd offered to go back in wearing a wire, a tracking bracelet, anything to make the FBI comfortable with his involvement. They weren't budging. Of course, if Kevin had just been honest with them from the beginning, this situation might have been avoided completely.

Rick shuddered at the memory of the first interview. Kevin had hurriedly tried to tell them everything he knew about Alexis' potential whereabouts and instead the agent, a man named Neil Christofferson, had asked Kevin about the nature of his relationship with Alexis. Christofferson had bluntly asked if Kevin had raped her, assuming that Alexis' abduction was the result of a longterm obsession on Kevin's part. Beckett had sat in on that one; she'd been the one to calm Kevin down when he'd screamed at the agent. If he hadn't been cuffed to his hospital bed, Rick was certain Kevin would have tried to kill the agent. He'd never heard the Irishman so angry.

I'd never hurt her—ever! Stop wasting your time on these stupid fucking questions and find her, you worthless piece of shit!

Rick couldn't help but agree with his former friend. The agent had been asking the wrong questions. After that disastrous first interview, a new agent had been assigned: Aaron Shields. Things had gone more smoothly since then, but they were all painfully aware of what each passing minute could cost them. Like a broken record, Kevin made sure to remind Shields with every interview that their time was limited.

"You know she's pregnant, right?" Kevin demanded. "She's thirty-three weeks now. You really think she's safe in her condition? You think he's going to just let her carry the baby full term?"

Rick was going to be a grandfather. Bittersweet didn't even begin to cover his feelings on that particular revelation.

"The FBI is out following Kevin's leads, along with some of our guys," Kate said quietly from her seat next to Rick as the recording continued. They were in her office at the precinct—the base of operations in the search for Alexis. Before they'd found Kevin's half-lifeless body in the cemetery a couple weeks earlier, Esposito could be found at the precinct with them. Since the truth had come out about his former partner, Javi had spent almost all of his time doing footwork, tracking down leads. He didn't want to listen to any more interviews, and Rick honestly couldn't blame him. Nothing was more painful than broken trust.

"They're too slow," he answered.

"They've got to keep a low profile."

"What if they did send Ryan out? If he knows the syndicate like he says he does—"

Kate shook her head. "He's not well enough yet. He was winded just walking to the bathroom. He'd be a liability if they sent him out now."

"Once he's stable, do you think they'll use him?"

"I don't know. They keep me in the loop on the case, but that's about it."

Rick had been with Beckett's team when they'd gone through Kevin's apartment. The writer had been expecting to find signs of abuse. Instead, the scene was almost domestic. Alexis' clothes shared space in Kevin's closet. Her toothbrush was next to his in the bathroom. They found long red hairs in their shared bed and photos from Kevin's life before his past had caught up with him. The fridge was stocked with Alexis' favorite foods and ultrasound photos were pinned to the metal door with magnets. Physiology texts and autopsy reports were stacked haphazardly around the apartment, and tucked between the pages of a pregnancy book on Kevin's side of the bed was a note in Alexis' handwriting.

Too tired to wait up. Wake me when you get home. I miss you.

Rick couldn't comprehend how, but it honestly seemed like his daughter had found some semblance of happiness while she'd been hidden away. She'd obviously been well taken care of. They'd gotten the medical chart from Alexis' under-the-table OB, whose questioning had been fruitless. As of her last appointment, both Alexis and her unborn baby girl were in perfect health. With every day that Alexis remained missing, it seemed less likely that she'd remain in good health. The signs of struggle in Kevin's apartment and the mostly empty syringe they'd found were a testament to that. Lanie was examining the drug to give them an idea of the possible complications it could cause to a pregnant woman. Needless to say, they were terrified of the results.

"You said your sister is part of the syndicate as well?" Shields continued.

"She's not a criminal. She was Nolan's nurse before Sloane killed him." Kevin was always so quick to defend his sister.

"Could we use her on the inside? Is she trustworthy?"

After a pause, Kevin answered. "Yes."

A tiny flame of hope lit inside Rick's chest.

"Call her. Leave the speaker on, please. If she asks about you, say that you're safe but keeping a low profile, and you need her help tracking down Alexis and Sloane."

Rick and Kate listened as Kevin dialed in the number, waiting as the phone rang.

"Hello?" A familiar male voice answered the phone.

"Can I speak to Brigid?" Kevin asked.

"You have the wrong number."

"No, I don't," Kevin insisted. "This is Brigid's phone number. Who's speaking?"

"This is Detective Liam Burke. Who the hell are you?"

"The fuck? Why do you have my sister's phone? I want to talk to her now."

"This is my fiancee's phone number!" Liam snarled. "And she's not taking calls right now."

"Why the fuck not?"

"Because she's in a coma, you sick son of a bitch!"

Rick and Kate stared at each other, wide eyed, then bolted for the exit, wordlessly heading back down to the hospital. It seemed the surprises weren't over yet.

"Good morning," a low voice rumbled.

Alexis jerked awake, sitting up in her bed, her heart pounding. Sloane sat on the edge of the bed, watching her with a small smile. She was still a little disoriented, and her eyes darted around the room. He'd caught her off guard on purpose, she was sure. Alexis moved to leave the warmth of her covers, but Sloane's hand on her blanket-covered thigh stopped her.

"No need to move, Miss Harper. How did you sleep? Have you enjoyed your days of rest?"

For just over a week, Alexis had been recovering from her time in the basement. She slept, ate, and spent her waking hours trying to plot her escape. She tried not to think about anything else, especially during Sloane's visits. For the most part, he'd left her alone. One of his lackeys usually brought her food, always ignoring her attempts to talk to them or ask for help. Those times when he'd come into her room to spend time with her were the worst. He hadn't hurt her again, but she was always waiting for that moment when he'd get tired of being nice.

"Yes, Devin." She paused, then added. "Thank you."

He stroked her hair. "You're welcome."

Alexis tried not to tense under his touch. He always seemed to want to touch her, whether it was stroking her hair or holding her hand or simply resting his large hand on her thigh while he spoke to her. She still wasn't comfortable with it.

His eyes fell to her distended stomach. Rosie was enjoying her usual morning exercise, and the movement was visible under the thin t-shirt that stretched over her abdomen. He pressed both of his large hands to her stomach, and Alexis almost jumped out of her skin. She hated it when he felt her baby. Her and Kevin's baby. It wasn't right for Sloane to be touching her when he'd killed her father. "Amazing," he said quietly.

Alexis kept her eyes low. She felt sick.

"Have you named her?"

She gritted her teeth. "Not yet," she lied. He didn't get to say her daughter's name.

"You want to keep her."

"Of course I do."

Sloane nodded. "Of course." Rosie seemed so fragile, sandwiched between those large hands. "I won't lie; I have no interest in watching you raise another man's bastard."

Fear poured into her so fast she forgot to breathe. "Please," she said, definitely not above begging when it came to her daughter. "Please don't hurt her. I'll do whatever you want. Just don't hurt her."

His empty, dark eyes locked on hers. "I thought you might say that."

"Please." A single tear escaped, running down her cheek. Sloane caught it with his thumb, then licked it off.

"You want to keep her? Fine."

Alexis slumped in relief. "Thank you. Thank you so much."

Sloane's hand slipped through her hair, angling her face up to look at him. "Show me how grateful you are."

Her heart pounded in her ears. She was definitely going to be sick. "What do you want?"

"For starters, your beautiful mouth."

Sometime later, Sloane left her alone, grinning, a new spring in his step. Alexis barely made it to the en-suite bathroom before she vomited up everything inside her. She wiped her mouth and turned the shower on, the heat just short of scalding, before stripping down and stepping inside.

She slid down to the tile floor, her arms wrapped around herself as the water pelted her body. She'd never be clean enough. Tears streamed down her face, and she didn't try to hide or control them.

It was worth it, she told herself. Anything he made her do was worth it if her baby was safe.

Author's Note: Thanks so much to everyone who reviewed the last chapter. You guys rock and are my light in these dark, dark chapters. :) I'd love to hear what you think.

Next time: After receiving devastating news, Kevin begs to be let off the leash.