Given the alerts issues, may I remind you that ch3 was posted Thursday, and if you didn't see it, you might want to read it first.

Chapter 4

The next afternoon, Jenna Cournat calls. It's not good news. Whoever bought his book paid cash, didn't leave a legible name, and all that the auction team can remember is that she was a good-looking brunette. As if there weren't several hundred thousand of those around Manhattan.

On the other hand, he doesn't need the book, as long as he can see Kate. And tonight, he will. He just needs to carry on being Rick Rodgers, and he really, really doesn't think that that will be a problem. Even so, he arranges with Jenna to take a look at the scrawl, just in case, and sets a time for the next day.

Come seven o'clock, Castle wanders into Remy's, dressed rather carefully in a decent but not expensive pair of pants and shirt with a casual coat, all of which he'd had to search out of the back of his closet. Keeping down appearances: any half-decent cop would be able to tell the difference between ordinary-Joe wear and his very expensive pure cotton shirts and cashmere sweaters. Here, he's just Rick.

Kate arrives several minutes later, a little hurried and flustered.

"Hey," she says. "Sorry. Had to finish up a warrant request."

"Oooohhhh. Tell me about it? What do you want?"

"Strawberry milkshake, plain burger, fries."

"Okay. What sort of a warrant? How do you get a warrant? Why do you need one? On TV they just break down the door."

While Castle is burbling at breakneck speed, Beckett orders her meal and drink, and then prods his arm when he doesn't do the same.

"Order," she says briskly. He does. "Now that you've stopped talking, do you want some answers, or are you just going to keep asking questions without waiting for me to reply."

He pouts at her. She is resolutely unaffected. "There's so much to ask you, though."

"Why?"

"Because it's interesting. I've never met a homicide detective before."

Beckett raises a cynical eyebrow. "Ghoul," she says, half-smiling. "You just want to know about juicy murders."

"No! I wanna know about everything."

"I can recommend an encyclopaedia, or show you how to search Google," she smirks.

Castle growls at her. "You're being mean."

"Yep."

"So to make it up to me you can tell me all about warrants."

"Why do you want to know about warrants?"

Beckett watches with some fascination as Rick Rodgers squirms. She waits, in her best interrogation style. As predicted, he can't bear the silence, and has to fill it. He is, she notes with sardonic amusement, blushing.

"I…" he hitches, gulps, and starts again. "I thought I might write a story."

She stares at him. "So as well as looking like Richard Castle you want to write books like him? Are you intending to murder him and take over his life?"

"Don't remind me I look like him. I'm sick of hearing that. Someone even suggested I should be his body double." They had. It had been really funny. Then. "Anyway, I thought he wrote thrillers. I wanna know about police procedure. "

"I guess it must be true," Beckett says to the surrounding air. "Everyone wants to write a book." She turns a piercing glare on Rick. "No attribution. No florid descriptions. No exaggerations. And definitely no kicking down doors without warrants. Anyway, all kicking down doors gets you is sore feet and arthritic knees."

Rick droops at her. "That's no fun."

"Crime isn't fun," she grates. "Crime hurts people." He blinks. "Never mind the victim, what about the people left behind? Dead's dead: they don't feel anything any more, but the rest of us do" – she stops very hard. Rick's mouth opens – and then he catches her expression, which promises blood and pain if he emits a single syllable, and shuts it again. She takes a drink, and then another, and then a bite of her burger, and another sip of her drink. She can feel his eyes upon her, but when she lifts hers he's still quiet: his gaze soft.

"So. Warrants," she says firmly, and begins to explain. Approximately every five words Rick comes up with another question. By the time she's finished, she has been wrung totally dry of every piece of information she might ever have known or possessed or heard or read on the subject of warrants. Rick's eyes are alight. Most people would have been desiccated into sand in the desert by the subject. He's utterly fascinated. He's even taken notes, which is above and beyond.

She takes a defiant bite of her now-tepid burger in order to be able to stop explaining for a while.

"But what about…"

"No. No more questions till I've eaten the rest of my dinner." She takes another defiant munch.

"But…"

"Nope. Food. You're finished. I'm not." She keeps on eating, in case he should do something drastic, such as remove the burger. If he does, she'll remove his fingers. That'll stop his story cold. "What's your real job?"

"I work in an office."

Castle isn't lying. He knows that it's totally misleading, but he absolutely can't afford to scare her off. He does work in an office – his office, in his expensively luxurious loft, in his own time. And he did write thrillers. Derrick Storm is a thriller series. This book: so far untitled, will be a police procedural. Mostly. It might also be a romance. Not much romance. His readership isn't – or at least has not previously been – notably romance-oriented. Then again, given the number of women in the signing queues, it might even be more popular if he does include more romance.

He pats the hand that isn't conveying burger and/or fries to mouth. Just the same as yesterday, the thrill sizzles through his fingers and up his arm. Her eyes widen, and he's sure she feels it too. Definitely more romance.

"An office? Doesn't sound very interesting. No wonder you want to know about cops."

"It's not." Especially when he's blocked. Nothing more tedious than staring at the walls of his office when he has no inspiration. "I'd much rather hear about cops."

"I've done enough talking."

"Would dessert keep you talking?" he says hopefully.

"I said, I've done enough talking. You talk. You asked enough questions." She pauses. "And I get dessert anyway, and coffee." She gestures at the server, who appears alongside the table, and orders brownies with ice cream, and a latte. "Did you want anything?" she asks Castle's amazed visage.

"No…" he stutters. He's not met an adult woman who eats like this for ten years. The ones he meets eat three small lettuce leaves – per day – and regard cucumber as dangerously calorific. Kate Beckett scarfed down her burger and looked like she savoured every rapid bite, and now she's eyeing up her brownie and ice cream like she hasn't eaten for a week. Not a woman who is slow about going after what she wants. In the short space of his thinking, half the dessert has disappeared.

"Staring is creepy," she says, and condescends to explain further. "I was hungry. Missed lunch."

"Why?"

"I said, no more talking." She employs the remains of the brownie to fill her mouth, effectively stopping any chance of words, and chases it with coffee.

Another oddity. This cop behaves and speaks as if she grew up in uptown society. Definitely she should have been a lawyer. Why a cop? He clamps down on a suicidal desire to ask, and suddenly remembers that odd feeling that she'd known about loss. Another wave of inspiration floods his brain.

"You can tell me tomorrow."

"Busy tomorrow."

"Next day?"

"Day after, okay?"

She puts her share of the check down (he does not like that. He wants to pay) and slips on her jacket.

"Here again? Seven?"

"Sure."

"Going to the subway?"

"Yeah."

"Good," he says happily. "So'm I." It doesn't take him more than ten seconds after they leave Remy's to put his arm round her and tuck her in. She fits beautifully into the planes of his form; exactly matches the curve of his elbow; and if only the walk to the station were longer, he'd be even happier.

Beckett had given some thought to whether Rick would try to put an arm around her again, and had rather decided he wouldn't. It becomes borne upon her that she had no good reason for that conclusion as soon as they leave Remy's; since she is quite definitively cuddled in. She likes it, she decides again. It's very reassuring to be cuddled.

Castle whisks himself home and lets story flood out through his fingers on the keys: creating a back story for his main character, who bears an astonishing physical resemblance to one Detective Kate Beckett. He pours into his writing the hints of loss; the tight wrapped, close-mouthed personality; and builds the portrait of a woman who's lost a close relation, who's changed her life to deal with it, who's still mourning her loss every day of her life. He can't stop writing till he's so exhausted he can barely see the keys: lost in his creation.

The next day, Castle is back at his laptop as soon as Alexis has left for school: desperate to haul his ideas out of his head and on to the paper where he can turn them into a coherent story. He outlines, filling in sentences and paragraphs as they occur to him: fleshing out his characters and his plot. When his phone reminds him that it's time to go see the auction list, he's almost angry that he has to pause.

"Hey, Jenna. I've come to see the list."

Jenna parks him in a comfortable chair in a quiet room, away from the fundraising hubbub of her team.

"I'll just bring it. Do you want a coffee?" She runs an interested gaze over him. Castle gives her back a bland, pleasant, and above all uninterested expression. She turns to the door with an air of mild disappointment, and shortly returns with the list and no coffee.

Castle peruses the list carefully. Very carefully, and then peruses it again even more carefully. Then he considers whether he needs the assistance of a graphologist, or whether an Egyptologist with a specialisation in hieroglyphics would be more appropriate. He has no more idea of what the scrawl might be – or indeed even whether it contains letters – than he would have been able to read the Great Pyramid in the original. He'd have done better with Elvish runes, or Klingon.

By dint of considerable squinting, he considers that the opening letter might be a K. Or a P. Or an R. Or maybe a B, D, G or even X. Nothing else resembles any letter of which he has ever heard or which he has ever read. He concludes, bitterly, that his book has been bought by a complete illiterate, manages to thank Jenna, provide Paula's details should more support for the charity be needed, and leave without descending into totally black despair.

Despair lurks about him nevertheless, until he reaches home and reads back the earlier work of the morning. Subsumed in the memory of Kate Beckett, inspiration drives out despair.

He misses seeing her that night, and the next, but it doesn't stop him writing: inspiration burning brighter than the sun. The story is all there, ready to be written, until he has to stop, because now he needs to know about the cops around her. She'd mentioned names, he recalls, and sifts his memory until those same names are forced to the front of his mind. Ryan, and Esposito. He'll ask about them, tomorrow night, he decides, and a little curl of happy warmth nestles in his chest at the thought of seeing Kate again.

Beckett, having spent the day determinedly chasing down clues and trying not to think about how interested Rick would have been in every tiny detail, finally departs the bullpen to meet Lanie.

"Hey girl. How you doing?"

"Good," Beckett says.

"Good? Wow, something must have gone right. What's his name?"

"What?"

"What's his name? You haven't said anything better than fine, in that tone that means you're not fine at all, for months, since you got ditched by that dumbass Fed. Must be someone making you happy. So what's his name?"

"I want a drink."

"And I wanna know this guy's name."

Beckett glares at her friend – for now – and then pushes her way to the bar. Lanie follows her, grinning evilly.

"Two glasses of white wine, please."

Two glasses are produced, and Beckett stalks back to a table. Lanie cheerfully saunters along behind her, still grinning evilly. The glasses click down with a decided note of irritation. Beckett drops into her seat without a click but with another decided note of irritation. Lanie, by contrast, bounces down and regards her with a bright-eyed look promising interrogation.

"So who is he?"

"Lanie! No-one."

"No-one makes you blush? Must be a really interesting no-one – or battery operated."

"Lanie!"

"C'mon, girl, give."

"It's nothing important." Lanie looks even more inquisitive. "Just this guy I met in a bar."

"And?"

"And nothing."

"When are you seeing him next?"

"We're not dating."

"That wasn't an answer. When are you seeing him again?"

"Tomorrow," Beckett mutters.

"At least put some lipstick on. A skirt wouldn't hurt, either."

"We're not dating. No lipstick. No skirt."

Lanie makes an unimpressed face. "You're as withered as the grass in the Mojave desert."

"There is no grass in the Mojave desert."

"Exactly."

Beckett sticks her tongue out, very childishly.

"So what's he like?" Lanie asks, interrogating yet again.

"Looks a bit like that author" –

"Richard Castle? You've been drooling over his photo for years."

"I have not," Beckett squawks indignantly. "Anyway, he's not that much like him. Not a smug, arrogant womaniser. Works in an office."

Lanie raises an eyebrow. Beckett glares back, unintimidated. She isn't interested in the Richard Castle story, only in the books. The books are what her mother loved. The books are what kept her halfway sane. She doesn't want to know about Richard Castle in reality – because it would be sure to puncture that little space where she can remember her mother alive, smiling, laughing, and happy. She'd only be disappointed by the reality.

"Name?"

"Rick Rodgers." As soon as she's admitted the name, Beckett wishes she hadn't. "No searching him out, Lanie! And no blabbing to Ryan and Espo, either."

Lanie regards her offendedly. "I wouldn't," she snips. "That's against the girlfriend code." She pauses. "And you'd blab something embarrassing about me if I did."

"Yep."

Lanie fixes Beckett with a glare. "So. This Rick Rodgers. What does he do?"

"Office job."

Lanie droops a little. "Interesting hobbies?"

"Dunno."

More droop.

"Bought you dinner?"

"Didn't let him."

By now Lanie is so drooped that she resembles a dead sunflower. "You didn't let him?" she squawks. "Girl, what are you on? You're crazy. If a man wants to buy you dinner, you let him. That's dating 101."

"Not dating."

"You damn well should be dating. It's been months since Fed-Ex left for Boston and it's about time you got back in the game."

"Don't wanna."

"Don't give me that shit, Kate. You're just scared."

"I am not."

"Are so. Scaredy cat. Just 'cause that asshole ditched you" –

"I ditched him" –

"Yeah, about ten seconds before he didn't ask you to go to Boston with him" –

"Shut up."

"– you won't even dip a tippy-toe in the pool. I swear if you don't do something soon I'm gonna push you in the deep end without a lifeguard."

"That's because you'll be hitting on him in the changing room," Beckett snips.

"You wouldn't be, so why'd you worry? A nice muscular lifeguard…" Her eyes turn dreamy.

"I don't want a lifeguard. I don't want to date. I'm fine."

Lanie regards her sceptically. "Well, if you're not gonna date at least don't drive this Rick guy off. You need some pals who don't do death all the time."

Beckett notably fails to point out that Rick is exceedingly interested in her job, and further fails to point out that she loves her job. Lanie on a mission is worse than a wolf on a blood trail. Anyway, she doesn't want to talk about Rick. He's… her friend. Even after only two meetings, he's her friend. She doesn't want to spoil it by displaying it to Lanie. Lanie will only ask hundreds of questions and she doesn't see the point of answering any of them. Well. Truthfully, she doesn't want to answer any of them.

"So who are you dating?" she asks combatively. "Now you've finished interrogating me, that is."

Lanie doesn't so much as blush. "Anyone who looks good," she grins. "I don't discriminate." She leers cheerfully. "But I only go on a second date if they treat me right."

Beckett groans. "Let's have more wine," she sighs.

"And more men?" Lanie leers hopefully.

"No men."

"No fun," Lanie grumps.

"Nope," Beckett says smartly, and disappears to the bar to get the drinks in so that Lanie can't retort.

Beckett's day is frantic. Fortunately she's been cleared and has her gun back, because a new body has dropped, and the team is racing round setting every investigative possibility on the go. She barely looks at her watch until six-forty-five, and realises with horror that she has no chance at all of making Remy's before seven-thirty, let alone seven. She can't leave the case.

She whips out her phone and rapidly texts Rick, a brief explanation and an apology, and turns back to the murder board and the case. Shortly, her phone chirps, with a reply. She opens it with some trepidation.

Okay. She breathes a sigh of relief. If you tell me where you are, I could bring you a takeout?

She considers for, oh, at least half a second, before she replies. Would love that. Twelfth Precinct, 321 E. 5th. Thanks.

Three-quarters of an hour later, the desk sergeant rings up. Fortunately Montgomery has left. Beckett doesn't want to test his tolerance for stray people in the bullpen.

"Beckett."

"Detective, I got a Rick here for you, with a takeout delivery."

"Okay. Um… send him up?"

"Sure."

A moment or two later, the elevator doors open and Rick walks out, staring round as wide-eyed as a five year old at the Macy's fireworks.

"Kate?" he says, spotting her and hurrying to her desk. "I brought takeout" – and then he spots her murder board, and stops mid-flow, drops the takeout (fortunately on to her desk) and stares at it, speechless and stunned.

Thank you to all readers and reviewers.

Alerts are still entirely non-existent. Apologies if I have missed anyone's review.