So now that the site has stopped being stupid I can post this and you guys will get it.

I clearly don't own Castle because if I did then I would have seen the promo for next week coming and I didn't so there.

Chapter 19 – Published Love Letters

I'd gone out to the patio to get the box before heading out to my car. I couldn't help myself I wanted to read it. I was so mad at him for not mentioning it to me, but I still wanted to read it. But it was already gone, and when I saw him standing by the car that I knew that he'd put it in there for me, because he hadn't been sure I'd take it. I was too angry with him for doing that but I realized that if he thought I wasn't going to take it he distrusted me at that moment almost as much as I distrusted him. So I didn't say anything.

Then the whole car ride home the inconspicuous white box on my passenger seat taunted me. I wanted to pull over and read it there. I wanted to hurl it out the window and watch the pages float away. I wanted to turn around right then and go back, have him read it to me, have him burn it with me. I couldn't make up my mind. I couldn't even discern why I was so upset about the reappearance of my alter ego.

So when I got home, I sent him a text and left the box sitting on my counter. It took three days before curiosity finally won when I got home from a case to a vase overflowing with purple Gerber daisies. Leaving the flowers on the kitchen island, I opened the box and extricated the manuscript, taking it over to my couch.

I ran my fingers over the title, Fresh Heat, one more time before I finally turned the page and fell into the world of Nikki Heat. It was all there, the case completely from his own mind, but Nikki and Rook were stumbling head over heels for each other faster than they had the first time, just like we had. The red numbers on my microwave read 3:34 in the morning when I was able to set the pages back in the box.

"Why does it bug you so much that he wrote it, if he wasn't going to publish it without your permission anyway?" Dr. Burke asked from his chair, looking every bit as calm as he had when I'd told him about Castle, and the PTSD relapse and everything else. The man was seriously unflappable and it was starting to drive me nuts.

"That's why I'm here, because I don't know. Aren't you supposed to talk to me in about something really random and we find out the answer seemingly magically?" Ok so I was in a snarky mood but it had been irking me so much all week. Rick was back in the city now and I need to have an answer to this infuriating question before I saw him. Because I had responded to his text with one word answers since I'd told him I was home and if it was eating at me it was definitely eating at him.

Burke cocked his head to the side, curiously, "Alright what round about topic should we talk about?"

"You're supposed to have the topic?"

"But you suggested the method, so it's only reasonable that we let you pick the topic."

I gritted my teeth, maybe the heat was getting to me, I felt like an idiot. "Work."

"Ok let's talk about work. How's it been since you got back from the holiday."

"The heat makes people stupid. They're mostly pop and drops, Jack shot Jill over Bill, nothing interesting." I sighed, the precinct had been almost comical with the number of open and shut cases.

"What do you mean nothing interesting?"

I thought about it, "Nothing that takes and brain power to solve…" I paused knowing I was going to regret this the instant it was out of my mouth, but this was where I'd wanted to get, "Nothing Castle would write about."

"Why wouldn't he write about it?" the man didn't even flinch.

"Because it's not interesting you can't write a best seller over a person stupid enough to not even flee the crime scene of a murder."

"Why is that important?"

"Because he's writing about me."

"You do get plenty of interesting cases, aren't you the go to detective for the weird ones?"

"I always have been. I've always liked the puzzle of them, trying to figure out the why in order to understand the who."

"That's why you've always like murder mystery novels and procedurals on TV isn't it? Because you like to solve the mystery."

"How did you know… never mind. What's the point?"

"What's the mystery that's plaguing you now?"

"How Castle is going to kept writing Nikki Heat without following me around?"

He nodded and smiled, "Do you want him to follow you around?"

"I liked having him there but we're in a different place now."

"Would that change with him following you around?"

"I have no idea."

"Does he want to follow you around?"

"I haven't asked."

"Why not?"

"I'm scared of what he'll say."

"What might he say?"

"That his books are more important than our relationship, that he needs to follow me around but we can't have a relationship if he's doing that."

That ridiculous rant, that sounded preposterous in my own head finally broke my shrink, the man that had only ever shown emotion when I was talking about running into Castle the first time, actually laughed at me, "Kate you know that's ludicrous."

"Apparently I don't."

He smiled at me like an endearing grandfather. "Alright, here's what you're going to do."

I rolled my eyes, this sounded like a mess. "Ok."

"Go home, and I want you to read Heat Wave, and then read Fresh Heat and then you are going to talk to him." I opened my mouth to ask why but I never got that far, "When you've done the first two things you're going to want to do the third anyway."

"That's it? You're telling me to go read two books I've already read and then go talk to him."

He nodded, "Yes I am."

"Fine." I huffed standing up. I was ready to make my way to Castle's loft right now, as I fled from the office but by the time I'd made it out onto the street I'd managed to take enough deep breaths to realize that Dr. Burke, as annoying as he was, was probably right. Heading home, I called the Chinese delivery place, and mentally located Heat Wave on my bookshelves. It had sustained some smoke damage when my last apartment blew up but it should still be readable.

The key slid into the lock, which shouldn't have surprised me, but it did. I hadn't had the guts to knock and wait for him to open the door. I was going to do this, and that meant going in and talking to him, not giving myself the chance to run over something that I knew wasn't a possibility.

The door swung open to a quiet loft, the warm summer evening suffusing the room with an orange glow. There didn't seem to be any one around, so I slipped into the entry way bending down to take off my sandals before picking up my packages and venturing further into the loft, thinking how nice it would be to come home to this place. Before mentally checking my run away thoughts, one hurdle at a time.

He probably wasn't home, he was probably out with his daughter enjoying the evening, as the air finally lost some of its strength with the sunset. But still I pressed further on. If he was here, he was in the study or his bedroom. The study door was open but I couldn't see anything from where I was, so I just went for it.

And was rewarded with the sight of my favorite author, my favorite person, brooding in an armchair across from the windows, so that he was awash in the soft golden light, clutching a tumbler of scotch. "Rick?" I said softly from the doorway, I'd come into the apartment without an invite but I wasn't going to enter his study without one.

His head turned slowly, the five o'clock shadow catching in the light as he focused on me, or tried to through the sun light, "Kate?" My name dropped off his lips almost reverently like I was an apparition. "Is that you?"

I crossed the room, setting the two things I'd brought with me down before squatting down so that was eye level with him. "Yeah it's me."

That was all it took, glass of scotch abandoned he was gathering me to him as fast as possible. Lurching out of his chair to wrap his arms around my back pulling me into the chair with him, my legs sliding onto either side of his, so we were chest to chest, as I looped my arms around his neck, tucking my face into his neck as he buried his face in my hair. He just held on as the light faded from the room leaving us in the evening twilight.

"Whatever it takes I'll burn the book, crush my hard drive, I'll have them recall all of the copies of Heat Wave, just don't ever leave me again." He wasn't crying but there was a hint of panic in him, as he pulled back.

"Castle," I brushed his hair out of his eyes, feathered a kiss over his lips, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry I ever made you worry about me."

He pulled in a deep breath, "I'm sorry I wrote a Nikki Heat novel without talking to you about it first."

"You really haven't shown it to anyone?"

He shook his head rapidly, "No, no one. We're the only ones that have read it… If you've read it otherwise it's just me."

"You should give it to your publisher, well first you should correct the mistakes that I marked, but you should give it to Gina," I told him, picking at a thread on his shirt, "You should keep writing Nikki if you have stories to tell for her." I lifted my eyes to meet his.

I don't think that I've ever stunned Castle speechless with my clothes on but that seemed to have done it. He swallowed hard, "Kate… I…"

"I over reacted." I conceded there was nothing left but to go for the truth. "Nikki Heat…" I smooth my hand across his t-shirt feeling the solid man underneath. I tried again, "The first Nikki Heat was an adventure for me, having you on cases is like bringing the library of mystery novels with me and picking through it to find the story that fits the case. I liked having you around because you did that. It made it less dreary to listen to you spin a story around the case, even when we found the story you made it far more interesting… I like listening to you tell stories."

His face went soft with a small smile, the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes deepening, "I'll tell you any story you want to hear."

"I want you to keep telling Nikki Heat stories as long as it makes you happy," I told him softly trying to match the twilight tone of the room, "but I don't want to lose this." I waved my free hand slowly in the small gap between us.

He caught my fingers bringing them up to his mouth so that he could brush a kiss across the knuckles. "This is not going anywhere," he said reverently.

"I know that." I leaned my head against his shoulder, taking deep breaths of the musky smell that Castle always had at the end of the day. The one that would cling to my clothes at the end of the day. "I was just afraid that you were going to want to come back to the precinct and that would be more important to you."

He dropped my hand so that he can wrap that arm around me, encouraging me to settle further into him. "You were always more important than the books," he says into my hair. "Coming to the precinct, following you around for research … that was so that I could spend time with you… the precinct helped me get a better handle on details that I'd been missing and gave me characters to work with but you were the reason I was there."

"I know that now."

"How?"

"Burke made me re-read Heat Wave and Fresh Heat again."

"And that convinced you?" He sounded skeptical, almost in disbelief that such a thing was possible.

"Lanie joked when Heat Wave came out that it was a love letter to me, but you were already gone onto James Bond by then. Besides I thought she was being preposterous… how long into shadowing me did you have the whole thing planned if not written?"

He paused, chest expanding under me, as he took a deep breath, "The outline was there before we closed that first case."

"But you stayed, you kept coming back to annoy me to death."

"I wasn't that bad," I could hear the smile in his voice.

"No you really weren't…"

"You were a puzzle that I want to figure out, I wanted to make the pieces fit and understand the story. I kept coming back because I needed to know the story. I still need to know the story." His voice was soft floating around me, and I closed my eyes just needing to be in the moment with him. And he let me, whether because he needed it to or because he could sense that's what I needed, but it didn't matter, it was quiet and calm for a moment before he spoke again. "What does this have to do with re-reading the books?"

I lifted up to pull back from him so that I could look at him, "Lanie was right Heat Wave was a love letter and I just couldn't see it at the time." He smiled, "If that was a love letter then I don't even know what to call Fresh Heat… How many girls get love letters in the form of novels?"

His eyes sparkled in the dark room as he smiled, "From me? Just you. Only you." And then he leaned in starting with a gentle kiss to my cheek before I turned my head and meet him sinking into the kiss, trying to communicate how much he meant to me, how much his words meant to me the written and the verbal.

"I love you," I whispered, pulling my head back to rest just rest against his.

"I know you do," his response came back, "I love you too," the words rumbling through my chest feeling every bit as tangible as he was, "You have no idea how much I love you." I could have argued tried to disagree but that would ruin it so I just basked in the moment.

"So I should give it to my publisher?" he finally asked.

I smiled at him, "You should."

"You really liked it?"

I nodded against him, "I'm probably biased, but yes I liked it. I couldn't put it down once I convinced myself to pick it up. I loved it."

"Ok." He sighed, relieved.

I chuckled a little bit, "You were worried that I wasn't going to like it?"

A self-deprecating smile, "Among other things."

"If I had told you not to publish it?"

He shrugged, "As long as you liked it I probably wouldn't have cared." I looked at him, well I glared at him knowing that wasn't true.

He caved, "Ok I probably would have cared if you'd said not to publish it, but not as much if you told me you didn't like it."

"You're so silly,"

"But you love me anyway."

"I do." I smiled at him running a hand over his face exhaustion settling over me from the late nights reading, and not being able to sleep because he wasn't there. Suddenly that was all I wanted to do was fall asleep cuddled in his arms, "Take me to bed Castle." I murmured against his neck.

"Demanding, aren't we?" his voice lacked any bite to it.

"I'm just so tired."

"Glad I'm not the only one," he shifted both us to the edge of the chair so that my feet could find the floor as he pushed us both upright, "I couldn't sleep without you."

"Do you want to come back to the precinct?" The question escaped my lips before I had a chance to actually think about it as we walked into the bedroom.

He however didn't miss a beat, "Do you want me there?" He handed me a clean t-shirt of his and waited for my answer.

"I liked having you there… but I need you here more." My fingers sank into the cotton as if it was a lifeline.

"If you could have both?"

"I would hear so many stories." It was the only answer I could come up with.

He smiled chuckling at me coming closer to me and undoing the buttons of my shirt for me, since I didn't seem to be making any progress on getting ready for bed, "And you like when I tell stories." He pushed the shirt off my shoulders before reclaiming the t-shirt he'd given me to pull over my head. When my head popped through, he leaned in and brushed a kiss over my lips, "It's totally up to you. You want me to come into the precinct and research I will, you want me to research by just talking to you at dinner and playing video games I will, but I'm not going anywhere."

"If you come back to the precinct do we still get all the other steps?" I finally kicked myself into action shoving my arms through the sleeves so that I could undo my pants and wiggle out of those too.

"Other steps?" he asked genuinely curious in his own exhaustion.

"Moving in, engagement, wedding, babies," I reminded him, pulling back the covers on his massive bed to crawl in.

He got in on the other side, settling himself into the pillow opening his arms for me, so that I could wrap myself around him like usual. "Yeah," it floated from his lips, "yeah, those things are non-negotiable."

Resting my head on his chest, I wrapped an arm around his waist, slipped, and leg between his, "Ok." I blinked sleepily.

"Ok?"

"Come to the precinct. Tell me stories every day."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," I nodded just a little bit against him. "I'll talk to Gate's but you're going to have to convince her."

"Just wait till she sees how much better your close rate is with me."

I smacked him lightly, chuckling, as I drifted off, "I love you."

"Love you too."

I suppose I should tell you that this is the penultimate chapter and hope that encourages you to review. I really would love to hear your thoughts on this so if you could drop me a line I'd love it. Even if it's just a line from the show.

Babyrose