Chapter 5: Release

She finds him outside the hospital, his back against a brick wall, his head slumped forward. She can see him breathe in sharply as he senses her arrival, but he refuses to acknowledge her. "Alexis woke up." She knows that'll get his attention. He shoots up when he hears that, straightens as though ready to take off.

"She what?" He pushes off the wall and starts rushing back inside.

"No, Castle, it's fine. I was there." She grabs his arm, stopping him from running inside. "She fell back asleep after the nurse gave her something for the pain. She's ok, just a little scared. I told her you were here."

"You spoke to her? Thanks." His gratefulness is sincere. There is no one more important to him than Alexis, and he knows that, despite everything, Kate does still care about her.

"Of course." She's hesitant now, lost some of the bravado she had when stormed out. But she wills herself to start again. "She said something to me though, um, right before the pain medicine put her back to sleep." He's still not looking at her, although she does notice a wince, and she wonders if this is the right way to go about it. But she's started now, and she needs to tell him. Her voice is quiet as she forces the words past her lips, trying hard to hold back tears. "She told me that I really need to let you go."

He looks up at her at that, startled. He's about to apologize for his daughter's intrusion into their personal lives when he finds that he just doesn't have the energy to do it. "Well, she's always been a perceptive kid," he states evenly instead.

She steps back so she is leaning against the brick wall beside him, suddenly feeling like she can't hold herself up anymore. "Is that what you want?" she whispers as her body betrays her and tears start to roll down her cheeks.

"It's not about what I want. It's never been about what I want. You made sure of that." His tone is angry once again, and he's glad for it; anger is much easier to deal with it, much easier to express, than the despair that is waiting for him underneath. She's about to respond when he decides to continue speaking. He is tired of dragging this with him for weeks and decides that he's ready to just cut ties.

"Listen, Beckett, I can't do this. I told you, I understand." He pauses, unsure of how honest he should be, then figures he should just lay it all out there, get it all out so he can start to put it behind him. He stares at his hands as he continues. "It hurts. God, it hurts a lot. Hurt a lot, when I heard. And I've tried to get over it, over you, in a variety of perhaps not-so-wise ways, but I've realized I just can't do it while following you around all the time. Maybe if you had been honest with me, and given me time to move on, I could have done it, could have kept following you around. God knows I would've tried. But knowing now how you so easily kept up the lie, how you've been stringing me along all these months, I just… I can't do it, Kate. I can't." He hasn't looked at her the whole time, afraid that he'll cave when he sees her eyes plead with him to stay.

"String you along? Is that what you think I've been doing?" She feels her gut clench, her heart drop. She takes a moment, breathes in deeply, tries to collect herself, steels herself for his response. Her thoughts run through her mind in quick bursts, all blinding, and she feels herself nearly doubling over from it all. Stringing me along. Can't follow you around. Over you.

"What the hell else am I supposed to think?" He practically spits the words at her, and starts pressing into her personal space, his carefully contained rage rearing its ugly head. "Tell me, Detective, what it is you want me to say. You want me to say that I'll follow you around forever? Be your constant confidence booster, always waiting in the wings to pick you up, hand you a coffee, give you a compliment?" She's caught so off-guard by his outburst, by this angry side that she rarely sees from him, that she can't even put words together to respond, doesn't even move back as he approaches her. "That's what I thought. More silence. Well, you just keep that up. Keep being a coward. See how far that gets you, see how many people you can trick into staying around. But I'm done. This? This is over." And just as suddenly as it started, he's walking off, past her, towards the hospital doors. She's at a loss, completely unsure of what to do, but she knows that he's right, that she can't continue to do nothing.

So she grabs his arm again, stops him, spins him to face her. "I know you know none of that is true. I know you know me better than that." She feels the tears start to well up again, gets angry at herself for not being able to hold it together when it comes to this man, this relationship. "You know me better than anyone. You've somehow weaseled your way into my life, made yourself a part of me, and I took that for granted, took you for granted. I did."

She pauses, and now it's her turn to wonder how honest she should be. She figures it's now or never, and she does not want it to be never. "God, Castle, you tried to take a bullet for me. I couldn't even process that. Do you know what that would have done to me? And that's what scares me the most. The idea that I could care about someone that much, just to lose them..." Her voice trails off. "I can't do it again, Rick. I just can't," she whispers, tears rolling down her face.

She's on a roll now, even as the tears fall, and as the words are flying out of her mouth, she's hoping beyond hope that she says the right thing, makes him see the reality of her situation, their situation. "It's too much. Too much responsibility, too much of everything I don't deserve. I can't have you love me so much that you put yourself in the line of fire for me. I can't tell Alexis that her dad isn't coming home because of me." She pauses for a second, sees him wince at that, then continues, her voice softer.

"That's why I kept quiet. Because I couldn't lie to you and tell you I didn't feel anything for you, but I also couldn't accept that you loved me. It's too much." As all of this is pouring out of her mouth, she is quickly realizing that these are not the right words. Her brain is screaming at her, trying to start a mutiny, overtake her mouth, tell him what she really wants to say and what he so clearly needs to hear. I love you. I love you so much that it scares me. Please still love me back. I've forgotten how to live without you. Don't make me live without you.

But she doesn't say those things. The tears are coming down, hard, and even though he's still looking at her like she's ripped his heart out (not like, she reminds herself, because she really may as well have done just that), there's a sort of tenderness in his expression, a saddened, muted kind of affection.

When he finally talks, his voice is so quiet, she almost doesn't hear him. "That's not fair. Because I could have lost you. For a minute, I did lose you." He pauses, that sentence still so painful even a year later. "And it's too late for me, Kate. I already love you. It doesn't matter that it's all too much, doesn't matter if you think you don't deserve it, because there's not a damn thing I can do about it now." He pauses, lowers his voice. "Except leave. The only thing I can do now is walk away."

He once again starts walking towards the hospital, this time slumped over with exhaustion, not booming with anger as he was before. The truth has deflated him, crushed his heart ever tighter, but he needs to shake it off, and quick, because he has a little girl in the hospital who needs her dad, so he works on squaring his shoulders as he walks in.

Kate watches all of the effort he's putting into getting himself together, and she feels as though she is being ripped apart.

"No," she suddenly blurts out, angrier than she meant it to sound. "You can't –"

"Like hell I can't," he turns and throws back at her before she has a chance to even complete her thought.

"Ok," she says quietly, looking down. "Ok, you're right. You can. And maybe you should." She pauses, thinking. "Actually, you definitely should. Because this right here, what's between us, is big. And it's scary. And we've hurt each other in the past. Hell, we've been hurt in front of each other, been closer to death more times than anyone should ever have to be," she realizes her voice is getting louder, and decides to reign herself back in, lowering her voice once again. "And we're going to hurt each other again."

He scoffs at that, looks at her, his eyes showing nothing but complete heartache. "Well, I'm done sitting around and being hurt," he says, impressed with himself for keeping his voice so steady.

"But walking away is going to hurt. More than anything else we've ever been through. I don't even know…" Her voice drifts off, and she tries to force her real thoughts out. She breathes deeply, and continues. "I don't even know what I would do – am going to have to do – if this is really it. If this is really happening. If you're really walking away. I know I screwed up and you should never have found out that way…" She can't find the words to make him understand, and everything she says seems to force him to clam up further, visibly collapsing into himself and away from her. Because she is confirming what he thinks, that she doesn't want to lose him as a friend, as a partner. So she presses on, tries to make herself as clear as humanly possible. "You shouldn't have found out that way because I should have told you. I should have sat down with you, been rational, and for once, uncomplicated, and said, hey Castle, I heard you tell me that you love me. And guess what? I love you, too." The last couple of sentences are rushed, as she tried to force the words out of her mouth before she had a chance to lose her nerve.

Castle's whole body reacts to that: his head flies up, his jaw clenches, his posture straightens, his hands tighten into fists. It's as though he's waiting for the next blow, steeling himself against another sharp punch to the gut, waiting for the "but…"

She's imagined telling him those four words a hundred times over, but never in her wildest dreams did he react so violently. But she's feeling brave now, so she pushes forward. "I love you, Rick, and I'm scared. I didn't want to tell you because I didn't want to screw everything up and lose you altogether." She sees he's about to respond, but she cuts him off. "I was wrong. So wrong. Incredibly and terribly wrong. But I love you. I am stupidly, ridiculously in love with you. And I have been for some time." She waits a beat, stands in front of him, trying to force herself into his line of sight. "Please don't walk away from us now," she says softly, her voice laced with tears she didn't realize she was crying. In some other universe, Kate Beckett would tell herself that she would sooner die than beg someone not to leave her, especially while crying. But in this universe, she cannot stand the idea of losing him, and she doesn't even care that she's been reduced to this pleading mess. She just needs him to understand.

His choked response is at once too much and not enough. "Why?"

She doesn't even know what exactly he is addressing with that – why are you telling me this now, why should I believe you, why do you love me, why should I care – but she knows for sure that she is almost out of words, that her vocabulary is failing her. She steps closer to him, invading his space, and puts her hands on his shoulders. He doesn't move, which she takes as a positive sign in comparison to his previous outright rejection, so she tries to take a deep breath and continue.

"I'm so sorry. I can't – I don't – " Can't live without you? Don't want to try? What could she possibly say to him to make him understand? She notes that the fact that she is apparently sobbing is not helping her at all and why can't she make him understand that she loves him and he needs to give them a chance?

And then all at once she finds herself crushed in his embrace, his arms tight across her back, her face buried in his neck. "Ok, Kate. Ok," he whispers, bringing one hand up to run through her hair, trying to soothe them both. "Ok."