Author's note: Finished a brief additional scene this evening, so here you go.
Castle walked back into the bullpen carrying a large paper sack with lunch for himself, Beckett, Ryan, and Esposito. The three detectives were pushing ahead with case paperwork to get everything filed before 3PM, per Gates' orders, so he'd volunteered to go out and bring lunch back for them.
Beckett glanced up as he came into view, giving him the same wide-eyed, worried look he'd already seen a dozen times that morning. He broke eye contact immediately, detouring towards Ryan and Esposito first.
Be her partner first, and her friend second, he reminded himself. He had made it his mantra.
For now, just being her partner was enough of an effort. He truly wanted their friendship to survive – it was the second most important relationship in his life, after his bond with Alexis – and he knew it was going to take some work. In time, though, they'd get back onto an even footing. Somehow.
At some point in the future, he might even be able to look at her without seeing the light glinting subtly across the chocolate and caramel curls framing her face, or the elegant line of her alabaster neck. The unbearably enticing fullness of her lower lip. The hypnotic depth of her hazel eyes. The sinuous, opposing curves of her waist and hips.
The scent of her hair. The all-too-brief taste of her kiss.
How she'd look in a flowing white dress.
Stop it, he thought, wincing at his own foolish mind. It was his curse as a writer. All too easy to see things in his mind, even when they weren't there. Even when they'd never been there.
Stop making up stories, he thought.
Easier said than done.
He handed Ryan and Esposito their lunches, gave them a tight-lipped smile, then walked back across to Beckett's desk and sat down in the guest chair. She was watching him as he set the paper sack down on the edge of the desk.
"Break room?" she asked, and he nodded after a moment. He glanced over towards the other two detectives, but Ryan was on hold on the phone and Esposito was starting at a document on his computer screen, both already eating.
The break room was empty, which wasn't ideal. He allowed her to enter first, and he carefully left the door fully open before heading over towards the coffee machine.
Beckett watched him as he busied himself with the machine, with his head down and his back to her.
You stupid man, she thought. You stupid, wonderful, infuriating man.
Despite his newfound studied nonchalance and distance, she could see that he was hurting.
This wasn't him, but she knew that the real Castle – the man-child, the joyful father, the adventurer in life, the storyteller – was still in there. Locked behind this barrier he'd put up. Behind–
A wall.
The difference was that her wall had been built on tragedy, and systematically dismantled by love – his love for her. Now he had a wall of his own, and she was the one who put it there.
Her own barrier was gone, but she'd engineered another without allowing herself to acknowledge it. A time-bomb waiting to go off for months, knowing that the resulting rubble would be piled high.
She swallowed, blinking rapidly to clear her eyes, and she heard Dr. Burke's voice in her mind.
This isn't just about you anymore, Kate.
Now it was Castle's turn to be the wounded one; the one with a gaping hole to mend. Now he was the one with a bleak image of the future, filled with a long, slow rehabilitation as he made himself fall out of love with her. He was the one who needed time to forget the idea of her he'd built in his mind, and no doubt clung to for the long months she'd removed herself from him, and even since she'd come back.
He had almost finished making the two coffees now, and still she was staring at him. She considered getting up and closing the door, but she knew what his response would be.
Let's focus on the work.
That's what he'd said, and if she was honest with herself, she knew that he didn't just mean today. He meant from now on. Again the panic rose up. Again she simply breathed through it, and reminded herself that he was feeling even worse.
She was terrified that she would lose him.
He was convinced that he'd already lost her.
Castle turned away from the counter and carried the two cups of coffee over to the table, placing hers in front of her before going around to sit in a chair on the opposite site, diagonally across from her.
Still she watched him, as he avoided eye contact, and with a flash of insight she knew that he couldn't bear to look at her because when he did, he couldn't help but see the woman he'd made her out to be.
The muse. The inspiration. The real Nikki Heat. The woman he'd said those three beautiful words to, on the darkest day under a bright sky.
The woman who loved him too.
But she knew that he'd already decided that wasn't true; that it couldn't be true. He'd spun out a new, alternate version of events, that tore down what they were building together. And it was her fault. She'd never given him real hope; just crumbs, and allusions, and plausible deniability. So he filled in the blanks, and lived with the doubts, and then it inevitably all came crashing down when he discovered her lie.
And now, maybe it was too late.
Now it was her mother's voice that echoed in her mind, the words familiar from so many evenings as a girl when she would ask what case her mother was working on, and why she pursued these things even though it had all already happened. The deeds had been done, and it was too late to help the victims.
Johanna Beckett would run a soothing hand through her daughter's hair, and look at her with patience and compassion, but also with a hint of fire in her eyes.
It's never too late for the truth, Katie.
Castle had pulled his own sandwich towards him, and was unwrapping it without much enthusiasm.
She suddenly reached out and put her hand on top of his, startling him. He froze for a moment, then looked up at her blankly.
She looked into his eyes, and let the tension flow out of her.
"Stop making up stories," she said.