A/N: So much for not updating in November. I couldn't do it. If you guys like reading this stuff (which apparently you do, or you probably wouldn't be reading this right now...), I can almost guarantee that I love writing it more. The lack of fanfic writing was starting to make me cranky. So I stopped that silly self-control nonsense and wrote another chapter. So now my NaNo word count is pathetically behind, but you get another chapter to read. :) Hopefully it's worth it. It was for me. Also, it was pointed out to me that the last chapter left you on a bit of a cliffhanger... not an extreme one, but there was definitely a little drop involved... and to let you hang there for the whole month really wouldn't be very nice of me. So without further ado, Chapter 11. Hope you enjoy it.

He woke very early the next morning to the sound of rain pounding on the roof. The blinds on his window were closed, but he could tell from the lack of light streaming in around them that it was still dark outside. He wanted to go back to sleep, but something about the sound of the rain was making him thirsty, so he decided to get a glass of water first.

He happened to glance out of the kitchen window while he was reaching into the cabinet for a glass. He expected to see an empty expanse of deck, but instead he saw the silhouette of a woman there, leaning against the railing. She was soaked, and the rain kept coming, falling over her and around her.

He told himself that he didn't care. She was a grown woman, and could take care of herself. If she wanted to stand outside in the rain, that was her business. But he found that he couldn't avert his eyes. He kept staring. Kept watching. A shiver ran through her body, and still she didn't move. Water dripped from her clothes and her hair.

He put down the water glass he'd never filled and closed the cabinet. Without really knowing why, he found himself stepping out onto the deck and closing the door behind him. The water immediately began to cover him, large drops soaking into his t-shirt. Casually, as if it wasn't raining at all and he always stood outside on his deck before sunrise, he strolled over to the railing and leaned against it. He stood beside her but he didn't look at her directly, and he didn't say anything at all. He didn't have anything to say.

They stood like this for a few minutes, looking out at the horizon, which was blurred from the rain. Finally he saw her head turn in his peripheral vision, and he turned as well to meet her eyes.

Her face was red and her eyes were swollen, leading him to believe that not all of the water on her face was a direct result of the rain. She shivered again and he fought the urge to wrap her in his arms, to protect her from the storm outside as well as the one that raged within her, remembering that he was still angry. Instead he nodded toward the door, suggesting that they go inside.

But she shook her head and looked away from him, back out at the water, stubbornly resolving to stay put.

It wasn't long before his own thin clothes were completely soaked through and he could feel the bone-chilling cold of the rain that neither stopped falling nor began to let up in any way. But he made his own resolution. He would not go back inside until she did.

He lost all track of time then. He had no idea how long they stood there, side by side but not touching, not speaking, not even looking at each other. But without ever turning to face her, somehow he was still aware of every movement she made. Every breath. Every shiver. Every time she turned her head just enough that she could see him in the same way.

It wasn't until he found himself unable to control his own shivering, to hide it or hold it in altogether because it didn't seem very manly, that she finally moved. She turned toward him, glanced at him for a split second, and then started for the door back into the house. She didn't check to see if he was following her, but he was, and he was privately grateful for her decision.

As soon as they were both inside he went for the hall closet and got out two towels. He handed her one before he began to dry himself with the other. But no matter how much he tried to blot the moisture away, no matter how tightly around himself he wrapped his towel, he couldn't seem to get warm again. This was a chill that went deeper than the skin, maybe even deeper than the bone. No matter what he did, he couldn't seem to correct it.

Somehow he felt more tired now than he had when he'd first woken up, but he no longer felt any desire for a drink. He wanted to go back to bed, but first he looked at Kate, hoping for some kind of assurance that she wasn't going to be stupid and go back outside as soon as he was back in his bed.

When he looked she was blotting her face dry with her towel. But as soon as she took the towel away new moisture formed, making the gesture of drying rather unhelpful.

He wasn't okay with this. He hated seeing her upset. No matter what happened, no matter how angry she made him, he was never going to be okay with seeing her cry. It would never feel like a victory. He felt his own eyes filling not with tears, but emotions. Pity. Compassion. Sorrow. Kate noticed him looking and for a split second met his gaze. In that same second, he knew that she understood it.

He looked away quickly, and without a word went back to his bedroom. He closed the door behind him with a heavy sigh, but before he reached the bed he heard a knock, so light that it was barely audible.

He wasn't sure why, but he went back to the door and opened it. Kate had discarded her towel somewhere, but her clothes and hair were still soaking wet. Her face was dry, although her eyes were red. "Couldn't sleep,"' she explained softly.

"Don't care," he said with ice in his voice, starting to close the door again.

But she caught it before it could swing closed. "Liar," she accused, meeting his eyes so that he could see the steely resolve they now contained.

He wavered, but tried to close the door again.

But again she didn't let him. "It brings them closer," she said firmly, like he was somehow supposed to know what the hell she was talking about.

He squinted his tired eyes. "What?"

"The storm," she clarified. "You're right. It really looks like the sky is coming down to meet the water."

"And the water embraces the sky," he added, without thinking, before he remembered what he'd been intending when he'd written that metaphor. "How…?"

"Well, you just left your notebook on the bed in there."

"You read it?" he asked, anger coming back in full force. "That's my personal—"

"Oh, shut up." She pushed past him into the room, rolling her eyes. "Like you wouldn't have done the same thing if it was mine." She sat down on the edge of the bed, making herself at home.

"I didn't say you could come in here." He frowned pointedly.

"Don't care," she said, exactly as he had a minute ago.

"How much did you read?" he sighed.

"All of it."

His eyes widened. He'd had that notebook for almost two months now. There was a lot of writing in it, and, he was sure, some fairly unintelligible handwriting.

"Your next Nikki Heat novel ought to be interesting." She smiled.

He reached for words but couldn't seem to find any. "I, uh… probably won't end up using most of that. A lot of what's in there was just… brainstorming."

She shrugged. "Well, I'm not your editor."

"No," he managed, still unable to grasp the fact that she'd read his entire notebook. All the Nikki Heat stuff… and everything else. He wasn't sure whether to be more angry or embarrassed.

"I'm sorry I doubted you," she said, suddenly looking down. "I know you were just trying to be a good friend, bringing me here."

Surely he was wrong, surely he was tired and he wasn't judging correctly, but he could almost swear he heard something like disappointment in her voice. But he knew she'd make fun of him for the next decade for even thinking something like that, so he didn't mention it. He was thrown enough just by the simple fact that she was apologizing. Even if she had been wrong, it wasn't like her to admit it. "Lanie got things messed up," he said, excusing her.

"No," she said, inordinately fascinated with his sheets. "It wasn't Lanie. She did tell me I should talk to you more, but what I said was mine."

He took a step closer to the bed, but frowned. Because that wasn't okay. It wasn't okay that she'd questioned his motives like she had, especially if she'd come up with the reasoning on her own. She should've known him better than that by now.

"Castle…" She looked up at him, her eyes a little watery once again. "I'm not ready to go home yet."

He nodded. "I know."

"I don't want to fight anymore."

He sighed. "Neither do I."

A single tear slipped down her cheek. "I…" She swallowed. "I can't do this without you."

Finally, he sat down on the bed beside her. "You could," he said without quite looking in her direction. "But you don't have to." He leaned against the headboard and let his eyes slide closed. He needed sleep, and he needed it badly.

"You really are a good friend," he heard her say. "Thanks for that."

"Mm." He felt himself slipping out of consciousness.

"You're tired?" He could hear a frown in her voice.

"Astute," he mumbled. "You should be a detective."

"I just don't get why," she said, ignoring his comment, which he realized too late that he shouldn't have made. "You went to bed really early last night."

"Kate, it's like five in the morning." He cracked one eye open. "Why aren't you tired?"

"I haven't gone to bed yet."

He groaned.

"What? I had a lot of reading to do, and some of your handwriting took me awhile to decipher."

He swallowed and opened both of his eyes, ignoring a weird feeling in his throat. "You're not going back to that not sleeping thing," he said, actually meeting her eyes now.

She shrugged a little guiltily. "You messed up my routine."

"Go sleep," he commanded, sinking down into his bed and pointing at the door.

"Okay," she said. "I'm going."

He accepted this and closed his eyes. He was asleep again in under a minute.

He woke for the second time that morning to what felt like a small army inside of his head, trying to make their escape by banging down the walls of his skull. The light was streaming in around the blinds now, leading him to believe that he must have been asleep for at least a couple of hours.

He tried to sit up, but was stopped by a strange weight against his leg. When he looked, he saw that it was Kate. She'd claimed not to be tired earlier, but she must've fallen asleep here before making it back to her room. She was positioned oddly, lying on her side near the foot of the bed where she'd been sitting, with her head resting on his leg (the weight he'd felt, he realized) and her legs hanging over the side so that one of her feet touched the floor. It didn't look comfortable. She was going to be in pain when she woke up. But not nearly as much pain as he his head was causing him.

He needed coffee, he decided, but he didn't want to wake her up. He managed to force himself into a seated position and tried to prop up her head with his hands while he moved his leg out of the way, but the way her head was oriented made that awkward. He ended up with one hand resting on her cheek while the other got tangled in her hair.

She stirred, and he froze. "Castle?" she mumbled, her voice just barely awake. "Why is your hand on my face?" He pulled away quickly, and she sat up, although slowly, massaging her lower back. "Ow," she groaned. "What the hell kind of a position was I sleeping in?"

"A very strange one," he tried to say dryly. Even to his own ear his voice sounded wrong, like in his sleep it had somehow been rerouted through his nose. "When I told you to go sleep, I meant in your room."

"God, you sound terrible," she said, completely ignoring what he'd said. She turned to face him and her brow furrowed in concern. "And you don't look great, either."

"Thanks," he muttered. He rolled his eyes, but that only seemed to make the army in his head angry, and he had to fight a separate battle to stop his hand from grabbing his forehead in a kind of defensive maneuver. But he was sure he hadn't managed to completely hide his grimace.

"You feeling okay?" she asked.

"I'm fine," he insisted, although his odd nasal voice wasn't supporting this assertion. "I just need coffee."

She nodded. "Yes. Coffee. Me too. I'll go make some." She got up, and he tried to follow her, but when he stood up he felt dizzy and had to sit back down. "You stay here," she said, more gently than he would've expected. "I'll bring it in."

He watched her go and positioned his pillow behind him so that he could sit up and lean against it. He wondered why his head had suddenly become a separate entity from the rest of his body, and one that he wished he could remove. Coffee would fix the problem, he told himself. Hopefully it would be ready soon.

He smiled when she finally came back into the room, a mug in each hand. He didn't think he'd ever loved the smell of coffee more than he did at that particular moment. "Here you go," she said as she handed it to him. "Hope it helps."

He accepted it graciously and immediately took a sip, burning his lip. "Hot!" he yelped.

"You have to let it cool for a sec, tough guy," she teased, sitting down on the other side of the bed. "I just made it."

"Could've told me that," he complained, setting the cup on the end table beside the bed.

"It's common sense."

"Overrated." He stopped paying attention for a second and his hand found its way up to his temple. He took it away again quickly, but Kate had seen.

She set her coffee cup down on the end table that stood on her side of the bed and pressed her hand to his forehead before he could realize what she was doing. She'd taken it away again before his reflexes, considerably slower than usual, could kick in to push it away. She expelled a breath of relieved air. "I don't think you have a fever. Probably just a cold."

"I'm fine," he insisted for the second time that morning.

She rolled her eyes. "Come on. I can tell you feel crappy. I'm not sure why you're trying to hide it from me."

He wasn't exactly trying to hide it from her. It was more that he was trying not to admit it, even to himself. He didn't want to be sick, so he wasn't. He felt fine. Just fine, he mentally reminded the army that was still trying to break free of his skull. It didn't help. But even if he was sick, he still wasn't exactly on the best terms with Kate. He was still a little irritated with her and he was sure she wasn't thrilled with him. Granted, the fact that she'd fallen asleep on his leg had to mean something, but he couldn't make his exhausted brain work out what that was. He took the coffee from the nightstand again and took a tentative sip. It was a little cooler now. Still hot, but cool enough to drink.

"See, you're not talking," she pointed out. "Normally I can't get you to shut up."

"Maybe I just don't have anything to say to you," he suggested coldly.

She seemed to deflate a little, but then she nodded. "Okay. I deserve that. But I'm sorry. I said I was sorry." She looked away for a second, took a sip of her coffee, and then met his eyes again. "I should take you home."

He frowned. "Why?"

"Because you're sick," she said, her expression caught somewhere between worry and frustration. "And because you're mad at me, and you should be mad at me. You shouldn't have to stay here with me now. You should go back to your family. Go back to your life."

He sighed. "We've been here before. This is my life."

She shrugged. "Only if you want it to be."

"I'm not going anywhere," he said firmly. "I'm not ready to leave."

"But you're sick."

"I'm not that sick. I'll be fine in a day or two. We still have more than a week before we have to be back."

"'We'?"

"Of course 'we'. I'm not gonna abandon you just because you pissed me off."

"You're sure that's what you want?"

"Don't ask me again," he warned.

She nodded. "I'm gonna earn your forgiveness," she told him, like she was making a threat.

"Oh?" He raised an eyebrow, intrigued, but then lowered it quickly because it really didn't help the whole situation with his head. "How?"

"You've been taking care of me this whole time. Now it's my turn. What can I do?"

"Nothing," he grumbled. "I'm fine."

"Come on, Castle. I'll get you anything you want. You might never get this opportunity again. Take advantage."

"All I want is for my head to stop hurting," he moaned, pressing his hand over his eyes.

"I can get you some aspirin or something. Where is it?"

"I don't usually keep that stuff here."

"Then I'll go buy some. Do you need anything else while I'm out?"

"No."

"Sure?"

"Yes."

"Okay. Then I'll be back in a bit." She smiled teasingly. "You gonna make it 'til I get back?"

He rolled his eyes and banished her with a wave of his hand.

She started to walk toward the door, but he stopped her. "Wait."

She looked back at him, eyebrows raised, waiting for directions. "Yeah?"

"Car keys are in the kitchen."

She nodded and left the room without closing the door behind her.

A/N (because I can never seem to leave it at just one): I didn't mean to do this. That might sound weird. But I really didn't. This story seems to have its own ideas about where it wants to go and how it wants to get there (especially how it wants to get there). I actually feel kind of bad about this chapter. As if Castle wasn't going through enough, now he has to get sick on top of it? Poor guy. But as much as I didn't intend for that to happen, I think it works well on a couple of different levels, so I left it that way (because as much as this story does have the power to take the wheel and show me some seriously unexpected back roads, I can still reroute it if it decides to take a road that I don't want to drive down). (Oh good, another unrelated author's note metaphor.)

So reviews are good! :) I'll be interested to see what everyone thought of that little semi-twist.

I'm not going to make any claims about when I'll have the next chapter ready by this time. I'm never right anyway. When I say it probably won't be for awhile, I have a chapter finished in a week. When I say I think it'll be soon, it takes a lot longer than I think it will. So I'm not going to say anything at all. The next chapter will be up when it's up. :) Thanks so much for your patience, and bearing with me through my occasionally insanely sporadic updating.