I would like to thank purplangel for their review, I was a little worried that Castle was being too harsh, but if they got their happily ever after now then the story would be over way too soon, and I am having a lot of fun with this.
Kate stood completely still in front of the closed doors, not capable of anything but just standing there. She couldn't breathe, she couldn't think, she couldn't feel...anything. She was completely numb inside, like there was a black hole in her chest, a great big sucking black hole. Her lower lip trembled and before she knew what was going on, she found herself being seated in the break room while Ryan and Esposito made her a coffee and asked her what had happened. How long had she been standing there before they came over? What did it matter...he was gone.
"He's gone...Castle...he's gone...and he's not coming back, not this time."
Esposito immediately pulled out his phone to call Lanie, she was the only one who could help Kate get through this.
"Why?" Ryan asked softly.
Kate couldn't answer, she opened her mouth to speak but found her voice was missing. Her eyes were cast off into oblivion, unblinking, wide with shock as tears built up, blurring the emerald green and shining blindingly so in the luminescent lights of the precinct. She could barely breathe and when she was handed a cup of coffee, her hands shut around it like a trap and held on tightly, as if her life depended on it. How could he be gone? He couldn't be...he was always there, how could he...he said he had lied. Was this what it had felt like for him? She couldn't believe he had kept it up as long as he had if he had been in this much pain. It felt like a whole chunk of her had been cut out and tossed away and she couldn't live without it. What had she done?
"What did I do? What did I do? What have I done..." Her wall broke and the tears came rushing down her face. She was responsible for this, she had brought all of this on herself, she was the guilty party here and she deserved all this pain. But even if she knew it was hers to bear, that didn't mean that it wasn't killing her any less. She had taken that risk, she had put her heart out to him...and now it was shattered into a million pieces. She had been so scared of the pain, and because of her caution she was feeling it ten-fold now. "What have I done..." She gasped.
Two arms wrapped around her and she realised that she was suddenly back home, with Lanie by her side. "Nothing sweetie, you haven't done anything, what are you talking about?"
"It's all my fault...he's never coming back and it's all my fault."
"No, I'm sure he'll come back, we just gotta figure out what happened and fix it and I'm sure he'll be back in no time, he always comes back to you honey."
"Not this time, not this time...not anymore, he said it, I heard him. Lanie, how could I be so cruel?"
"Honey, that is ridiculous, I've known you for years and you are not a cruel person."
"Yes I am, I'm a horrible, ungrateful bitch!"
Kate buried her face in her hands and cried while Lanie rubbed her back and whispered to her, trying to calm her down. None of them knew what had happened, but Ryan and Esposito had gone to visit a certain writer to find out what...and maybe deal out a few kidney punches while they were there. Lanie hoped they would, Javier had said no, but she could dream. He had destroyed her best friend and for that she wanted revenge.
There was a loud banging on the front door of the expensive apartment, but instead of it being answered by a famous novelist, a young redhead opened the door. "Hi, what are you guys doing here? Are you looking for my dad?" Alexis was shocked as the two detectives barged inside and started yelling out for her father.
"He isn't here, he went to the precinct, what's wrong? Is he in trouble? Is he hurt?"
"Not yet he isn't." Esposito growled as he stormed into Castle's office, not willing to take anyone's word on where he might not be.
Ryan came down from checking upstairs. "He's not here, where else would he go?"
Esposito came back out and charged towards the door. "The Old Haunt."
The two detectives flew out of there in a gust of movement and rage. Alexis closed the door behind them and quickly called her dad. She had no idea what was going on, but she was really worried for his well-being right now. She listened for someone to pick up, but it went straight to voice mail. He had turned his phone off and now there were two very angry trained cops looking to spill some blood.
Ryan walked through the front door of The Old Haunt first, raking his eyes over everyone in the bar. Esposito went straight towards the basement and was stopped by one of the patrons. "Excuse me, who are you?"
"Friends of the boss, we need to have a private word with him about something." He made sure that his voice was as pleasant as possible so the guy wouldn't think they were here to kill him. He either believed that this was a friendly social call or he realised that these were not the kind of guys to mess with, so he stepped back and let them down the stairs. Once they were both down the stairs, they were caught with a sight they hadn't been expecting. Castle was sitting at his desk with his hands ripping through his hair, everything that belonged on the desk was on the floor and the place was an absolute mess. Papers were scattered, there was broken glass everywhere and there was a rather large bottle of bourbon sitting in front of Castle, open and half devoured, but there was no glass. The bitter anger softened at the sight of their close friend in such a state and they started to think that maybe they had gotten it all wrong.
"Bro, what the hell is going on?"
Castle looked up from his drink and the boys were shocked to see the tear tracks running down his face. He didn't bother to wipe the tears away, they had already seen them and he knew they wouldn't be the last tears he shed today, so why bother. He tried to answer the question, but instead just grabbed the bottle in front of him and downed a good lot of what was left. He indicted to two chairs over against the wall and they dragged them across the floor and sat down in front of their friend.
"Tell us what happened." Esposito said quietly, and Castle finally spoke.
"I couldn't pretend anymore..."
Lanie stayed beside her friend for hours, just trying to get her to tell her what had gone so very wrong since last night.
"I lied to him...I lied about something really important...and he said he forgave me...and then he left." Was about as much as she could say, just trying to remember how to breathe.
Lanie's phone began to ring and she stepped away to take the call so that Kate couldn't hear. Kate sat on the couch, her glistening eyes staring at the floor, not a single light in them. The stars were gone and so was the hope that had filled them only hours ago, now there was only emptiness. Everything that she was, everything she had been trying to be, had all been destroyed and it was all because of her selfish need to be in control and to not let herself get hurt. She threw her head back against the back of the couch and only just managed to suppress a scream. She bit down on her lower lip until it bled and she sobbed silently, knowing she would give up anything to stop feeling this pain.
This couldn't be real, they had gotten so close, so damn close, but it still slipped away through they're fingers. She looked down at the coffee table and noticed there was a bowl there, holding a few little burbles for decoration. There was also a newspaper, a book and an empty glass that had been filled with water a few moments ago. She picked up the book first, turning it over and running her eyes over the large photo of him on the back. She traced her fingers along the lines of his face, and then she snapped. She picked up the bowl and threw it across the room where it hit the floor and smashed, the glass burbles shattered into a million pieces. Lanie screamed with shock at the smash and was looking at her friend with fearful panic.
Kate couldn't explain why but it had made her feel better, as if breaking things could help relieve this horrible, sickening feeling that was choking her. She grabbed the paper and ripped it violently, throwing the shreds on the floor before grabbing the glass and throwing it with all the energy she had. It smashed against the wall and then she went for the book. She held it in her hands for a while, just staring into his bold blue eyes, before she opened it up and started ripping the pages out. By the time she finally just threw it on the floor, 'Heat Wave' was completely trashed. She broke down in screaming sobs on the floor after kicking the coffee table violently across the room, and Lanie found herself wanting to cry too. She explained to Esposito what all the noise had been and she ended the call.
She couldn't think of what could help Kate, when she was stressed they usually had ice cream, or if not that than a glass of wine. Lanie didn't think that alcohol would be the best idea for Kate right now, considering the way her father had taken to it after the death of her mother, she didn't want to risk a repeat performance; and ice cream was certainly not going to do it this time, she doubted she would even be able to convince Kate to eat it.
Lanie crouched down beside her best friend and hugged her fiercely, just wishing that she knew what to do. She tried to soothe her friend, to cheer her up, but she knew there was only one thing in the world that was going to be able to make her happy and that one thing had walked out on her for good.
"Ok, we get it, you keep giving and giving and she never gives anything back, I get that, but she told you that she wanted it, I mean that was one hell of a kiss. So why are you still not coming back?" Esposito asked. He and Ryan were feeling like perfect idiots right now, thinking that Castle was the bad guy when it turned out that he had more patience and loyalty than either of them could manage.
"Because she won't stop, I know she's not ready yet, I can see it in her eyes. She is going to find some excuse and run away again, she isn't ready for this. I can't be with her and then lose her again, the next time we might not be able to keep being friends. She makes me happy...but she also kills me. I just can't do it anymore, hearts were not meant to be tortured like this. If I just keep going back...I may not have anything left."
He looked so broken, twiddling a glass in his hand after his friends had insisted he stop drinking straight from the bottle. He had finished the bottle off a while ago, but they had stopped him from getting another. He was leaning over his desk, his head would drop down onto his outstretched arm every once in a while. Silence settled between the three for a long time, and then Castle started mumbling, it was clear he had had too much to drink by the way he was speaking.
"I just love her so much...her eyes...that curly hair...she is so beautiful...I love her so much, I love her so much its killing me."
Neither detective knew what to do, their friend was beyond hope until he was sober again. They couldn't take him home and let his daughter see him like this, and he couldn't stay in The Old Haunt forever. Ryan's phone started ringing and he cringed as he saw the number.
"Detective Ryan."
Esposito watched his partner as he nodded and then wrote something down on a slip of paper. Ryan hung up and looked dourly at his partner. "We got a case."
Esposito wanted to call Gates and tell her that she could find someone else to solve the case, but he knew that was not an option. They rose to their feet and headed towards the stairs, looking back at their friend, feeling completely useless at not being able to help him. What could they do? What could anyone do when your best friend was slowly slipping away? They walked up the stairs and headed off to the crime scene, hoping that maybe Lanie was having a little more luck with Beckett.
Lanie was standing at the door, she had gotten a call and she needed to go to a crime scene. Standing around in a cold room with a dead body was the last place she wanted to be right now, but as she looked back at Kate wrapped up in a blanket, asleep on the couch, she knew that she had other responsibilities too. She closed the door quietly behind her and hoped that Kate might just sleep for a long while, until she got the chance to come back.
But she was to have no such luck. The moment the apartment door closed, she woke up and looked around. Empty. It was always empty. She hated being here, she didn't want to sit in her apartment any longer, but she had nowhere else to go. So Kate sat up and pulled the blanket around her shoulders tightly and buried her face in the soft material. She pulled her knees up to her chest, hugging them tightly, and she closed her eyes and let the tears come. Why had she lied to him? That was the biggest mistake she had made, she had betrayed his trust in her and now she was serving time for it. She couldn't find the strength to get off the couch, but she knew there was a bottle of wine hidden in the kitchen. Maybe it would bring some peace, maybe it would numb the pain and she would be able to breathe again.
She forced herself to stand up and she dragged the blanket across the ground, keeping it tight around her shoulders. Everything felt colder now, lonelier, darker, like all the light in her world had been sucked out. Although the fact that it was getting late might also have something to do with that. She dug around in the kitchen until she found the wine and she grabbed a tall glass and returned to the couch, pouring herself a nice stiff drink and downing it in one shot. She knew better, after what her father had been through, she knew better, but as the delicious liquid ran down her throat, she started to feel a little lighter.
When Lanie returned, sometime around 11pm, she found Kate passed out on the couch, the wine glass was smashed against the far wall and the wine bottle was completely empty, rolling around on the floor. Shit. The ME immediately went to the kitchen and searched frantically, every where she could find for any and all alcohol. She found two wine bottles and a few beers in the fridge, she stuffed them all in a plastic bag and tossed them in the trash. She couldn't allow Kate to get that far, she had already drowned herself in one bottle, giving her the chance to become an alcoholic was not an option. But she knew that if Kate really wanted to drink, then nothing was going to be able to stop her.
Across town, in the basement office of The Old Haunt, Rick had his head flat against the desk, one hand wrapped around another beer (it was a bar, there was absolutely no shortage of alcohol here), and his other hand was holding his phone as he scanned through his photo library. A weak smile lit his lips when he found a picture of Kate smiling at him, it had been one of those nights at Remy's and he couldn't help himself. She had been looking the other way so she had no idea he was taking a picture of her. His beautiful, intelligent, sexy, stunning, extraordinary angel...he would just have to learn how to live without her.
He shoved the beer away from him and he sat up, taking in a deep breath and rubbing his eyes, it was time for him to go home. He had let himself have this one day to mourn what he had lost and now he needed to move on. He looked down at his phone and was about to call a taxi when he realised that he had been about to call Kate. He wanted to hear her voice, he wanted to know she was ok, he knew that what he had done was going to hurt her, but he had no right to call her now and ask how she was doing, he had walked away and if he called her it would only cause them both even more pain.
He called for a taxi and 20 minutes later he was opening the door to his loft, he stepped in, closed the door and the first thing he saw was the cover art for 'Heat Rises' glaring at him through the open door to his office. Yeah, this was going to be a lot harder than he thought.
There will be a phone call, some more drinking, and a little light in someone's life, but I ain't telling you anymore!