CH6
Rick with Alexis in hand were exiting the plane first. One of the perks of sitting in first class in the front seats with your daughter seated next to you.
Gina was also in first class, however she was a few seats back so Rick didn't have to put up with her while flying home. He had put up with her on most of the other flights plus at the book stores as well as at the hotel.
It wasn't so much that he hated Gina, it's just all those not to subtle hints that he shouldn't have brought Alexis with him, were getting to him. Alexis was his life and the most important person in his life, leaving her behind with some nanny or baby sitter just didn't sit well with him. And having to listen to Gina tell him all this was pissing him off.
Rick and Alexis, hand in hand started walking down the tub that connected the terminal to the plane. "Glad to be back?" Rick asks her.
"Yup, I want to go home, but I'm hungry." Alexis offers up.
"We'll stop for something along the way." Knowing home was likely empty of food since they had been gone for a few days, five to be precise in four different cities.
Rick was however thankful that this was the last of these long distance multi-cities signings that Gina had set up. There was only a single one in New York left for this year. After that it was up to him, Black Pawn and their respective lawyers to work out the next contract.
Rick however couldn't escape from Gina again until he exited baggage claim. "Next time leave the kid behind Richard." Gina whispered out standing next to him waiting for their luggage.
"Her name is Alexis Gina." Rick spoke up loud enough for almost everyone to hear him. "And she goes where I go because she is my daughter, and my next contract with Black Pawn is going to exclude these long distance long term signing trips." Rick informs her.
"Richard keep your voice down." People might hear and word would spread and gossip would start. The type of gossip she didn't want.
"You should have thought about that before you insulted my daughter Gina." Rick informs her with his voice still loud enough to carry.
"Being seen at these signing with a kid hurts your image of being a playboy." Gina points out still whispering.
"This playboy image is your doing Gina, assigning me blonde women who hang on my arm like a ships anchor and chain. I have a daughter Gina, one who doesn't need to have her kids at school teasing her about her dad going through women one after the other.
I'm a family man, that's also something that is going to be in the new contract. Alexis comes first, not you, not Black Pawn and not the money. If I have to sell the loft and find someplace smaller, then I will." Rick spotted his bag with Alexis's bag right next to it.
Lifting his bag out and Alexis's, then pulled up the rods to pull them behind them.
"Come on pumpkin, we're going home." Rick hands over her little bag since she liked pulling it herself. "Don't call me Gina, I'll call you. … Just don't hold your breath." Rick all but yells out over his shoulder as Rick and Alexis walk away.
Gina can feel all the people with eyes looking directly at her as she waits for her bag, fuming!
It's not that she hates children, she just doesn't want any. And having Richard with one was something that did piss her off. He just had to have a child with some other woman. DAMN IT!
"What are you people looking at?" Gina yells out, trying to get all the eyes off of her.
It turned out to actually be a bad idea to yell. It was only now that she noticed a lot of them had cameras out and were still taking pictures. It hadn't occurred to Gina that a lot of these people were returning from being on vacation and would have cameras on them or in their carry-on bags.
Gina was on her way outside with her bag in tow, when she overheard. "We can sell the pictures and story to a tabloid." It got Gina to groan, this was all Richard Castle's fault. He just had to go and have a kid and bring the brat with him. DAMN IT!
Gina started working on a new plan all the way hone before going into the office. She needed to get started on damage control, before it all got out of hand.
"So what do we call and have delivered?" Rick looked at Alexis next to him since they were in an airport service car being taken home. "Chinese or pizza?" Rick offered, suspecting what her answer would be.
"PIZZA!" Alexis gave him her choice.
It got Rick to chuckle, he had expected as much. "Pizza it is then." Rick was smiling. Alexis meant everything to him. Listening to Gina make her out to be some kind of circus side show had him in a foul mood, for most of the trip. He honestly didn't know what to do about it, yet.
Stepping inside. "Take your bag to your room and dump your clothes into the hamper while I call for pizza." Rick tells her.
"Okay." Alexis drags her mini-suitcase up the stairs one bump after another bump followed by another, etc. It had Rick grinning while he went looking for the lists in the kitchen then grab the house phone and made the call.
Rick took his bag into his bedroom and started un-packing, knowing he would need to help Alexis with hers soon. The clothes went into the hamper downstairs and was just putting the stuff into the bathroom when he heard the front door.
Little early for Pizza? Rick headed for the door and found the upstairs neighbors at his door. It was a 5 floor tall building and he had the 4th floor, which was actually two floors tall.
"Hi, what's up? Alexis and I just got home." Rick tells her.
"Do you have any damage?" The neighbor asked.
"Damage? What sort of damage?" Rick hadn't been here long, but things didn't look any different to him.
"We were gone for the weekend and when we got home we found that parts of the ceiling had cracked with a little of the ceiling on our floor." She explains.
"REALLY!?" Rick left the door open and started looking around the loft, especially the ceiling.
His neighbor had stepped inside a little with him and started looking up too.
"No, I don't see anything." Rick didn't remember seeing anything in his bedroom and Alexis hadn't yelled that her room was damaged. "Let me look around a little and then go up to the roof after dinner and I'll let you know if I find anything." Rick offers.
"Thanks Mr. Castle, I appreciate that." She didn't want her husband up on the roof.
"Not a problem, I'll let you know what I found." Rick closes the door and heads upstairs. "Hi pumpkin, need a hand with that?" Rick starts helping her unpack her little suitcase and then puts it away in the closet. Hopefully not to come out for a long time.
"How about you wash up, while I go down and check the mail. The pizza should be here soon." Alexis was looking at her dad funny since he was walking around her room half the time looking up at her ceiling.
It got Alexis to look up at her ceiling after Rick was gone. Then she went in to wash her hands, and was just reaching the kitchen breakfast bar when Rick showed up at the front door with the mail and 5 days of local ledger.
Rick wasn't done saying. "Trash, … trash, …. trash, …." As he threw out most of the mail when the pizza arrived with a knock on the front door.
"So what was your favorite part?" Rick asks as they sit at the counter eating pizza.
Alexis thought it over since the trip had been mostly boring. Sitting in a bookstore watching her dad sign book after book. Listening to her dad fight with Gina over him bringing her with him. And yet after they got away from Gina and the bookstores her dad had made everything fun.
"The pool?" Alexis had talked her dad into using the pool if the hotel had one. Not all of them did.
"The museum." Alexis changed her mind, since two of the cities they had gone to the local museums. They were nice, just not as nice as the one at home.
"The zoo?" One of the cities only had one bookstore signing giving them enough time to spend the rest of the day at the city zoo. That had been a lot of fun.
"Anything else?" Rick was smiling happy that his little girl at least had some fun.
"Not Gina." Alexis's face suddenly went sad and a little scared. Alexis didn't like Gina and voicing her opinion might make her dad mad. Not that he had ever been mad at her before.
"I'm sorry." Rick stroked her long hair. "Gina and I just don't, …." Rick didn't know how to explain his association with Gina to a five year old, coming up on six soon. A couple of weeks before Halloween actually.
"You were yelling." Alexis confides now that they were talking about Gina.
This sent shock waves through Rick and made him mad, sad and embarrassed. His little girl had heard him having an argument with Gina and that was just not acceptable. He was going to have to be more careful when he was around Gina and his daughter at the same time.
"It'll never happen again, I promise." Rick drew a cross across his chest and then bopped Alexis on her nose lightly with his finger tip. Getting her to giggle.
"All done eating greasy pizza?" Rick asks Alexis. Getting Alexis to show him her greasy fingers.
"You go upstairs and wash, then we have to go check on something." Rick wasn't leaving her alone. Even if it was just to go up to the roof of his building.
Rick watched her head for the stairs. "Don't touch anything with those hands." Rick warned her as she had reached out to use the handrail. Watching Alexis yank her greasy hands back and take the stairs one step at a time.
Rick put the left over pizza in the refrigerator, noticing that he needed to go shopping tomorrow if they wanted to eat. Then washed his own greasy hands at the kitchen sink.
Alexis was soon back downstairs. "Ready?" Rick asked her. Getting Alexis to nod her head.
Rick decided on taking the elevator up to the 5th floor and then over to the stairs to get to the roof. The door to the landing was locked with a deadbolt and also had a padlock. Opening this door got him into a foyer area that housed most of the electrical panels for all of the units in the building.
"Remember, don't touch anything." Rick advises Alexis, watching Alexis shake her head and cross her arms. Getting Rick to grin.
The door to the roof was just like the other door except it also had a metal bar holding the door in place. No one was getting into the building by the roof access.
Rick opened the door. "WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?" Momentarily forgetting that Alexis was right behind him.
"Wow dad, what is that?" Alexis stepped right past him and out onto the roof.
Rick was momentarily frozen to the spot and watched Alexis step right up to it and place her palm on it. "ALEXIS!" Rick did however find his voice, even if it was a little late.
"It's cool dad, what is it?" Alexis turned to look at Rick to ask her question then turned back around to look at it again.
"I have no idea, but this must be what damaged Mr. and Mrs. Siemmens ceiling." Rick came up next to Alexis and reached out to touch it too.
"It's metal." Rick comments. "These look like portholes." Rick notices them and tries to look inside. Then brings his hand up to either side of his face wondering if that would help.
"What's inside dad?" Alexis was watching.
"It's dark." All Rick saw was black.
"Dad, … What's this?" Alexis asks just a second before she pushes it. Getting Rick too late to reach out and grab her hand before she did something.
The area around the porthole hisses and the door pops out and slides back revealing the interior.
"COOL!" Alexis was impressed and promptly went inside to sit in one of the two seats.
"ALEXIS, … Get out of there." His daughter was going to give him a heart attack one of these days.
"It's cool dad." Alexis was beaming. "There's even one for you." Alexis moves across to sit in the other seat.
It got Rick to hand his head. Oh well, in for a penny, and Rick stepped inside and sat down.
There were controls for him to touch like an airplane, except it didn't look like there were any windows except the little port holes on each side. There were however a number of TV screens in front of him.
"How do you see out dad?" Alexis was looking around. There was a wall behind the seats, so this was all there was. The seat backs were really low, forcing Alexis to sit up straight on her own.
The whole thing was confusing to her.
"I don't know." Rick answers her question. "Maybe they use cameras on one of these TV's" Rick waves at the back of TV's in front of him.
"Maybe one of these buttons." Alexis offers and reaches out to touch one of the ones closest to her.
This time however Rick is fast enough to grab her hand to stop her. "Don't touch. … We don't know how to fly it. We touch the wrong thing and we could end up going over the side of the building and crashing. Besides it's not ours." Rick points out.
"Stealing is bad." Alexis hung her head low. It's just that she was so excited about what they had found. "We can't keep it can we?" To Alexis it was another toy, something to play with.
"No we can't. We are however going to have to keep our eyes on it, see if we can find out who's it is. … Maybe they can include us in their movie." Rick offers smiling.
"Like Star Wars!" Alexis was suddenly excited and it gave her an answer as to who's it was. "COOL!" She was going to be in a movie. How exciting!
"Come on Alexis before we damage something and make them mad at us." Rick needed an excuse to get his daughter moving.
If they damaged it they wouldn't let them be in their movie. That gave Alexis a reason to get moving and out of whatever it was.
"How do we close it?" Rick asks looking it over. Only to watch Alexis reach out and push the button again and seeing the door close.
Rick re-locked all the doors and stopped at Mrs. Siemmens apartment. "Mr. Castle." She was glad to see him.
"There is some debris on the roof that came from somewhere. I'll arrange to have a contractor come out and repair your ceiling. If you're not home at the time I promise to sit inside and watch him the entire time." Rick doubted the contractor would steal anything, but it would make her feel better.
"Thank you Mr. Castle. One of us will likely be here." Thanking Rick before closing the door and taking Alexis back to their home.
"It's not debris dad." Alexis corrects him.
"Since the movie studio didn't ask my permission to put their object on my roof, that makes it debris." Rick counters knowing he is walking a really fine line here. Just that he's not convinced it was a fake.
Just that if it was real, what did that mean, and who's was it? And why his roof?
Except for going up there often to try and catch who the owners were, figuring they would come back at least to check on it, Rick didn't know what else to do. It would take days to have cameras added to the roof and wired down to his unit. Plus he would need to add video screens, and was it worth it?
Rick decided to do it the hard way, up and down the stairs from time to time. Just how were they getting onto the roof? All the doors were locked from the inside and the security bar was in place.
"Movie daddy?" Alexis snapped Rick out of his head.
"Sure, you pick one while I make the popcorn and get the drinks." Rick tells her.
Rick sat down on the sofa after putting the bowl of popcorn and drinks on the coffee table. "What are we watching?" Rick asks taking the VHS case from Alexis.
"Aladdin, excellent choice!" Getting Alexis to smile. Rick put the tape into the VHS player and sat back down on the sofa after picking up the remote and pressing play.
"Can we get a magic carpet daddy?" Alexis gave him her best puppy dog eyes, it almost always worked.
"You have to have a Genie first don't you?" Rick countered hoping that got him out of those puppy dog eyes.
"Oh yeah." Alexis was bummed. "Can we get a Genie bottle?" Alexis tries again.
"We can look for one the next time we are at the beach. Maybe we'll find one after it washes up on the beach." Rick offers, since the chance of even finding a bottle were thin, let alone one that had a Genie inside.
The answer did however make Alexis happy, she liked going out to their house on the beach.
Then Rick got the shock of his life. "They're kissing, yuck. … You don't kiss anyone daddy." Alexis had turned to look at him.
Alexis had seen her daddy with a number of different women but never more than once.
"You only kiss when you love someone." Rick points out. "And I love you." Rick adds and bends over to kiss Alexis on her head.
"But you're alone daddy. … There's no mommy." Alexis sounded sad and was looking at the floor now instead of the movie.
"You're mother loves you pumpkin." Rick kisses her again.
"No she doesn't. She never comes when she promises. She never calls. No birthdays, no Christmas, no, …. " Alexis didn't remember the word.
"Your mother does love you Alexis, she's just busy." Rick tries to defend Meredith even though he doesn't know why, except that she is her mother.
"DON'T CALL HER THAT! … I HATE HER!" Alexis jumps up off the sofa and runs for her room slamming the door behind her.
Leaving a stunned Rick sitting on the sofa. How did they go from watching Aladdin to her hating her mother? Except that Meredith was never here for her, and she did break all of her promises. No phone calls, no birthday presents from her. Rick had actually bought them for her and put her name on them.
Did Alexis know he was doing that? What Rick didn't know was that Alexis knew his handwriting.
Rick stopped the movie and pressed rewind and went upstairs. Knocking on Alexis's door, but getting nothing.
"Alexis?" Rick knocks again but still gets nothing, so he slowly opens the door. Finding her curled up on her bed, crying.
Rick sits on the bed and reaches out. "Alexis?" Only to feel her shake him off.
"Your mother does love you, she just doesn't know how to show it." Rick tries again, wishing Meredith would change.
"STOP CALLING HER THAT!" Alexis hated her, she really did.
At first she thought it was her fault that her mother didn't like her, but her dad loves her, so it must be her fault.
"Ok, I won't call Meredith your mother." Rick offers.
"STOP DAD. … Don't even talk about her. She's not my mother and I don't want her." Rick didn't like the sound of her voice.
"Alexis, like her or not she is your mother, …." Alexis however interrupts him.
"NO DAD! … A mother would be here. A mother would keep her promises. A mother would be here when I'm sick. A mother would tell me she loves me, not tell lies. A mother would call me to find out how my day went. Find out if I'm happy or sad." Alexis hated her and she was going to get her dad to see, no matter what.
"I don't have a mommy so stop telling me I do. You promised never to lie dad." Alexis points out the one truth they had told each other.