A/N: Thoroughly enjoyed reading your funny/shocked/curious reviews to the last chapter. Thank you for making me smile.
Chapter 7: Rewriting History
When Kate steps off the elevator and begins the well-worn journey towards her desk, she's struck, just a few steps in, by a memory: a startlingly familiar memory that makes her stop in her tracks. Like déjà vu, it causes her to pause and look around, the wire mesh surrounding the bullpen still a veiled barrier between her and her workspace, obscuring her view of the homicide floor like the lattice grill on a confessional. She just can't put her finger on it...not yet.
From her vantage point out in the hallway she can see Ryan and Espo seated at their desks, an argument about something (no doubt) inconsequential animating their faces and fueling extravagant hand gestures.
It takes her a moment. Being back here, day two after twelve weeks away, is more than a little disconcerting. She got up early, straightened her hair, put on a purple shirt that always makes her feel powerful, and a lot more hopeful than the drab, grey cotton turtleneck she'd worn the day before, and then she headed straight to the range. She made sure she got there as soon as doors opened so that she could quickly dispense with the NYPD regulation requiring her to complete a firearm requalification test before getting her sidearm back.
After she shakes herself out of the daydream she'd momentarily dropped into, she proceeds around the corner into the bullpen with the paper target rolled up and tucked beneath her arm. Requalification included firing fifty rounds at stationary targets placed at seven, fifteen, and twenty-five yard distances. She had to achieve a minimum of thirty-nine hits to qualify. She walked out of the range with a perfect score: her final paper target showing all ten shots inside the ten ring, five of them peppering the X at the heart of the sheet, tearing a vicious hole in the very center. She's putting her rage at being made a target herself to the best possible use: she's using it to give her focus, and she's letting is drive her towards the kind of life she now knows she wants.
So, yes, it takes her a moment with everything she has going on, all the competing thoughts swirling around her brain, but then she realizes, as she nears her desk, that it's his cologne. That was the sensory memory she was having out in the hallway. It's Castle's bespoke fragrance she can smell. With its unique blend of fresh, sharp, citrusy verbena top notes, the warm, spicy middle note of ginger with a hint of pepper, and a base note of expensive, exotic, yet subtle sandalwood, she'd know it anywhere.
She approaches her desk looking around, expecting to see the writer sitting in that tatty old chair, since this scent memory is so overwhelmingly powerful, familiar and real. But then she is eager to see him again, and her mind has been playing tricks on her lately: altering her taste buds and heightening certain smells and sounds ever since she came round from surgery. Dr. Burke explained that it's a part of her hypervigilance: a symptom of PTSD that means being eternally on guard and ultra cautious in certain surroundings and situations. So maybe this is just that, coupled with a little wishful thinking.
But when she reaches her desk she stops, and then she turns to face her two fellow detectives.
"Has…has Castle been in here today?" she asks the boys, her gaze landing on a black gift box that's been strategically placed in the center of her desk, the whole thing expertly tied up with red satin ribbon.
Before Ryan or Esposito can even answer, the man in question comes strolling back from the bathroom drying his hands on a white linen handkerchief, humming to himself as he walks. He looks amazing, stunning…perfect even. He's smartly dressed, undeniably handsome, not a hint of the exhaustion, grief or melancholy that stalked him last night. In fact, there is nothing left in his demeanor or expression to indicate any discord in his life at all. His skin is glowing, his jaw freshly shaved. Kate would go so far as to say that he's been to a professional barber for a hot shave before he arrived this morning, since his skin looks so smooth and unblemished, the shave as perfect and as close as she's ever seen it. He has 'new leaf' or 'fresh start' written all over him, and she finds herself yearning to touch his jaw with a long, slow caress of her fingers just to prove to herself that his skin is as soft and smooth as it looks.
"I see you found the gift I left you," he says, startling her out of her fantasy.
His tone is jaunty and amused, as if none of the last twenty-four hours had even happened: none of the arguing, the heartache, the tears or that drunken telephone call she chose to end prematurely around midnight.
Kate tears her eyes away from his face to glance down at the gift box again, something between excitement and nerves beginning to churn in her stomach.
"I…I just got here. How long have you been here exactly?" she asks, looking around the bullpen at the handful of other staff who've made it to their desks at this hour.
"Open it," says Castle, completely ignoring her previous question.
"What?" asks Kate distractedly, studying his face for a second, before leaning down to place her purse in her bottom desk drawer.
"The box. Open. It," he insists, sinking down into his habitual chair, one leg easily crossed over the other, that relaxed, amused, 'I own the keys to the kingdom' aura surrounding him once more.
Kate stares at him for a second or two, trying to figure out what he's playing at just by looking into his eyes. She wonders if this is his attempt to get back to normal: their pre-shooting normal of not taking about anything significant outside of casework, and certainly not talking about themselves in the context of any kind of extracurricular relationship.
She finally harrumphs a loud, patience-stretching sigh when she realizes that he's just going to sit there looking devastating, grinning up at her until she gives in and opens the damn box.
"Okay, I do this and then you have to let me get back to work," she mutters, as she tugs on the end of one soft, notched tail of satin ribbon.
"No problem," he gives up far too quickly.
"And if you embarrass me with whatever's in here—"
"Beckett, just open the box," he insists, bouncing back in the hard chair as if he's the one receiving the surprise.
The buxom bow immediately yields to her, unfurling with the sensual grace and flutter of a pliant starlet from a 1930's Hollywood movie. She sets the satin ribbon aside, resisting the urge to pause and caress its glossy gleam, and then she carefully removes the lid of the box and sets it to one side too.
She frowns in confusion when she peels back a layer of tissue paper and finally reveals the contents. "I…Castle, I already have a copy of Heat Rises. You signed it for me yesterday."
"Yeah, well, now you have two," he replies with some triumph, crossing his arms over his chest.
"But—"
"Look, sell the other one on eBay if you want," he interjects, with a dismissive gesture, tapping this brand new copy on the hard outer cover with his short nails to indicate that this is the version she should hold onto.
Kate lifts the hardback out of the black gift box to the accompanying percussion of rustling tissue. "But I don't—"
Castle's eyes cloud over for a second and a look of discomfort crosses his face. "I messed up yesterday. The inscription…I—"
"You didn't write an inscription," she reminds them both, slowly opening the pristine book, that familiar spinal crack accompanying the gesture.
Because her request that he, "Make it out to Kate" had merely elicited a superfast scrawl of his signature, once he had sufficiently recovered from the shock of seeing her again to put pen to paper.
"And that was my mistake," he admits, standing suddenly. "Coffee?"
Kate looks at him as if he's a crazy person. "Coffee? But…Gates," she whispers, as if her boss is the Wicked Witch of The West who can be summoned by the merest mention of her name.
Kate glances towards the Captain's office. She can see Victoria Gates speaking to someone on the phone. From this distance she can't tell who she's talking to or what's being said, but the longer she watches, the sterner and angrier Gates' expression becomes. Her lips purse and her forehead slowly creases into a tighter and tighter frown, as if her brows are being drawn together by some master puppeteer armed with an invisible cord.
"Is that your requalification? Can I see?" asks Castle, as eager as a puppy.
"Eh…please," she says, distractedly handing him the paper target to look at.
But before he can even begin to unroll it, a sharp bark comes from Captain Gates' office.
"Detective Beckett, would you come in here? And bring your little sidekick with you."
Castle and Beckett stare at one another, that old familiar spark igniting between them. They share that sense of collusion in the space of a look - us against the world - despite the threat hanging over their heads. Castle hands the rolled up paper target back to her with exaggerated care, as if it were a stick of dynamite which might suddenly explode, and then he sweeps out his arm, ushering her towards Gates' office ahead of him.
"Please, ladies first," he murmurs, and Kate rolls her eyes.
They stand side-by-side in front of Gates' desk, like two naughty children called to the Principal's office, and await what's coming.
"You think you're clever, Mr. Castle, going around my back like that. Well, let me tell you the score. I don't care how powerful your friends are. You screw up at all on my watch, and I'll prosecute you to the fullest extent of the law. You understand me?" she barks, her dark eyes flashing dangerously.
"Yes, ma'am," replies Castle, despite what Kate told him last night.
"Sir," snaps Gates, while Kate stares at her boots and digs her nails into the palm of her hand to quell the giddy feeling rising in her throat.
"Sir," repeats Castle, keeping his eyes straight ahead for once.
"Now get out of my office."
Beckett watches with an amused grin as Castle quickly exits the Captain's office, leaving her standing there alone.
"Detective," growls Gates, eyeing Kate up and down.
Kate clears her throat and sobers her expression. "Yes?"
"You or that pal there embarrass me like that again, I will bury you."
Beckett nods. "Yes, sir. Now, um, if you don't mind…" she says, pulling out her requalification target and placing it on Gates' desk. "I'd like my gun back."
Gates puts on her glasses and opens the target, peering at the bullseye to check Beckett's accuracy. All of the shots are in the 10 ring or better.
When Beckett leaves the Captain's office in triumph, her Glock in her hand, she finds Castle and the boys milling around by her desk.
She pulls Castle aside and gives him an assessing look. "Showing her up with the Mayor? You might as well have beaten a beehive with a bat.
Castle grins. "It worked, didn't it? Besides, it sure was great seeing her face twitch like that."
Kate shakes her head, but finds herself grinning too. "Right, well, now that she's thoroughly mad at me, I'm going to get back to work while I still have a job. You sticking around after that performance or…did you just want to make my life hell?"
Castle lifts his leather jacket off the back of his chair and shrugs it on. "I have something I have to take care of—"
"Right, of course you do," Kate replies with a tense smile, sinking down into her desk chair and rolling it forward, ready to get down to work.
She's disappointed. How could she not be? Seeing him here today looking so put together, his mood buoyant, teasing like old times; she got her hopes up. But now he's leaving again.
"If you'll let me finish," replies Castle, leaning down to her level, his hands planted on her desk, his face mere inches from hers.
Kate sits back in her chair, needing to put some space between them. Seeing him again in this setting is almost worse than at the swings or in his loft last night. It reminds her of how far she's come, mentally, emotionally, and yet how stuck they seem to be in this place – still just partners, even hanging on to that by just a thread.
"Go on," replies Kate, a mix of patience and curiosity mingling in her voice when Castle just hangs there staring at her.
He smirks in amusement when he hears the little telltale note of interest she's unable to hide from him.
"As I said, I have something to take care of and then I will be back to— Nah, ah, ah," he objects, holding his hand up to prevent her from interrupting again. "And then I will be back to take you out to dinner."
"Dinner?" she repeats, her eyes widening, her breathing becoming shallower, her pupils dilated to a dark, bottomless black.
"Don't make me regret taking you somewhere with actual cutlery," he jokes, though the joke seems to be lost on Kate.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Well, if looks could kill, and I'm sure you're pretty handy with a knife if required."
Kate sighs with exhaustion and a kind of heavy resignation. "Castle, if this is your idea of a joke…"
The writer's face grows serious in an instant and he holds up his hands in defense. "No. No joke. This is my way of…of fixing what I seemed incapable of fixing yesterday," he answers contritely, giving her a long, meaning-filled, almost pleading look.
Kate shrugs, though the off-hand gesture belies the hungry interest illuminating her gaze. "What…what's changed since—"
She breaks off to glance over at the boys, checking that they aren't listening in to their private conversation, before she leans in to finish her question. "What's changed since last night?"
"Let's just say I've used up my 'phone a friend'," Castle offers, enigmatically, his gaze darting back and forth between her lips and her eyes. "And that call made me realize what I was on the verge of throwing away."
"Who'd you call?" asks Kate, watching him warily.
Castle stands, raps his knuckles just once on her desk, and then he turns to wave goodbye to the boys. "I'll be back before seven," he tells Kate, in a tone that is for her ears only. "Text me if anything comes up between now and then, okay?"
Kate slouches back in her chair, unable to do anything but watch him walk away.
"Hey, what'd your boy want?" asks Esposito, after both he and Ryan give up dogging Castle's route to the elevator looking for clues when he finally disappears from view.
"I have no idea," replies Kate, finding a ghost of a smile suddenly tugging at her lips without her consent. A bubble of happiness erupts inside her without warning and her smile begins to widen.
"Right," nods Ryan, also smiling, though his is more of the disbelieving, 'stop yanking our chain' variety.
"Don't you two have work to do?" snaps Kate, purely as a way to get her emotions back in check. "Sonja Gilbert?" she asks, opening her folder with a slap of pleather on wood.
"Yep. Guns, drugs, and love gone wrong," replies Ryan, glancing up from his notes.
"Where are you with the boyfriend?" adds Kate.
But the response from her team is lost to her when her eyes re-settle on the copy of Heat Rises that Castle brought in for her this morning, still sitting untouched in the top right hand corner of her desk. In the stress surrounding the summons to Gates' office she never got a chance to open the book and read the inscription Castle said he'd left in there.
She pulls the book towards her, taking a moment to admire the familiar cover art, and then she slides her index finger beneath the satisfyingly tight front page before slowly turning it over. There, on one of the end papers, is a message penned in black ink, the words inscribed in possibly they neatest version of Castle's handwriting that she's ever seen.
The inscription reads:
"To Kate.
The answer to your question should have been yes. Yes, yes, and forevermore yes.
All my love, Rick x"
She stares at the words until they make no sense anymore, their garlands, arcades, angles and thread but a hazy blur on the page, now viewed through a prism of unshed tears.
"Boss, you okay?" she hears, above the thundering gallop of her heart and the rushing sound in her ears.
When she looks up, both Ryan and Esposito are staring at her, twin expressions of concern on their faces.
Kate clears her throat, swipes a tear from her cheek, and then she smiles with a newfound confidence. "Yeah, never better," she nods, giving them both a watery, reassuring smile. "Let's get back to work. Tell me again where we are with Sonja's boyfriend."
TBC...
Note: I used the original script from Episode 4x01: 'Rise' for Kate and Castle's encounter with Gates and the immediate aftermath when she emerges from Gates' office, plus the last few lines of dialogue about the case. The rest is mine.