As always, thanks to everyone who has followed/favorited/reviewed. And thanks to Ally, who puts up with my questions.
Kate isn't the only one surprised when Rick comes to the precinct flanked by two cops, each of them carrying two big boxes of fan mail in addition to the two Rick has in his hands. She expected the two he had, but not this.
Now, she gets to spend the day in the conference room with him helping him go through his fan mail in an attempt to find a possible serial killer. The nerves she already felt in his presence ratcheted up another three notches.
"Do you actually read through all this?" Esposito asks as the Rick and the cops place the boxed on the table in the conference room.
"Usually, but I'm a bit behind because of the new book and all. This is just from the last three months-everything I haven't read yet."
Esposito shakes his head and leaves the room just as Kate enters, closing the door behind her. She tosses him a pair of gloves, which he barely manages to catch.
"Put those on," she orders, pulling her own pair over her hands after she lays a legal pad and her cell phone on the table. She's trying so hard to be normal around him, to let her see that she turned out fine. But she isn't fine, not with him here and everything she never told him hanging over her head.
"This is my mail. Why do I have to wear gloves?"
"You know, for a mystery writer you sure do forget some of the essentials." She chuckles as he sits down in a chair across the table from her, begrudgingly sliding the gloves over his hands. "Any one of these letters could potentially become evidence. We don't want to contaminate it and possibly lose any DNA evidence that could lead us to the killer."
"Have you ever caught a killer from something this simple-a letter?"
"Not a letter specifically, no." Kate takes the first letter from the box next to her, carefully removing it from the envelope and unfolding it. She has the chance to read about two words before he's questioning her again.
"What's the most off the wall way you've caught a murderer?"
When she lifts her head and sees him across the table, his forearms are resting on it and he's leaning forward in anticipation of whatever story she might share with him. The sight makes her flash back to a previous life, one where her life was on a different path.
"Can we just get to work?" she asks, pulling herself out of her memories.
He doesn't respond to her, instead sitting back in his chair and pulling a letter from the top of the pile next to him.
Kate isn't sure how long they keep to themselves, each of them submerged in their own pile of his fan mail, looking for even the smallest clue. She finally allows herself to sneak a glance in his direction, only to see that he's doing the same, dropping a portion of the letter he's reading to look over the top of the paper.
"What?" she asks him in what she hopes comes off as exasperation.
"You still furrow your brow when you're thinking. It's cute. Always has been."
"Rick…"
"I know, I know. After the case."
She hates the dejected look he gets when he thinks that she's shutting him down. But she's not-not really. She's just trying to make her way through this minefield with as little damage as possible.
"No, I wasn't going to say that. I...I was just wondering why you're so interested in this case. And don't tell me it's because of the copy cat. I know better."
"Aw, come on, Kate. You disappear from my life and randomly reinsert yourself almost seventeen years later? As the police detective investigating murders that happen just like they do in my books? The universe is speaking."
"You and the universe. Some things never change," she says, her arms going up in frustration as she leans back in her chair.
"And some things do. Mainly you." He waits a beat before continuing. "What happened, Kate? How did you go from being pre-law at Stanford to being a homicide detective in Manhattan? We both know damn well this isn't where your life was headed."
The joking and playful banter that she remembered falls away immediately. The teasing glare leaves away her eyes, replaced by the beginning of tears. She's painfully aware that she's letting him see a part of herself that didn't exist years ago.
She doesn't have a chance to respond before the whole situation explodes.
"Mom, Uncle Roy said you were in here. Can I-oh, sorry. I didn't know you were with someone."
Her eyes immediately dart to Rick's, noticing how he drops the paper in his hands into his lap as his face goes almost completely slack in response to their unexpected visitor.
"Oh, hey Jo. It's no problem. This is Richard Castle," she says, hoping that her voice doesn't betray the nervousness she feels. "He's helping out with the case."
"As in, your favorite author Richard Castle?"
She loves her daughter-she really does-but right now Kate wishes Jo wouldn't have shared that particular piece of information. At least not at this moment in time. She gives her daughter a warning glare, then switches her attention back to Rick, trying to read his reaction to this whole scenario. Despite a slight grin, which is probably in response to Jo's outburst of knowledge, she can't read his reaction to the whole situation.
"What did you need, Jo?" Kate asks, completely ignoring her daughter's question.
"Kaitlyn's parents have an extra ticket to see The Lion King tonight. Can I go?"
"It's a school night-"
"No, it's not. Parent/Teacher conferences are tomorrow, remember?"
Kate does her best to keep her attention on Jo, as opposed to checking back to see what kind of reaction Rick is having to their exchange. It's bad enough that she knows he's watching the whole conversation with interest, and no doubt coming up with all kinds of scenarios in his head.
"In that case, I guess it's fine. Do you need any money or anything?"
"No, Mom. I'm good. Thanks," she says, leaning in to give Kate a kiss as he heads to the door. Before she leaves, she turns around and smiles, this time directing her attention to the author. "It was nice to meet you, Mr. Castle."
He smiles and waves as the girl leaves the room, but doesn't say anything. Kate turns her attention to him once she hears the ding of the elevator in the bullpen, signaling her daughter's departure from the precinct.
"Of all the things you could have told me, of all the reasons you could have given, this is the last one I would have guessed, Kate."
Until now, the door to the conference room has been open. But now, she senses that they need to address this situation sooner rather than later. In retrospect, she realizes it was silly to think that she could even attempt to postpone this conversation for however long the case took to solve.
Once she's returned to her chair, she looks at him and tries to gauge what's running through his head right now. She used to be able to read his moods and almost sense what was running through his mind. They were so in sync that their friends found it creepy. Seventeen years later though, she has no clue what's going on in his mind.
"So there was someone else? If that was the case, why didn't you just tell me? It would have hurt, but I'm a big boy. I would have preferred knowing that you loved someone else as opposed to the complete radio silence I got."
Kate doesn't know how to respond to him, and she certainly doesn't know if there's anything she can say to make up for what she did to him. He doesn't look at all like the millionaire playboy he's projected to be in the gossip papers. She knows better, of course. She knows what's in his heart, knows how much he loves his family and does everything he can to protect them.
"There was no one else, Rick."
He starts to respond, but cuts himself off mid-word when her words catch up with him. Kate forces herself to keep eye contact with him, doing her best to keep herself from breaking down in front of him right now. Despite the fact that she's giving him this right now, she's still very aware of their location and how this is definitely not the time or place to have this conversation in its entirety.
"Does she know?"
His question surprises her, though she's happy she doesn't have to spell it out for him.
"No." It's a simple answer, but the only one she's willing to give him right now.
"That's it? Just 'no'?"
"I'm not going to get into this with you right now," she says in frustration, standing up to walk across the room to sit down next to him. "You deserve a full explanation, and I promise that you will get one. But I'm not going to do it here, and certainly not now. Besides the fact that I have a couple murders to solve, I'm in a little bit of shock right now."
"Don't talk to me about shock. I just found out that I have another daughter. On accident." He stands up and moves away from her, his hands combing through his hair. "I don't know if I can be here right now."
Kate stands up, ready to do her best groveling, when Esposito busts through the door and interrupts them. "Beckett, we've got another one."