Previously:
"Oh, shit."
The scene is one Kate would expect to find in one of Rick's books, not her own apartment. And it pisses her off, because she and Rick were making so much progress. It was painful and she feels like she could lock herself in her bedroom and cry for an hour before eventually falling asleep, but it was progress.
Damn it, Josh wasn't supposed to be back from Haiti for at least another month, and the last thing she expected him to do when he did get back was kiss ambush her in the doorway. The fact that Richard Castle, best-selling author (not to mention her ex-boyfriend and father of her daughter) watched the whole thing take place makes matters worse, but the icing on the cake is Jo coming home and seeing it all.
Her daughter is the first one to gather herself enough to find out what Josh is doing here.
"Dr. Davidson, I thought you were in Haiti."
"I came back early," he tells the girl before he turns to look at Kate. "I wanted to surprise your mom, but by the looks of things, I should have called first."
She follows Josh's eyes as they fall on Rick's, who looks a little mad and very confused.
"Josh," Kate says, stepping toward Rick to pull him by the arm, "this is Rick Castle."
"You mean the Richard Castle? The author?"
"Yes," she admits as she braces herself. Thankfully, Jo has finally shut the door. Whatever is about to play out, she doesn't need the neighbors getting a free show.
"You're kidding me!" Josh laughs as he extends his hand to shake Rick's. "You know Kate is probably your biggest fan. She convinced me to go pick up your last book for her, and she insisted that I be at the bookstore the minute they opened. I had to take it to her at the station, too. She couldn't even wait a few hours to read it."
Kate hangs her head, embarrassed to no end by the way Josh has outed her as a Richard Castle fangirl. But when she chances a glance at Rick, she's pleasantly surprised to see the smirk on his face, like he's won a game he didn't even know he was playing.
"How did you guys meet anyway?"
"He's my-"
"He helped us with a case about a month ago," Kate breaks in, keeping Jo from spilling the beans about this new development to Josh. She doesn't dare even suggest that she knew Rick in college. Josh is a smart guy, and she has no doubt that he would be able to connect the dots.
"Some sicko was copycatting murders in my books," Rick finally says, having been silent until now. He hands the glass and bottle of wine over to Kate, leveling a beaten look upon her. "It's late, and it sounds like you have some catching up to do, so I better get going." He walks toward the door, and Kate follows him. She's not about to let him leave without some reassurance. Not again.
"Rick." She closes the door behind them, but leaves it cracked.
"You have nothing to explain." He tried to keep walking, but she grabs him by the wrist, drawing him back to face her. "I'm not angry, beyond the fact that we were finally making some headway."
"But we're not-"
"Kate, honestly. I'm not mad." He smiles at her, and she sees how hard he's trying to convince her, even though she doesn't believe him for a second. "I'll call you in a couple days, okay?" She nods, and he steps in a little closer and lowers his voice. "Tell Jo goodnight and give her a kiss for me?"
"Of course."
He slips his hand out of her light hold and walks down the hallway, and she doesn't miss the way his head is bowed. So much for progress.
Kate sees him walking toward her desk a few days later, completely out of the blue. He hasn't made any effort to get in touch with her since the night Josh showed up at her place, despite his assurances that everything was fine between them. He appears in a good mood, though, so she's willing to run with it-until she sees the suspicious looks she gets from Ryan and Esposito.
"Castle, hey. This is a surprise." She tries to keep her voice light, doing her best not to sound like she has more of a familiarity with him than what the boys would expect. The last thing she needs right now is to have them snooping around her personal life more than they already do.
"I was in the neighborhood and thought I would stop by and see if you were free for lunch," he says, his suit jacket folded over his arm as he sits down in the chair next to her desk. "But from the looks of it, you're not."
His eyes flash toward the murder board, and she follows his gaze, huffing out a breath at the truth of his statement. "Not really, no. We just got this case last week-a string of home invasions. They struck again last night."
"I thought you worked homicide cases."
"I do, which is why we got this case. The first two robberies were just that, but the first murder was committed just last week. And then came the one last night-nasty one, too. They shoved the woman in a wall safe and cut off her ring finger, after they shot her at close range."
"Beckett, we've got Mitchell in the box," a uniform yells across the bullpen.
"Thanks," she yells back, before she turns to Rick. "Can you wait? I have to interrogate this guy first, but then I should have some time for lunch."
"Can I watch?" he asks excitedly.
"You are not going in there with me." Kate points a finger at him as she walks by him, hoping that he'll listen to her.
Rick waits until after they've placed their order at Remy's before he says anything, mostly because he figures she's convinced he wants to talk about something completely different.
"That Mitchell guy is a real tool. Do you think he did it?"
"No, but he knows something. I just-" she starts but stops abruptly, once she realizes what he just admitted. "Which one of them let you in observation?"
"They both did, actually. But they had their own agenda."
"I don't doubt it," she tells him with a smirk as she swirls her straw around her shake. "How bad was it?"
"They're suspicious, but they think we're dating and not telling anyone. They have no idea what's really going on."
Kate is calm, totally bypassing the fact that he convinced Ryan and Esposito into letting him into the observation room in favor of getting his impression of how much they might know about her history with Castle.
"Esposito is probably the worst. Any time I even mention meeting someone other than my father outside of work, he wants to interrogate them and make sure the guy is suitable to be around Jo."
"Did he do that with good Dr. Davidson?"
He regrets asking the question when she sucks in a breath. Whatever the situation with this Josh guy is, she's definitely not comfortable discussing it. And part of him doesn't think that he has a right to even ask, but he waits her out, hoping that they had truly made some progress before they were interrupted the other night.
"I do my best not to talk to them about my personal life with them. So no, they didn't do that with Josh. They didn't know about him."
She doesn't elaborate any more than that, but he notes her use of the past tense. The more he thinks about the other night and the scene they created at her front door, he realizes that she wasn't exactly excited to see him.
"And me?" The question is selfish, he knows. But he's curious what she tells her co-workers about him. He might also be fishing for information.
"As far as they know, we met for the first time when you worked that case with us. However, their curiosity skyrockets every time you show up at the precinct."
"What, we can't be friends?" he asks, shaking a fry in her direction. "Maybe I'm doing research for a new novel-oh, you could be my muse!"
She smiles when the idea comes to him, one that he hasn't seen in many years. He doesn't know what the deal is with Josh, and she doesn't seem like she's desperate to clear the air about who this guy really is to her, but Rick can hardly complain when she's smiling at him like that. Whatever there used to be between them, and whatever there might be now, that smile gives him hope and tells him that he doesn't have the whole story.
"Do you really think that's a good idea?"
"I think it's the best idea I've had in a long time, actually. Those stolen property photos on your desk? I might even know someone we could show them to."
"Let me think about it," she tells him, which is almost as good as her saying yes.
Twitter: supermandy77
Tumblr: supermandy1977