It's been two weeks. Two weeks and she's started to see the way he looks at her. When they were back at work after that day at the park he'd voiced those concerns about them having the wrong guy and after some arguing and him stealing the case file they did conclude he was right and found the brother had done it all. After that he somehow managed to nestle his way in to shadow her at work, apparently he knows the mayor or something like that. At first she'd been against it, hated how he just gets what he wants so easily. Now… not so much. She's actually enjoyed having him around again, it's… weird but it feels right.

"Hey, could I invite you to dinner tonight?"

Kate looks up from the paperwork and looks at the writer. Those blue eyes immediately pulling her in.

"Why?" she questions and he smiles.

"Do I have to have a reason?" he asks back and Kate narrows her eyes but turns back to the paperwork. "I promise no funny business, besides, I'm inviting Lily too."

"Oh, yeah, because inviting others has stopped you before," she says without thinking.

"Yeah, well, none of those were your daughter," he states and she stops in the middle of writing a sentence. "Kate?"

She doesn't dare look up att him, tries to focus on the paperwork as she hums.

"How… why isn't her father in the picture anymore?" he asks in a low voice, she thinks in order not to let her coworkers know what he's asking her.

She feels her heart beat faster, what is she supposed to answer to that? She can't tell him here. She refuses to tell him here. But it might be time soon. He will most likely figure it out himself if she doesn't tell him anyway, but the question is still how is she supposed to tell him?

"It's complicated," she says and shrugs. "I don't really wanna talk about it, right now."

She can feel his gaze on her, probably observing her and reflecting on her wording, which is only confirmed by his next question.

"So, some other day? When you're ready?"

Glancing up at him she sees his genuine concern and curiosity along with the patience he has always had with her. And so she nods, a small smile playing at the corners of her lips.

"So, dinner tonight, what do you say?" he asks again and she bites her lower lip.

"Yeah," she says with a low voice and watches as he shines up while trying to contain his excitement. "What time should we be there?"

"When is your shift over?" he asks back and she looks at her watch. Her father's old watch.

"Shift ends at 5pm unless we catch a case…" she answers and looks up at him.

"Well, let's hope we don't," he states with a smile and she has a feeling he's going to regret saying that out loud.

To both their irritation they caught a case almost seconds after. A boy had been shot and dumped in a boat floating in the river. Castle made some reference to vikings which made Kate roll her eyes. Looking back at the case she's still irritated that she can't seem to understand what happened. She told him she couldn't come over to eat dinner but now she's regretting not going over, maybe she would've been able to relax if she had something else on her mind. Or, maybe not relaxing since she would've been thinking about how to tell him. Lily's asleep, at least she hopes she is, and so she's got nothing else to focus on. And one of those kids is damn annoying. Her gut tells her it's him, but the evidence isn't with her. Her phone chirps with a text and so she looks at it. Only to smile.

She walks into her bedroom and closes her door, figures she doesn't want to wake her daughter or disturb her while she's trying to sleep when she hits the call button.

"So, I guess you can't sleep either," he states when he answers and she sighs with frustration.

"I don't get it, he has to have done it, but that smug jerk thinks he can get away with it," she says with annoyance filled in her voice, which she tries to keep low and calm. Tries.

"Can't we just throw him in jail because we know he's the killer?" Castle suggests and Kate wishes it was that simple.

"No, we have to have evidence, especially considering he's so well connected," she groans.

For a few seconds they don't say anything, just enjoy the company of the other without speaking.

"Too bad we couldn't have dinner today," he says with a saddened tone.

"Yeah, I'm sorry Castle," she says and he immediately disagrees.

"It's not your fault, I jinxed it. Besides, you can't help you're New York's finest detective," he says with so much pride it makes her heart skip a beat. "You have no idea how many times I thought about searching for you," he reveals. "Though I always thought I'd find you as a lawyer, never imagined you'd…" he goes silent.

"Become a cop?" she finishes with a small question evident in her voice. "Yeah, well, they never found… and I thought I would be able to do something about it, but when I realized I was going down a rabbit hole I-ah, I stopped."

"Do you ever think about reopening the case again?" he asks and it's the first time he's mentioning it like this.

"No, I can't," she says and she hears the question before he asks it.

"Why not? Maybe I could help…"

She cuts him off before he can suggest anything she won't be able to resist. "The same reason a recovering alcoholic doesn't drink."

He's silent for a second, probably thinking about what she said. "Oh, yeah, I get it."

"I can't do that to Lily, not…" not again.

"Not when your dad did it to you," he says, completely misjudging her words.

It's both a relief… and a disappointment. He's met her a couple times for two weeks now, and she can't help but wonder if he has even the slightest clue. If he does, he isn't showing it. Kate goes to sit on her bed, but it only takes a second before she stands up again in order to go to her closet, she takes out the box again and sits down on the floor in order to open it.

"After a couple years I actually thought about seeking you out too," she reveals suddenly as she's looking down at an old row of pictures they took in a photobooth years ago.

"Really?" he asks and she feels her cheeks blush. She never intended to share that information, but she didn't want to talk about her dad, or her mom, anymore. Not when the real reason she stopped is breathing in the other room and happens to be connected to the man she's speaking with at the moment.

"Do you remember that time we somehow sneaked into the old abandoned tivoli and found a working photobooth?" she asks without thinking as she picks up the pictures.

He chuckles immediately. "Yeah, and how you scolded me for climbing the fences once we had to hide from the police coming to check out some noises."

She chuckles at that. Yeah, they shouldn't have done that. He had made her do a lot of things she never thought she would do. Well, that's not entirely true, a voice reminds her in her mind, Rebel Bex.

"Yeah, well, can you blame me?" she questions and she can almost see him shrug in front of her.

"Hey, do you remember when we hid in the library after the school was closed to have a sleepover there?" he asks and she bites her lip. "That was your idea."

"It did turn out a lot different than I originally planned," she says with a small hint of accusation.

"You didn't exactly object," he shoots back and she feels her cheeks get warm.

"No, I didn't," she admits as she thinks back to the night in the library.

"You know, that was the last time we…" he starts whispering but quiets down when he realizes what he's saying.

And nine months later… "Yeah, it was before mom…"

They turn quiet for a while. Kate continues to look through some of the pictures in her box, feeling nostalgic about it all.

"We should probably get to bed," he breaks the silence and she bites her cheeks.

"Yeah, we should, we got the case," she agrees but continues to look through the pictures. "Oh."

"What?" he asks and she silently curses herself.

She found the letter. She'd forgotten about the letter. "N-n-nothing," she gets out with much more struggle than she expected.

"Kate, what's wrong?"

"I-ah," she opens the letter, still remembering every word she'd written down. "I should go, to bed, right now."

"Kate?" he says again and she clenches her eyes shut.

"Castle, is there any way we can get lunch tomorrow?"

She can almost hear the confusion setting in. How he's trying to find his words and trying to understand what she's saying.

"Yeah, why?" he says with concern written in his voice.

"I-ah, need to show you something," she swallows hard. "But we do need to go to bed and work and… just it's nothing… sleep tight," she says and before he can say anything she's hanging up.

Once she's pushed the button she's staring at her phone, wondering what she's just done. Now she has to tell him. Which is about damn time but still so frightening. She looks down at the letter again and for a second she thinks about opening it, but decides she doesn't need to. She remembers every word.

She puts everything back in the box again and hides it. When she's back in her bedroom she sets her steps towards her bathroom in order to make herself ready for bed. It doesn't take her long and before she curls under her covers she goes to check the front door to make sure it's locked and then she carefully opens her daughter's door to peek inside. When she's sure she's indeed sleeping she closes the door again and goes to bed. Closing her eyes she keeps seeing images of him from back when they were together, and that's how she falls asleep.

Hey Rick!

I know this is weird, we haven't spoken in a while, maybe you don't even remember me. It's Kate, Beckett, and there's something you should know. I know you're busy, I know you're a big writer now, but it feels so wrong not telling you. I feel bad. I did something, and I think you're going to hate me. But one thing tells me you should know, you need to know. I was wrong excluding you.

You have a daughter. She's five now. And I know it's not right of me to tell you this now, should've told you from the start. I don't want anything, I don't need anything. I just feel like you should know, you deserve to know. She's yours too, even if I never told you. I'm sorry I didn't tell you. I don't blame you for hating me, I don't blame you if you don't want to know her, I'm not going to force you. I just… I shouldn't have kept it from you. I should've told you the second I found out.

I was afraid, Rick. I'd just lost mom, and dad… well, at least Lily became our rescue.

I'm sorry.

Kate Beckett

She never sent it.


A/N: Thank you so much for reading, hope you enjoy this chapter. I haven't had much time to write this week, been working a lot and dancing a lot, will dance tomorrow too lol. But I'll try write some more and start writing the fourteenth chapter so I'm still at a good phase. Anyway, hope you enjoyed! Until next time, xxxx