97. Chapter 97

Chapter 97

When she walked into the loft, Castle met Kate at the door to collect his kiss before Jamie came to meet her calling, "Mama."

She dropped her things on the sofa, scooped her baby boy up in her arms, and planted kisses on his face, all the while telling him how glad she was to see him as Castle watched in contented pride.

"Things are about to change, Rick. I can feel it. Look at what the captain gave me this afternoon. We can talk about it later."

Castle peeked over the back of the sofa to see, and said, "Captain's exam? Are you ready for that now?"

"I don't know. She made some good points."

"Want to tell me about them later?"

"Yeah. But right now I just want to take Jamie to his room and enjoy him for a little while."

Jamie leaned back to look at her. "Toys?" he asked excitedly.

"Toys, Buddy. That's right!" Kate agreed. "Let's go."

"Bear," Jamie insisted, giggling as Kate dangled him upside down low enough to grab his bear from the floor.

"Lanie is impossibly pleased that our boy is so attached to this bear she gave him," she told her husband as she returned her giggling son to a better position to take him upstairs.

"I don't doubt that a bit," he told her, sounding amused. "You and Jamie have fun. I'm close to the end of this chapter. Gonna to see if I can finish it in the peace and quiet that will soon happen downstairs. I'll join you in a little while."

"Take your time. I'll spend some time with Jamie, then either start dinner or order in. Did you say you wanted some editing on your last chapter?"

"Yeah. Something doesn't feel quite right."

"Okay, we can look at it later," she said over her shoulder as she took their baby upstairs.

Giving in to one of his occasional indulgences, Castle went to the bedroom and turned on the baby monitor, leaving it at a very low volume level. He wasn't trying to eavesdrop. He just enjoyed the background noise of a happy wife and child. Then he went back to work with a smile and a plan to finish the trouble he was getting Nikki and Rook into for the chapter's cliffhanger. He'd get them out of that mess and let them have some fun in the next chapter. Now and then he'd hear the sound of blocks falling on themselves, usually followed by laughter from the two occupants of the nursery. Then there was his wife's voice in reading mode and his son's excited interruptions as he pointed out things on the page. He'd stop to smile now and then, but it wasn't slowing him down. It just reflected that the work was being done by a contented man.

By the time she and Jamie came back downstairs, Kate had remembered there were leftovers from the night before that should make a good dinner again. After making a salad and putting what was left from last night's dinner on to heat, she went to check on her writer. Standing in the doorway, she asked, "How's it going?"

"A few more lines, and another chapter is finished."

"And we're free of Gina for another month or so?"

"Yes."

"I'm all for that. So what's going on with Nikki and Rook?"

"You looking for spoilers? They're in deep trouble and won't get out of it until the next chapter."

She smiled. "Dinner can be on the table in about ten minutes. Is that enough time?"

"Should be," he said, not moving his eyes from the screen. "I'm honestly only a few lines from finished. Then I'll leave it alone for a while and look at it again later."

As promised, he was ready for dinner when the oven timer sounded for the bread. They took turns seeing that Jamie didn't make too big a mess in the high chair between them and talked as they had dinner.

"So the captain's exam?" Castle asked.

Kate related her conversation with Gates that afternoon and asked, "What do you think?"

"That she's right," he said with conviction.

"You realize that we wouldn't be working together at all anymore. I'd only be in the field in case of emergencies or difficult situations. And there would be more paper pushing and politics in the background."

"If you decide you want to go for the promotion, the difference in you and the vast majority of the other captains is that you can walk away from it any time you want. We don't need your income. I just want you to be doing what makes you happy. If you want to quit…or demote yourself back to investigative work, it won't affect anything financially for us. You already have more options than most people, and the captain's exam will give you more career options to go with them."

"What do you see as the pros in the argument for captain? I mean, I'd basically be on call twenty-four/seven. I don't think it's generally that bad, though. Gates seems to have a pretty decent life outside the precinct, and so did Roy. But the specter would always be there.

"You said Gates mentioned team building, and command potential showing when it's needed. Kate, you have an ability to walk a line between superior officer and friendship without ruffling too many feathers in the process. That gives you an advantage right out of the gate. That isn't an ability everyone has. Montgomery had that, and he had the respect of the people in his command. They were comfortable around him, knew he cared about them, knew he was proud of them, encouraged them to do their best; but they also knew which lines they couldn't cross and what to expect to happen if they did…and they respected that. You'd be that kind of captain, and you know you respected that he was. It's an opportunity to put that team building ability to work on an entire precinct. You could pull together an entire station house of departments willing to work together, not people who set up their own territories. Gates wouldn't be encouraging her best detective to give up investigations and take on other duties if she didn't see that, too. You know she's been giving you a push in this direction since before you made lieutenant."

"I did thank her before I left…let her know I recognized her efforts and appreciated them."

"So prepare for the test. It never hurts to have options, whether you decide you want them or not." As they both reached for the high chair at the same time, trying to capture the piece of Jamie's dinner that was about to be flung to the floor, Castle smiled. "As for working together, our most important project is sitting right here between us. Just passing the exam doesn't mean there's an opening right away; so meanwhile, I can consult now and then, and be Daddy the rest of the time."

"I do miss you at work."

"And I miss being there, but I wouldn't change a thing," he said, ruffling Jamie's hair.

"Me, either," Kate answered, smiling at the two of them.

After they had the kitchen in order, Castle looked down to where Jamie was playing, said, "Come on, Son. Bath time," and gathered the boy and his bear in his arms.

"I'll do that," Kate insisted. "You go get started on rescuing our two favorite characters from whatever trouble you've caused them."

"But…"

"Go ahead while you have the chance. I can tell you're in the mood to write tonight. You do all this while I do my job. It's my turn." She took Jamie from his arms, and he kissed them both on their heads.

"I do have a really good idea for how to get them out of this."

"I thought so," she answered and gave him a little peck on the lips before taking Jamie up for his bath. When she had Jamie ready for bed, she brought him down and said, "We came to say goodnight."

"You're not considering tucking him in without me, are you?" He took Jamie and tickled his tummy. "Let's go read you another story."

"Book!" His son was bouncing in his arms.

"A calm story," Kate insisted. "Don't get him all stirred up again."

"Come on, Mommy. We'll all sit in the rocking chair and have a calm story and cuddle. We all like that."

"Yeah, we do," she agreed and then chuckled as she followed her two men up the stairs. "One day that poor rocking chair is going to rebel and fall apart."

Later Castle showed her the chapter he wasn't satisfied with. "It's in the middle…right here," he said, pointing it out. I think the sequence of events makes sense, but there's something in the presentation that I'm not happy with."

Kate read it and offered a couple of suggestions, Castle tentatively made those changes. After both of them tried another couple of smaller changes, he was satisfied, and kissing the tip of her nose, told her, "If you decide you don't want to be captain, I'll hire you as my editor."

xxxxx

Beckett submitted her application for the captain's exam a couple of weeks before the due date and let Captain Gates know.

"Good," was the captain's only response, but her demeanor said that she was pleased. She and Beckett had come to understand one another much better in the past couple of years.

xxxxx

The family decided against going to the Hamptons for Memorial Day weekend because Kate was on call. Jamie was old enough that they could play with him in the water more easily, and Castle was looking forward to it. But he wanted Kate there to see their son take his first steps into the ocean waves and play with the floating toys in the pool, so they planned their beach visit for the first full weekend Kate had off. They sat down with a calendar, mapped out the weekends she would normally have off, and planned one of them to include the entire extended family as well as Jordan Shaw and her family and Captain Gates and her husband. That had worked well before, and they were excited about it. After a full year without injury, crisis, or pregnancy to keep her from full duty, Kate didn't even hesitate to ask for a full week off in August to spend with her family…and already had it approved.

As it happened, though, Memorial Day weekend turned out to be memorable anyway. JD had spoken to Castle alone the week before. The extended family had gathered at the loft, and Castle was about to put the steaks on the stove's grill when Alexis and JD came in a few minutes late.

"She said 'Yes,'" JD announced proudly as Alexis held up her left hand and wiggled her fingers to show off her sparkling new ring.

Castle made his way to her as Lanie asked, "Have you thought about when yet?"

"Kind of," Alexis answered hesitantly.

By then Castle was standing close enough to hug his child and look at her ring. What does that mean?" he asked warily.

Sensing some tension, the others went quiet, seeming to want to blend into the woodwork.

"Dad, you and Kate put together sort of a miracle wedding in no time. Do you still know enough guys to do the same thing for us?"

Looking at the two of them he asked quietly, trying not to look as stern as he wanted to. "Are you…"

"No! No! No, Sir," JD exclaimed, "We just want to be married. And we were hoping to do that before school starts in the fall. That's all."

If there had been any doubt as to the question, JD's immediate, and rather panicked answer dispelled it. The tension in the room immediately lifted and there were a number of amused smiles hidden behind hands or turned heads to ease JD's plight. The stiffening posture of all the protective male relatives, of whatever actual status in the family, immediately relaxed.

Alexis explained, "I know that JD and his granddad already feel like family, but I want it to be official. I want Jamie to grow up knowing he has a big brother that belongs to him as well as a big sister. And, Dad, we just want to be married…like you and Kate did."

Castle couldn't very well argue with that; so he hugged his child and said, "Then I'll call Bradford tomorrow, and you can decide what you want. He'll be relieved we're giving him more than a month this time."

"Thanks, Dad."

Then he pulled JD into a hug, too.

Kate had let Castle have his time with his daughter, but she was close by and wrapped her stepchild in her arms as soon as Castle let her go.

Castle turned to the rest of the crowd and said, "Well, now we have even more to celebrating to do. Let's get those steaks cooking."

The general hugginess that Meagan had pointed out recently went on for a while amid the congratulations, and Meagan shamelessly joined in all of it.

xxxxx

Kate was busy for the next two weeks. There was a case that had come to a standstill and another one that came in after that. The second one was much easier to close. There were a lot of signs from the beginning leading them in the right direction, but when Kate had Castle look at the video of the crime scene and he recognized a symbol that most people wouldn't have identified as important, everything started falling into place. Castle hadn't seen anything more than the rest of the team did in the other case, though. Just before Kate was leaving, looking forward to her weekend with the family, they got a call with a lead on the case that had them stumped for so long. All three of the other team members told her to go and not to worry about it.

Alexis and JD went with to the Hamptons with them, and the trip to the beach was entertaining for all of them. With four adults and one Jamie, they were able to take turns, and all of them had time to relax. Jamie loved the water…after he'd had time to figure out its charms. It was cold when a wave first washed across his feet, and it surprised him. He was skittish after that, but Castle and Kate took turns standing with him on the dry sand watching as the other one obviously enjoyed standing or splashing in the shallow waves. Jamie was eventually enticed to try again, holding Kate's hand and cautiously approaching the shallow little waves as Castle committed the whole scene to video. Before long, Jamie was laughing and splashing and stomping in the water while Kate took over the camera. After his nap, Jamie with the pool toys was just as much fun to watch. Alexis and JD insisted on providing the introduction to the pool, and the parents watched, commented, laughed, and recorded.

That night, Alexis and JD watched a movie and offered Rick and Kate time to walk on the beach without worrying about their son.

As they walked, holding hands, Kate turned to her husband and said, "Thank you."

"For what?" he asked.

"For making sure I was here to see Jamie today. I wouldn't have wanted to miss that for the world. It's a memory I'll never forget."

"I have videos on my phone. We'll save them so we can embarrass him when he's a teenager," Rick answered.

"Don't downplay this, Rick. You believed in us before I did. You gave me a second chance to prove myself, to have what we do now. And you're still making sure we have the moments together that I didn't even know I needed."

"Kate, I spent Alexis's whole life seeing those moments only with her. I absolutely reveled in them, but I had nobody to share them with. I couldn't understand how Meredith didn't see that they were important enough to remember, or to care if she missed them. Any time I know one is about to happen and can include you, I do. Things like today can wait until the right time. I don't want to miss a single second of the two of us seeing them together. It's for me as well as for you…and for Jamie. I want us both to be able to tell him about them when he's older. He should know he was that important to both his parents. I wish Alexis could have had that before she was in high school."

"She may not have had both of you, but she knows that her father did, does, and will always love her…and tell embarrassing stories about her as long as he lives. She knows you gave her everything you could."

"You've been good for both of us. Alexis knows she always has a woman in her life to turn to, And I never feel alone anymore. Even if you're not physically with me, I know without a doubt that you're out there somewhere, wanting to come home to our family. So, thank you, too."

They migrated toward each other without conscious thought, Castle's arm draping over her shoulders, Kate's around his waist. "It's muggy out here. This could get hot and sweaty, you know," Rick said with a little smirk in her direction.

"Don't care," she said, teasingly bumping his shoulder with her head. "We'll just have to depend on the ocean breeze to make it bearable…and look forward to one of those really memorable showers when we get back to the house."

Rick grinned. "Already looking forward to that."

When they got back, they thanked the younger couple and told them they were relieved of Jamie duty. Then they enjoyed their much anticipated shower and went to bed, falling asleep to the sound of the ocean.

The following day, before Kate had to return to the city, all the adults looked at the calendar during Jamie's afternoon nap. They decided the wedding should be during the time in August that Kate already had scheduled for vacation. And they all looked deflated at the mention of Meredith showing up, knowing she would try to take center stage. Not a lot was said. The sentiment just seemed to be understood.

"I guess I have to tell her sometime soon," Alexis sighed. "But I'd rather have Kate be mother of the bride."

"I appreciate the thought, but you have a mother who's going to want to be here," Kate answered.

"Then will you be my matron-of-honor? You're important."

"I'll be whatever you want me to be…other than mother of the bride," Kate assured her.

Castle just watched. He had someone to share this with, too…the excitement, the sense of loss of his daughter, the sense of gain in the gift of a young man he already respected and thought of as another son. And he knew Kate understood how all of it affected him, and how Meredith affected his daughter. He knew she hated that Meredith took her wonderful child for granted, but Kate still respected the boundaries of motherhood.

He caught JD watching him as he watched Kate accept Alexis's request and told him softly, "Just love my daughter this much. That's all I ask."

"That's hard to match, Mr. Castle," he answered just as quietly. "We know it takes time, but it's where both of us want to be. It's where we're headed."

"You're a good man, Mr. Farnsworth. I trust you with my daughter," Castle answered, glancing over at him.

"I think your dad and JD are having a moment," Kate whispered surreptitiously to Alexis.

"I'm glad they can do that," Alexis whispered back and smiled. Then she said, loud enough to clearly understand, "Okay, we have a wedding date. Can we have the wedding here?"

A few cursory plans were made, and Alexis agreed to call her mother that night. Then she stood, motioned for Kate to follow her, and walked to the kitchen, where they sat down at the table near the back door. "I didn't want JD to hear because he's seen your wedding pictures, and I don't want him to know what I'm wearing. You know I loved your mother's wedding dress, right?" Kate nodded, then Alexis rushed into the next thing she wanted to say. "I'm not asking to wear it. I'm shorter, and I don't want to ask to cut it or damage it in any way. I mean you and dad might have a girl as tall as you, and I wouldn't want to ruin it for my sister, or you might want to renew your vows, or…"

"You've thought about this a lot, haven't you?"

"I really love that dress. Would you mind if I find somebody to copy it for me?" She paused to take a breath and then plowed into her next sentence. "I mean, if I copied it, I could pass it along to my daughter, if I have one. And if you and dad have a girl, you could pass yours along from your mother. And just for the record, I'd love to have a sister."

"Wow. You really have thought about this a lot."

"I guess I have. But just since JD proposed. I look at the ring and think about the dress."

"Honey, there's no way to know if either of us will have a daughter or that she'd love the dress the way we do. I'd be happy for you to wear that dress…to have it altered for you or to have it copied. I'll bet your grandmother knows exactly where to find someone who could do either. Your mother might be disappointed that she doesn't get to help you pick out a dress, though."

"But I want to wear that dress. Maybe she can help me pick out a veil…and the attendant's dresses."

"Oh, well I'm definitely crashing that party, then. The two of you do not get to pick out an ugly matron-of-honor dress for me," Kate teased.

"Well, bummer!" Alexis answered mischievously. "So much for my plan to make myself look better." Both women laughed.

"What's so funny in there?" Castle called.

"Bridesmaid's dresses," Alexis called back.

"Not touching that subject," he answered.

Later, they packed the SUV while Jamie finished his nap, stopped for an early dinner on the way home, and were back in the city that night.

xxxxx

When she was back, the boys informed Beckett that she hadn't missed anything. The information on their unsolved case looked good, but it turned out that nothing could be done to gather most of it until the man they needed to contact was back in town on Monday. His wife said he and his friends were fishing at a lake upstate out of cell phone range. "I'm sure that's why they go there," she told them. They saw him Monday morning, and his information was the link that pulled everything together to allow them to close the case within a couple of days.

It was unbearably hot in New York City for a few weeks, and by the time the July beach party weekend rolled around, everybody was ready to go. It wasn't obvious that the Captain would be there because she wasn't there most weekends anyway, but Beckett's entire team had the weekend off. When asked, Esposito simply said they were going to Castle's place at the beach. Sully was included this time and peppered them with questions as he rode to the Hamptons with Ryan and Jenny.

"The first time we had this crowd together here, it was right after Bracken and Simmons were taken down. It was a celebration. The captain had been the go between for the FBI to work with the information Castle and Beckett had put together and coordinate it with what they already had. Jordan Shaw, the FBI agent in charge, will be there with her family, too. And we've added Frank Stokes since he and Lanie are together now, and Maria and Gabe with Esposito. The captain doesn't usually socialize with us outside the precinct, but we worked closely enough on that investigation that she came to help celebrate…and she and her husband will be there this weekend. We just don't talk about it at work. And Castle's place is amazing. You'll see. We're almost there."

The gathering was as successful as before; but this time, it was without the overshadowing weight of near tragedy and the stress of taking down Bracken and Simmons. The mood was lighter, and the place was a little more crowded, The adults adopted the "It takes a village to raise a child" approach and took turns watching children. Castle and Ray Gates, without needing much encouragement from the children who had been there before, organized a second cannonball contest.

Kate stood with Gates, both of them shaking their heads. "Do you think they'll ever grow up," Gates asked.

Kate grinned as she watched most of the men and a couple of the older children line up for their chances to raise the biggest splash. "Do we really want them too?" she asked.

Gates looked at her and smiled. "Probably not," she agreed.

Kate had Jamie in her arms, and he seemed fascinated by all the activity. As each contestant took a turn, he smiled, building up to laughter as the splashes got bigger. By the time it was down to four finalists, he was belly laughing at each effort. Castle and Ray Gates were good-naturedly trash talking one another as the final two again, and when Castle outdid himself and was the obvious winner, Jamie turned, clapped his hands against Kate's face, and said, "Daddy sp'ash!" flinging his arms out and laughing.

"Yeah, Baby. Daddy splashed big," Kate said, laughing with him. Turning to Gates, she said, "He learned that word when we were here a few weeks ago. Once he decided the water was okay, he did some sp'ashing of his own. I can see my two men out here cannonballing together in another couple of years."

"Well, if they don't want company, don't let Ray know," Gates answered, smiling.

Again the group gathered mid-morning the next day for brunch and a calmer gathering before they all gradually drifted away during the afternoon and headed back to life in the city…without ocean breezes to ease the heat.

xxxxx

On the way home, Castle reminded Alexis that Bradford would be meeting with them on Tuesday.

"It's our wedding, Dad. You don't really think we might forget, do you? I saw what Bradford did in only a month for you and Kate. We can't wait to talk to him."

Castle took a deep breath and launched into a sentence they all thought might last for the remainder of the ride home. "No matter how long I've known it was going to happen or how much I trust JD, I'm still adjusting to the idea that my baby girl, who should still be only about ten and waiting for me to braid her hair for soccer practice, by the way…but who it seems is now twenty years old, and how did I miss so much of that happening, and thinks she should be married right now, and furthermore actually seems to know what she's doing, is about to start planning her wedding." He stopped long enough to catch his breath and finished with, "I'm the father of a daughter. Be patient."

There was a brief moment of silence from the others before they all started to laugh. Castle was watching the road, but from the low rumble of the laughter, he could tell that JD was the first to succumb.

"Young man," he said as if delivering a curse, "I hope your first child is a girl."