30. Chapter 30

Kate wakes suddenly, heart pounding, but the dream is gone. Not even a whisper of it in her head. Thankfully.

She's damp with sweat though.

She turns her head to see Castle asleep on his stomach at the far end of the bed, nearly a whole body's worth of space between them. She loves these California king sized beds. She shifts her arm out from under the pillow, reaches across the sheets.

She brushes his elbow, pulls back so she can get out of bed.

She goes to the bathroom, washes her hands, splashes water on her face. She takes a long breath out and looks at her face in the mirror. The sun has colored her cheeks, her forehead, her neck so that whatever nightmare woke her, it hasn't left its mark.

Kate slips on a tshirt and pajama pants, shivering in the air conditioning. She walks quietly through the bedroom and out into living room, shutting the door behind her carefully. Moonshine spills in the sliding glass doors, but she heads down the hallway to the kids' rooms.

She starts with Ellery first. Has to. She can't remember the dream, but the jangling nerves and sweat still slicking her skin is memory enough. Inside the absolute darkness of her daughter's room, it takes a long moment for her eyes to adjust.

Then she can see. Ellery sacked out in bed, covers knocked off her body, little arm flung off the side. Kate gets to her knees beside her, leans in on the mattress to kiss her daughter's cheek, smell her night-time scent. Ellery could sleep through a hurricane. Kate draws the girl's arm back into bed, untangles the sheet from her legs, pulls the covers back up.

She strokes the side of Ella's face, brushes her sweaty neck, runs her fingers through the girl's dark hair. She kisses her again, lets her lips linger against the soft, soap-scented skin, closing her eyes.

Just a moment longer. One more. Sigh.

She pulls away. Her daughter is fine; beautiful and tiny and stubborn and often mute, but fine. No darkness has touched her.

Kate gets to her feet and heads through the connecting bathroom to Dashiell's room. The nightlight in the bathroom is on, a blue glow that haunts the shower curtain, echoes on the tile. Dash is curled tight in bed, all the covers piled on top of him, his weighted blanket thrown off on the floor, his face half-buried in the pillow.

She leans over him, pausing until she sees his chest moving, then lightly brushes her lips against his hair. She pulls back, standing beside his bed, waiting to be sure he won't wake.

His fingers twitch, but he doesn't open his eyes. Kate moves the remote control from the floor to his bedside table, angles the clock away from him so that the light from the numbers won't wake him up, then grabs the weighted blanket and lays it on top of the comforter.

Dash's mouth drifts open; he lets out a ragged sigh. Kate breathes softly, waits again, but he doesn't stir.

She leaves through the bathroom, unwilling to open his door and accidentally wake him. She takes another long look at her daughter, sleeping with abandon, then opens the bedroom door and goes back out into the hallway.

She remembers finding Dashiell in the baby's room last year, his face pressed against the slats of the crib. He turned around to see his mother, standing surprised in the doorway, and he said, "I just had to check."

Poor kid, Kate knows that feeling all too well.

She sighs and heads back for their bedroom, slipping inside quietly, listening for the sound of Rick's breathing in the darkness. Moonlight casts her side of the bed in silver; she walks in puddles of mercurial darkness to crawl into bed with him. She slides in close, sighing at his warmth, and drapes herself over his back, her cheek to his shoulder blade.

He takes in a long, sighing breath and seems to sink into the mattress as he exhales. She waits, but he's still asleep. Kate curls her arm around his back, her fingers at his ribs, and closes her eyes.

This is right. This is what she needs.

Frrraaakkkk.

What the hell?

Castle squints, panting, reaches behind him out of reflex, feels the hot skin, the tumbling hair.

"Kate?"

He clears his throat and looks behind him, twisting his face against the pillow, and sees Kate draped all over his back, her left arm curled up along his, fingers tangled in his. He slips his free hand to her neck; she's sweating, making him feel both suffocated and burning up.

No wonder she hates to cuddle. This is downright obnoxious. And the older he gets, the less he longs for these cuddling moments. What is she doing?

He clamps his arm at her shoulders and turns slowly, trying to keep from waking her, gets to his back with Kate still over him. She stirs but she doesn't wake; her breath fans his neck and her fingers are still tangled in his left hand.

He lifts his head and strokes his right hand over her cheek, pushing her hair back. She must be dreaming. Dashiell sweats like this when he dreams too.

He untangles his hand from her fingers and wraps his arm around her back, brushing his palm up and down her spine, closing his eyes. After a moment, he feels Kate's body conform to his, as if her muscles were easing up, the tension draining out of her.

He lifts his head and her mouth is open against his chest, her breathing regular. He glances at the clock - she'll probably wake at any moment. Nearly six.

Ug. It's hot. She's a furnace. All-

She grunts and jerks, as if she's falling, then startles so badly that she drops off his chest. Rick catches her, laughing to himself, and rolls to the side with her, watching her eyes open and her awareness flicker in and out.

"Rick."

"Morning, hot stuff."

She blinks slowly, looking at him. Her hand comes up between them and her fingers fumble at his lips.

"Yummy," she murmurs.

He laughs, more than surprised by her. "Oh yeah?"

"I keep having bad dreams," she sighs, and rolls into his chest. Her fingers curl at his chin.

Okay, so she's not really awake yet. Funny. Kate is usually alert and aware from the moment her eyes open. "Bad dreams, babe?" He nuzzles into her neck, a wet kiss to her jaw.

"Mm, hmm." She roots her nose into his armpit; a mistake she will surely regret. But then she sighs and wriggles even closer, curling into him, and his chest tightens with it. Kate snuggling into him.

"What about, sweetheart?"

"Callin' me names," she mutters.

"Only because I love you."

"Okay," she sighs.

His lips quirk; he brushes a kiss against the top of her head. "Bad dreams?"

"They killed you," she shivers, and it seems to wake her a little. Because she pulls back, blinks up at him.

"They killed me?"

"What?"

"Your bad dreams. I died in your bad dream, Kate?"

"You what?" She looks truly confused now, giving him that what the hell are you talking about? look.

"What did you dream about?"

"Dream? I don't. . .remember," she says, but something flashes across her face and she shivers again. "Oh. Well. I can guess."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. There's one. . .I hear you get shot."

"In your dream."

"Unh," she grunts and tries to get away from him. He lets her go, watching her sit up and pull her sweaty shirt away from her chest, fanning herself. She gathers her hair in one hand and lifts it off her neck, blowing out a long breath.

"It's only six," he points out.

She peers past him to the clock, then flops back to the bed with a sigh. "Okay, so I have a dream where. . .I can hear you get shot."

"Is this one of those dreams where it's dark and you can't see, but you can hear everything? I have one of those. Dashiell is pulling knives out of the dishwasher and I can't move, can't make him stop."

She gives him a little smile. "No. It's actually. Uh. More like a memory."

"Oh." Well, that's pretty crappy. No wonder she's flipped out. Except he can't remember a time where she thought he'd been shot. The reverse, yeah. "Is this. . .the stuff you're trying to work through?"

He rolls towards her, lying on his stomach and propping himself up on his elbows to look at her face. Her eyes cut to him and he sees there is so very much more to this than one bad dream. The desperation he saw in her eyes back on the couch last night - that's gone. But the grief remains.

"I don't want to get into it," she says softly.

He sighs, glances to the sliding glass doors and the dawn light. A feather soft touch of her hand against his cheek brings his eyes back to her; she looks sad. He knows it's because she understands that she ought to be able to share with him, but she's just so very internal. It's not that she's reserved; really, Kate isn't reserved at all - she's passionate and intense, and she feels things so deeply. It's just that she's got the personality type that doesn't really need anyone else. And he knows that. Honestly, it doesn't really bother him anymore. In fact, she's kinda started rubbing off on him too. He likes to write things out now, in solitude for a few hours, just get it out.

"Hey, Kate, don't. It's okay. You don't want to get into it, I know. I get it. Splinter, right? Let it work itself out."

She strokes his cheek. "I don't know any more. What if I've left it so long that it's just. . .infected?"

He kisses her palm, then leans down to kiss her forehead; he feels her fingers curl around the back of his neck. Maybe this is the time, then, to push her.

"So what's this about, Kate?"

She clutches at his neck and her breath sighs out, long and resigned.

He pulls back a little. "Something bad. You're still having dreams? Dreams where I get shot."

She nods but releases his neck, scoots away so she's lying on her side and studying his face. Instead of talking, she looks like she's memorizing him.

"Something bad," he repeats.

"I don't even know where to start," she says finally, closing her eyes. Even saying that much is a start.

"Let's sit up," he says softly, and sits back against the headboard. She rolls to her knees, then sits on the side of the bed for a moment before standing up.

He watches her drift away, crossing her arms over her chest as she looks out of the sliding glass doors towards the gathering glow. Sunrise is close.

He stays in bed, watching her back, the beautiful line of her neck, the sun-streaked strands of her hair. He's struck sometimes, by just how very gorgeous she is now. Sure, she was cute and hot when she hauled him out of his book release party and into the precinct (in fact, he's told her before that her interrogation of him was their first date), but every year she's only grown more beautiful, more amazing, stronger and more mature and just. . .gorgeous. Maybe it's because she loves him, maybe that helps, but he really thinks it's just her.

"Remember when I got jumped by those Russian mobsters?"

He jerks back to the present, to their conversation. Uh. . .ah. "In April. They ambushed you on a call-in tip, right?" April: six months ago. And all this, whatever this is, started six months ago.

"Yes. April." She goes very still.

"You told me you woke up in a back room of an abandoned warehouse. Alone. Stuck in there for an hour until Ryan and Espo tracked you down."

"Right." She turns her head to look at him over her shoulder, something dark and desolate in her eyes.

His chest tightens; he leans forward. "Did. . .did they do something to you, Kate?"

She gives a short nod, and he can't breathe. Can't feel his body for the tidal wave of grief-filled rage that rises up in him. He needs to beat something, smash his fist into something, preferably those Russian bastards.

He chokes and gets to his feet, not sure if he should touch her, wanting only to erase whatever violation-

"What? What did they do to you?" His voice sounds strangled, hands clenched in fists at his side. She turns to him, catches sight of his face and brings her hands up to his cheeks, shaking her head.

"Oh God, no. Castle, no, baby. Not that. I'm sorry. No-" She presses her mouth to his and he sinks into her, draping his body over hers as if his relief could somehow protect her, too late, too late.

"Not that," he repeats, swallowing hard, his arms tight around her back. "Then. Then what?"

"They weren't there. They left me alone. I woke up in this dark room, not even tied up. There was this PA system and they had a twenty second recording set up on repeat play. For an hour. Over and over. It felt like. . .days."

A recording. A recording? Oh. She said- "Is this where me being shot comes in? They played you a recording and you thought-"

"Yes," she nods once and kisses his cheek before stepping back, regaining her distance. Probably also regaining her control.

"Tell me." And inherent in his command is also the question Why didn't you tell me?

"On the tape they told me I'd messed with their family. So they were going to take mine."

"Oh." Take hers?

"Then I heard your voice. A gunshot. And then a little girl screaming."

A little girl screaming? What did that have to do with-

"Screaming for daddy. Over and over," she whispers and rubs her hand over her eyes, sighs.

"Oh. Ella. It was meant to be Ella."

She nods. "And I didn't. . .I couldn't be sure. With your voice - that's easy to snag off the internet or a taped interview. But that little girl-" Kate shudders and presses her hands into her eye sockets, speaks again slowly. "Whatever they did to that girl's father, in front of her, to get her to sound like that. . ."

"Oh, Kate," he murmurs and can't keep his distance. Castle closes his arms around her back and squeezes. "Why didn't you tell me?" he whispers, and he can't help the grief in his voice that matches the grief in her eyes.

"I can't - couldn't - it just-"

"Sorry, I'm sorry. Don't - it's in the past. You're telling me now." He knows that there are things, even experiences they've shared, that she just doesn't ever bring up again. It took them three years to even mention the case that brought them together, three years to go back over the scars and put the specter of that torture to rest. He knows this is how she works.

"You're smothering me," she huffs, shoving on him, but she's offering him a small smile.

He pulls back, watching her; she runs a hand through her hair, turns back to the sliding glass doors and the balcony.

"The worst part. To me. The worst part was not knowing for sure. Grieving felt like betraying hope. Betraying you, somehow. I don't know why. But refusing to believe it, being blind and willfully ignorant, that felt wrong too, felt like it cheapened. . .us, what we had and was lost now."

"It's not lost. I'm not dead," he says softly, reaching out a hand to brush across her hip. "And if you're not ready to talk about this, Kate. We don't have to talk."

"I'll never be ready." She gives him a rueful look.

"Hey, we're on vacation. You were right. You don't have to do it here. Okay?" Obviously, it did some real damage to her. And he knows - he absolutely knows - that Kate Beckett heals in silence and solitude. She separates herself. So instead of disappearing for a week on her own, she's just been mentally compartmentalizing. And it's stopped working.

Maybe the week alone might have been better for her. As much as it hurts to admit it. It's not how he handles things, but it's what works for her.

"I need to stop thinking about it. Need to stop letting it affect me," she says finally. "So if you'll just let me. Get through this."

"Go on, then." He waits for her to continue, then drops into the armchair beside the glass door, watching her.

She starts to pace, a short circuit from the windows to the bed and back. "The reason I couldn't be sure. That I didn't know. It was because I. . .I had no idea what Ella sounded like. I still couldn't tell you for sure if the voice I hear in my dreams, that little girl's voice, is my daughter or not."

"I can tell you. It's not," he says firmly, catching her gaze and holding it. "Because she's fine. And I'm fine. We're all okay."

Kate nods, gives him a flickering, ghost-like smile. "Yeah. No. I know. But I couldn't tell. I was in this dark room and the PA system was scratchy and it would start up and I knew, knew it was coming, and every time I flinched at the gunshot, and then just. . .I fell apart the moment I heard her voice, her terrible, screaming voice, and I didn't know. I didn't know. Because I never hear my little girl speak."

Oh. Oh, damn. That's what this has been about, all this insistence on Ellery using her words, getting Ella to talk instead of ordering Dash around. Wow. He should've seen - well, but how could he have known?

"She speaks. And this weekend, wow. A lot, right?" Castle sits forward, giving her a grin. "But Kate, even if Ella talked our ears off, I think any parent would have heard that little girl on the tape screaming and felt the exact same. No matter if your rational mind kept telling you, no that's not my daughter. There'd still be that horror, that fear, because you're a parent. And you never want to hear that."

He stands up and approaches her; she's watching him thoughtfully, chewing her lower lip. Castle brushes his hand at her mouth, smooths his thumb over the lip that's pulled tight.

"I'm okay," she says, then laughs a little. "I know it doesn't sound like it. But I really was fine. I came home early that day and told you-"

"Only half the truth-"

She sighs. "Only part of it. But I couldn't say - it was too fresh. I couldn't. I just," she gives him a slow, measuring grin. "You were attentive, and you loved me. Twice, remember? I needed that. That was good."

"I'm always good," he tosses back, letting her lighten the mood. He actually doesn't remember, but he trusts that it helped.

"You are good," she murmurs and kisses the underside of his jaw, still soft. "You're very good."

He hums back at her and wraps a hand in her hair, realizing how lucky she was that day, to have only been forced to listen to a recording. And not anything more - damaging.

"Still, Kate. That's just. . .I can't imagine."

"I think it wouldn't be so bad except. . .a few weeks later, they managed to get ahold of my work number. They played the tape-"

"Damn." He wants to strangle someone. The Russian mafia bastards. Slowly strangle them. Watch the light go out in their eyes for this.

"After I switched extensions with Ryan, he got a few of those calls. He, uh. . ." She gives a short sigh. "Do you remember that night he came over and asked to baby-sit?"

"Oh, yeah. Actually. I thought it was weird, I mean, Jenny was out of town and - oh - that explains it."

"Yeah. Remember how we found them all on the couch when we got home? That was the same day Ryan got the call."

Damn. It must be bad. "They still calling you?"

"They figured out that the numbers got switched, so I got a few more. But now all my calls are forwarded to either Ryan or Espo. Esposito didn't look so hot either, the first time he picked up."

"You know, like three months ago, Esposito called and wanted a Madden football match-up. He came over and we played that game for like. . .three hours. He even let Dashiell on his team. I can't remember if I told you that. You were out on-call. But Espo *never* wants to let Dash on his team; he's too competitive. But that afternoon he was super patient and -"

"That was the same night that Lanie told me that Esposito had dropped the bomb on her."

"The what?"

"That he wanted them to have a baby."

"You're kidding me!" He jumps, holding her by the shoulders. "Not-uh. Esposito was the one to bring that up? I so so so thought that was all on Lanie's side of things."

Kate grins at him, most of the sadness cleared out of her eyes. "Wrong. Espo. He's a softie."

"He is a softie. But he'd hurt me if I said that."

She snorts and wraps her arms around his neck. "Thank you."

He lifts an eyebrow as if in question, but he knows. And he's glad it's worked. She leans against him for a moment, brushes a gentle kiss to his adam's apple. Castle glances down at her and she's just. . .beautiful. How much he loves this woman, and how much he sees that love reflected in every line of her body.

"I have two favorite pictures of you. Two I absolutely love," he says quietly.

She hums her own question, her forehead pressed to his chest.

"One is in Ella's room, of my three girls together, you know the one?"

"Your girls," she laughs, then smiles secretly against his shoulder, as if he can't feel that.

Good, good. He knows that his words have power over her, that when he gives language and story to what they have together, it does something for her, to her. He wants all that terrible darkness gone from her eyes, banished from her dreams.

"The one from Chicago, in Alexis's apartment? I have a copy of that one on my desk," she grins at him.

He nods. "Yeah. I have it in my study too. And next to it is my other favorite photo of you."

She hums and slides her arms down to his hips, moves in closer. Her cheek shifts so she's against his shoulder, watching the light coalesce at the eastern rim of the sky. He sways a little, in a slow rhythm to the rising sun, pressing a kiss to her temple.

"I love every picture of you, Kate. All the ways you look at me, at our kids, the ways you love us. But this one? You just." He sighs, brushes his hand over her spine. "It was in the hospital right after Ellery was born. I had to leave you, I hated to leave you, but I had to go buy tinier baby clothes, remember? Ella's little body was too small for everything we had packed, and Dash was so long as a baby we overestimated. Anyway your dad and Dashiell rode back with me, to see you both."

"Yeah," she breathes.

"Dash crawled up next to you - he was so jealous - and you were holding Ellery, right after you'd fed her so you had that look on your face, oh God, Kate, there's something so very beautiful about you when you're holding our kids-"

She shivers and draws her arms around him.

He takes a deep breath. "Dash took one look at Ellery and then looked at you and we could both tell how much he wanted to hold her. He saw it on your face, how amazing it was. So he cuddled in really close and you shifted Ellery over to his lap with your arms around them both, holding her head, and Dash just looked. . .awestruck."

She breathes out and turns her head to him. "He said, 'Hi baby girl.' Just like he used to cuddle with me and talk to my belly. And then he leaned over and kissed her, remember that? on the lips." She laughs. "And Ella squirmed under him."

She wriggles her shoulders as if mimicking how Ella squirmed that day.

He grins. "Yeah. I got a picture of the two of you looking down at Ella. I love it. I love that moment. All of us together in that room and Dashiell just melting at the sight of his baby sister, and you - you, Kate-" Castle stops, presses his mouth to hers in an overflow of it all. "Everything in me loves you so much, is for you, for you, and I'd do anything to make this okay, to fix this. Please don't keep things from me when all I want to do is-"

"I'm sorry," she whispers, and strokes his neck with her fingers. "I didn't tell you because I didn't know how to tell you and not break apart. I needed to be able to go into work the next day and the next day without taking all of you in with me too, just to be sure you were all safe. Not telling you was the only way I knew to survive. It forced me to to act calm, to be normal, and I needed normal."

He eases his grip on her waist, her neck, knowing he's sometimes just too much. But for the past few years, she's handled him just right. She's let him hold her too tight. So he tries not to take advantage of that. "I know. I get it. I do."

"I know you do," she whispers back. "I'm sorry I'm like this. You should have better-"

"It's not for me. Don't change just because *I* can't handle it." He laughs, brushes a thumb along her hip, can manage to let go now. "I just don't want you to go through this alone. Not when it's like this, nightmares and not sleeping and kinda freaking out over Ella."

"I didn't freak out over - okay, I did a little bit. I know." She kisses his mouth, deep and long and apologetic, taking his hands in hers and drawing them back to her waist. He doesn't even need to forgive her, just hold her and know she's alive, and has been for six months.

He breaks away to nip at her jaw; his teeth graze her bottom lip. "Guess what? I'm coming back to the 12th."

She takes in a shuddering breath as his hips push against hers. "Yes," she whispers and presses her palm into his lower back. "You are."

"You don't do this alone."

"If you'd been with me that day-"

"You would've known I was okay-"

"They would've shot you in front of me," she gasps and her teeth are against his, clashing, taking it from him.

He stills, breaks from her, pulling back to look at her. Her eyes are dry; she's just stating a fact. One she carries around with her like guilt, knowing that bringing him back is dangerous.

"So that's what this is about."

She stares at him. "I don't know." Her mouth opens but nothing more comes out.

"But you arranged for me to come back."

"Because I need you there."

Fear. Desire. Guilt. Love. All in that one statement.

"I'll be there. But nothing will happen to me. Nothing will happen to you. We're a great team, Kate. I've got your back. You've got mine. If I had been there, they'd never have gotten the drop on you."

She sucks in a long breath and abandons her seduction to throw her arms around him again, lifting herself up. He strokes his hands down her back and feels her body relax instead of respond. She was first, and still is now, his best friend.

"Partners," she murmurs. "Can't wait."

He grins and squeezes her, then shuffles her back towards the bed. "It's not even seven o'clock, Kate. Let's just sleep for now."

"But I'm not-" she yawns widely. "-sleepy. Oh."

Castle laughs. "Yeah, you are. See? I got your back. Now. To bed with you."