262. Chapter 262

After Like Father, Like Daughter

By

UCSBdad

Disclaimer: Like I own Castle. Rating: M Time: See above.

Kate Beckett knocked smartly on the apartment door.

In seconds, Alexis threw open the door. "Kate!" The young redhead threw her arms around the detective and hugged her. "Come in. Come in. I'm glad to see you again." Alexis took her hand and led her into the apartment. "Would you like some coffee? It's not the gourmet coffee that Dad buys, but it isn't bad."

Kate smiled. "I spent years drinking the sludge that the NYPD thinks is coffee, anything else at all would be a vast improvement."

Alexis busied herself with her coffee maker as Kate looked round the apartment. The last time she had been here, she hadn't really taken in a lot of things. She decided that Castle was wrong about the place. Oh, it definitely had a Chateau Shabby vibe, but all in all, it was cute and homey. It was better than some of her apartments at Alexis' age.

"Here we go." Alexis handed Kate her coffee and sat with the older woman on the couch.

Kate took a sip and smiled. "This is actually pretty good. What is it?"

"I got some coffee in Costa Rica. There are a lot of small producers there who mostly sell through cooperatives, but a lot of them have little mom and pop type stores. I bought the coffees there."

Kate took another sip. "I want to talk to you about me and you dad and what happened with us."

Alexis shook her head. "I told you that the past is in the past. I know that Dad loves you and you love Dad. That's all I need to know."

Kate shook her head. "One of the problems that your dad and I had was that we never talked to each other about how we felt. I don't want that to happen in our family. If anything I'm going to talk about things to Castle, you and Martha until you all beg me to shut up. Do you mind? I really want to tell you about us."

"Kate, if it's important to you, then it's important to me. Talk."

Kate took a deep breath. "You know my mom was murdered and that's why I became a cop. My relationship with my mom was a lot like yours with you dad. She was my hero. In spite of my wild child days, which weren't that wild, I wanted to be just like her. And then one day, there I was, a pre-law student at Stanford, ready to start my brilliant career. I'd be the first female Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. I'd have a wonderful husband who'd be a brilliant lawyer, just like me. We'd have children. Perfect children." Kate blushed slightly. "I'd like to think I'd have had a daughter just like you. I still might have one."

"Kate, you do have a daughter just like me. You have me."

She smiled and hugged Alexis. "Thanks. I really appreciate that. But, to continue, my perfect life ended abruptly. My mom was murdered and Stanford and law school were the furthest things from my mind. I knew I had to do something and so I became a cop."

Kate looked away from Alexis briefly. "You know about my dad?"

Alexis nodded. "He had a drinking problem."

Kate nodded. "So there I was, trying to be the best cop I could be so that I'd be a detective someday, trying to get my dad to sober up, and trying to find something that someone had missed in my mom's case file. Except there was nothing there and I spent three years looking. It took me a year of therapy to realize I had to give up my mom's case and try to get justice for other victims. It took another year after that before my dad was able to sober up. And so I became a homicide detective. And that's all I was. I was a detective 24/7. I had little or no social life and I didn't need one. I did date some guys, but nothing came of it. Mainly because I found I had built up a wall to keep me safe. If I never cared for anyone, if I never loved anyone, then I could never be hurt like I was when Mom died."

Kate looked up to see tears in Alexis' eyes.

"Kate, I'm so sorry. I…wish there was something I could do."

Kate shrugged. "Actually, someone did something. Your dad. He showed up in my life and refused to get out of it. I was very upset that all of a sudden I had this over aged frat boy poking his nose into every aspect of my life. He just wouldn't quit."

"That's Dad."

"And worst of all, for me at that time, was that he was useful. I solved cases that I might never have solved without his help. And I gradually came to accept him as my partner on the homicide team. And I decided he was a friend, as well. But I knew he'd never be anything more. He was Richard Castle, world famous author and celebrity. I was just some badly broken, obsessed, insecure cop."

"Kate! You are so much more than that."

"I'm beginning to come around to your dad's way of thinking. But, the other problem was that Castle was a twice divorced playboy. He'd never be the kind of husband I'd dreamed of. He'd eventually just break my heart. And he did when he went to the Hamptons with Gina."

"But Dad couldn't have known that you were interested."

"Because, like I said, we never talked. I waited until too late to tell him I wanted to go with him. I kept everything locked up inside of me. I never let him in unless I absolutely had to. I dated other men, but they had one failing. They weren't Richard Castle, the man I was in love with."

"How long have you been in love with dad?"

"I don't really know, Alexis. I pushed him away for so long and told myself so many times that Richard Castle was not the love of my life, could not possibly be the one great love of my life, that I don't really know. I wish I did."

"I think he knew."

Kate nodded. "Maybe he did. But that's no excuse for me not telling him, or even admitting it to myself. And then he told me that he loved me. While I was laying on my back in a cemetery with a bullet in my heart. With everything I had to deal with, PTSD, the knowledge that someone wanted me dead, the death of Roy Montgomery, just everything, I couldn't handle it. Now that's ironic. Tough as nails Detective Kate Beckett can't handle the fact that the man she loves, loves her back." Kate shook her head. "To this day I don't know why Rick stayed with me through all of this. Any sensible man would have decided to have nothing to with Kate Beckett after six months."

"He stayed because you are remarkable." Alexis said quietly. "And because he loves you. He loves you more than anything or anyone."

"And I love him more than anyone or anything." Kate felt a tear run down her cheek.

Alexis leaned over and hugged her again. Then wiped the tear away.

"And now were about to become a family. And I worry. You and your dad have always been so close that I'm afraid I'll always feel like an outsider. That there'll always be a bond between you two that I'll never share."

Alexis nodded. "There is. But there's a bond between you and dad that I'll never share. You've been together as partners solving homicides for, what, over five years now? I'll never be a part of that, and to tell you the truth, I don't think I want to be. And we have a bond in both loving dad, and the longer that we're all together, the more we'll bond. We're going to be a family, Kate, I know that."

"Thanks. It's good to know that we're together."

"Always." Alexis answered.