Chapter Eleven
Interlude In England Part 3

Previously

"Major Castle," Hunt stated on the other end of the line, "my driver will be there shortly with a few things to make your stay during Miss Beckett's recovery a little more bearable. He should be there shortly. James jumped at the chance to look in on his daughter again."

As if on cue, a car horn sounded outside.

"That would be him. I'll let you go for now. Have a pleasant evening." Hunt stated before hanging up.

Castle shook his head as he got up to open the door, making sure the hall light was out before opening the door and was met by a small red blur that launched herself into his arms.

"DADDY!"

Rick wrapped his arms around his little girl, her small five year old frame dwarfed by his broad chest as he spun her around and around, kissing her on top of her head, tears forming in his closed eyes as he took in the smell of her hair as he held her tight. His heart leaping with joy at the sight and smell of her, he'd been afraid he would never see her again.

His eyes turned to ice briefly at the sight of his mother, resplendent even in the olive drab outfit she was wearing as she walked in the door with Jim Beckett close at her heels with hers and Alexis' bags, a young Army corporal close behind. He managed to keep his voice light as he hissed at her.

"We will be having words later."

"Hello to you too, kiddo." Martha replied, obviously tired.

"There are empty guest rooms upstairs, ma'am, follow me." Corporal Demming offered in a misguided attempt to break the tension in the room. Rick remembered him as the same one who'd helped them get Kate situated earlier in the afternoon. He hadn't liked the way he had been looking at Kate when Lanie was helping her into bed. He would be having words with the man if he kept making excuses to come out here. A word with the base C.O. would hopefully solve the matter.

The bombers had begun to rumble in not an hour later and the noise had unnerved Kate. Between the near continuous roar of aircraft and the near constant wail of ambulance klaxons, Lanie'd had to give her something to keep her calm. The two of them tried to dance around the topic of battle fatigue, but had refrained from openly discussing it.

Jim looked at him expectantly, his hope to see Kate clear on his face, but was too polite to come right out and ask. The man had brought him his own little girl as if by magic. He didn't know how Hunt had managed it, but there was anger too.

"Jim, let me go upstairs and see if Kate is awake enough for company. I'm sure she'd love to see you too."

Castle knew there was a story there, but he was well aware that now was not the time as he let Alexis slide to her feet and took her by the hand.

"Come on, Pumpkin, how would you like to meet my friend Kate who works with Daddy to fight the Nazis?"

"Okay, Daddy." Alexis replied, clinging tightly to his hand, "bye bye, Sergeant Beckett."

Alexis fixed Jim with a megawatt smile and a jaunty salute, which Jim snapped to full attention and returned with a flourish, a wink and a lopsided grin, making her giggle with delight. Giving him a glimmer of what Jim may have been like as a father once upon a time. Rick had no doubt that his baby girl had charmed every officer and enlisted man who came in contact with her.

He was overjoyed to be able see her, no matter what strings Hunt had pulled to bring her here. It blunted some of his anger at his mother for potentially putting her at risk by bringing his baby girl across the U-boat infested Atlantic with her.

The Iron Man, it seems, had a heart after all.

He would be having words with his mother for bringing her along into a war zone, however. But only after he had put his baby girl to bed. As overstimulated as she was in her excitement to be here, he'd been a father long enough to know the crash would be coming in short order.

Kate lay in bed looking up at the ceiling. It had been quiet for nearly an hour after the rumbling of airplanes had finally died down. She had been unprepared for how badly the loud noises would rattle her, since she had barely heard the shot that hit her before the burning in her shoulder that had spun her into Rick's arms that night when she had gone to see him off.

Doctor Davidson had told her that the shoulder wound was mostly superficial, the only cause of concern was a nicked blood vessel. To that end he had prescribed a local anesthetic and a sling to keep her arm still. With a little physical therapy she would be good as new in no time. Her emotions however, were a complete mess, the internal scars more telling than the physical one from the bullet and would take longer to heal. In her heart of hearts, Kate wondered if they ever would be.

Castle had told her that he was in love with her - repeatedly - as he tried to keep her awake during the flight. She knew it was true, Manon had tried to tell her before Lorient. If she was being honest with herself, she felt the same way. She'd run out in the middle of the night at Lt. Esposito's urging to tell him so before he left. But now she wasn't so sure she should.

She was a mess, a broken shell of herself since her mother was killed, her priorities skewed toward revenge ever since. She wasn't really ready for any kind of a romantic relationship - at least until France was truly free - but she didn't want to push him away either, he'd been hurt too many times by the women in his life before now as it was. She knew she wanted a future with him if they made it through the war, she just wasn't sure she deserved his love after the way she'd treated him.

A soft knock on her door brought her out of her reverie, however. She knew if had to be Rick, he was the only person she knew of who would have been so quiet and careful with her in this situation. The doctors and nurses never knocked, not even Nurse Parish.

"I'm awake, Castle." she stage whispered, reaching out to turn on the lamp next to her bed, bathing the room in soft light.

The door cracked open just enough for him to poke his head inside. In spite of herself, her heart swelled at the sight of him, filling her with a warmth she could not identify.

"Kate, your father is here, he wanted me to see if you were awake." Castle whispered sweetly, causing another surge of warmth run through her.

Her father was alive - and sober - once again filled with a purpose that had eluded him during her early teen years when his demons had inexorably dragged him into the bottle. Kate had to remind herself that this had been mother's goal when she'd accepted the Look magazine assignment in France back then. Mom would have been happy to see he'd turned his life back around. She would have considered it a fair trade for her life, even if nobody else who loved her, dad included would have agreed.

Kate looked back up when Castle hadn't moved from the door, a strange look on his face, as if he was unsure about something, before his face softened and she heard whispers outside her door, before it finally swung open.

"Kate, there's somebody I would like you to meet." he said as he stepped into the room.

It wasn't until her eyes were drawn downward as she sat up and placed her feet on the floor that she saw the little girl hiding behind one of his legs. At Castle's urging, she finally stepped into full view. The first thing Kate noticed was her wavy red hair, then a pair of clear blue eyes that matched her father's.

"Kate, this is my daughter, Alexis." He said softly, the love in his eyes seeming to bubble out of him.

Just like when he'd shown her Alexis photo, it made Kate's heart melt. She had seen him look at her just like that, and it both warmed her heart and terrified her in equal measure. Hands she had seen kill without hesitation seemed softer around the edges when holding his daughter.

"Hi," the girl whispered softly, "daddy says you help him fight the bad men."

Kate smiled a little, the girl was too sweet and charming to be real, even as she shyly reached out a hand. Her right hand was in a sling, so she took the girl's hand with her left.

"Does it hurt?" Alexis asked quietly, eyes drawn to her bandaged shoulder under the loose fitting sleep shirt.

"A little yeah," Kate replied softly, finding herself unable to lie to the girl. "the doctor gave me something for it."

With almost no warning, the girl pulled out of her father's grasp and pressed her lips lightly to her bandaged shoulder, Kate barely felt the brush of the girls lips against the gauze, carefully biting back her discomfort.

"Kissed it better," the girl whispered before seeking shelter against her father again, "like Grams does."

Castle couldn't help but look lovingly at his little girl before lifting her from the floor, she looked exhausted, nearly falling asleep in his arms as he cradled her to his chest.

"I have to put her to bed," Rick whispered softly, his chin tucked over his daughters head as he gently rocked her, a motion he likely was unaware he had slipped into, "I'll send your father in shortly."

When Rick turned to head out the door, Kate didn't miss the sleepy wave the girl gave her as her father carried her out the door. Her own hand moving to wave back almost unbidden.

"Night, night." Alexis whispered sleepily.

"Mother, you brought my daughter across Goddamn Atlantic Ocean!" Rick hissed, doing his best to keep his voice down so not to wake Alexis sleeping in the next room. "What the hell were you thinking? Have you forgotten that there's a war on?"

"Of course not, kiddo." Martha whispered back.

"U-boats are sinking ships every day between New York and here, good men are dying out there every goddamn day!"

"Richard..." Martha began, but Rick cut her off.

"Have you seen London, mother? The Luftwaffe still bombs it, in case you haven't heard... you brought my daughter your granddaughter into a goddamn war zone!"

He hadn't realized how loud he'd raised his voice, until Alexis burst into the room, terrified.

"Daddy! Please don't yell at Grams anymore! Please!"

Rick lifted his daughter off the floor where she was clutching at his leg, unsure where her panic was coming from. It broke his heart to see his usually bubbly, happy baby girl in such distress.

"I'm sorry, Pumpkin," he whispered into her hair, "I didn't mean to scare you baby. I'm so sorry."

"You and mommy yelled and then you went away...and...and... then ...mommy... went away...I don't want Grams to go away too!" Alexis choked out between sobs, tears running down her face.

"Richard," Martha whispered, stroking Alexis' back soothingly, "I turned down three USO tours after Meredith left her with me, but... I couldn't turn this one down and stay employed in the theater. My agent didn't give me a choice this time."

Martha understood why Rick was upset at her. What Meredith had done had left her incensed and the two of then had argued for twenty minutes in hushed tones while Alexis had slept on her couch. That odious man she ran away with had tried to involve himself, by grabbing her arm and she'd flattened him with one punch, breaking his nose.

"Alexis deserves better than you, so take that homewrecker of yours and get the hell out of my sight. Don't you ever come back!"

From that moment on, it had been her and Alexis against the world. Just like it had been with her father, after Richard had gone down with the Titanic. It had taken weeks to get the little darling to stop blaming herself for Meredith being a two-timing back-stabbing Jezebel.

"There wasn't anybody I knew that I could trust to take her. An overnight maybe, but not for the six weeks I'd be gone. When the Army Air Corps offered to fly the whole troop out, it seemed safe enough to bring her along."

Things calmed down shortly after that. Rick still wasn't sure what Brigadier Hunt's game was but he'd needed this, to see his family safe and sound. For Alexis to see him alive. As long as Hunt got them back to The States safely was well, he would learn to live with it.

**Author's Note** Yes, I am putting off writing Kate and her father interacting. I haven't decided yet how I want that to go, or how soon and how much Kate would feel comfortable sharing with her him yet, so for now their conversations will be implied, or described after the fact. Though for now they will likely be considered brief. They did not exactly part on the best of terms so there may be a bit more awkwardness there while Kate works out how much she wants to share with him.