Closer Than They Appear

Sometimes Castle wondered how he'd managed to find his way into this world. It had been a mistake, a miscalculation that had led him here to begin with. He had gone to a guy for a favor for his first novel, his only novel. A few months later that favor had been called in.

One job, they said. All you have to do is drive a car.

But then it had been strongly implied that once you're in you don't get out again, at least not easily. One job had turned into two, and then to three.

He had tried to get out, once, a couple years after his daughter was born. He had awoken the next morning to find an envelope slipped under his door, the lone picture inside had said enough. It had been grainy, as if taken zoomed in from a distance, but it had definitely been his two year old playing on the jungle gym in their usual park, her red hair flying happily free around her chubby cheeks. He had shown up to his job the next day, and hadn't thought of giving them a reason to question his loyalty since. Then she waltzed into his life.

She wreaked havoc on his heart from the minute she slid into his car. She didn't say a word for the first month they knew each other. He didn't even know her name. He went to the agreed upon address, she got out, did the job and got back in. But her eyes said more than enough to make up for the silence. There was pain swimming in dark green irises- torment that went beyond her years.

The first time he heard her voice it wasn't what he expected. He'd imagined something foreign to match her look. Russian, possibly Greek, Italian, or some exotic isle no one ever heard of except for in books or movies. Instead he was met with startlingly normal.

"I'm Rick by the way. Rick Castle."

After a month of driving her around the city to do the boss's dirty work, story after possible back story writing itself in his mind, he couldn't continue on in silence, he needed to know… everything about this woman.

Her eyes flickered up to meet his in the rearview mirror, but they disappeared again just as quickly, focusing on wiping any trace of blood from the blade in her gloved hand.

"I just wanted to introduce myself, it seems like we're going to be working together a lot," he continued, not letting himself be deterred by her lack of a response. "Don't worry, you don't have to say anything. You seem more of the strong silent type to me. Besides, my daughter says that I talk enough for two. I can always just fill in your half of the conversation myself."

"You have a daughter?"

The question was quiet, and he almost missed it amidst his ramblings.

His eyes darted back to the mirror, catching her intense gaze staring back at him. He swallowed deeply, his throat bobbing with the motion. Part of him wondered if this was the kind of personal information he should be giving to a person in such a questionable profession, but then again he was in that profession too. Besides there was just something about her that made him continue.

"Yeah," he replied, beaming proudly. "Her name is Alexis, she's fifteen and possibly the smartest person on the planet."

She nodded at that, her lips trembling like maybe she wanted to smile but had forgotten how. "You love her?"

"More than anything," he stated, his voice low, resolute. "Enough to do this."

Her only response to the confession was the question in her eyes, imploring him for more, asking what she couldn't or wouldn't in words.

"I owed a guy a favor, little did I know it would be an open-ended payment. I tried to get out once, a long time ago, they threatened Alexis's life, so I stayed."

He turned the wheel, steering the nondescript black town car back into the underground parking garage. Killing the engine, he sat quietly as she sheathed the knife back into the compartment in her boot, preparing to exit, gather her payment and disappear into the ether until the next call came in, but her hand paused on the chrome door handle.

"Kate. My name is Kate."

And then she was gone.

And so it continued, a few words spoken here and there, mostly him rambling on about a some inane topic while she listened, more than one loaded look shared between them through the rearview mirror, until one Wednesday night she returned to the car at a sprint, chest heaving as she dove into the back seat, yelling for him to drive.

"Go! Go, go, go!" The yell came before the door even slammed shut behind her.

The tires squealed as he peeled away from the curb, steering the car with the utmost precision until they reached what was arguably a safe distance from the quaint suburban neighborhood.

"Pull over," the command came urgently and he didn't even question it as he pulled off into the parking lot of an abandoned gas station.

The car was still rolling to a stop when she threw open the door, sprinting out into the inky night. His eyes darted around, studying their surroundings- graffiti and vines crawling up the sides of the dilapidated building, the cracked sign advertising fuel at prices that were laughable now. Cars passed on the road, paying no attention to the lone vehicle pulled conspicuously off to the side. When she didn't return, he finally cut off the engine, pushing open his door, caution falling aside to concern.

"Kate?" He called softly as his eyes adjusted to the dark.

The sound of retching answered his call.

He found her leaning against the back of the building, her form only a dark shadow in the night.

"You okay? We really have to go."

When she didn't move, he continued. "Cops will have been called by now. We need to get back to the city, change the plates."

"I thought it would get easier. I thought…"

"Kate…" He felt for her, he really did, but this was not the time or the place for soul bearing confessions.

"They had a five year-old."

The words stopped him cold and he slid down the wall beside her, mirroring her pose- legs bent in front of him.

"She woke up, she saw me. I had to… I had to, right? There was no other way."

His hand wrapped around her knee and a bolt of lightning shot up his arm straight to his heart. Her short gasp told him she had felt it too.

"There was no other way. You did what you had to do."

"Right." She nodded in the darkness.

His head leaned back against the abandoned building, watching as the mist rolled in.

"Let's go."

The command is soft but decisive and she's already halfway back to the car by the time he pushes himself off of the ground, his knees reminding him once again that he is now edging closer to forty than thirty.

"Do you ever think about just keeping on driving?"

He didn't respond, at least not out loud, because the answer of turning north and not stopping until the border was behind them was far too enticing. The question was her last moment of weakness and the wall that she had built was once again firmly erected by the time the car rolled into the garage and she disappeared into the night.

It started about a year after they first met. She returned to the garage after collecting her payment from the powers that be. He didn't even heard her approach, the soft pad of her boots not even echoing through the cement walls.

"Hey, Castle."

No matter how unmanly, he would always be grateful for the sharp yelp he emitted in response from where he was wiping down the car of any fibers, hairs and fingerprints, because that was the first time he saw her smile. It was small, hesitant, but it was there.

"Kate, hi. What's up?"

"Help me forget."

"I made a deal with the devil."

She was lying on top of him on the cloud-like pillow-top bed in the four-star hotel suite she'd checked them into. Her lips painted the words onto his bare chest.

There was a story coming so he stayed silent, content to play with the long soft strands of hair blanketing the perfect porcelain skin of her back.

"My mom was murdered when I was nineteen, the police weren't doing shit so I quit college, tried to find answers for myself. I was reckless, got in over my head, and that's when I met him, Lazarus. He said he could help, that he would do everything in his power to find out who killed her. I just had to do something for him in return. It started out small, back alley meetings, "negotiating" with clients… then he called me into his office one night, said he saw something in me, said I had potential..."

The words hung between them for a long moment, her warm breath bathing the skin over his heart.

"Did you ever find him?"

She hummed in response. "Put a bullet through his brain myself. But someone hired him, Castle and sometimes I feel like it's not even worth it anymore. Like I'm never going to find him, this will never end. It's a noose around my neck. Sometimes I just want to be free."

It began out like any other night. She greeted him with a small smile as she slipped into the back seat. It was a familiar routine they had fallen into after almost four years together, chatting amicably as he pulled out into the city traffic, her wrapping her braided hair into a bun that would be easily hidden under a cap, checking her weapon of choice for the job.

"Hey, Castle."

"Kate."

"How are you?"

"Good. Alexis graduated last week. Valedictorian."

"Really? That's great, you must be proud."

"You have no idea. She and my mother just left for Italy yesterday, going to spend the summer gallivanting around Europe."

Kate let out a low hum from the back seat. "Europe sounds nice. I've always wanted to see Spain, and the Louvre. Stonehenge. Bath."

"You've never been?" He was surprised. He knew how much money she was paid for each job she did. She was the best. Top dollar. She could have traveled the world over by now.

"No. Not yet. I always figured there would be plenty of time after…"

He remembered the words she had whispered to him in the middle of the night once. I need closure, Castle. I need to know what happened to her, to put this chapter of my life behind me before I can be more, before I can live. You understand that, don't you?

"Soon. We'll go together."

"Yeah," Her contemplative smile fell slightly even as she nodded in agreement. "Together."

It was the pop of the gun that caught his attention. He had seen the weapon she had in her palm when she slipped from the car. It had had a silencer. She always used a silencer. The second and third shots had him flying from the vehicle, protocol be damned.

She was lying on the ground, ragged breaths heaving as blood oozed from her leg, her shoulder.

"Kate!" Her name was off his lips before he could stop it, his hand reaching for her gun, shooting a single round through the head of the target who had been struggling to push himself off the ground, causing him to flop back down, motionless.

"Kate… can you hear me, Kate? Stay with me…."

"Cas…" The sound wheezed off her lips as he lifted her from the ground, red staining both of them.

"Hold on, Kate. Just hold on." He demanded as he ran back to the car, laying her gently in the back seat, stripping off his shirt to press against the hole mere inches above her heart. He knew a guy, just before the border crossing into Canada.

"You're going to be okay, Kate. You hear me? Just stay with me. We'll get you fixed up and then we're going to go to Rome. You can meet Alexis and my mother. We'll go to Pompeii. You'll love it there, Kate. We'll stay there forever."

"Free." A single tear leaked from the corner of her pleading eye, swirling with his as they fell steadily, blurring his vision.

"Yeah, Kate. We'll be free."

The sound of sirens jolted him into action, and he whipped off his belt, winding it around her back to hold the wadded shirt in place. A single sock formed a tourniquet around her thigh.

"I love you. I love you, Kate." He should have said it sooner. He should have figured out a way, taken them away from this life... "So, you hold on for me, okay? Just a little bit longer. You hear me?"

"Hear you."

Shutting the door he climbed into the front seat, blood coating the steering wheel as he pulled away from the curb, turned the car north and just drove.

A/N: Based on the Tumblr Prompt: AU Prompt: Chauffeur for mafia hitman/woman. The AU of Kate being a hit man hired by Bracken has actually been an idea that has been rolling around in my head for a while now. I'm so happy I finally got a chance to put it into words. I hope you all enjoyed this far-from-fluff prompt-fill. :)

Thank you as always to KC for the beta and title help.